Contratries In Marriage Of Heaven And Hell

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

In religion and ethics, evil refers to the morally objectionable aspects of the behavior and reasoning of human beings -- those that are deliberately void of conscience, and show a wanton penchant for destruction. In addition, evil is sometimes defined as the absence of good, which could and should be present; the absence of which is a void in what should be. Though the idea of evil is thought to be troubling, William Blake's Marriage of Heaven and Hell offers an alternative approach on dealing with suffering in the world, while also challenging orthodox Christian beliefs.

To begin with, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell is an overall study of contradictions. Without these contradictions, Blake believes that there is no progression. Blake begins early in the work to establish these inconsistencies and to him all the contradictions can basically be expressed in one contradiction that encompasses all others: good versus evil. "Without Contraries is no progression. Attraction and Repulsion, reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence. From these contraries spring what the religious call Good and Evil. Good is the passive that obeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy. Good is Heaven. Evil is Hell."

Blake states that "contraries" are crucial to the existence of man, but religion has polarized Man's dual qualities, using one side of his nature to repress the other; Christian "good" represses "evil" energy. Blake expresses this idea in several ways. It is the Devils that are witty, exciting, and always seem to have wise things to say, where as the Angels are dull. Thus, hell isn't that bad of a place compared to an awful heaven, just as expressed in the fourth "Memorable Fancy". Blake turns the traditional Christian image of fire as punishment and suffering upside down and thereby taking it back as an image of energy rather than fear. He writes of "walking among the fires of hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius, which to Angels look like torment and insanity..." and speaking with a Devil who writes with "corroding fires" of "an immense world of delight..." in the first "Memorable Fancy". In the fourth "Memorable Fancy", an Angel takes the narrator into Hell in order to convince him that his blasphemies will lead to eternal damnation, but after traversing a "fiery" landscape of destruction where the Angel leaves him, the traveler finds himself "on a pleasant bank beside a river," the previous being only illusions conjured by the Angel. And those who attempt to write of the sublime using only religious notions merely "hold a candle in the sunshine".

By doing so, Blake successfully inverts and ultimately subverts the categories of good and evil. By confusing the roles of Christ and Satan, Blake twists the thoughts of anyone who wishes to think in clear terms of good and evil. Having hidden the moral absolutes, Blake makes the reader more open to his "Proverbs of Hell". What before may have seemed over-indulgent now seem to be reasonable, because Blake has stretched the idea that the indulgence of desire is evil. Throughout the proverbs, Blake reiterates the theme: "Dip him in the river who loves water," or "if it feels good, do it."Two proverbs, "he who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence" and "the cistern contains; the fountain overflows" suggest that not only is acting on desire not evil, but such gratification is necessary to prevent the problems that suppression may cause. Restraining desires creates a cistern within, whereas satisfied desires are like a beautiful, overflowing fountain. "Expect poison from the standing water" also implies that restraint, or stagnation, is ultimately dangerous.

Orthodox religion not only fails to recognize the virtues of energy and desire, it actively seeks to repress them with reason and restraint. There are two types of men, writes Blake, the prolific, which is often seen as evil, and the devouring, often seen as good. For Blake, "These two classes of men are always upon earth, and they should be enemies; whoever tries to reconcile them seeks to destroy existence."

To further convince the reader with his arguments, Blake maintains that Jesus Christ supports this kind of division:

"Jesus Christ did not wish to unite but to separate them, as in the Parable of the sheep and the goats! & he says, `I came not to send Peace but a sword'". Blake supposes the parable in which Christ separates the sheep from the goats is equivalent to separating the contraries, and that Christ's claim to bring a sword represents his wish to maintain tension between the contraries rather than provide a peace that would require the submission of energy to restraint. Furthermore, contends