The English poet William Blake expressed his interpretation of Innocence and Experience throughout his poems. Based on Blake’s perception, both phases are necessary to contrast with each other and make a difference in our lives. A human being would not be able to identify an experienced person if all of us had always been experienced. Although the passing of one phase to the next can many times be shocking, these two states enhance our perception of the world and in a way help us achieve our happiness by understanding better the evil and the good in the world.

   The “Chimney Sweeper”  poems in Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience illustrates William Blake’s view that neither naive innocence nor bitter experience is completely accurate. There is a higher state of understanding that includes both innocence and experience. Both are need to complete one another to form the more accurate view. In this case, it is an expression on the poet’s view of the political issue dealing with chimney sweeps that dominates both poems. Although the viewpoints of each poem are different, both show plight of the majority of the chimney sweepers in the cities of England, and while one endorses hope and the other bitterness, the reader must acknowledge that something needs to be done to improve life for these children.

  William Blake’s poems both entitled “The Chimney Sweeper” address a political issue publicized during the time he was writing. In Songs of Innocence, the boy in “The Chimney Sweeper” sees his situation through the eyes of innocence and does not understand the social injustice. In Songs of Experience, the boy in the poem sees the injustice and speaks against the establishments that left him where he is. Different aspects of one poem illuminate opposing aspects of the other poem. Ideas addressed in Innocence contrast the different views of Experience, as Experience does for Innocence.The poem “The Chimney Sweeper,” in both Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience, protests the living conditions, working conditions, and the overall treatment of young chimney sweeps in the cities of England.

   In song of innocence Little Tom is a metaphorical object that has been personified; an unknown, ill-fated young worker that has been given a voice. By using this character, Blake confronts the ideology of children being exploited as a means of making money with the reality that these people have basic human rights and deserve to be treated respectfully.

  The narrator is a chimney sweep whose mother died and was sold by his father at a very young age, as implied by the lines “And my father sold me while my tongue / could scarcely cry ‘weep weep weep weep!’” (2-3). The phrase “in soot I sleep” (4), refers to the living conditions of the sweeps.  The poem goes on to talk about Tom Dacre and his dream, an important part of the poem. 

 The young narrator of the poem repeats in detail a dream that was had by Tom. In this dream, all of the young chimney sweepers were "lock'd up in coffins of black./ And by came an Angel who had a bright key,/ And he open'd the coffins & set them all free". The narrator reads the dream sanguinely, and Tom actually feels a sense of physical warmth after waking from the seemingly serene dream.However, it is made apparent to the reader that the angel is representative of the repressive society in which these children live. When the angel tells young Tom that "if he'd be a good boy/ He'd have God for his father & never want joy", the message seems to be a piously optimistic one. 

  In “The Chimney Sweeper” from both Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience William Blake uses the colors black and white to describe images within the two poems. The first instance of color is introduced in line 8 of the Songs of Innocence Poem, “You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair.” This line introduces the problem that is occurring in the poem, that the chimney sweeper is becoming filthy because of the soot in the chimneys. It may be considered that the job of the chimney sweeper is tainting him. The black soot is dirty and is polluting the chimney weepers clean white hair, the white standing for the purity of the child. Throughout both poems the speakers directly and indirectly use the colors black and white to show images of the chimney sweeper. 

 In the Songs of Innocence poem the narrator has hope for the future of the chimney sweeper by using the image of a pure white baby. This is demonstrated in lines eighteen and nineteen, “Then naked and white, all their bags left behind,/ They rise upon clouds, and sport in the wind:” In using the words naked and white, the image of an infant is shown. Infants are born into the world innocent and pure with hope for their life. By using this image the reader is shown the hopefulness of the speaker as they expect to be taken from the world they are living in to heaven, where they can live in innocence.

   This analysis leads to the conclusion that William Blake saw the chimney sweepers as innocent children, by his use of describing them with words associated with purity. However, in the society they live in, innocent children were suffering because of the job that they are performing. This is shown through Blake’s use of the word black, dealing with darknesss.

   Unlike the one in Songs of Innocence, "The Chimney Sweeper", in Songs of Experience is very dark and pessimistic. This poem also seems to be very judgmental and gives motives for everything, but unlike Song of Innocence, the sweeper in this poem does not free himself from his misery.

   In the first two lines, Blake gives us an image of an anguished child in a state of agony or even in a state of corruption. The color black seems to be very important because it is used to represent sin against innocence, the color of the white snow. Blake also shows the same child weeping, when he really means to say sweeping, because that is what has that child in such grief. This stanza ends by someone asking him about his parents, which later end up being responsible for this child's state.

    In the second stanza, the child is pictured in a very more happier and playful mood. This soon changes when he decides to tell the stranger more about his parents. They are showed to be punishing their child for being so happy by "clothing in clothes of death and teaching him to sing notes of woe." It is very obvious the sweeper's feels hate towards his parents for putting him in such sadness, but instead he chooses to hide it by making himself look happy and satisfied.

   It is clear in the last Stanza that Blake's criticizing the Church , especially, and the state for letting a lot of these things happen. During this time many children were dying from being, either, worked to death or from malnutrition. Neither the state or the church did anything to stop this and is obviously why Blake feels so much anger towards them. The sweeper's parents are really no help towards their own child. This makes the reader wonder, if they are worshipping god, the source of good doings, why do they chose to ignore their own child. They would rather turn their heads the other way and instead findlove at.

   I think this is a very striking poem. It clearly shows Blake’s anger towards society at this time. I also think that he used many of his poems to make people aware of the suffering of people at this time. I also think That he wrote two separate books to give a fuller effect. Songs of Innocence, I think was how people thought that everything was okay. Songs of Experience, in my opinion was to open every ones eyes.

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