Afterwards it becomes a fruitful source of spiritual corruption:—
Then were the churches, hospitals, castles, palaces,
Like nets and gins and traps to catch the joys of eternity;
And all the rest a desert,
Till like a dream, eternity was obliterated and erased.
Prior to this, however—
Antamon call'd up Leutha from her valleys of delight,
And to Mahomet a loose Bible gave.
But in the North to Odin, Sotha gave a code of war.
A gradual debasement of the human race goes on—
Till a philosophy of five senses was complete!
Urizen wept, and gave it into the hands of Newton and Locke.
Clouds roll heavy upon the Alps round Rousseau and Voltaire.
And on the mountains of Lebanon round the deceased gods of Asia,
And on the deserts of Africa round the Fallen Angels.
The Guardian Prince of Albion burns in his nightly tent!
Under the symbol of the kings of Asia, the Song describes the misery of the old philosophies and despotisms; their bitter lament and prayer that by pestilence and fire the race may be saved; 'that a remnant may learn to obey':—
The Kings of Asia heard
The howl rise up from Europe!
And each ran out from his web.
From his ancient woven den:
For the darkness of Asia was startled
At the thick-flaming, thought-creating fires of Ore.
And the Kings of Asia stood
And cried in bitterness of soul:—
'Shall not the King call for Famine from the heath?
'Nor the Priest for Pestilence from the fen?
'To restrain! to dismay! to thin,
'The inhabitants of mountain and plain!
'In the day of full-feeding prosperity,
'And the night of delicious songs?'
