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Home  »  Lyra Sacra: A Book of Religious Verse  »  Auguries of Innocence

Henry Charles Beeching, ed. (1859–1919). Lyra Sacra: A Book of Religious Verse. 1903.

By William Blake (1757–1827)

Auguries of Innocence

 
        To see a world in a grain of sand,
  And a heaven in a wild flower;
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
  And eternity in an hour.

A ROBIN REDBREAST in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage;
A skylark wounded on the wing
Doth make a cherub cease to sing.
Kill not the moth nor butterfly,        5
For the last judgment draweth nigh.
 
He who respects the infant’s faith
Triumphs over hell and death.
He who shall teach the child to doubt
The rotting grave shall ne’er get out.        10
He who replies to words of doubt
Doth put the light of knowledge out;
A puddle, or the cricket’s cry
Is to doubt a fit reply.
 
Every night and every morn        15
Some to misery are born;
Every morn and every night
Some are born to sweet delight.
Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine;        20
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.
 
God appears, and God is light
To those poor souls who dwell in night;
But doth a human form display        25
To those who dwell in realms of day.