Title] The Earth' 1st rdg. cancelled, and changed to 'The Human I would] could MS. 2 If there was nobody poor MS. A Divine Image] This song cannot, strictly speaking, be regarded as part of the foregoing book. A companion poem to 'The Divine Image' (p. 75), it seems to have been engraved by Blake in the same manner as the rest, with a view to its forming one of the Songs of Experience. It was not, however, included in any authentic copy of the Songs issued during the author's lifetime, and is only found in an uncoloured impression in the British Museum Reading Room copy, where the watermark of the paper, which is dated 1832, proves that it must have been printed, perhaps by Tatham, at least five years after Blake's death. POEMS FROM THE ROSSETTI MS. I Written circa 1793 Never seek to tell thy Love Never seek to tell thy love, In this section are included all the poems in the Rossetti MS., arranged in the order in which they occur, with the exception of the early versions of some of the Songs of Experience (the variant readings of which are given in footnotes), and the gnomic verses, epigrams, and short satirical pieces which I group together elsewhere. Never seek, &c.] I give here the earlier and incomparably finer version of this song, which Blake subsequently altered by cancelling the first stanza (after changing 'seek' to 'pain' in l. 1), and substituting ⚫O! was no deny ' for the concluding line of the poem. |