In "London", William Blake brings to light a city overrun by poverty and hardship. Blake discards the common, glorifying view of London and replaces it with his idea of truth. London is nothing more but a city strapped by harsh economic times where Royalty and other venues of power have allowed morality and goodness to deteriorate so that suffering and poverty are all that exist. It is with the use of three distinct metaphors; "mind-forg'd manacles", "blackning Church", and "Marriage hearse", that Blake conveys the idea of a city that suffers from physical and psychological imprisonment, social oppression, and an unraveling moral society.

According to William Richey the phrase "mind-forg'd manacles" has two contributors, the oppressors and the victims (1). Both contributors help set and reinforce the psychological distress and sense of entrapment each citizen of "London" suffers from. The oppressors are presented as disease, Royalty, the Church, and...