Page:Life of William Blake, Gilchrist.djvu/371

 In sober daylight, criticisms were hazarded by the profane on the character or drawing of these or any of his visions. 'Oh, it's all right!' Blake would calmly reply; 'it must be right: I saw it so.' It did not signify what you said; nothing could put him out: so assured was he that he, or rather his imagination, was right, and that what the latter revealed was implicitly to be relied on,—and this without any appearance of conceit or intrusiveness on his part. Yet critical friends would trace in all these heads the Blake mind and hand,—his receipt for a face: every artist has his own, his favourite idea, from which he may depart in the proportions, but seldom substantially. John Varley, however, could not be persuaded to look at them from this merely rationalistic point of view.

At these singular nocturnal sittings, Blake thus executed for Varley, in the latter's presence, some forty or fifty slight pencil sketches, of small size, of historical, nay, fabulous and even typical personages, summoned from the vasty deep of time, and 'seen in vision by Mr. Blake.' Varley, who accepted all Blake said of them, added in writing the names, and in a few instances the day and hour they were seen. Thus: ' Wat Tyler, by Blake, from his spectre, as in the act of striking the tax-gatherer, drawn Oct. 30, 1819, 1 h. P.M.' On another we read: ' The Man who built the Pyramids, Oct. 18, 1819, fifteen degrees of 1. Cancer ascending.' Another sketch is indorsed as ' ''Richard Cœur de Lion drawn from his spectre. W. Blake fecit, Oct''. 14, 1819, at quarter-past twelve, midnight.' In fact, two are inscribed ' Richard Cœur de Lion,' and each is different. Which looks as if Varley misconstrued the seer at times, or as if the spirits were lying spirits, assuming different forms at will. Such would doubtless have been De Foe's reading, had he been gravely recording the fact.

Most of the other Visionary Heads bear date August, 1820. Some fell into Mr. Linnell's hands and have remained there: the rest still belong to the Varley family. Remarkable performances these slight pencil drawings are, intrinsically, as