Songs of Innocence Is a Publication of the Pennsylvania State University

This publication of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence is a publication of the Pennsylvania State University. This Portable Document file is furnished free and without any charge of any kind. Any person using this document file, for any purpose, and in any way does so at his or her own risk. Neither the Pennsylvania State University nor Jim Manis, Faculty Editor, nor anyone associated with the Pennsylvania State University assumes any responsibility for the material contained within the document or for the file as an electronic transmission, in any way. William Blake’s Songs of Innocence, the Pennsylvania State University, Jim Manis, Faculty Editor, Hazleton, PA 18201-1291 is a Portable Document File produced as part of an ongoing student publication project to bring classical works of literature, in English, to free and easy access of those wishing to make use of them, and as such is a part of the Pennsylvania State University’s Elec- tronic Classics Series. Cover design: Jim Manis; Cover art: William Blake Copyright © 1998 The Pennsylvania State University Songs of Innocence by William Blake Songs of Innocence was the first of Blake’s illuminated books published in 1789. The poems and artwork were reproduced by copperplate engraving and colored with washes by hand. In 1794 he expanded the book to in- clude Songs of Experience. Frontispiece 3 Songs of Innocence by William Blake Table of Contents 5 …Introduction 17 …A Dream 6 …The Shepherd The images contained 19 …The Little Girl Lost 7 …Infant Joy in this publication are 20 …The Little Girl Found 7 …On Another’s Sorrow copies of William 22 …The Little Boy Lost 8 …The School Boy Blakes originals for 22 …The Little Boy Found 10 …Holy Thursday his first publication. 22 …A Cradle Song 11 …Nurse’s Song 23 …Spring 11 …Laughing Song 24 …The Blossom 12 …The Little Black Boy 25 …The Lamb 13 …The Voice of the Ancient Bard 26 …Night 13 …Ecchoing Green 15 …The Chimney Sweeper 16 …The Divine Image 4 Introduction Piping down the valleys wild, Piping songs of pleasant glee, On a cloud I saw a child, And he laughing said to me: “Pipe a song about a Lamb!” So I piped with merry chear. “Piper, pipe that song again” So I piped, he wept to hear. “Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe; Sing thy songs of happy chear- So I sung the same again, While he wept with joy to hear. “Piper, sit thee down and write In a book, that all may read.” So he vanish’d from my sight, And I pluck’d a hollow reed, And I made a rural pen, And I stain’d the water clear, And I wrote my happy songs Title Page Every child may joy to hear. 5 The Shepherd How sweet is the Shepherd’s sweet lot! From the morn to the evening he strays; He shall follows his sheep all the day, And his tongue shall be filled with praise. For he hears the lamb’s innocent call, And he hears the ewe’s tender reply; He is watchful while they are in peace, For they know when their Shepherd is nigh. 6 Infant Joy On Another’s Sorrow: “I have no name: I am but two days old.” Can I see another’s woe, What shall I call thee:’ And not be in sorrow too! “I happy am, Can I see another’s grief, Joy is my name.” And not seek for kind relief! Sweet joy befall thee! Can I see a falling tear, Pretty joy! And not feel my sorrow’s share? Sweet joy, but two days old. Can a father see his child Sweet joy I call thee: ‘Weep, nor be with sorrow fill’d! Thou dost smile, I sing the while, Can a mother sit and hear Sweet joy befall thee! An infant groan, an infant fear? No, no! never can it be! Never, never can it be! And can he who smiles on all Hear the wren with sorrows small, Hear the small bird’s grief & care, Hear the woes that infants bear, 7 And not sit beside the nest, Pouring pity in their breast; The School Boy And not sit the cradle near, Weeping tear on infant’s tear; I love to rise in a summer morn When the birds sing on every tree; And not sit both night & day, The distant huntsman winds his horn, Wiping all our tears away? And the sky-lark sings with me. O! no, never can it be! O! what sweet company. Never, never can it be! But to go to school in a summer morn, He doth give his joy to all; O! it drives all joy away; He becomes an infant small; Under a cruel eye outworn, He becomes a man of woe; The little ones spend the day He doth feel the sorrow too. In sighing and dismay. Think not thou canst sigh a sigh, Ah! then at times I drooping sit, And thy maker is not by; And spend many an anxious hour, Think not thou canst weep a tear, Nor in my book can I take delight, And thy maker is not near. Nor sit in learning’s bower, Worn thro’ with the dreary shower. O! he gives to us his joy That our grief he may destroy; How can the bird that is born for joy Till our grief is fled & gone Sit in a cage and sing:’ He doth sit by us and moan. Hear can a child, when fears annoy, 8 But droop his tender wing, And forget his youthful spring? O! father & mother, if buds are nip’d And blossoms blown away, And if the tender plants are strip’d Of their joy in the springing day, By sorrow and care’s dismay, How shall the summer arise in joy, Or the summer fruits appearr Or how shall we gather what griefs destroy, Or bless the mellowing year, When the blasts of winter appear? 9 Beneath them sit the aged men, wise guardians of Holy Thursday the poor; Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your ’Twas on a Holy Thursday, their innocent faces clean, door. The children walking two & two, in red & blue & green, Grey-headed beadles walk’d before, with wands as white as snow, Till into the high dome of Paul’s they like Thames’ waters flow. O what a multitude they seem’d, these flowers of London town! Seated in companies they sit with radiance all their own. The hum of multitudes was there, but multitudes of lambs, Thousands of little boys & girls raising their innocent hands. Now like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the voice of song, Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of heaven among. 10 Nurse’s Song Laughing Song When the voices of children are heard on the green, When the green woods laugh with the voice of joy, And laughing is heard on the hill, And the dimpling stream runs laughing by; My heart is at rest within my breast, When the air does laugh with our merry wit, And everything else is still. And the green hill laughs with the noise of it; “Then come home, my children, the sun is gone When the meadows laugh with lively green. down, And the grasshopper laughs in the merry scene, And the dews of night arise; When Mary and Susan and Emily Come, come, leave off play, and let us away With their sweet round mouths sing “Ha, Ha, He!” Till the morning appears in the skies.” When the painted birds laugh in the shade. “No, no, let us play, for it is yet nay, Where our table with cherries and nuts is spread, And we cannot go to sleep; Come live & be merry, and join with me, Besides, in the sky the little birds fly, To sing the sweet chorus of “Ha, Ha, He!” And the hills are all cover’d with sheep.” “Well, well, go & play till the light fades away, And then go home to bed.” The little ones leaped & shouted & laugh’d And all the hills ecchoed. 11 The Little Black Boy My mother bore me in the southern wild, The cloud will vanish: we shall hear his voice, And I am black. but O! my soul is white; Saying: ‘Come out from lhe grove, my love & care. White as an angel is the English child, And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.’ But I am black as if bereav’d of light. Thus did my mother say, and kissed me; My mother taught me underneath a tree, And thus I say to little English boy. And, sitting down before the heat of day, When I from black and he from white cloud free. She took me on her lap and kissed me, And round the tent of God like lambs we joy, And pointing to the east began to say: I’ll shade him from the heat, till he can bear “Look on the rising sun: there God does live, To lean in joy upon our father’s knee; And gives his light, and gives his heat away; And then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair, And flowers and trees and beasts and men recieve And be like him, and he will then love me. Comfort in morning, joy in the noonday. “And we are put on earth a little space, That we may learn to bear the beams of love; And these black bodies and this sunburnt face Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.

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