[A Vision of Albion]

(Jerusalem, f. 15, ll. 6–20.)

I SEE the Fourfold Man; the Humanity in deadly sleep,

And its fallen Emanation, the Spectre and its cruel Shadow.

I see the Past, Present, and Future existing all at once

Before me. O Divine Spirit! sustain me on thy wings,

That I may awake Albion from his long and cold repose;

For Bacon and Newton, sheath’d in dismal steel, their terrors hang

Like iron scourges over Albion. Reasonings like vast Serpents

Enfold around my limbs, bruising my minute articulations.

I turn my eyes to the Schools and Universities of Europe,

And there behold the Loom of Locke, whose Woof rages dire,

Wash’d by the Water-wheels of Newton: black the cloth

In heavy wreaths folds over every Nation: cruel Works

Of many Wheels I view, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic,

Moving by compulsion each other; not as those in Eden, which,

Wheel within wheel, in freedom revolve, in harmony and peace.