13If thought is life
And strength & breath,
And the want
Of thought is death;
17Then am I
A happy fly,
If I live
Or if I die.
13-16 If… death]
'Thought is life
And strength & breath;
But the want
Of thought is death.'
MS. Book 1st rdg. del.
The Tyger
1Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
5In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?
Engraved on a single plate from the first draft of the poem on pp. 109, 108 (reversed) of the MS. Book. The MS. readings, too numerous to be readily intelligible in footnotes, are given in full in the appended note on the different versions of 'The Tyger.' This poem was first printed in ordinary type in Malkin's Father's Memoirs (1806), p. xxxix, from a copy probably supplied by Blake himself, which exhibits an important variant reading of the last line of the third stanza. An early corrupt version also appeared in Cunningham's Lives of the British Painters (1830), ii. 144.
2 forests] forest Malk., Cunn., R1; Thro' the desarts Chas. Lamb (quoting from memory, in a letter to Bernard Barton, May 15, 1824).4 Could frame] Framed Cunn., DGR, WMR (2nd version).6 Burnt] Burned Cunn., DGR., WMR (2nd version); burn'd Wilk.the] that DGR, WMR (2nd version).fire] fervour Cunn., R1.of] within DGR, WMR (2nd version).7, 8 dare] dared DGR, WMR (and version).
