Page:Life of William Blake 2, Gilchrist.djvu/44

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22
SELECTIONS FROM BLAKE'S WRITINGS.

SCENE V.—In Sir Thomas Dagworth's Tent. To him enters Sir Walter Manny.


Sir Walter. Sir Thomas Dagworth, I have been a-weeping
Over the men that are to die to-day.


Dagw. Why, brave Sir Walter, you or I may fall.


Sir Walter. I know this breathing flesh must lie and rot
Cover'd with silence and forgetfulness.—
Death wons in cities' smoke, and in still night,
When men sleep in their beds, walketh about!
How many in walled cities lie and groan.
Turning themselves about upon their beds,
Talking with Death, answering his hard demands!
How many walk in darkness, terrors around
The curtains of their beds, destruction still
Ready without the door! how many sleep
In earth, cover'd with stones and deathy dust.
Resting in quietness, whose spirits walk
Upon the clouds of heaven, to die no more!
Yet death is terrible, though on angels' wings:
How terrible, then, is the field of death!
Where he doth rend the vault of heav'n, and shake
The gates of hell! Oh, Dagworth! France is sick:
The very sky, tho' sunshine light it, seems
To me as pale as the pale fainting man
On his death-bed, whose face is shown by light
Of sickly taper! It makes me sad and sick
At very heart. Thousands must fall to-day.


Dagw. Thousands of souls must leave this prison house
To be exalted to those heavenly fields,