# The Book of Urizen

The Book of Urizen. Printed in 1794. The author's spelling.
* THE [FIRST] BOOK of URIZEN
* LAMBETH. Printed by Will Blake 1794.
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818: Title-page
* [Plate 2]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 2
* PRELUDIUM TO THE [FIRST] BOOK OF URIZEN
* Of the primeval Priests assum'd power,
* When Eternals spurn'd back his religion;
* And gave him a place in the north,
* Obscure, shadowy, void, solitary.
* Eternals I hear your call gladly,
* Dictate swift winged words, & fear not
* To unfold your dark visions of torment.
* [Plate 3]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 3
* Chap: I
* 1. Lo, a shadow of horror is risen
* In Eternity! Unknown, unprolific!
* Self-closd, all-repelling: what Demon
* Hath form'd this abominable void
* This soul-shudd'ring vacuum? — Some said
* "It is Urizen", But unknown, abstracted
* Brooding secret, the dark power hid.
* 2. Times on times he divided, & measur'd
* Space by space in his ninefold darkness
* Unseen, unknown! changes appeard
* In his desolate mountains rifted furious
* By the black winds of perturbation
* 3. For he strove in battles dire
* In unseen conflictions with shapes
* Bred from his forsaken wilderness,
* Of beast, bird, fish, serpent & element
* Combustion, blast, vapour and cloud.
* 4. Dark revolving in silent activity:
* Unseen in tormenting passions;
* An activity unknown and horrible;
* A self-contemplating shadow,
* In enormous labours occupied
* 5. But Eternals beheld his vast forests
* Age on ages he lay, clos'd, unknown
* Brooding shut in the deep; all avoid
* The petrific abominable chaos
* 6. His cold horrors silent, dark Urizen
* Prepar'd: his ten thousands of thunders
* Rang'd in gloom'd array stretch out across
* The dread world, & the rolling of wheels
* As of swelling seas, sound in his clouds
* In his hills of stor'd snows, in his mountains
* Of hail & ice; voices of terror,
* Are heard, like thunders of autumn,
* When the cloud blazes over the harvests
* Chap: II
* 1. Earth was not: nor globes of attraction
* The will of the Immortal expanded
* Or contracted his all flexible senses.
* Death was not, but eternal life sprung
* 2. The sound of a trumpet the heavens
* Awoke & vast clouds of blood roll'd
* Round the dim rocks of Urizen, so nam'd
* That solitary one in Immensity
* 3. Shrill the trumpet: & myriads of Eternity,
* [Plate 4]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 4
* Muster around the bleak desarts
* Now fill'd with clouds, darkness & waters
* That roll'd perplex'd labring & utter'd
* Words articulate, bursting in thunders
* That roll'd on the tops of his mountains
* 4: From the depths of dark solitude. From
* The eternal abode in my holiness,
* Hidden set apart in my stern counsels
* Reserv'd for the days of futurity,
* I have sought for a joy without pain,
* For a solid without fluctuation
* Why will you die O Eternals?
* Why live in unquenchable burnings?
* 5 First I fought with the fire; consum'd
* Inwards, into a deep world within:
* A void immense, wild dark & deep,
* Where nothing was: Natures wide womb
* And self balanc'd stretch'd o'er the void
* I alone, even I! the winds merciless
* Bound; but condensing, in torrents
* They fall & fall; strong I repell'd
* The vast waves, & arose on the waters
* A wide world of solid obstruction
* 6. Here alone I in books formd of metals
* Have written the secrets of wisdom
* The secrets of dark contemplation
* By fightings and conflicts dire,
* With terrible monsters Sin-bred:
* Which the bosoms of all inhabit;
* Seven deadly Sins of the soul.
* 7. Lo! I unfold my darkness: and on
* This rock, place with strong hand the Book
* Of eternal brass, written in my solitude.
* 8. Laws of peace, of love, of unity:
* Of pity, compassion, forgiveness.
* Let each chuse one habitation:
* His ancient infinite mansion:
* One command, one joy one desire,
* One curse, one weight, one measure
* One King, one God, one Law.
* Chap: III
* 1. The voice ended, they saw his pale visage
* Emerge from the darkness; his hand
* On the rock of eternity unclasping
* The Book of brass. Rage siez'd the strong
* 2. Rage, fury, intense indignation
* In cataracts of fire blood & gall
* In whirlwinds of sulphurous smoke:
* And enormous forms of energy;
* All the seven deadly sins of the soul
* [Plate 5]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 5
* In living creations appear'd
* In the flames of eternal fury.
* 3. Sund'ring, dark'ning, thund'ring!
* Rent away with a terrible crash
* Eternity roll'd wide apart
* Wide asunder rolling
* Mountainous all around
* Departing; departing; departing:
* Leaving ruinous fragments of life
* Hanging frowning cliffs & all between
* An ocean of voidness unfathomable.
* 4. The roaring fires ran o'er the heav'ns
* In whirlwinds & cataracts of blood
* And o'er the dark desarts of Urizen
* Fires pour thro' the void on all sides
* On Urizens self-begotten armies.
* 5. But no light from the fires. all was darkness
* In the flames of Eternal fury
* 6. In fierce anguish & quenchless flames
* To the desarts and rocks He ran raging
* To hide, but He could not: combining
* He dug mountains & hills in vast strength,
* He piled them in incessant labour,
* In howlings & pangs & fierce madness
* Long periods in burning fires labouring
* Till hoary, and age-broke, and aged,
* In despair and the shadows of death.
* 7. And a roof, vast petrific around,
* On all sides He fram'd: like a womb;
* Where thousands of rivers in veins
* Of blood pour down the mountains to cool
* The eternal fires beating without
* From Eternals; & like a black globe
* View'd by sons of Eternity, standing
* On the shore of the infinite ocean
* Like a human heart strugling & beating
* The vast world of Urizen appear'd.
* 8. And Los round the dark globe of Urizen,
* Kept watch for Eternals to confine,
* The obscure separation alone;
* For Eternity stood wide apart,
* [Plate 6]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 6
* As the stars are apart from the earth
* 9. Los wept howling around the dark Demon:
* And cursing his lot; for in anguish,
* Urizen was rent from his side;
* And a fathomless void for his feet;
* And intense fires for his dwelling.
* 10. But Urizen laid in a stony sleep
* Unorganiz'd, rent from Eternity
* 11. The Eternals said: What is this? Death
* Urizen is a clod of clay.
* [Plate 7]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818. Plate 7
* 12: Los howld in a dismal stupor,
* Groaning! gnashing! groaning!
* Till the wrenching apart was healed
* 12: Los howld in a dismal stupor, Groaning! gnashing! groaning! Till the wrenching apart was healed The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818: Plate 9
* 13: But the wrenching of Urizen heal'd not
* Cold, featureless, flesh or clay,
* Rifted with direful changes
* He lay in a dreamless night
* 14: Till Los rouz'd his fires, affrighted
* At the formless unmeasurable death.
* [Plate 8]
* Chap: IV[a]
* 1: Los smitten with astonishment
* Frightend at the hurtling bones
* 2: And at the surging sulphureous
* Perturbed Immortal mad raging
* 3: In whirlwinds & pitch & nitre
* Round the furious limbs of Los
* 4: And Los formed nets & gins
* And threw the nets round about
* 5: He watch'd in shuddring fear
* The dark changes & bound every change
* With rivets of iron & brass;
* 6. And these were the changes of Urizen.
* [Plate 10]
* Chap: IV[b]
* 1. Ages on ages roll'd over him!
* In stony sleep ages roll'd over him!
* Like a dark waste stretching chang'able
* By earthquakes riv'n, belching sullen fires
* On ages roll'd ages in ghastly
* Sick torment; around him in whirlwinds
* Of darkness the eternal Prophet howl'd
* Beating still on his rivets of iron
* Pouring sodor of iron; dividing
* The horrible night into watches.
* 2. And Urizen (so his eternal name)
* His prolific delight obscurd more & more
* In dark secresy hiding in surgeing
* Sulphureous fluid his phantasies.
* The Eternal Prophet heavd the dark bellows,
* And turn'd restless the tongs; and the hammer
* Incessant beat; forging chains new & new
* Numb'ring with links. hours, days & years
* 3. The eternal mind bounded began to roll
* Eddies of wrath ceaseless round & round,
* And the sulphureous foam surgeing thick
* Settled, a lake, bright, & shining clear:
* White as the snow on the mountains cold.
* 4. Forgetfulness, dumbness, necessity!
* In chains of the mind locked up,
* Like fetters of ice shrinking together
* Disorganiz'd, rent from Eternity,
* Los beat on his fetters of iron;
* And heated his furnaces & pour'd
* Iron sodor and sodor of brass
* 5. Restless turnd the immortal inchain'd
* Heaving dolorous! anguish'd! unbearable
* Till a roof shaggy wild inclos'd
* In an orb, his fountain of thought.
* 6. In a horrible dreamful slumber;
* Like the linked infernal chain;
* A vast Spine writh'd in torment
* Upon the winds; shooting pain'd
* Ribs, like a bending cavern
* And bones of solidness, froze
* Over all his nerves of joy.
* And a first Age passed over,
* And a state of dismal woe.
* [Plate 11]
* 7. From the caverns of his jointed Spine,
* Down sunk with fright a red
* Round globe hot burning deep
* Deep down into the Abyss:
* Panting: Conglobing, Trembling
* Shooting out ten thousand branches
* Around his solid bones.
* And a second Age passed over,
* And a state of dismal woe.
* 8. In harrowing fear rolling round;
* His nervous brain shot branches
* Round the branches of his heart.
* On high into two little orbs
* And fixed in two little caves
* Hiding carefully from the wind,
* His Eyes beheld the deep,
* And a third Age passed over:
* And a state of dismal woe.
* 9. The pangs of hope began,
* In heavy pain striving, struggling.
* Two Ears in close volutions.
* From beneath his orbs of vision
* Shot spiring out and petrified
* As they grew. And a fourth Age passed
* And a state of dismal woe.
* 10. In ghastly torment sick;
* Hanging upon the wind;
* [Plate 13]
* Two Nostrils bent down to the deep.
* And a fifth Age passed over;
* And a state of dismal woe.
* 11. In ghastly torment sick;
* Within his ribs bloated round,
* A craving Hungry Cavern;
* Thence arose his channeld Throat,
* And like a red flame a Tongue
* Of thirst & of hunger appeard.
* And a sixth Age passed over:
* And a state of dismal woe.
* 12. Enraged & stifled with torment
* He threw his right Arm to the north
* His left Arm to the south
* Shooting out in anguish deep,
* And his Feet stampd the nether Abyss
* In trembling & howling & dismay.
* And a seventh Age passed over:
* And a state of dismal woe.
* Chap: V
* I. In terrors Los shrunk from his task:
* His great hammer fell from his hand:
* His fires beheld, and sickening,
* Hid their strong limbs in smoke.
* For with noises ruinous loud;
* With hurtlings & clashings & groans
* The Immortal endur'd his chains,
* Tho' bound in a deadly sleep.
* 2. All the myriads of Eternity:
* All the wisdom & joy of life:
* Roll like a sea around him,
* Except what his little orbs
* Of sight by degrees unfold.
* 3. And now his eternal life
* Like a dream was obliterated
* 4. Shudd'ring, the Eternal Prophet smote
* With a stroke, from his north to south region
* The bellows & hammer are silent now
* A nerveless silence, his prophetic voice
* Siez'd; a cold solitude & dark void
* The Eternal Prophet & Urizen clos'd
* 5. Ages on ages rolld over them
* Cut off from life & light frozen
* Into horrible forms of deformity
* Los suffer'd his fires to decay
* Then he look'd back with anxious desire
* But the space undivided by existence
* Struck horror into his soul.
* 6. Los wept obscur'd with mourning:
* His bosom earthquak'd with sighs;
* He saw Urizen deadly black,
* In his chains bound, & Pity began,
* 7. In anguish dividing & dividing
* For pity divides the soul
* In pangs eternity on eternity
* Life in cataracts pourd down his cliffs
* The void shrunk the lymph into Nerves
* Wand'ring wide on the bosom of night
* And left a round globe of blood
* Trembling upon the Void
* 6. Los wept obscur'd with mourning... The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818: Plate 14
* [Plate 15]
* Thus the Eternal Prophet was divided
* Before the death-image of Urizen
* For in changeable clouds and darkness
* In a winterly night beneath,
* The Abyss of Los stretch'd immense:
* And now seen, now obscur'd, to the eyes
* Of Eternals, the visions remote
* Of the dark seperation appear'd.
* As glasses discover Worlds
* In the endless Abyss of space,
* So the expanding eyes of Immortals
* Beheld the dark visions of Los,
* And the globe of life blood trembling.
* [plate 18]
* 8. The globe of life blood trembled Branching out into roots... The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818: Plate 18
* 8. The globe of life blood trembled
* Branching out into roots;
* Fib'rous, writhing upon the winds;
* Fibres of blood, milk and tears;
* In pangs, eternity on eternity.
* At length in tears & cries imbodied
* A female form trembling and pale
* Waves before his deathy face
* 9. All Eternity shudderd at sight
* Of the first female now separate
* Pale as a cloud of snow
* Waving before the face of Los
* 10. Wonder, awe, fear, astonishment,
* Petrify the eternal myriads;
* At the first female form now separate
* [Plate 19]
* They call'd her Pity, and fled
* 11. "Spread a Tent, with strong curtains around them
* "Let cords & stakes bind in the Void
* That Eternals may no more behold them"
* 12. They began to weave curtains of darkness
* They erected large pillars round the Void
* With golden hooks fastend in the pillars
* With infinite labour the Eternals
* A woof wove, and called it Science
* Chap: VI
* 1. But Los saw the Female & pitied
* He embrac'd her, she wept, she refus'd
* In perverse and cruel delight
* She fled from his arms, yet he followd
* 2. Eternity shudder'd when they saw,
* Man begetting his likeness,
* On his own divided image.
* 3. A time passed over, the Eternals
* Began to erect the tent;
* When Enitharmon sick,
* Felt a Worm within her womb.
* 4. Yet helpless it lay like a Worm
* In the trembling womb
* To be moulded into existence
* 5. All day the worm lay on her bosom
* All night within her womb
* The worm lay till it grew to a serpent
* With dolorous hissings & poisons
* Round Enitharmons loins folding,
* 6. Coild within Enitharmons womb
* The serpent grew casting its scales,
* With sharp pangs the hissings began
* To change to a grating cry,
* Many sorrows and dismal throes,
* Many forms of fish, bird & beast,
* Brought forth an Infant form
* Where was a worm before.
* 7. The Eternals their tent finished
* Alarm'd with these gloomy visions
* When Enitharmon groaning
* Produc'd a man Child to the light.
* 8. A shriek ran thro' Eternity:
* And a paralytic stroke;
* At the birth of the Human shadow.
* 9. Delving earth in his resistless way;
* Howling, the Child with fierce flames
* Issu'd from Enitharmon.
* 10. The Eternals, closed the tent
* They beat down the stakes the cords
* Stretch'd for a work of eternity;
* No more Los beheld Eternity.
* 11. In his hands he siez'd the infant
* He bathed him in springs of sorrow
* He gave him to Enitharmon.
* Chap: VII
* 1. They named the child Orc, he grew
* Fed with milk of Enitharmon
* 2. Los awoke her; O sorrow & pain!
* A tight'ning girdle grew,
* Around his bosom. In sobbings
* He burst the girdle in twain,
* But still another girdle
* Opressd his bosom, In sobbings
* Again he burst it. Again
* Another girdle succeeds
* The girdle was form'd by day;
* By night was burst in twain.
* 3. These falling down on the rock
* Into an iron Chain
* In each other link by link lock'd
* 4. They took Orc to the top of a mountain.
* O how Enitharmon wept!
* They chain'd his young limbs to the rock
* With the Chain of Jealousy
* Beneath Urizens deathful shadow
* 5. The dead heard the voice of the child
* And began to awake from sleep
* All things. heard the voice of the child
* And began to awake to life.
* 6. And Urizen craving with hunger
* Stung with the odours of Nature
* Explor'd his dens around
* 7. He form'd a line & a plummet
* To divide the Abyss beneath.
* He form'd a dividing rule:
* 8. He formed scales to weigh;
* He formed massy weights;
* He formed a brazen quadrant;
* He formed golden compasses
* And began to explore the Abyss
* And he planted a garden of fruits
* 9. But Los encircled Enitharmon
* With fires of Prophecy
* From the sight of Urizen & Orc.
* 10. And she bore an enormous race
* Chap: VIII
* 1. Urizen explor'd his dens
* Mountain, moor, & wilderness,
* With a globe of fire lighting his journey
* A fearful journey, annoy'd
* By cruel enormities: forms
* Of life on his forsaken mountains
* 2. And his world teemd vast enormities
* Frightning; faithless; fawning
* Portions of life; similitudes
* Of a foot, or a hand, or a head
* Or a heart, or an eye, they swam mischevous
* Dread terrors! delighting in blood
* 3. Most Urizen sicken'd to see
* His eternal creations appear
* Sons & daughters of sorrow on mountains
* Weeping! wailing! first Thiriel appear'd
* Astonish'd at his own existence
* Like a man from a cloud born, & Utha
* From the waters emerging, laments!
* Grodna rent the deep earth howling
* Amaz'd! his heavens immense cracks
* Like the ground parch'd with heat; then Fuzon
* Flam'd out! first begotten, last born.
* All his eternal sons in like manner
* His daughters from green herbs & cattle
* From monsters, & worms of the pit.
* 4. He in darkness clos'd, view'd all his race,
* And his soul sicken'd! he curs'd
* Both sons & daughters; for he saw
* That no flesh nor spirit could keep
* His iron laws one moment.
* 5. For he saw that life liv'd upon death
* The Ox in the slaughter house moans
* The Dog at the wintry door
* And he wept, & he called it Pity
* And his tears flowed down on the winds
* 6. Cold he wander'd on high, over their cities
* In weeping & pain & woe!
* And where-ever he wanderd in sorrows
* Upon the aged heavens
* A cold shadow follow'd behind him
* Like a spiders web, moist, cold, & dim
* Drawing out from his sorrowing soul
* The dungeon-like heaven dividing.
* Where ever the footsteps of Urizen
* Walk'd over the cities in sorrow.
* 7. Till a Web dark & cold, throughout all
* The tormented element stretch'd
* From the sorrows of Urizens soul
* And the Web is a Female in embrio
* None could break the Web, no wings of fire.
* 8. So twisted the cords, & so knotted
* The meshes: twisted like to the human brain
* 9. And all calld it, The Net of Religion
* Chap: IX
* 1. Then the Inhabitants of those Cities:
* Felt their Nerves change into Marrow
* And hardening Bones began
* In swift diseases and torments,
* In throbbings & shootings & grindings
* Thro' all the coasts; till weaken'd
* The Senses inward rush'd shrinking,
* Beneath the dark net of infection.
* 2. Till the shrunken eyes clouded over
* Discernd not the woven hipocrisy
* But the streaky slime in their heavens
* Brought together by narrowing perceptions
* Appeard transparent air; for their eyes
* Grew small like the eyes of a man
* And in reptile forms shrinking together
* Of seven feet stature they remaind
* 3. Six days they shrunk up from existence
* And on the seventh day they rested
* And they bless'd the seventh day, in sick hope:
* And forgot their eternal life
* 4. And their thirty cities divided
* In form of a human heart
* No more could they rise at will
* In the infinite void, but bound down
* To earth by their narrowing perceptions
* [Plate 28]
* The Book of Urizen, copy G, c. 1818.
* They lived a period of years
* Then left a noisom body
* To the jaws of devouring darkness
* 5. And their children wept, & built
* Tombs in the desolate places,
* And form'd laws of prudence, and call'd them
* The eternal laws of God
* 6. And the thirty cities remaind
* Surrounded by salt floods, now call'd
* Africa: its name was then Egypt.
* 7. The remaining sons of Urizen
* Beheld their brethren shrink together
* Beneath the Net of Urizen;
* Perswasion was in vain;
* For the ears of the inhabitants,
* Were wither'd, & deafen'd, & cold:
* And their eyes could not discern,
* Their brethren of other cities.
* 8. So Fuzon call'd all together
* The remaining children of Urizen:
* And they left the pendulous earth:
* They called it Egypt, & left it.
* 9. And the salt ocean rolled englob'd
* The End of the [first] book of Urizen