User:Dmitrismirnov/sandbox


 * The Voice of the Ancient Bard
 * The Mental Traveller
 * Beulah (Blake)

Beulah, "married" in Hebrew or "espoused", see for example (Mechon Mamre), is the happy and delightful for the Lord country (See Book of Isaiah  . This is  one of names given to Palestine when it is rejoined to God after the exile, a prophesied attribute of the land of Israel. The name of Beulah used also by Bunyan in  his Pilgrim's Progress, where it  was the pastoral earthly paradise (in sight of the Heavenly City) where Christian and the other pilgrims rest before crossing the River of Death and entering the Heavenly City.

In Blake's System, this is the realm of the Subconscious, the source of poetic inspiration and of dreams. It is also the land, a dreamy paradise where the sexes, though divided, blissfully converse in shameless selflessness. Beulah is available through dreams and visions to those in Ulro, the utterly fallen world. It placed between Eternity and Ulro. This is a peaceful idealized place, with no conflict, the conventional image of Heaven or Eternity where all are one. But this notion of Eternity is misguided and fallen. Its inhabitants, the daughters of Beulah, and act as muses for the poets who dwell in Ulro. Beulah occurs 182 times in Blake.



First it was appeared in Night the first of The Four Zoas (5:29-35)

"There is from Great Eternity a mild & pleasant rest Namd Beulah a Soft Moony Universe feminine lovely Pure mild & Gentle given in Mercy to those who sleep Eternally. Created by the Lamb of God around On all sides within & without the Universal Man The Daughters of Beulah follow sleepers in all their Dreams Creating Spaces lest they fall into Eternal Death"

Blake also described Beulah in his poem Milton ( Book the second, 30:1-31:11):

"There is a place where Contraries are equally True: This place is called Beulah. It is a pleasure lovely Shadow Where no dispute can come, Because of those who Sleep. Into this place the Sons & Daughters of Ololon descended With solemn mourning, into Beulah's moony shades & hills Weeping for Milton: mute wonder held the Daughters of Beulah, Enraptur'd with affection sweet and mild benevolence.

Beulah is evermore created around Eternity; appearing To the Inhabitants of Eden around them on all sides. But Beulah to its Inhabitants appears within each district, As the beloved infant in his mother's bosom round incircled With arms of love & pity & sweet compassion. But to The Sons of Eden the moony habitations of Beulah Are from Great Eternity a mild & pleasant Rest..."

Here is a general explanation on the visionary world of Blake in Jerusalem The Emanation of the Giant Albion (13:12-20):

""The Eastern Gate, fourfold: terrible & deadly its ornaments: Taking their forms from the Wheels of Albions sons; as cogs Are formd in a wheel, to fit the cogs of the adverse wheel. That toward Eden, eternal ice, frozen in seven folds Of forms of death: and that toward Beulah, stone: The seven diseases of the earth are carved terrible. And that toward Ulro, forms of war: seven enormities: And that toward Generation, seven generative forms. And every part of the City is fourfold; & every inhabitant, fourfold.""