great chain
William Blake was a member of a social class with a long history of radical dissent. The Artisan class which he, as the son of a hosier, was born into and consequently remained in as an engraver later in his life, had opposed in turn first the landed mercantile aristocracy in the late eighteenth century and then the emerging industrial capitalism of the early nineteenth. However, in order to determine whether Blake's visionary world had any relevance to the political realities of the period it is necessary to briefly outline what these were. Whilst history usually records these as the emergence of rationalism, utilitarianism, science in a form we now recognise, and political economy, it is precisely because these forces were destined to eventually become the core values of contemporary society that we must beware of recording them as the only significant movements of the time-victors always have the privilege of writing history to suit themselves. In the London of the 1780's that Blake lived in there was, in reaction to the spread of the aforementioned values, an explosion of anti-rationalism with a re-emergence of illuminism, masonic rituals, animal magnetism, millenarian speculation and mysticism with the formation of severa
He began to hold the view that revolution must be in the minds of the people, rather than in a political sense and that The Fall and The Redemption must also be explained in a spiritual sense. Poetry was to be "a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings" as Wordsworth had it. As time passed however, Blake and his contemporaries grew more and more disillusioned with the revolution as it became more and more bloody, and Robespierre's rule became known as The Terror. However, when exploring the question of Blake'spolitical relevance, it is worth remembering that Blake called his ~Universal Man" 'Albion'; clearly as a representation of England and the imaginative power that is 'Urthona' in Eden becomes 'Los~ in the fallen world, the artisan poet who is in conflict with "Urizen" the master architect of capitalism. It is possible to see the biblical fall being used only as a metaphor. He was most concerned with the biblical plot of The Fall, humanity in the fallen world, redemption and the promise of a return to Eden and the creation of a New Jerusalem. The original aims of creating a just and equal society and aiding other countries who wished to do so became submerged in conquest and totalitarianism and eventually the Romantic Movement as a whole was forced to re-examine its beliefs. New factions of religious belief were also growing and Blake is known to have been actively involved in the setting up of The Church of The New Jerusalem which was a millenarian group who believed that the apocalypse and the creation of God's kingdom on earth was imminent. " In HolY Thursday Blake's indignation at this state of affairs becomes apparent. Millenarianists took the rebellion of the American colonies and the French Revolution as signs of the prophesied New Age in the Bible which was to last for a thousand years before Christ would come again and create 'a new Heaven and a new Earth. Whether Blake's visions were literal, laudunum induced, or fabricated purely to challenge and provoke is debatable and much disputed. Daughter of Beulah, SingHis fall into Division and his Resurrection to Unity.
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Acceptance Essays
