Blake felt that the establishment of his time destroys love and goodness, but they also destroy nature by taking over the country side and destroying it, as in the poem “London”; “Thy life Thames’ waters flow” this strongly portrays a picture of England’s natural imagery, which has also been corrupted by society. Not only does Blake feel that establishment corrupted love, “The Sick Rose” but it has also engulfed the natural and beautiful world as in the poem “London”, “In every voice, in every ban, the mind-forged manacles I hear” in Blake’s mind these ‘manacles’ represented institution which control’s people’s thoughts and minds, they are symbolic of how contemporary life shackles the mind and Blake infers how people have become enslaved by their own creation of society and institutionalism. Within the poem “London” wandering is a term used to show the way in which modern day man has lost all sense of identity and real being. Here, Blake describes himself in a city, London, which was commonly known as the center of the empire. For Blake, London is the center of England’s problems and it acts to fuel Blake’s hatred towards tyranny - the home of the monarchy, the centre of industry and an unnatural habitat. His anger leads him into repetitions, which dominate the structure of the poem “London” – “the every cry of every Man… the Infant's cry of fear… in every voice, in every ban.”
Blake’s use of list-like structures in his work serves to emphasise his views to a larger degree. During the first two lines of “London” the repetition of the word “chartered” creates a strong sense of regulation; the repetition drums his hatred into the reader, allowing us to gain a greater understanding and appreciation of his emotion. It is the “chartered” living that Blake despises.
“How the Chimney-sweeper's cry, Every black'ning Church appalls;” The young Chimneysweeper is a comprehensible reflection as to the way the world is being treated. The chimneysweeper works among the waste-dirt of the “Black'ning Church”. “Black'ning” is a verb of incessant duration for Blake, showing the ever degraded and poorly run church, it also conveys what Blake sees as the corruption of innocence. The image of the chimneysweeper – serves this purpose also as black (evil & corruption) and the child (innocence) are juxtaposed; the imagery used also evokes visions of fire, child slave labour is thus another damning indictment on his society. The juxtaposition of black and the church also infers Blake’s resentment and distrust of the Church – which is another image of innocence and goodness blackened – corrupted. In the majority of Blake's poems, there are phrases like this, which exploit the hatred that William Blake has for the Church and tyranny.
Arguably because of Blake’s hatred of tyranny, he had an undying love for freedom liberty and everything that symbolised it. His love of liberty could have been a rebel reaction to society’s enslaving “manacles”. This is evident in his poems from Songs of Innocence. One in particular is the poem ‘Spring’ in which Blake expresses his feelings for the natural world and all that lies within it, particularly animals and young children. The simple title ‘Spring’ suggests new beginnings. It talks about “little girl” and “little boy” giving hope to the modern world. This simple language is used to make a clear point; giving simplicity into new life and the images of innocence, the boy and girl serve to enhance his point – that a return to innocence will eliminate tyranny and corruption thus liberating the soul of “manacled” humanity.
“Sound the flute, now its mute” the flute represents the modern bustle and noise which is being drowned out by “birds delight” showing that nature can be such a powerful force that it can drown out anything that gets in the way of its freedom, in this case, modern culture and industrialisation. Alliteration within the poem such as “sweet and small” and “cock does crow” strengthens Blake’s point on how the simplest of things can give life and hope to anything, the words have a jubilant quality, which emphasize the goodness of them and of their suppression of tyranny.
In the poem “The Echoing Green” Blake attempts to portray his image of a day that has been left alone by the tyranny of the modern world. The natural world is seen as uplifting and to all that experience it “make happy the skies.” The rhyming is in couplets to give a sense of well being and joy to the poem; this structure also emphasizes the order and grace that is imbued in the natural world. The poem then mentions how this scene was much the same in the past: “such were the joys” and how childhood moves on: “in our youth-time were seen”. In Blake’s mind, the sun and the coming of the day is beautiful and spiritual, showing bare nature. The night can be clearly seen as a way of ending all joy, and even life “No more can be merry, the sun does descend and our sports have an end.” Here the classic images of light and darkness are used to represent good and evil. This was Blake’s love of nature, the day and all that come with it but darkness came along with the industrial revolution, and the denaturing of England’s countryside, something that William Blake cherished.
Through Blake’s poems we can see that he was a man full of inspiration and undying hope. Songs of Innocence and Experience gives us an image of an incredible man’s views on the world that he was part of and, ultimately, paradoxically, loved but also detested. His utter hatred of the industrialised world as he knew it was relieved in his eccentric visionary ways and his idealistic views on the natural world as vividly portrayed in his poetry – particularly in “Songs of Innocence and Experience”. Blake celebrates liberty in his poetry often using the image of innocence to do this. A radical opponent of Industrialisation and other factors that penetrated the society of his day such as imperialism, he attacks the tyranny wreaked by the institutions of the Church and Government in particular in his poetry using the vivid and heartfelt imagery for which he is now famed. It his perhaps his vehement hatred of the evils of the Establishment that drove him to rebel against it in a celebration of liberty through his poetry.
