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In his own words

The Clod and the Pebble

William Blake · 1757-1827 · From Songs of Experience (1794)

"Love seeketh not itself to please, Nor for itself hath any care,But for another gives it ease, And builds a heaven in hell's despair."
So sang a little clod of clay, Trodden with the cattle's feet,But a pebble of the brook Warbled out these metres meet:
"Love seeketh only Self to please, To bind another to its delight,Joys in another's loss of ease, And builds a hell in heaven's despite."

Two definitions of love, from a trodden clod of clay and a hard little pebble. Blake lets both stand and takes no side.

The poems are in the public domain. The texts here follow Poems of William Blake, Project Gutenberg ebook 574, reproduced verbatim, punctuation included. That late 19th century text keeps the famous Tyger spelling while smoothing some others, so a few lines read slightly differently than in Blake's original etched plates. Songs of Innocence first appeared in 1789, Songs of Experience in 1794, combined by Blake into one book whose title page promises to show the two contrary states of the human soul. The introductions and groupings are ours.