But when they find the frowning babe,
Terror strikes through the region wide:
They cry, "The babe! the babe is born!"
And flee away on every side.

For who dare touch the frowning form,

His arm is withered to its root;

Lions, boars, wolves, all howling flee,
And every tree does shed its fruit.

95

100

And none can touch that frowning form
Except it be a woman old;

She nails him down upon the rock,

And all is done as I have told.

About 1801-3.

1863.

AUGURIES OF INNOCENCE

To see a world in a grain of sand,

And a heaven in a wild flower;

Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

A robin redbreast in a cage

Puts all heaven in a rage;

A dove-house filled with doves and pigeons
Shudders hell through all its regions.

A dog starved at his master's gate
Predicts the ruin of the state.

A horse misused upon the road
Calls to heaven for human blood..
Each outcry of the hunted hare
A fibre from the brain does tear.
A skylark wounded in the wing,
A cherubim does cease to sing.

The game-cock clipt and armed for fight
Does the rising sun affright.

Every wolf's and lion's howl

Raises from hell a human soul.

The wild deer, wand'ring here and there,
Keeps the human soul from care.

5

10

15

20

The lamb misused breeds public strife,
And yet forgives the butcher's knife.
The bat that flits at close of eve

Has left the brain that won't believe.
The owl that calls upon the night
Speaks the unbeliever's fright.
He who shall hurt the little wren
Shall never be beloved by men.

He who the ox to wrath has moved
Shall never be by woman loved.
The wanton boy that kills the fly
Shall feel the spider's enmity.

He who torments the chafer's sprite
Weaves a bower in endless night.
The caterpillar on the leaf

Repeats to thee thy mother's grief.

Kill not the moth nor butterfly,

For the Last Judgment draweth nigh.
He who shall train the horse to war
Shall never pass the polar bar.
The beggar's dog and widow's cat,
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.
The gnat that sings his summer's song
Poison gets from Slander's tongue.

The poison of the snake and newt

Is the sweat of Envy's foot.

The poison of the honey-bee

Is the artist's jealousy.

The prince's robes and beggar's rags
Are toadstools on the miser's bags.
A truth that's told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent.
It is right it should be so;
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,

Through the world we safely go.
Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine.
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.

The babe is more than swaddling bands:

The emmet's inch and eagle's mile
Make lame Philosophy to smile.
He who doubts from what he sees
Will ne'er believe, do what you please.
If the sun and moon should doubt,
They'd immediately go out.
To be in a passion you good may do,
But no good if a passion is in you. . .
The winner's shout, the loser's curse,
Dance before dead England's hearse.
Every night and every morn
Some to misery are born.

Every morn and every night

Some are born to sweet delight.
Some are born to sweet delight,

....

Some are born to endless night.

We are led to believe a lie

125

When we see not through the eye,

Which was born in a night to perish in a night,

I will not cease from mental fight,

Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem

15

In England's green and pleasant land.

1804.

TO THE QUEEN

The door of Death is made of gold,
That mortal eyes cannot behold;
But when the mortal eyes are closed,
And cold and pale the limbs reposed,
The soul awakes, and, wond'ring, sees
In her mild hand the golden keys.
The grave is heaven's golden gate,
And rich and poor around it wait:
O Shepherdess of England's fold,
Behold this gate of pearl and gold!
To dedicate to England's Queen
The visions that my soul has seen,
And by her kind permission bring
What I have borne on solemn wing
From the vast regions of the grave,

Before her throne my wings I wave;

Bowing before my sov'reign's feet,

"The grave produced these blossoms sweet,
In mild repose from earthly strife,

The blossoms of eternal life."

About 1806-7.

FROM

THE EVERLASTING GOSPEL

The vision of Christ that thou dost see

Is my vision's greatest enemy.

5

ΤΟ

15

20

1808.

....

Thine is the friend of all mankind;

Mine speaks in parables to the blind.

Thine loves the same world that mine hates;
Thy heaven-doors are my hell-gates.

5

Socrates taught what Meletus

Loathed as a nation's bitterest curse;

And Caiaphas was, in his own mind,