William Blake
William Blake
William Blakewas an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. His prophetic works have been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language". His visual artistry led one contemporary art critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". In...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth28 November 1757
He loves to sit and hear me sing, Then, laughing, sports and plays with me; Then stretches out my golden wing, And mocks my loss of liberty.
Let men do their duty and the women will be such wonders; the female lives from the light of the male: see a male's female dependants, you know the man.
He who wants, but doesn't act, is a pest.
Praises reap not! Joys laugh not! Sorrows weep not!
I asked a thief to steal me a peach: He turned up his eyes. I asked a lithe lady to lie her down: Holy and meek, she cries. As soon as I went An angel came. He winked at the thief And smiled at the dame- And without one word spoke Had a peach from the tree, And 'twixt earnest and joke Enjoyed the lady.
The Whole Business of Man is The Arts, & All Things Common.
Nothing can be more contemptible than to suppose Public Records to be true.
Pay attention to minute particulars. Take care of the little ones. Generalization and abstraction are the plea of the hypocrite, scoundrel, and knave.
Little fly, thy summer's play My thoughtless hand has brushed away. Am not I a fly like thee? Or art not thou a man like me? For I dance and drink and sing, Till some blind hand shall brush my wing!
Where others see but the dawn coming over the hill, I see the soul of God shouting for joy.
The human mind cannot go beyond the gift of God, the Holy Ghost. To suppose that art can go beyond the finest specimens of art that are now in the world is not knowing what art is; it is being blind to the gifts of the spirit.
Innate ideas are in every man, born with him; they are truly himself. The man who says that we have no innate ideas must be a fool and knave, having no conscience or innate science.
[L]et light Rise from the chambers of the east, and bring The honey’d dew that cometh on waking day. O radiant morning...
O Earth, O Earth, return! Arise from out the dewy grass; Night is worn; And the morn Rises from the slumbrous mass.