In The Republic, Plato says our souls are divided into three parts, the reasoning part, the part that feels ashamed or angered, and the appetitive part. He then tells us the example of the charioteer and his two horses. One of the horses was good, and the other bad. These horses were supposed to represent parts of the soul. I suggest reading Plates 3 & 4 in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell because they tell about what Blake believes of the soul and body. Are Plato and William Blake relaying the same overall message about good and bad/evil? If not what are the differences in their themes of their respective texts.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Heaven and Hell
William Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell constantly compares heaven and hell and always relates them to each other. Blake concludes that if there is a good, there is also an evil comparison. "Good is the passive that obeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy.Good is Heaven. Evil is Hell" (xvi). Notice that "Reason" and "Energy" are both capitalized and he intends his audience to view Reason as good or heaven and Energy as evil or hell. William even states that evil and good are inside all of us and relate to the five senses we have. Is Blake trying to instill the same message that Plato did in The Republic, that humans are divided into parts of good and evil, and how we react to these parts decides how we think?
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In The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Blake addresses the differences between human reason and human emotion as Plato does in the Republic. I think it is important to note however, that while Plato gives us a philosophical dialogue, what Blake presents is an art form. As such, different interpretations of his work are encouraged. Plato, however, makes a clear argument and, through the character of Phaedrus, shows the reader that his (Plato’s) argument is the only logical one. Blake presents his argument regarding human reason and desires, which essentially aligns with Plato’s, in a manner that invites discussion and even criticism.
ReplyDeleteI got a different impression from reading The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Yes, Blake and Plato both discuss the components of the body and soul, and how that relates to good and evil. However, Blake's message is much different from Plato's. Plato says the bad part of us(namely desire) must be restrained, and we should use reason alone. Blake, on the other hand, says restraining our desire is what's wrong, and what many have called the devil and hell has in fact been wrongly condemned. In plate 4, he calls Energy Evil, and then states that "Energy is eternal delight." Blake says we shouldn't repress our desires at all. In the Proverbs of Hell he says that one should "sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires." Other anecdotes throughout indicate angels being naive or oppressive, while devils are liberating us. Blake's philosophy is in fact a marriage of heaven and hell, because he claims that elements of both are important and good.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of having good and evil in the human beings reminds me with the story of "Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" written by Robert Stevenson. It shows the impossibility of separating the good from the evil in the human being. It is possible that one may control the other, but it is not rational to divide them from each other. The character at the end of the story dies because he tries to separate his good from his evil. Same with Hell and Heaven, freedom and rules, or desires and restrictions. Just like what Berkley suggests, an idea is connected to several other ideas and it is difficult to separate it from the rest, hell and heaven are the same.
ReplyDeleteI think Blake uses so many contradictions in his piece of work. He does not emphasize one part on another but leaves the readers to choose and decide.
I think your point about viewing Blake's work as an art form is interesting, Sally. But I think that rather than opening up the interpretation of his philosophy, Blake's art reinforces his points further. We can see this especially in the images that surround the text. For instance, on Plates 3 and 4, the drawings of people in hell follow the text closely, emphasizing the "eternal delight" of hell by depicting figures who seem to enjoy and almost become one with the flames licking at their bodies. The overall feeling of movement conveyed by the images on Plate 3 - the flowing lines of the fire, outstretched limbs of the woman giving birth, and the elongated bodies of the running figures - serves to strengthen Blake's emphasis on the idea of the energy of evil. This combination of linguistic and visual messages works to more powerfully express his personal philosophy to the viewer.
ReplyDeletePlato and Blake both introduce the idea of good versus bad, which Plato defines as reason being the good and desire being the bad in us. However, I agree with Jennifer in that Blake and Plato have distinct principles they are trying to convey. While Plato’s philosophy of reason is concrete, Blake’s representation of the good and evil is more conceptual. A good representation would be Blake’s belief that Hell is a place for unrepressed desire, where “energy is the only life and is from the Body and Reason is the bound our outward circumference of energy.” It seems that Blake is trying to highlight his beliefs against the conventional moral standard set by society, which during the time was falling apart by the ongoing French Revolution. Its adequate to state however that to Blake this unrepressed energy and reason must exist together for “Without contraries is no progression.” Furthermore, it’s seen that Blake tries to reconcile these two elements much through the art form, but more importantly through the Proverbs of Hell in Plates 7-10. Seemingly paradoxical, they are superb examples of Blake’s credo concerning good and bad.
ReplyDeleteBlake is trying to redefine the way we think about the concepts of body and soul. This definition differs from what Plato proposes. For instance, Blake writes about errors that body and soul are "two real existing principles" and that "God will torment Man in Eternity" if he follows his energies or desires as Plato would label them. What Blake thinks, and this seems to go against what AJ suggests, is that separating body and soul is worthless. This is closer to the marriage that Sally mentions, since he is not encouraging us to give up either, but to use both to our best advantage. Blake illustrates this by highlighting both the inconsistencies in Milton and the way in which he described heaven and hell in Paradise Lost, thereby showing that they depend on each other and that giving up either is unfavorable.
ReplyDeleteAt first when I read The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, the quote AJ brought up, "Good is the passive that obeys Reason, Evil is the active springing from Energy", I thought of Plato too. It seems like a similar division of the soul into desire and reason. However, on plate four it becomes clear that Blake has a different interpretation of this division. He states that "energy is the only life", implying that desire is what life should be based on, not reason. Later Blake says how reason should not restrain desire, because "those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained". Having strong desires and acting on them is essential to life. This directly contradicts Plato's view that reason should always constrain desire.
ReplyDeleteOn the question of whether the soul can be divided into good and evil parts, and whether our reactions to this division impact the way we think, Blake and Plato certainly agree. However, Blake believes that "Without Contraries is no progression," whereas Plato believes that there is a specific manner in which one must progress and that progression can only be achieved be denying all things contrary to this manner. I find it interesting that Blake titles the section that discusses the "eternal delight" of hell the "The Voice of the Devil." This emphasizes that both good and bad can be involved in attaining knowledge; Blake echoes the ideas of the Devil and uses them to build arguments.
ReplyDeleteI think AJ's comparison of Plato's Phaedrus and Blake's The Marriage of Heaven and Hell is really thought-provoking. Both separate the soul into good and evil, restraint and desire, reason and unreason. However, I think Plato heavily emphasizes that humans must use restraint to suppress evil desires in order to reach a higher truth. Conversely, Blake recognizes the beauty, necessity, and importance of evil, sin, and desire. He says, "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," (xvi). This portrays reason as oppressive and negative. He goes on to talk about the giants that formed the world, saying they, "the causes of its life & the sources of all activity...live in chains...but the chains are the cunning of weak and tame minds which have power to resist energy, according to the proverb, the weak in courage is strong in cunning," (xxiii). Here, Blake again emphasizes that the weak in courage are able to restrain desire and passion through reason, imprisoning the sensual, active creators of life and the world. Blake goes on to say that, "no virtue can exist without breaking these ten commandments. Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules," (xxvii). Blake recognizes the virtue of so-called "evil." Reason and rules cannot dictate actions and lead to a full, rewarding, and meaningful life. He describes the "Bible of Hell," indicating that one can learn and gain from Hell just as one can learn and gain from the conventional Bible of Heaven.
ReplyDeleteI think that it is correct to say that both Blake and Plato believe there are good and bad qualities in us, but not necessarily in terms of parts. As some have mentioned before, Blake does not believe that body is separate from the soul. In fact, he believes that "every thing that lives is holy." He suggests that we contain in ourselves all the spiritual energy in the form of imagination and desire, as apposed to Plato who suggest that we seek separate Platonic Forms of truth. Also, while Plato sees reason as the ultimate attainable goal, Blake sees "energy as eternal delight" and that we should strive to not remain passive. He seems to imply that with just reason this is the tendency and he writes "The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, and breeds reptiles of the mind."
ReplyDeleteI think that Plato assumes certain aspects are holy and divine, but Blake does not assume either. He mocks the standard belief by reversing everything with his Proverbs of Hell. Even when we quote those to aim at his philosophy, we must be careful, because Proverbs of Hell does not necessarily mean completely evil or wrong. I like what Fatema says about letting the reader decide, but I feel like it is almost not a decision, but an emotional reaction to the visual and verbal imagery.
ReplyDeleteI think we could gain some insight into the similarities and differences between Plato and Blake's position regarding the primacy of reason and logic just through the narrative style Blake uses. He makes heavy use of exclamations, extreme imagery and illustrations in the book, which call up emotional responses in themselves rather than necessarily provoking rational thought at first sight. That observation reinforces the idea that Plato restricts emotion and desire from ideal rational decisionmaking and dialogue, whereas Blake does not hesitate to call upon both rationality and emotionality. That is relevant because emotional thought processes are often considered unwise and malicious in much of Plato's work (except for divine madness), whereas they remain of great importance for goodness in Blake's work.
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