William Blakes The Lamb Essay - 537 Words

The Lamb - William Blake Summary The poem begins with the question, quot;Little Lamb, who made thee?quot; The speaker, a child, asks the lamb about its origins: how it came into being, how it acquired its particular manner of feeding, its quot;clothingquot; of wool, its quot;tender voice.quot; In the next stanza, the speaker attempts a riddling answer to his own question: the lamb was made by one who quot;calls himself a Lamb,quot; one who resembles in his gentleness both the child and the lamb. The poem ends with the child bestowing a blessing on the lamb. Form quot;The Lambquot; has two stanzas, each containing five rhymed couplets. Repetition in the first and last couplet of each stanza makes these lines into a refrain,†¦show more content†¦The answer is presented as a puzzle or riddle, and even though it is an easy one--childs play--this also contributes to an underlying sense of ironic knowingness or artifice in the poem. The childs answer, however, reveals his confidence in his simple Christian faith and his innocent acceptance of its teachings. The lamb of course symbolizes Jesus. The traditional image of Jesus as a lamb underscores the Christian values of gentleness, meekness, and peace. The image of the child is also associated with Jesus: in the Gospel, Jesus displays a special solicitude for children, and the Bibles depiction of Jesus in his childhood shows him as guileless and vulnerable. These are also the characteristics from which the child-speaker approaches the ideas of nature and of God. This poem, like many of the Songs of Innocence, accepts what Blake saw as the more positive aspects of conventional Christian belief. But it does not provide a completely adequate doctrine, because it fails to account for the presence of suffering and evil in the world. The pendant (or companion) poem to this one, found in the Songs of Experience, is quot;The Tygerquot;; taken together, the two poems give a perspective on religion that includes the good and clear as well as the terrible and inscrutable. These poems complement eac h other to produce a fuller accountShow MoreRelatedOpposition in William Blakes The Lamb and the Tyger689 Words   |  3 Pagesï » ¿Opposition in William Blakes The Lamb and The Tyger William Blakes Songs of Innocence and Experience contain some of his most known poems including The Lamb from Songs of Innocence and The Tyger from Songs of Experience. These two poems are intended to reflect contrasting views of religion, innocence, and creation, with The Tyger examining the intrinsic relationship between good and evil. 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