Bravely Unconventional in 1799

— “As a man is, so he sees.” —

In 1799 the English mystic, poet, and painter William Blake sat down to pen a lively document in defense of the imagination, the inventively eccentric, in sum: the artistic spirit. For anybody laboring in service to a dream, an image, or voice of inspiration, whose work defies convention or leaves folks wagging their heads in disapproval or bewilderment, this text is a prime comfort.

Blake was addressing a dissatisfied client. Reverend John Trusler had commissioned from him some illustrations, but upon receipt found them to be stylistically disagreeable — and, one guesses, too drastic a departure from traditional Christian iconography. Blake specialized in the unorthodox but evidently what Trusler whiffed most clearly in the artist’s flair was “immorality.”

August 23, 1799.

Revd. Sir,

I really am sorry that you are fall’n out with the Spiritual World, especially if I should have to answer for it. I feel very sorry that your ideas & mine on moral painting differ so much as to have made you angry with my method of study. If I am wrong, I am wrong in good company. I had hoped your plan comprehended all species of this Art, & especially that you would not regret that species which gives existence to every other; namely, Visions of Eternity. You say that I want somebody to elucidate my ideas. But you ought to know that what is grand is necessarily obscure to weak men. That which can be made explicit to the idiot is not worth my care. The wisest of the ancients consider’d what is not too explicit as the fittest for instruction, because it rouses the faculties to act. I name Moses, Solomon, Aesop, Homer, Plato.

Given Blake’s uninhibited defense of his own work –an act justifiably recognized in some as blind egotism — it’s worth bearing in mind that he had by this point in his career attained a stage of technical mastery. For all his eccentricities, his self-confidence (righteous indignation?) was just. In other words, it was not self-importance, delusional pride, or base implacability that prompted his letter, but something far more profound. Blake knew well — and said himself — that “Without unceasing practice nothing can be done. Practice is Art. If you leave off you are lost.” And he knew the intensity and dedication with which he practiced.

Because Blake was consummate he could be honestly unconventional, and rise to his own defense without unduly flattering himself regarding his gifts. There’s an important difference between faith in one’s unique vision and fallacious pride.

But as you have favor’d me with your remarks on my design, permit me in return to defend it … I perceive that your eye is perverted by caricature prints, which ought not to abound so much as they do. Fun I love, but too much fun is of all things the most loathsome. Mirth is better than fun, & happiness is better than mirth. I feel that a man may be happy in this world. And I know that this world is a world of Imagination & Vision. I see everything I paint in this world, but everybody does not see alike. To the eyes of a miser, a Guinea is far more beautiful than the sun, & a bag worn with the use of money has more beautiful proportions than a vine filled with grapes. The tree which moves some to joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in the way. Some see Nature all ridicule & deformity, and by these I shall not regulate my proportions; & some scarce see Nature at all. But to the eyes of the Man of Imagination, Nature is Imagination itself. As a man is, so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers. You certainly mistake, when you say that the Visions of Fancy are not to be found in this world. To me this world is all one continued Vision of Fancy or Imagination, & I feel flattered when I am told so. What is it sets Homer, Virgil, & Milton in so high a rank of Art? Why is the Bible more entertaining and instructive than any other book? Is it not because they are addressed to the Imagination, which is spiritual sensation, and but mediately to the Understanding or Reason? Such is true painting, and such was alone valued by the Greeks & the best modern artists. …

Blake’s religious regard for the Imagination (capital I) reminds me of some remarks by his contemporary John Keats, written in a different letter some years after: “I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart’s affections and the truth of Imagination. What the Imagination seizes as beauty must be Truth, whether it existed before or not.” What was it Blake said at the outset? “If I am wrong, I’m wrong in good company.”

I am happy to find a great majority of fellow mortals who can elucidate my Visions, & particularly they have been elucidated by children, who have taken a greater delight in contemplating my pictures than I even hoped. Neither youth nor childhood is folly or incapacity. Some children are fools & so are some old men. But there is a vast majority on the side of Imagination or spiritual sensation.

To engrave after another painter is infinitely more laborious than to engrave one’s own inventions. And of the size you require my price has been thirty Guineas, & I cannot afford to do it for less. …

I am, Revd. Sir, your very obedient servant,

William Blake

There it is: the stout and soundly articulated refusal to compromise or let one’s Art be co-opted for fear of missing out on a buck. And time has proved the rightness of Blake’s refusal. His work is still very much with us. Who over the last several generations has not read or memorized in school those haunting lines…

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

(As for the good Reverend Trusler? We’re told he was the author of two books: Hogarth Moralized and The Way to be Rich and Respectable. Says it all, I fear.)

“[Blake] was a commercial artist who was a genius in poetry, painting, and religion,” say the editors of The Portable Blake. “He was a libertarian obsessed with God; a mystic who reversed the mystical pattern, for he sought man as the end of his search. He was a Christian who hated the churches; a revolutionary who abhorred the materialism of the radicals. He was a drudge, sometimes living on a dollar a week, who called himself “a mental prince”; and was one.” Yes, Blake knew what he was about, knew how to go about it, and didn’t let anything divert his vision — certainly not a crabby critic.

Note, by the way, that little biographical tidbit about living on a dollar a day. Uh-huh, Blake was poor. Good art has never guaranteed good income, much as being guided by one’s own lights rarely does. Therein we find a caution for the faint of heart. … But also, perhaps, comfort for creatives unpaid but as yet undaunted.

Stay the course. William Blake and countless others have got your back.

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