(I.) EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY, LETTERS, AND REMINISCENCES OF HENRY
CRABB ROBINSON, TRANSCRIBED FROM THE ORIGINAL MSS. IN DR. WILLIAMS'S
LIBRARY (1810-1852)
(1) FROM CRABB ROBINSON'S DIARY
(2) FROM A LETTER OF CRABB ROBINSON TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH
(3) FROM CRABB ROBINSON'S REMINISCENCES
(II.) FROM 'A FATHER'S MEMOIRS OF HIS CHILD,' BY BENJAMIN
HEATH MALKIN (1806)
(III.) FROM LADY CHARLOTTE BURY'S DIARY (1820)
(IV.) BLAKE'S HOROSCOPE (1825)
(V.) OBITUARY NOTICES IN THE LITERARY GAZETTE' AND 'GENTLEMAN'S
MAGAZINE' (1827)
(VI.) EXTRACT FROM VARLEY'S ZODIACAL PHYSIOGNOMY (1828)
(VII.) BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF BLAKE BY J. T. SMITH (1828)
(VIII.) LIFE OF BLAKE BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM (1830)
PREFACE
It was when Mr. Sampson's edition of Blake came into my hands in the
winter of 1905 that the idea of writing a book on Blake first presented
itself to me. From a boy he had been one of my favorite poets, and I
had heard a great deal about him from Mr. Yeats as long ago as 1893, the
year in which he and Mr. Ellis brought out their vast encyclopaedia,
_The Works of William Blake, Poetic, Symbolic, and Critical._ From
that time to this Blake has never been out of my mind, but I have always
hesitated to write down anything on a subject so great in itself, and
already handled by great poets. Things have been written about Blake by
Rossetti which no one will ever surpass; and in Mr. Swinburne's book
Blake himself seems to speak again, as through the mouth of a herald.
I read these, I read everything that had been written about him; gradually
I got to know all his work, in all its kinds; and when I found, in Mr.
Sampson's book, the rarest part of his genius, disentangled at last from
the confusions of the commentators, I caught some impulse--was
it from the careful enthusiasm of this editor, or perhaps straight from
Blake?--and began to write down what now filled and overflowed
my mind. Having begun on an impulse, I laid my plans as strictly as I
could, and decided to make a book which would be, in its way, complete.
There was to be, first, my own narrative, containing, as briefly as
possible, every fact of importance, with my own interpretation of what
I took to be Blake's achievements and intentions. But this was to be
followed by a verbatim reprint of documents. These documents were
the material of Gilchrist, but, even after Gilchrist's use of them, they
remain of primary and undiminished importance: they are the main
evidence in our case.
The documents which form the second part of my book contain
every personal account of Blake which was printed during his lifetime,
and between the time of his death and the publication of Gilchrist's
_Life_ in 1863, together with the complete text of every reference
to Blake in the _Diary, Letters, and Reminiscences_ of Crabb
Robinson, transcribed for the first time from the original manuscripts.
All these I have given exactly as they stand, not correcting their errors,
for even errors have their value as evidence. The only other document
of the period which exists was written by Frederick Tatham, within two
years of the appearance of Cunningham's _Life_, and bound up
at the beginning of a colored copy of Blake's _Jerusalem_, now in
the possession of Captain Archibald Stirling. This manuscript was
consulted by Mr. Swinburne and afterwards by Mr. Ellis and Mr. Yeats;
but though many extracts have been made from it, it was printed for
the first time by Mr. Archibald G. B. Russell in his edition of _The
Letters of William Blake_ (Methuen, 1906). This very important
volume completes the task which I have here undertaken: the reprint
of every record of Blake from contemporary sources.
The mere contact with Blake seems to awaken the natural generosity
of those who have concerned themselves with him. To Mr. John Sampson,
the editor of the only accurate edition of Blake's poems, I am indebted
for more help and encouragement than I can hope to express in detail; and
particularly for prompting me to a search among birth and marriage and
death registers, by which I have been enabled to settle several disputed
points of some interest. To Mr. A. G. B. Russell I owe constant personal
help, and the very generous loan of the proofs of his edition of Blake's
_Letters_, and of Tatham's _Life_, with free leave to use them
in the narrative which I was writing at a time when his book had not yet
appeared. Through this favour I have been able to take such facts as
Tatham is responsible for directly from Tatham, and not at secondhand.
I am also indebted to Mr. Russell for reading my proofs and saving me from
some errors of fact. I have to thank Mr. Buxton Forman for allowing me
to read and describe the unpublished manuscript in Blake's handwriting
in his possession. Finally, my particular thanks are due to the Librarian
of Dr. Williams's Library, Mr. Francis H. Jones, for permission to copy
and print the full text of all the references to Blake in the Crabb
Robinson Manuscripts.
LONDON, _April_ 1907.
LIST OF BOOKS CONSULTED
1. _Life of William Blake_. By ALEXANDER GILCHRIST. Two volumes.
Macmillan, 1863. New and enlarged edition, 1880.
2. _William Blake: A Critical Essay_. By ALGERNON CHARLES
SWINBURNE. John Camden Hotten, 1868. New edition, Chatto & Windus,
1906.
3. _The Poetical Works of William Blake_. Edited by W. M.
ROSSETTI. Aldine Edition. Bell & Sons, 1874.
_4. The Life and Letters of Samuel Palmer_. By A. H.
Palmer. Seeley & Co., 1892.
5. _The Life of John Linnell_. By ALFRED T. STORY.
Two volumes. Bentley, 1892.
6. _A Memoir of Edward Calvert_. By his third son [SAMUEL
CALVERT]. S. LOW & Co., 1893.
7. _The Works of William Blake: Poetic, Symbolic, and Critical_.
Edited, with lithographs of the illustrated Prophetic Books, and a Memoir
and Interpretation, by EDWIN JOHN ELLIS and WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS.
Three volumes. Quaritch, 1893.
8. _The Poems of William Blake_. Edited by W. B. YEATS.
'The Muses' Library.' Lawrence & Bullen, 1893.
9. _William Blake: his Life, Character, and Genius_.
By ALFRED T. STORY. Sonnenschein & Co., 1893.
10. _William Blake: Painter and Poet_. By RICHARD GARNETT.
'Portfolio,' 1895.
11. _Ideas of Good and Evil_. By W. B. YEATS. (William Blake
and the Imagination, William Blake and his Illustrations to the Divine
Comedy.) A. H. Bullen, 1903.
12. _The Rossetti Papers_ (1862 _to_ 1870); a Compilation
by W. M. ROSSETTI. Sands & Co., 1903.
13. _The Prophetic Books of William Blake: Jerusalem_.
Edited by E. R. D. MACLAGAN and A. G. B. RUSSELL. Bullen, 1904.
14. _The Poetical Works of William Blake_. Edited by
JOHN SAMPSON. Oxford, 1905.
15. _The Letters of William Blake_; together with a Life
by FREDERICK TATHAM. Edited by ARCHIBALD G. B. RUSSELL. Methuen,
1906.
16. _The Poetical Works of William Blake_. Edited and annotated
by EDWIN J. ELLIS. Two volumes. Chatto & Windus, 1906. (The only edition
containing the Prophetic Books.)
17. _William Blake_. Vol. I. Illustrations of the Book of Job,
with a general Introduction by LAURENCE BINYON. Methuen, 1906.
18. _The Real Blake_. A Portrait Biography. By EDWIN J. ELLIS.
Chatto & Windus, 1907.