The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell begins and ends with evocations of the revolutionary spirit, inspired by the early days of the French Revolution and the American Revolutionary War. By 1790, the year Blake began writing The Marriage, the old order in France had fallen. Feudal rights and the nobility itself had been abolished, and France’s National Constituent Assembly had adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen.

As news of these developments reached London, Blake was on fire with enthusiasm. In “The Argument” at the beginning of The Marriage, Rintrah, who “roars and shakes his fires in the burden’d air” (Plate 1) is an embodiment of the wrath of rebellion. Blake hoped the revolution would spread to England, where it had many sympathizers, and he returned to the topic at the end of his book, in “A Song of Liberty.” In this song, the old oppressive rulers try to destroy Orc, the spirit of revolution. They hurl him “thro’ the starry night” (Verse 10), but the fire he embodies is heading for London: “The fire, the fire, is falling! / Look up! Look up! O citizen of London, enlarge thy countenance!” (Verses 11-12).

For Blake, political revolution went hand in hand with spiritual revolution; they were two sides of the same coin.