Page:The prophetic books of William Blake, Milton.djvu/63

 To display Nature's cruel holiness: the deceits of Natural Religion.

Walking in my Cottage Garden, sudden I beheld

The Virgin Ololon & address'd her as a Daughter of Beulah.

Virgin of Providence, fear not to enter into my Cottage.

What is thy message to thy friend: What am I now to do?

Is it again to plunge into deeper affliction? behold me

Ready to obey, but pity thou my Shadow of Delight:

Enter my Cottage, comfort her, for she is sick with fatigue.

P. 37 THE Virgin answer'd: Knowest thou of Milton who descended,

Driven from Eternity; him I seek, terrified at my Act

In Great Eternity which thou knowest: I come him to seek.

So Ololon utter'd in words distinct the anxious thought:

Mild was the voice but more distinct than any earthly.

That Milton's Shadow heard, & condensing all his Fibres

Into a strength impregnable of majesty & beauty infinite,

I saw he was the Covering Cherub & within him Satan

And Rahab in an outside which is fallacious within,

Beyond the outline of Identity in the Selfhood deadly:

And he appear'd the Wicker Man of Scandinavia, in whom

Jerusalem's children consume in flames among the Stars.

Descending down into my Garden a Human Wonder of God,

Reaching from heaven to earth, a Cloud & Human Form,

I beheld Milton with astonishment & in him beheld

The Monstrous Churches of Beulah, the Gods of Ulro dark,

Twelve monstrous dishumanized terrors, Synagogues of Satan,

A Double Twelve & Thrice Nine: such their divisions.

And these their Names & their Places within the Mundane Shell.

In Tyre & Sidon I saw Baal & Ashtaroth. In Moab Chemosh:

In Ammon Molech: loud his Furnaces rage among the Wheels

Of Og, & pealing loud the cries of the Victims of Fire:

And pale his Priestesses unfolded in Veils of Pestilence, border'd

With War: Woven in Looms of Tyre & Sidon by beautiful Ashtaroth.

In Palestine Dagon, Sea Monster: worship'd o'er the Sea.

Thammuz in Lebanon & Rimmon in Damascus curtain'd:

Osiris, Isis, Orus, in Egypt: dark their Tabernacles on Nile

Floating with solemn songs, & on the Lakes of Egypt nightly

With pomp even till morning break & Osiris appear in the sky.

But Belial of Sodom & Gomorrha, obscure Demon of Bribes 39