Holy Thursday (Experience) - William Blake
A Somber Reflection on Hollow Charity
Original (Line 1): Is this a holy thing to see
English (Line 1): Is this a holy sight to behold
Original (Line 2): In a rich and fruitful land,—
English (Line 2): In a land so rich and full?
Original (Line 3): Babes reduced to misery,
English (Line 3): Children reduced to misery,
Original (Line 4): Fed with cold and usurious hand?
English (Line 4): Fed by a cold and calculating hand?
Original (Line 5): Is that trembling cry a song?
English (Line 5): Is that trembling cry truly a song?
Original (Line 6): Can it be a song of joy?
English (Line 6): Can it be a joyful tune at all?
Original (Line 7): And so many children poor?
English (Line 7): With so many children living in want?
Original (Line 8): It is a land of poverty!
English (Line 8): This, indeed, is a land of destitution!
Original (Line 9): And their sun does never shine,
English (Line 9): Their sun never truly shines,
Original (Line 10): And their fields are bleak & bare,
English (Line 10): And their fields lie bleak and bare,
Original (Line 11): And their ways are fill’d with thorns:
English (Line 11): Their paths are strewn with thorns,
Original (Line 12): It is eternal winter there.
English (Line 12): For them, it is eternal winter.
Original (Line 13): For where-e’er the sun does shine,
English (Line 13): For wherever sunlight truly falls,
Original (Line 14): And where-e’er the rain does fall,
English (Line 14): And wherever rain can freely bless the earth,
Original (Line 15): Babe can never hunger there,
English (Line 15): No infant will starve there,
Original (Line 16): Nor poverty the mind appall.
English (Line 16): Nor can poverty terrorize the mind.
From William Blake’s Holy Thursday (1794), part of Songs of Experience. Public domain.
In “Holy Thursday (Experience),” William Blake offers a stark contrast to the hopeful procession depicted in his “Holy Thursday” poem from *Songs of Innocence*. Here, Blake trains an unflinching eye on the conditions of the children and the broader society around them. He frames the question of whether this public display of caring—marching children into a church—truly alleviates their deeper suffering or merely masks societal indifference.
The poem’s tone is accusatory. Phrases such as “cold and usurious hand” condemn the notion of charity given only with reluctance or personal gain in mind. Instead of the vibrant images of children in colorful attire from *Innocence*, the speaker evokes images of bleakness—eternal winter and a sun that never shines—signaling that mere ritual cannot fix the systemic poverty afflicting these “babes.”
Throughout the stanzas, Blake implies that genuine warmth, symbolized by sunshine and rainfall, is absent, replaced by hollow appearances of benevolence. The questioning structure—“Is this a holy thing to see…?”—demands moral introspection. By ending on the note that where real compassion exists, “Babe can never hunger,” Blake underscores how institutional hypocrisy perpetuates destitution. Rather than celebrating an orderly ceremony, the poem thus provokes readers to see beyond rituals and confront the deep-rooted inequalities beneath them.
Key points
1. Blake highlights the disparity between public displays of charity and actual compassion.
2. The imagery of ‘eternal winter’ and barren fields signifies entrenched social injustice.
3. Ritualistic care is revealed as insufficient or self-serving, given systemic poverty.
4. The poem underscores Blake’s moral plea: that true empathy must go beyond formalities.
