William Blake Quotes

Let every Christian, as much as in him lies, engage himself openly and publicly, before all the World, in some mental pursuit for the Building up of Jerusalem.

How can a bird that is born for joy Sit in a cage and sing?

The ignorant Insults of Individuals will not hinder me from doing my duty to my Art

Sooner strangle an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.

I have no name: I am but two days old. What shall I call thee? I happy am, Joy is my name. Sweet joy befall thee!

Silent as despairing love, and strong as jealousy.

The countless gold of a merry heart, The rubies and pearls of a loving eye, The indolent never can bring to the mart, Nor the secret hoard up in his treasury.

And is he honest who resists his genius or conscience only for the sake of present ease or gratification

A truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.

The pride of the peacock is the glory of God. The lust of the goat is the bounty of God. The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God. The nakedness of woman is the work of God.

You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.

He who makes his law a curse, by his own law shall surely die.

God appears, and God is Light, to those poor souls who dwell in Night; but does a Human Form display to those who dwell in realms of Day.

Better to shun the bait than struggle in the snare.

Nature has no outline. Imagination has.

Dip him in the river who loves water.

Mans desires are limited by his perceptions; none can desire what he has not perceived.

Every harlot was a virgin once.

The moon, like a flower in heaven's high bower, with silent delight sits and smiles on the night.

Innocence dwells with Wisdom, but never with ignorance.

Love seeketh only self to please, To bind another to its delight, Joys in another's loss of ease, And builds a Hell in Heaven's despite.

The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow, nor the lion, the horse, how he shall take his prey.

Since the French Revolution Englishmen are all intermeasurable one by another, certainly a happy state of agreement to which I forone do not agree.

The weak in courage is strong in cunning.

This life's dim windows of the soul Distorts the heavens from pole to pole And leads you to believe a lie When you see with, not through, the eye.

Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow.

Life delights in life.

The fool who persists in his folly will become wise.

We are led to believe a lie When we see not through the eye.

First thought is best in Art, second in other matters.

The pride of the peacock is the glory of God.

A DIVINE IMAGE Cruelty has a human heart, And Jealousy a human face; Terror the human form divine, And Secresy the human dress. The human dress is forged iron, The human form a fiery forge, The human face a furnace sealed, The human heart its hungry gorge.

The tigers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.

He who shall hurt the little wren Shall never be beloved by men.

Without minute neatness of execution, the sublime cannot exist! Grandeur of ideas is founded on precision of ideas.

To be an Error and to be Cast out is a part of God's Design.

As a man is, so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers.

No bird soars too high if he soars with his own wings.

But to go to school in a summer morn, O! It drives all joy away; Under a cruel eye outworn, The little ones spend the day In sighing and dismay.

The Man who pretends to be a modest enquirer into the truth of a self-evident thing is a Knave.

I heard an Angel singing; When the day was springing, Mercy, Pity, Peace; Is the world's release.

May God us keep From Single vision and Newton's sleep.

There is a place where Contrarieties are equally True.

God keep me from the divinity of Yes and Nothe Yea Nay Creeping Jesus, from supposing Up and Down to be the same thing as allexperimentalists must suppose.

To create a little flower is the labour of ages.

To generalize is to be an idiot.

The person who does not believe in miracles surely makes it certain that he or she will never take part in one.

He who pretends to be either painter or engraver without being a master of drawing is an imposter.