Jerusalem: Notes

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Blake's most famous lines, which introduce his long exploration of Milton and his influence, are not the simple expression of jingoistic patriotism which they are sometimes represented as being. Behind the poem stands Blake's sense of Milton's picture of God and of Satan, a picture which, Blake feels, had separated Man, England, Creation into warring fractions, with the enrgy/evil of Satan demonised out of notions of God and the 'Good'. The awkening of 'Albion' (a composite term for Blake, combining ancient Man within Everyman, but also 'England') would be brought about through an apocalyptic reawakening and, from this, the possiblility of re-entrance to wholeness. In this extract, as within much of Blake's verse, there remains the passionate view of England, and London in particular, as Jerusalem, the 'Primitive Seat of Patriarchal Religion', and of Jesus dwelling not only in the political State, but in the "state" of all citizens, i.e., within each Man. Blake's vision is, as the above suggests, often difficult to apprehend, except in its basic simplicity: God, Man and State now live in parts, but can be restored to wholeness, within the terms of Blake's elaborate mythological vision.



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