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Spurgeon, Caroline F. E., 1869-1942

"Mysticism in English Literature"


2. Energy is the only life and is from the Body, and Reason is the
bound or outward circumference of Energy.
3. Energy is Eternal Delight.
Blake goes on to write down some of the Proverbs which he collected
while walking among the fires of hell. These "Proverbs of Hell" fill
four pages of the book, and they are among the most wonderful things
Blake has written. Finished in expression, often little jewels of pure
poetry, they are afire with thought and meaning, and inexhaustible in
suggestion. Taken all together they express in epigrammatic form every
important doctrine of Blake's. Some of them, to be fully understood,
must be read in the light of his other work. Thus, "The road of excess
leads to the palace of wisdom," or, "If the fool would persist in his
folly he would become wise," are expressions of the idea constantly
recurrent with Blake that evil must be embodied or experienced before it
can be rejected.[80] But the greater number of them are quite clear and
present no difficulty, as for instance the following:--
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
He whose face gives no light shall never become a star.


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