A better understanding of "The Chimney Sweeper"

To understands Blake’s “The Chimney Sweeper” written in his Songs of Innocence, we must first have knowledge of the content he was writing about.  In the 17th century, the master sweep would employ young boys to climb and scramble up chimneys to brush clean the flue with small brushes and metal scrapers removing tar deposits caused by smoke.  The boys were apprentices and started as young as five years old, they were usually orphans, although others were sold into the trade by their families.  The conditions of the boys were harsh and cruel, they slept in cellars, seldom bathed and the years of accumulated  soot produced cancer. It was a dangerous job and climbing boys often choked and suffocated to death from the chimney air, boys also became stuck in narrow flues or fell causing more casualties. “The Chimney Sweeper ” by William Blake is written from the perspective of a little boy who was sold into the trade of chimney sweeping when he was still very young.  The boys friend Tom, who is also a chimney sweeper, becomes discouraged when his head gets shaved, in spite of this, the boy encourages Tom by stating that with no hair, no hair can get dirty.  That night Tom has a dream of other chimney sweepers in coffins and an angel with a key opens the coffins and “sets them free”. The chimney sweepers are clean, merry and go play. The angel then tells tom “if he'd be a good boy, He'd have God for his father, and never want joy” (Blake).  When Tom wakes, and goes to work, he is not affected by his harsh conditions because of what the angel told him.  This poem is placed in the Songs of Innocence because innocent children are associated with having a child-like faith; kids have no trouble believing in things an “experienced” adult would find unlikely.  If the angel had appeared to an adult, the result would of been different, instead of giving them hope, the “experienced” adult would know too well to have faith in something that could let you down.  Tom’s faith allows him to remove himself from his next days work and remain content in his situation. Being an innocent child, ignorance can also be implied. The term “ignorance is bliss” properly fits this poem; Tom, blinded by his faith, of his fate, can live in an internal world of bliss.  Innocence, although not always positive, saves Tom from the word around him, by hazing his perspective and giving him hope.