articularly those from the Songs of Experience, strike a particular nerve for those who are living in a society where the cost of living compared with income is steadily increasing, where AIDS, Ebola, and other new and frightening diseases are becoming increasingly common, and where the public is becoming increasingly disillusioned about the reliability and trustworthiness of politicians. These works resonate for a generation which has to deal with exponentially increasing population problems and with rapidly increasing demands on our immigration facilities and resources. They strike a special chord with a nation that, due to the aforementioned problems, the rise of violent crime, and other considerations, is rapidly desensitizing itself to the "marks of weakness, marks of woe" that we are becoming accustomed to seeing on the faces of passers-by on the street. Blake did, however, approve of some of the measures that individuals and societies took to gain and maintain individual freedom. As Appelbaum said, "He was liberal in politics, sensitive to the oppressive government measures of his day, [and] favorably inspired by the American Revolutionary War and the French Revolution" (Appelbaum v). According to Keynes, Blake wrote many positive and appreciative things about the revolutionary American political thinker Thomas Paine, for instance, such as "The Bishop never saw the Everlasting Gospel any more than Tom Paine" (Damon 318). As "London" shows, however, Blake did not entirely approve of the measures taken to forward the causes he longed to advance: "London" refers to how the "hapless Soldier's sigh/ runs in blood down Palace walls" ("London"). Among many other events which took place during the French Revolution, this could possibly refer to the storming of the Bastille or the executions of the French nobility. Blake also espoused many other notions with which we are now familiar, and occasionally even believe to be self-evident. For ...
