Poems by Blake: The Divine Image; The Human Abstract – Class 12 English Chapter 8 Notes & NCERT PDF

About the Poet: William Blake (1757–1827)

William Blake was a poet, painter and engraver. He abhorred the rationalism and materialism of his times. What he saw and painted were human beings beset with evil, yet striving for the divine within them.

His lyrics appeared in two sets of volumes: Songs of Innocence (from which The Divine Image is taken) and Songs of Experience (from which The Human Abstract is taken), representing the two contrary states of the human soul. Most poems in the first volume have counterparts in the second.

A note tells us Blake published his poetry in a very unusual way: he personally manufactured each copy. The verses were not typeset but, together with their illustrations, were cut into copper plates, and he coloured the pages in water colours. So Blake can be called the first multi-media artist.

Poem I: The Divine Image (Song of Innocence)

To Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

All pray in their distress;

In distress, everyone prays to the four virtues — Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love — and thanks them afterwards. These virtues are God our father dear, and they are also Man, his child and care. God and the human being share the same divine qualities.

For Mercy has a human heart,

Pity a human face,

And Love, the human form divine,

And Peace, the human dress.

Each virtue takes a human shape: Mercy lives in the human heart, Pity shows itself in the human face, Love in the whole human form, which is therefore divine, and Peace is the human dress. So every person of every clime who prays in distress is really praying to the human form divine. Therefore all must love the human form, whether in heathen, Turk or Jew:

Where Mercy, Love, and Pity dwell

There God is dwelling too.

Idea: in the state of innocence, the human being is the image of God; divinity is found in human kindness, whatever one's religion.

Poem II: The Human Abstract (Song of Experience)

Pity would be no more

If we did not make somebody Poor;

And Mercy no more could be

If all were as happy as we.

This is the counterpart to The Divine Image, spoken from experience. The same virtues are now shown as distorted. Pity exists only because we make people poor; Mercy only because others are less happy than we are. Peace comes from mutual fear, until selfish loves increase.

Then Cruelty knits a snare and spreads baits. He sits down with holy fears and waters the ground with tears; Humility takes root under his foot — false humility grows from cruelty. Soon the dismal shade of Mystery spreads over his head, and the Caterpillar and Fly feed on it. The tree bears the fruit of Deceit, ruddy and sweet to eat, and the Raven makes its nest in its thickest shade.

The Gods of the earth and sea

Sought thro' Nature to find this Tree;

But their search was all in vain:

There grows one in the Human Brain.

The gods searched all of Nature for this tree, but it does not grow in Nature — it grows in the human brain. Evil, deceit and hypocrisy are products of the human mind.

The Two Poems Together

Literary Devices & Form

Word Power

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