Test 2

I did not have a strong emotional reaction to William Blake’s poem, “The Human Ab-stract”, but I did find it intriguing. It reminds me of my own musings about the difference between a hero and a villain. The first stanza, “Pity would be no more, / If we did not make somebody Poor; / And Mercy no more could be, / If all were as happy as we;” (1-4) reminds me that we make our own villains. In echo, there would be no villains if every-one thought the same. Furthermore, most of the people we label as villains are the ones trying to correct this imbalance forcibly. Communism, while flawed, reflects this thought politically. The reason they are mostly labeled as “evil” or “bad” in America is because people naturally want to feel different and individual. In Japan this is not as much of an issue because they focus on the community more than the individual. That is not to say, however, that they do not experience pity or mercy because true equality is, currently at least, impossible and unfathomable.

Continuing this thought is the next stanza: “And mutual fear brings peace, / Till the self-ish loves increase; / Then Cruelty knits a snare, / And spreads his baits with care.” (5-8), the first line reflects the theories of Hobbes and Locke, in which governments exists to bring peace between individuals. Consequently, when the love of something superintends the fear created by the government, there is the possibility of war. This war could be something as small as a fan-war between movie fans or as large as World War II. The last two lines refers to how said wars blind the participants of the trap they have ensnared themselves in. People who have known each other for decades turn on each other and in-dulge in acts of cruelty. It doesn’t matter than neither side is good or evil, they are just “wrong” in the others eyes.

In the third stanza: “He sits down with holy fears, / And waters the ground with tears; / Then Humility takes its root / Underneath his foot” (9-12) the speaker is referring to Cru-elty and how the tears he causes to fall causes people to belittle themselves and hate the other side for their cruelty. However, this blinds them to the cruelty they cause to their “enemy” so it is a hypocritical humility (as mentioned in footnote 1 on page 1423 of Vol-ume B). This brings to mind that wars spread seeds of unfounded hate between individu-als that sour their view of others. For example, there is much strife between blacks and whites for the actions of their ancestors to this day.

Next, Blake writes: “Soon spreads the dismal shade / Of Mystery over his head; / And the Catterpiller and Fly / Feed on Mystery” (13-16). In my mind, this refers to how, once the war is started, the participants forget who started it or even why it started. I believe the fly represents corruption or disease, which grows as it feeds on the forgetfulness of peo-ple. As for the catterpiller, it represents human greed for disasters and distress of others. This is followed by: “And it bears the fruit of Deceit, / Ruddy and sweet to eat; / And the Raven his nest has made / In its thickest shade.” (17-20). This refers to the tendency of people to believe whatever they hear. They continue believing that the “other” people are bad because everyone else thinks so.

Finally, the poem ends with: “The Gods of earth and sea, / Sought thro’ Nature to find this Tree, / But their search was all in vain: / There grows one in the Human Brain.” (21-24). These last four lines refer to how only humanity has the capacity to so delude them-selves into fighting each other for nothing. Now I come back to the thought of how hero and villain is perceptive and not “real.” In my opinion, heros are criminals that get away with murder. We call them heros because the majority supports his or her ideals.