Saturday, June 09, 2018

Jerusalem (Anthem)

Have the English quite paid attention to the words when they sing their unofficial national anthem?

And did those feet in ancient time,
Walk upon Englands mountains green:
And was the holy Lamb of God,
On Englands pleasant pastures seen!

And did the Countenance Divine,
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here,
Among these dark Satanic Mills?

Bring me my Bow of burning gold;
Bring me my Arrows of desire:
Bring me my Spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariot of fire!

I will not cease from Mental Fight,
Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand:
Till we have built Jerusalem,
In Englands green & pleasant Land.


They are insane, yes; Did Jesus visit England? NO! William Blake, who penned them was insane. I will not cease from Mental Fight, what do you think he's talking about there, Anglos? Okay, we knew Blake was nuts. I refer rather to the complete sexual innuendo and euphemism used by Blake. 
According to my amateur's research "pasture," even "mountains" were a pretty common sexual trope by 1804. Something about nature gave them wood. "Pioneer of nature" was euphemism for penis in 1653. And here's Robert Burns in 1786:

Yon Wild Mossy Mountains

Yon wild mossy mountains sae lofty and wide, 
That nurse in their bosom the youth o' the Clyde, 
Where the grouse lead their coveys thro' the heather to feed, 
And the shepherd tends his flock as he pipes on his reed. 

Not Gowrie's rich valley, nor Forth's sunny shores, 
To me hae the charms o'yon wild, mossy moors; 
For there, by a lanely, sequestered stream, 
Besides a sweet lassie, my thought and my dream. 

Amang thae wild mountains shall still be my path, 
Ilk stream foaming down its ain green, narrow strath; 
For there, wi' my lassie, the day lang I rove, 
While o'er us unheeded flie the swift hours o'love. 

There is something about "green" as well but I don't understand it. In 1796 Napoleon wrote to Josephine rhapsodizing about her "little black forest."

"Pleasant." Pleasant pastures, pleasant land. Almost 500 years earlier Chaucer, wrote in the woman's voice, in The Tale of the Wife of Bath:

Namely a bedde hadden they meschaunce;
Ther wolde I chide and do hem no plesaunce,

(Especially in bed had they mischance,
There would I chide and give them no pleasance)

"Burning" is obvious.

"Gold." I.e. blonde.

For ilka birss upon her cunt, Was worth a ryal ransom.
-Burns, late 18th Century

"Arrows of desire;" "Spear." "Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand."




"O clouds legs unfold!"

And, there is this note in Wikipedia on the anthem:

The original text is found in the preface Blake wrote for inclusion with Milton, a Poem, following the lines beginning "The Stolen and Perverted Writings of Homer & Ovid: of Plato & Cicero, which all Men ought to contemn: ..."

ANY questions, Brits? ANY at all? Stop singing that perverted thing at "ryal"weddings & etc.