Willow Locke - Anarchist Detective

There is No Natural Religion

Ayala walked to work in the luminous morning. She wore the beautiful forget-me-not dress that Yaakov had bought for her. The fabric swirled around her as she walked. A tuft of poplar down caught in her lace cuff, and she lightly brushed it off. Her new black boots clicked smartly on the sidewalk. Her dark hair was clean and soft, it flowed in waves down her shoulders. She sang snatches of the song she had heard the chanteuse singing at the Orpheus Ascendant with Yaakov.

All that I ask is love,
All that I want is you,
And I swear by all the stars, I'll be forever true.
To greatest heights or lowest depths, I'd go to be with you.

The poplar down swirled all around her in a great cloud. The little tufts caught the rosy morning light. It looked like snow.
She felt renewed. She could face the blouse factory today. It was difficult but it was just work after all. She would get through the day, as she got through every day. And eventually, as Mr. Blanck had said, things would change. Nothing was permanent. Talia had left the blouse factory, and it was only a matter of time before she would leave too. Reuven's injuries had cost him a day's wages, but that was all. The union had protected him. Although he was still in pain, he was on his feet and had left for work early.
She wasn't sure that she loved Yaakov, although he had been so kind. There had been progress at least. Some wall had broken down and he had revealed himself. Now they were communicating directly, not through letters, not through Reuven. She felt like she had a choice in the matter instead of feeling that her fate was controlled by abstract plans made by others on her behalf.
She felt a new certainty, somehow matters would be resolved. People were looking out for her interests. Yaakov, Rueven, Talia, even Mr. Blanck cared in his own way. She just needed some more time to let things unfold. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to be married to Yaakov.
She loved the emptiness of the city at dawn. She looked northward through the arch and up the broad expanse of Fifth Avenue. Two years ago it had been just another cramped city street covered with a perpetual layer of mud and horse manure. But with the advent of Ford's motor car, the city had undertaken a project to widen it. All of the haphazard wooden buildings on Fifth Avenue had been leveled, the sidewalks had been torn up, the street was cleared and new cobbles were laid. Now the polished cobbles glistened in the light of dawn. The renovation was proof against the usual filth of the streets. The layer of muck didn't accumulate again on the new Fifth Avenue. There at least, pristine new black Model-Ts were beginning to outnumber horses. There was only one Model-T on Fifth Avenue this early. A cab waiting for customers. Ayala could see the cab driver asleep behind the wheel of the parked car.
The early morning light reflected off the buildings. Grids of windows projected their images onto the cobbles below in luminous geometry. The growing cloud of poplar down hung motionless in the air above the reflected shapes. It looked like some kind of system; as if the poplar down was the transmission of an encoded message, one for her and her alone. This moment belonged to no one but her. She didn't know what the future held, but now, at least, she felt that the choice was hers to make.

************************************
When James and Willow arrived 10 minutes early to their English Literature class and sat down at a table near the front, Professor Lane was transcribing a series of arguments onto the chalkboard. He occasionally referred to an ancient illustrated folio which he kept on his desk. He only touched the book with his left hand, upon which he wore a cotton glove to protect the crumbling pages from the oils in his fingers.
"Good morning, Locke, Whitcomb," he said as he wrote the last few lines of his transcription. Willow opened her bag and arranged her new notebook and Dixon Tigonderoga on her desk. She opened the notebook to the homework Professor Lane had assigned; an analysis of the rhythm of several of Blake's poems. She checked through her work, scanning it with the point of her pencil. She had found several lines where the structure of the poem suggested unnatural emphasis. Blake's rhyme of "eye" and "symmetry" suggested an unnatural pronunciation of the latter. She wondered how Professor Lane would pronounce it. Perhaps in Blake's time the words had actually rhymed. She shaped the words under her breath, trying to understand the structure.
"And how are you finding your studies?" Professor Lane addressed both of them. "Do you like Blake?"
It was almost time for class to begin, and more students began filtering into the classroom.
"Very much, sir," answered James.
"And you, Locke?" asked Professor Lane. "How are you finding it?"
"It's perplexing," said Willow. "I can't tell the difference-" she hesitated.
"Yes?" asked Professor Lane. "Go on."
"I can't tell the difference between Blake's beliefs and his experiences. He writes about angels not as symbols or ideas, but as though he were interacting with them."
"Ah, yes," said Professor Lane, picking up the illustrated folio with his gloved hand. "You've touched on the central problem of Blake."
He held the folio up for Willow and James to see. Willow read the title painted in Blake's serpentine, branching calligraphy:
"There is No Natural Religion"
The edges of the folio were illuminated with the image of a tree, its knotted limbs seemed to writhe on the page. A nude man and woman lay among the tree roots, their backs arched with an inexorable current of sensation. The woman's splayed toes clutched at the branching roots.
"Human beings," began Professor Lane in an oratorical style that signaled class had begun, "Human beings are entangled. They cannot free their spirits from their perceptions. They cannot free their perceptions from their bodies. Their limits and shortcomings hint at their limitlessness."
Professor Lane turned to the chalkboard and continued. "William Blake described this paradox in his philosophical treatise, 'There is No Natural Religion,' I've written some of it out for you on the chalkboard, and I'd like you to recopy it."
There was a flurry of activity as students opened their notebooks and began writing. A few students were still arriving, and they rushed to their seats to get started. Willow looked up at the chalkboard and began to copy the text into her notebook.

There Is No Natural Religion
Man's perceptions are not bounded by organs of perception; he perceives more than
sense can discover.
Reason, or the ratio of all we have already known, is not the same that it shall be
when we know more.
The bounded is loathed by its possessor. The same dull round even of a universe
would soon become a mill with complicated wheels.
If any could desire what he is incapable of possessing, despair must be his eternal
lot.
The desire of Man being Infinite, the possession is Infinite & himself Infinite.
Application. He who sees the Infinite in all things sees God. He who sees the Ratio
only sees himself only.
Therefore God becomes as we are, that we may be as he is.

"Man's perceptions," said Professor Lane, "Are entangled with the infinite. The quotidian, the tangible, the world we perceive, is edged with infinity. We sense it outside of the capacity of our 'organs of sense.' Blake argues that we must push beyond our bounded senses to find the mysterious symmetry between God and Man."
Professor Lane had said the word "symmetry" in the ordinary way, not with the Blakean emphasis. He collected the homework and lead the class in a discussion on "There is no Natural Religion." He asked the class to come up with their own descriptions for Blake's concepts and create allegorical arguments. Willow drew in her notebook with her Dixon Ticonderoga over the course of the discussion. She was drawing Blake's man and woman, entangled in the tree, their fingers and toes knotted in the roots and branches.