What Can We Learn of Blake’s View of Nature from the Introduction of Innocence and Experience?

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Within both poems Blake uses nature to symbolise his view on the world and changes to the society he lived in. He creates links between both poems whilst depicting a change from an uncultivated image of nature within his introduction to Innocence to a sense of desperation to restore the Earth to its natural form in Experience. Blake’s introduction to Innocence opens with an image of some ‘valleys wild’ with reference to ‘a song about a lamb’. This indicates the untouched, pure scene in which no human influence has yet been inflicted and introduces religious imagery which Blake states to create ‘pleasant glee’. The image of a lamb may depict vulnerability and rebirth and, as this has connotations with new life and purity which links to childhood innocence, therefore foreshadows his vision of a child ‘on a cloud’ – also signifying religious imagery as the child can be interpreted as a cherub figure. However the presence of the ‘lamb’ may suggest sacrifice, especially of nature which Blake may link to the key of happiness, and the disregard for the environment and religion society will indulge to feed its growing appreciation of materialism and wealth. The ‘cloud’ also introduces the sense of a temporary condition as it could disperse thus alike the state of childhood innocence. The tone of the poem changes within the fourth stanza as the child ‘vanished from sight’ showing the change from innocence to experience. The change implies that Blake believes society is losing sight of religion which emphasises the importance of nature. This further represented as the voice ‘plucked a hollow read’, showing the destruction of nature to create human happiness and ‘I stained the water clear’ shows the actions are tainting and the difficulty of remaining neutral in civilization thus tending towards experience. In addition, within the introduction to Experience, the

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