August’s poems
… are from Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience.
(1789)
To Mercy Pity Peace and Love
All Pray in their distress:
And to these virtues of delight
Return their thankfulness.
For Mercy Pity Peace and Love
Is God our father dear:
And Mercy Pity Peace and Love
Is Man his child and care.
For Mercy has a human heart
Pity, a human face:
And Love, the human form divine.
And Peace, the human dress.
Then every man of every clime
That prays in his distress,
Prays to the human form divine
Love Mercy Pity Peace.
And all must love the human form.
In heathen, turk or jew
Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell
There God is dwelling too.
A Divine Image
(1794)
Cruelty has a Human Heart
And Jealousy a Human Face
Terror, the Human Form Divine
And Secrecy, the Human Dress
The Human Dress is forged in Iron
The Human Form, a fiery Forge
The Human Face, a Furnace seal’d
The Human Heart, its hungry Gorge.
Vaughan Williams’s interpretation is the ancestor of certain TV theme songs, Karin suggests.
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯
The Divine Image(1789)
To Mercy Pity Peace and Love
All Pray in their distress:
And to these virtues of delight
Return their thankfulness.
For Mercy Pity Peace and Love
Is God our father dear:
And Mercy Pity Peace and Love
Is Man his child and care.
For Mercy has a human heart
Pity, a human face:
And Love, the human form divine.
And Peace, the human dress.
Then every man of every clime
That prays in his distress,
Prays to the human form divine
Love Mercy Pity Peace.
And all must love the human form.
In heathen, turk or jew
Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell
There God is dwelling too.
A Divine Image
(1794)
Cruelty has a Human Heart
And Jealousy a Human Face
Terror, the Human Form Divine
And Secrecy, the Human Dress
The Human Dress is forged in Iron
The Human Form, a fiery Forge
The Human Face, a Furnace seal’d
The Human Heart, its hungry Gorge.
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯
Vaughan Williams’s interpretation is the ancestor of certain TV theme songs, Karin suggests.