"The Sun glow'd fiery red! The furious Terrors flew around On golden chariots, raging with red wheels, dropping with blood! The Lions lash their wrathful tails! The Tigers couch upon the prey and suck the ruddy tide; And Enitharmon groans and cries in anguish and dismay.
Then Los arose: his head he reared, in snaky thunders clad; And with a cry that shook all Nature to the utmost pole, Called all his sons to the strife of blood."
Blake was very sanguine. He had endured the rude shock of the Reign of Terror, and though he had thrown aside the red cap, he was determined to see in these horrors nothing but the grim accompaniments of every regenerating process. Enitharmon, once awake after her long sleep, would call together the sweet ministers of melodious songs. Ethinthus, Queen of Waters, Manatha-Varcyon on her golden wings, Leutha, soft soul of flowers, Antamon, Prince of the Pearly Dew, "all were forth at sport beneath the solemn moon, waking the stars of Urizen with their immortal songs; that Nature felt thro' all her pores the enormous revelry, till Morning opened the eastern gates."
_Europe_ has for frontispiece one of Blake's most famous designs--_The Ancient of Days_. The vision was seen against the dark gloom of the upper story of his Lambeth house. Its real ground lay in the Book of Proverbs. Wisdom says: "When He prepared the heavens, I was there: when He set a compass upon the face of the depth ... then I was by Him, as one brought up with Him."[3]
The author of the Proverbs looks back to the first creation, which God saw to be very good. Blake looks forward to the new. What if all around are dark clouds? Yet the Ancient of Days is in an orb of light, and He is stooping down and measuring the deep with His compasses. Nothing can stay His hand. The upheaval of Europe, involving the world, is the prelude to the new creation when the Almighty's vision for His universe shall be fulfilled.
_Europe_ touches the limit of Blake's rebellion. During the next thirty years history was to comment on the French Revolution in a way that was not his in his impetuous prophetic books. He was to learn that rebellion is a road to wisdom because it is a species of excess. Excess teaches a man to know what is enough, and when Blake knew the exact value of rebellion he was prepared to read the Past afresh, and find that its treasury contained priceless jewels that he never even suspected, while he was passionately searching for some new thing.