The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

Only Plates 2-3, “The Argument,” and Plates 25-27, “A Song of Liberty,” are poetry. The remainder of the work is in prose. “The Argument” is a free-verse poem. It is divided into six stanzas of uneven length. The first stanza consists of two unrhymed lines. These lines are repeated as a refrain as the last two lines of the poem. The four unrhymed stanzas in between are of six lines, five lines, three lines, and four lines. The imagery shows how the “just man” (Plate 1) brings life, where before there was only death. The “vale of death” (Plate 1) and its “thorns” (Plate 1) and “barren heath” (Plate 1) give way to images of nature’s beauty and abundance—roses and honey bees, river, and spring. This new situation is disturbed when the “villain” (Plate 1) and “sneaking serpent” (Plate 1) enter the picture, driving the just man back into the wilderness.

“A Song of Liberty” is in a different form: a list of numbered verses. The lines are much longer, resembling biblical lines and verses. This is the same line length that Blake used in many of his Prophetic Books.