Notes for Marriage of Heaven and Hell

Blake’s Revolution
I) Do away with restraint in all forms
A) Humans created “Religion” and then allowed it to enslave them (Plate 11, 189)
i) The “Priesthood” tells us that “the Gods had ordered such things”—i.e. we are enslav’d by the gods
that we in fact created
ii) “Thus man forgot that All deities reside in the human breast” (189)
B) 4th Memorable Fancy (plate 17, 192)
i) stable (Jesus) -> Church (institution) -> Vault (burial of Jesus and true religion) -> Mill (grinding
machine = Reason = systematic philosophy) -> Winding Caverns (maze of rationalism) -> Abyss
(emptiness of spirituality)
ii) This journey leads to a cliché of Christian Hell (193-194)
iii) Angel returns to his mill and the “vision” vanishes
(a) “The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water & breeds reptiles of the mind”
II) Reason (and the Systems it produces) as a form of Restraint (i.e. Mechanism)
A) The Voice of the Devil (plate 4, 185)
B) How God and Satan switched places (plate 3, 185)
i) “Without Contraries is no progression”—but contraries are too much for small minds; therefore
ii) from these contraries “spring what the religious call Good & Evil”
iii) “Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained; and the restrainer or
reason usurps its place & governs the unwilling” (plate 5, 186)
III) Obedience and Restraint—The Greatest Enemies
A) “The crow wish’d every thing was black, the owl that every thing was white” (plate 10, 189)—conformity
B) “The eagle never lost so much time as when he submitted to learn of the crow” (plate 8, 188)
C) “He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence” (plate 7, 187)
D) “For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his own cavern” (plate 14,
191)
IV) Solution? a Marriage of Heaven and Hell
A) Restore the Energy of Hell (which is really the Energy of Heaven)
i) The Proverbs of Hell (plate 7ff, 187ff)
ii) How do we restore the energy?
(a) Admit the power of the lions and eagles: “When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of
Genius” (plate 9, 188): eagles, lions, tigers, etc. fierce, independent, powerful, sublime, non-
conforming, ambitious, uncontrollable
(b) Do not restrain them: “One Law for the Lion & Ox is oppression” (plate 24, 196)
B) When restraints are lifted . . . we achieve a seeing that goes beyond perception and becomes visionary
i) “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite” (plate 14,
191)
ii) Isaiah the prophet on true prophecy: “I saw no God, nor heard any, in a finite organical perception; but
my senses discover’d the infinite in everything” (plate 12, 189)
iii) The true greatness of the world:
How do you know but ev’ry Bird that cuts the airy way,

English 467 1
 Is an immense world of delight, clos’d by your senses five? (plate 7, 187)

English 467 2