윌리엄블레이크의 천국과 지옥의 결혼 (2)

[볼키]

(1)에 이어서 계속...

A MEMORABLE FANCY


The Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me, and I asked them how they dared so roundly to

assert, that God spoke to them; and whether they did not think at the time, that they would be

misunderstood, & so be the cause of imposition.

Isaiah answer'd, I saw no God, nor heard any, in a finite organical perception; but my senses

discover'd the infinite in every thing, and as I was then perswaded, & remain confirm‎'d; that the

voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I cared not for consequences but wrote.

Then I asked: does a firm perswasion that a thing is so, make it so?

He replied, All poets that it does, & in ages of imagination this firm perswasion removed

mountains; but many are not capable of a firm perswasion of any thing.

Then Ezekiel said, The philosophy of the east taught the first principles of human perception:

some nations held one principle for the origin & some another; we of Israel taught that the

Poetic Genius (as you now call it) was the first principle and all other others merely derivative,

which was the cause of our despising the priests & Philosophers of other countries, and

prophecying that all Gods would at last be proved to originate in ours & to be the

tributaries of the Poetic Genius; it was this that our great poet King David desired so fervently &

invokes so patheticly, saying by this he conquers enemies & governs kingdoms; and we so

loved our God, that we cursed in his name all deities of surrounding nations, and asserted that

they had rebelled; from these opinions the vulgar came to think that all nations would at last be

subject to the jews.

This said he, like all firm perswasions, is come to pass, for all nations believe the jews code

and worship the jews god, and what greater subjection can be?
I heard this with some wonder, & must confess my own conviction. After dinner I ask'd Isaiah to

favour the world with his lost works, he said none of equal value was lost. Ezekiel said the

same of his.

I also asked Isaiah what made him go naked and barefoot three years? he answer'd, the same

that made our friend Diogenes the Grecian.

I then asked Ezekiel, why he eat dung, & lay so long on his right & left side? he answer'd, the

desire of raising other men into a perception of the infinite; this the North American tribes

practise, & is he honest who resists his genius or conscience only for the sake of present

ease or gratification?

The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fire at the end of six thousand years is

true, as I have heard from Hell.

For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to leave his guard at tree of life,

and when he does, the whole creation will be consumed, and appear infinite, and holy

whereas it now appears finite & corrupt.

This will come to pass by an improvement of sensual enjoyment.

But first the notion that man has a body distinct from his soul, is to be expunged: this I shall do,

by printing in the infernal method, by corrosives, which in Hell are salutary and medicinal,

melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying the infinite which was hid.

If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.

For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.

I was in a Printing house in Hell & saw the method in which knowledge is transmitted from

generation to generation.

In the first chamber was a Dragon-Man, clearing away the rubbish from a caves moth; within, a

number of Dragons were hollowing the cave.

In the second chamber was a Viper folding round the rock & the cave, and others adorning it

with gold, silver and precious stones.

In the third chamber was an Eagle with wings and feathers of air; he caused the inside of the

cave to be infinite; around were numbers of Eagle like men, who built palaces in the immense

cliffs.

In the fourth chamber were Lions of flaming fire raging around & melting the metals into living

fluids.

In the fifth chamber were Unnam'd forms, which cast the metals into the expanse.

There they were reciev'd by Men who occupied the sixth chamber, and took the forms of books

& were arranged in libraries.

The Giants who formed this world into its sensual existence and now seem to live in it in

chains, are in truth, the causes of its life & the sources of all activity; but the chains are, the

cunning of weak and tame minds, which have power to resist energy, according to the proverb,

the weak in courage is strong in cunning.

Thus one portion of being, is the Prolific, the other, the Devouring: to the devourer it seems as if

the producer was in his chains, but it is not so; he only takes portions of existence and fancies

that the whole.

But the Prolific would cease to be Prolific unless the Devourer as a sea recieved the excess of

his delights.

Some will say, Is not God alone the Prolific? I answer, God only Acts & Is, in existing beings or

Men.

These two classes of men are always upon earth, & they should be enemies; whoever tries  to

reconcile them seeks to destroy existence.

Religion is an endeavour to reconcile the two.

Note. Jesus Christ did not wish to unit but to seperate them, as in the Parable of sheep and

goats! & he says I came not to send Peace but a Sword.

Messiah or Satan or Tempter was formerly thought to be one of the Antediluvians who are our

Energies.

An Angel came to me and said O pitiable foolish young man! O horrible! O dreadful state! consider the hot burning dungeon thou art preparing for thyself to all eternity, to which thou art

going in such career.

I said, perhaps you will be willing to shew me my eternal lot & we will contemplate together

upon it and see whether your lot or mine is most desirable.

So he took me thro' a stable & thro' a church & down into the church vault at the end of which

was a mill: thro' the mill we went, and came to a cave, down the winding cavern we groped our

tedious way till a void boundless as a nether sky appear'd beneath us, & we held by the roots

of trees and hung over this immensity, but I said, if you please we will commit ourselves to this

void, and see whether providence is here also, if you will not, I will? but he answer'd, do not

presume O young-man but as we here remain behold thy lot which will soon appear when the

darkness passes away.

So I remain'd with him sitting in the twisted root of an oak; he was suspended in a fungus,

which hung with the head downward into the deep.

By degrees we beheld the infinite Abyss, fiery as the smoke of a burning city; beneath us at an

immense distance was the sun, black but shining; round it were fiery tracks on which revolv'd

vast spiders, crawling after their prey; which flew or rather swum in the infinite deep, in the most

terrific shapes of animals sprung from corruption, & the air was full of them, & seem'd

composed of them; these are Devils, and arc called Powers of the air. I now asked my

companion which was my eternal lot? he said, between the black & white spiders.

But now, from between the black & white spiders, a cloud and fire burst and rolled thro' the

deep, blackning all beneath, so that the nether deep grew black as a sea & rolled with a terrible

noise; beneath us was nothing now to be seen but a black tempest, till looking east between

the clouds & the waves, we saw a cataract of blood mixed with fire, and not many stones throw

from us appear'd and sunk again the scaly fold of a monstrous serpent; at last to the east,

distant about three degrees appear'd a fiery crest above the waves; slowly it reared like a ridge

of golden rocks till we discover'd two globes of crimson fire, from which the sea fled away in

clouds of smoke, and now we saw, it was the head of Leviathan; his forehead was divided into

streaks of green & purple like those on a tygers forehead: soon we saw his mouth & red gills

hang just above the raging foam tinging the black deep with beams of blood, advancing toward 

us with all the fury of a spiritual existence.

My friend the Angel climb'd up from his station into the mill; I remain'd alone, & then this

appearance was no more, but I found myself sitting on a pleasant bank beside a river by

moonlight hearing a harper who sung to the harp, & his theme was, The man who never alters

his opinion is like standing water, & breeds reptiles of the mind.

But I arose, and sought for the mill & there I found my Angel, who surprised asked me how I

escaped?

I answer'd, All that we saw was owing to your metaphysics; for when you ran away, I found

myself on a bank by moonlight hearing a harper. But now we have seen my eternal lot, shall I

shew you yours? he laugh'd at my proposal; but I by force suddenly caught him in my arms, &

flew westerly thro' the night, till we were elevated above the earths shadow; then I flung myself

with him directly into the body of the sun; here I clothed myself in white, & taking in my hand

Swedenborgs volumes, sunk from the glorious clime, and passed all the planets till we came to

saturn; here I staid to rest, & then leap'd into the void, between saturn & the fixed stars.

Here, said I! is your lot, in this space, if space it may be call'd. Soon we saw the stable and the

church, & I took him to the altar and open'd the Bible, and lo! it was a deep pit, into which I

descended driving the Angel before me; soon we saw seven houses of brick; one we enter'd;

in it were a number of monkeys, baboons, & all of that species, chain'd by the middle, grinning

and snatching at one another, but witheld by the shortness of their chains; however I saw that

they sometimes grew numerous, and then the weak were caught by the strong, and with a

grinning aspect, first coupled with & then devour'd, by plucking off first one limb and then

another till the body was left a helpless trunk; this after grinning & kissing it with seeming

fondness they devour'd too; and here & there I saw one savourily picking the flesh off of his

own tail; as the stench terribly annoy'd us both we went into the mill, & I in my hand brought the

skeleton of a body, which in the mill was Aristotles Analytics.

So the Angel said: thy phantasy has imposed upon me & thou oughtest to be ashamed.

I answer'd: we impose on one another, & it is but lost time to converse with you whose works

are only Analytics.

Opposition is true Friendship.

I have always found that Angels have the vanity to speak of themselves as the only wise; this

they do with a confident insolence sprouting from systematic reasoning:

Thus Swedenborg boasts that what he writes is new; tho' it is only the Contents or Index of

already publish'd books.

A man carried a monkey about for a shew, & because he was a little wiser than the monkey,

grew vain, and conciev'd himself as much wiser than seven men. It is so with Swedenborg; he

shews the folly of churches & exposes hypocrites, till he imagines that all are religious, &

himself the single  one on earth that ever broke a net.

Now hear a plain fact: Swedenborg has not written one new truth:
Now hear another: he has written all the old falshoods.

And now hear the reason. He conversed with Angels who are all religious, & conversed not

with Devils who all hate religion, for he was incapable thro' his conceited notions.

Thus Swedenborgs writings are a recapitulation of all superficial, opinions, and an analysis of

the more sublime, but no further.

Have now another plain fact: Any man of mechanical talents may from the writings of

Paracelsus or Jacob Behmen, produce ten thousand volumes of equal value with

Swedenborgs, and from those of Dante or Shakespear, an infinite number.

But when he has done this, let him not say that he knows better than his master, for he only

holds a candle in sunshine.

Once I saw a Devil in a flame of fire, who arose before an Angel that sat on a cloud, and the

Devil utter'd these words.

The worship of God is, Honouring his gifts in other men each according to his genius, and

loving the greatest men best; those who envy or calumniate great men hate God, for there is no

other God.

The Angel hearing this became almost blue, but mastering himself he grew yellow, & at last

white pink & smiling, and then replied,

Thou Idolater, is not God One? & is not he visible in Jesus Christ? and has not Jesus Christ

given his sanction to the law often commandments, and are not all other men fools, sinners, &

nothings?

The Devil answer'd: bray a fool in a morter with wheat, yet shall not his folly be beaten out of

him; if Jesus Christ is the greatest man, you ought to love him in the greatest degree; now hear

how he has given his sanction to the law of ten commandments: did he not mock at the

sabbath, and so mock the sabbaths God? murder those who were murder'd because of him?

turn away the law from the woman taken in adultery? steal the labor of others to support him?

bear false witness when he omitted making a defence before Pilate? covet when he pray'd for

his disciples, and when he bid them shake off the dust of their feet against such as refused to

lodge them? I tell you, no virtue can exist without breaking these ten commandments; Jesus

was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules.

When he had so spoken: I beheld the Angel who stretched out his arms embracing the flame of

fire, & he was consumed and arose as Elijah.

Note. This Angel, who is now become a Devil, is my particular friend; we often read the Bible

together in its infernal or diabolical sense

한때 나는 활활 타는 불 속에서 악마를 보았다. 그는 구름 위에 앉아 있는 천사 앞에 일어서서 이렇게 말

했다. 「하느님을 섬김은 사람들 속에서 하느님이 선물을 기리며, 위대한 인간을 가장 사랑하는 데 있다.

위인을 모략하고 시기함은 하느님을 미워하는 일로서, 왜냐하면 그 밖의 하느님은 존재하지 않기 때문

이다」

이것을 들은 천사는 노여움으로 얼굴을 푸르락거리며, 그러나 자제하여 미소를 지으면서 응답했다. 「그

대 우상 숭배자여! 하느님은 한 분이지 않는가? 예수 그리스도 속에서 보이는 그분 아닌가? 그리고 그리

스도께서는 십계의 율법을 재가(裁可)하시지 않았는가? 그 밖에 모든 사람은 바보, 죄인 그리고 보잘것

없는 존재들이 아닌가?」

악마는 대답했다. 「바보를 밀과 함께 절구 속에 넣어 빻아 보라. 그러나 그의 어리석음은 결코 빻아 없

앨 수 없을 것이다. 만약 예수 그리스도가 가장 위대한 인간이라면, 그대는 그를 사랑해야만 한다. 그런

데 그리스도께서 어떻게 십계율을 재가했다고 말하는가? 그는 안식일을 조롱하고, 안식의 신을 그처럼

조롱하지 않았던가? 자신 때문에 살해당한 사람들을 살해하지 않았는가? 간음했다 하여 붙잡힌 여인을

율법으로 심판하지 말라고 하지 않았던가? 자신을 먹이기 위해 남들의 노동을 훔치지 않았는가? 빌라도

앞에서 자기 변호를 그만두었을 때 그는 거짓 증언을 하지 않았던가? 제자들을 위하여 기도하고, 그의

제자들을 영접하지 않는 사람들의 집을 나올 때는 발에 먼지를 털라고 제자들에게 말했을 때 그는 탐하

지 않았는가? 내가 그대에게 말하고자 하는 것은 십계율을 깨뜨리지 않고는 어떠한 덕도 존재하지 않는

다는 것이다. 예수께서는 덕 그 자체이며, 충동으로부터 행동하셨지, 법칙으로부터 행동하시지 않았다」

악마의 말이 끝났을 때 내가 천사를 바라보았더니, 그는 두 손을 벌리고 타오르는 불을 껴안았다. 그리고

그는 불타고 엘리야가 되어 일어났다.

노트 : 이제는 악마가 된 이 천사는 나의 특별히 친근한 동무이다. 우리는 지옥적이거나 악마적인 의미에

서의 성서를 자주 함께 읽었다.

which the world shall have if they behave well.

I have also: The Bible of Hell: which the world shall have whether they will or no.

One Law for the Lion & Ox is Oppression.

A SONG OF LIBERTY

자유의 노래
1. The Eternal Female groan'd! it was heard over all the Earth:
2. Albions coast is sick silent; the American meadows faint!
3. Shadows of Prophecy shiver along by the lakes and the rivers and mutter across the ocean. France rend down thy dungeon;
4. Golden Spain burst the barriers of old Rome;
5. Cast thy keys O Rome into the deep down falling, even to eternity down falling,
6. And weep.
7. In her trembling hands she took the new born terror howling;
8. On those infinite mountains of light, now barr'd out by the atlantic sea, the new born fire stood

before the starry king!
9. Flag'd with grey brow'd snows and thunderous visages the jealous wings wav'd over the deep.
10. The speary hand burned aloft, unbuckled was the shield, forth went the hand of jealousy among the flaming hair, and  hurl'd the new born wonder thro' the starry night.
11. The fire, the fire, is falling!
12. Look up! look up! O citizen of London, enlarge thy countenance; O Jew, leave counting gold!

return to thy oil and wine; O African! black African! (go, winged thought, widen his forehead.)
13. The fiery limbs, the flaming hair, shot like the sinking sun into the western sea.
14 Wak'd from his eternal sleep, the hoary element roaring fled away;
I5. Down rush'd beating his wings in vain the jealous king; his grey brow'd councellors,

thunderous warriors, curl'd veterans, among helms, and shields, and chariots, horses,

elephants: banners, castles, slings, and rocks,
I6. Falling, rushing, ruining! buried in the ruins, on Urthona's dens;
17. All night beneath the ruins, then their sullen flames faded emerge round the gloomy King.
18. With thunder and fire: leading his starry hosts thro' the waste wilderness, he

promulgates his ten commands, glancing: his beamy eyelids over the deep in dark dismay,

19. Where the son of fire in his eastern cloud, while the morning plumes her Golden breast,

20. Spurning the clouds written with curses, stamps the stony law to dust, loosing: the eternal

horses from the dens of night, crying,

Empire is no more! and now the lion & wolf shall cease

1 영원의 여성이 괴로운 신음 소리를 냈다! 그 소리는 온 지상 위에 울렸다.

2 앨비언의 해안은 고통으로 침묵하고, 아메리카의 푸른 들은 실신한다!

3 예언의 그림자들이 호수와 강을 따라 전율하면서 대양을 넘어 웅얼거린다. 프랑스여, 그대의 동굴을

부수어 버려라!

4 황금의 스페인이여, 옛 로마의 장벽을 깨뜨려라!

5 오, 로마여, 그대의 열쇠를 심연 아래로 떨어뜨려라!

6 그러고는 울어라. 다음에 그대가 섬기는 자물쇠에 절하라.

7 영원의 여성의 떨리는 손에 새로 태어난 공포가 울부짖는다.

8 지금은 대서양으로 막힌 저 무한한 빛의 산백 위에서 새로 태어난 불은 별의 왕 앞에 우뚝 섰다!

9 차가운 회색의 이마와 천둥 치는 얼굴로 깃발을 달고 질투심에 찬 날개들은 심연 위를 파드득거린다.

10 창을 든 손은 위로 불타 버리고, 방팬ㄴ 죔쇠가 풀린 채 활활 불 붙는 머리칼 사이로 질투의 손이 앞으

로 나아갈 때, 새로이 태어난 경악은 별이 총총한 밤으로 돌진하였다.

11 불, 불이 떨어지고 있다!

12 보아라, 보아라! 런던 시민이여, 그대의 눈을 크게 떠라! 유태인이여, 이제 황금을 그만 헤아리고 그대

의 기름과 포도주에게로 돌아가라! 아프리카인이여, 검은 아프리카인이여!

13 불 붙는 팔다리, 불타는 머리칼은 서쪽 바다로지는 태양처럼 맹렬히 내달았다.

14 영원의 잠엣 깨어나, 무성한 털을 가진 존재가 울부짖으며 달아났다.

15 질투심에 찬 왕은 헛되이 날개를 파드득거리며 달려 내려갔다. 회색 이마를 지닌 그의 신하들, 천둥

같은 병사들, 곱슬머리의 전사(戰士)들은 모두 투구와 방패, 전차, 말, 코끼리, 깃발, 성, 투석기, 바위 사

이에서 ㅡ

16 떨어지고, 내달으며, 멸망한다!

17 온밤 내 폐허 밑에서 지낸다. 그리하여 그들의 음산한 불꽃은 사르라지고 침울한 왕이 그 둘레에 나

타난다.

18 천둥과 불로써, 군대를 쓸쓸한 황야를 통해 이끌며, 그는 그의 십계율을 공포한다. 당황하여 심연위

를 훑어보면서,

19 거기에서는 아침이 황금의 젖가슴을 깃털로 장식할 때, 불의 아들이 동녘 구름 속에서 ㅡ

20 저주로 씌어진 구름들을 걷어차고, 매정한 율법을 짓밟아 먼지로 만들며, 밤의 토굴로부터 영원의 말

들을 해방시키면서 외친다.

제국은 사라졌다! 사자와 늑대도 사라질 것이다

Chorus

Let the Priests of the Raven of dawn, no longer in deadly black, with hoarse note curse the

sons of joy. Nor his accepted brethren, whom tyrant, he calls free: lay the bound or build the

roof. Nor pale religious letchery call that virginity, that wishes but acts not!

For every thing that lives is Holy.

코러스

이제는 더 이상 사제가 목쉰 소리로 기쁨의 아들들을 저주하지 않게 하라. 동포들이 서로 경계를 짓고 지

붕을 세우지 않게 하라. 바라기만 할 뿐 행하지 않는 창백한 종교적 음욕을 처녀성이라고 부르지 마라.

살아 있는 모든 것은 신성한 것이다.

번역 출처 : 『천국과 지옥의 결혼』김종철 옮김, 민음사 펴냄.

[vayana]

우와아 짝짝짝!!! 볼키님께 기립박수!!!

[볼키]

번역체가 맘에 드시면, 함 사서 보세요. ^^

[류 훈]

어떤 책인지 소개해 주실래요?

[볼키]

옙. ^^

[ShenKu]

이제 늘기쁘게 님이 뭔가 할 일이 있으신 것 아닌가요?