12 August: Boreham on William Blake

When Genius Masquerades
In William Blake, the anniversary of whose death, on August 12, 1827, we mark today, we salute the most perfect blending of simplicity with sublimity of which we have any record. Supreme alike as poet, as painter, and as engraver, the keynote of his artistry and of his minstrelsy was an exquisite simplicity. Mingling with simple folk and cultivating simple habits of life, there was not an atom of affectation or artificiality about him. And, like most men of simple way and simple tastes, he was ecstatically happy. He lived as the birds lived, and sang as the birds sang, for the very joy of it. To him every common object was transfused with radiant splendour; every crust of bread was sacramental; every cup of cold water that he lifted to his lips was, to him, the Holy Grail. He hardly wrote a line that a little child could fail to understand; yet his crystal clear conceptions are shot through with a gorgeous imagery that for beauty has never been surpassed.

None can rival him in his swift recognition of the essential glory of all common things. It is not every Londoner—and certainly not every poor Londoner—who realises the rare romance of London. Blake did. Seeing little beyond the grimy and squalid aspects of London life that pressed so unattractively about him, his glowing fancy nevertheless transformed each narrow alley into one of the boulevards of Paradise. Like Francis Thompson, a century later, he saw archangels hovering over Oxford Circus, saw Temple Bar gleam like one of the Pearly Gates, saw Jacob's Ladder pitched 'twixt heaven and Charing Cross, and saw Christ walking on the water, not of Gennesaret, but the Thames. History cherishes the brave records of a few men who, dwelling amidst the most noisome slums, cannot be blind to the sublimity that glistens and sparkles on every kerb and cobblestone. Of such clear-visioned and triumphant spirits, William Blake will ever stand as a conspicuous example. He saw the best shining through the worst, and lent it lustre by the melodious notes in which he sang it.

Art Of Looking Through Commonplaces
In his lifetime nobody knew what to make of him. Did he actually behold the celestial visions that he so vividly and musically described, or did he only fancy that he saw them? Nobody could feel sure; perhaps he himself scarcely knew. In his "Vision of the Last Judgment" he explains that he seldom sees the outward creation, and that, if he does see it, it is because his eyes are dim and his vision obscure. To him the material realm was a window through which he saw the invisible. Sympathise with his bewildered contemporaries, the twentieth century scarcely knows how to assess his supernal revelations and cryptic communications. But what does it matter? The only thing worth noting is that this man, whose eyes seemed to descry the glory of the ineffable, has taken his place as one of the purest poets, one of the most eminent painters and one of the most cunning engravers of all time. His stanzas are treasured among our classics; his pictures adorned the walls of the Royal Academy; and his engravings are still studied with admiration by the masters of that craft.

Blake deserves to be esteemed as the peak and pinnacle of the renaissance in our literature. In him, romanticism burst into blossom. Gray and Collins were its pioneers; Cowper had given it tuneful and pleasing expression; but Blake imparted to it a resplendence that it had never before known. Yet he had slumbered for some time in Bunhill Fields before it occurred to anybody that the quaint little figure who had passed so modestly from an uneventful and unobtrusive life to an obscure and unmarked grave, had ever done anything worth noticing or said anything worth remembering. The people of the district never suspected that the quiet old man, who seemed to spend all his days on the verge of starvation, had any spark of genius in his peculiar composition.

Waiting A Century For Recognition
We must not be too hard on them. How should they know—these men as they formed themselves into little knots and gossiped about the oddities of their eccentric neighbour; these women as they stood at their doors, arms akimbo, and contemplated him in pitying curiosity—how should they know that the object of their speculations was destined to shine among the immortals? What reasons had they to suspect that this soft-footed little man was a seer, gifted with deeper penetration into the mysteries of life than any of his contemporaries; a prophet, reading with clear eyes the riddle of the days to be; a philosopher, weaving for his white and withered brows the aureole of a deathless renown?

When the old dreamer died, they buried him, remarking casually that the poor little street would seem strange without his familiar figure and his childish ways. They had grown fond of him, and were sincerely sorry that he would amuse them no more. But that was as far as it went. There was no recognition of his real greatness; no inscription was placed upon his tomb; and it was not until the centenary of his death, in 1927, that a monument to his honoured name was set up in St. Paul's Cathedral.

He came to the desert of London town,
Grey miles along;
He wandered up and
he wandered down,
Singing a quiet song.
He came to the desert of London
town,
Mirk miles broad;
He wandered up and he wandered down,
Ever alone
with God.
At length the good hour came, he died
As he had lived,
alone;
He was not missed from the desert wide:
Perhaps he was found at the
Throne!

It took a slow witted world a long time to recognise his worth; but his fame, tardily established, has come to stay. He will always be remembered as one of God's good men—brave, simple, lovable, and tender—by whose lyrics and by whose life mankind has been enriched.

F W Boreham

Image: William Blake