No More Learning

Why howl[[s] the Lion & the Wolf? Why do they roam abroad?
Deluded by [the] summers heat they sport in enormous love
And cast their young out to the [? ]] hungry wilds & sandy desarts
PAGE 18 {This text on this page was written on top of a rough sketch of a figure in a diving position. GD}
Why is the Sheep given to the knife? The Lamb plays in the Sun
He starts! he hears the foot of Man! He says, Take thou my wool
But spare my life, but he knows not that the winter cometh fast
The Spider sits in his labourd Web, eager watching for the Fly
Presently comes a famishd Bird & takes away the Spider
His Web is left all desolate, that his little anxious heart
So careful wove; & spread it out with sighs and weariness.
This was the Lamentation of Enion round the golden Feast
[[End of the First Night]]y
Eternity groand and was troubled at the image of Eternal Death
Without the body of Man an Exudation from his sickning limbs
Now Man was come to the Palm tree & to the Oak of Weeping
Which stand upon the edge of Beulah & he sunk down
From the Supporting arms of the Eternal Saviour; who disposd
The pale limbs of his Eternal Individuality
Upon The Rock of Ages. Watching over him with Love & Care
End of the First Night


PAGE 23
Night the [Second]


{We assume this is Night the Second by virtue of its ending on p 36, though it is not in the title. Evidently Blake tried it as Night the Third and as Night the First at least twice. SAS Note further that in Night One, page 9, Blake had inserted "Night the Second", even though the end of the First Night One is indicated on page 22. LFS}
Rising upon his Couch of Death Albion beheld his Sons
Turning his Eyesoutward to Self. losing the Divine Vision
[The] Albion Man calld Urizen & said. Behold these sickning Spheres {The Man is erased from the 1st rendition and Albion is set in its place.
SAS}
Whence is this Voice of Enion that soundeth in my ears Porches
Take thou possession! take this Scepter! go forth in my might
For I am weary, & must sleep in the dark sleep of Death {According to Erdman's notes this line was crossed out in pencil for deletion and a replacement was written in the right margin, then the deleting lines and the replacement were thoroughly erased. The line leavess these traces: ? ? Remember? O ? Urizen/ Cxxxg / xxdxding / xxxvns? SAS}
Thy brother Luvah hath smitten me but pity thou his youth
Tho thou hast not pitid my Age O Urizen Prince of Light {According to Erdman, "Blake first wrote and erased a different text for 8, ending ? of fallen man? ;" SAS}
Urizen rose from the bright Feast like a star thro' the evening sky
Exulting at the voice that calld him from the Feast of envy {"Indignant" and "Feast of envy" were in both the first and final rendition of this line. Blake considered altering "Exulting" to "Indignant" and "Feast of envy" to "Feast of love" in the second rendition, but later changed his mind and returned to the original. SAS}
First he beheld the body of Man pale, cold, the horrors of death
Beneath his feet shot thro' him as he stood in the Human Brain
And all its golden porches grew pale with his sickening light
No more Exulting for he saw Eternal Death beneath
Pale he beheld futurity; pale he beheld the Abyss
Where Enion blind & age bent wept in direful hunger craving
All rav'ning like the hungry worm, & like the silent grave
PAGE 24
Mighty was the draught of Voidness to draw Existence in
Terrific Urizen strode above, in fear & pale dismay
He saw the indefinite space beneath & his soul shrunk with horror
His feet upon the verge of Non Existence; his voice went forth {According to Erdman, this line was at one time followed by a line that has been erased. Erdman has recoverd a portion of the line, reading: Above him he xxx Jerusalem ? in ? the bloody ?