The Lamb

Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?
Gave thee life, and bid thee feed,
By the stream and o'er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing, woolly, bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice?
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,
Little Lamb, I'll tell thee.
He is called by thy name,
For He calls Himself a Lamb.
He is meek, and He is mild;
He became a little child.
I a child, and thou a lamb,
We are called by His name.
Little Lamb, God bless thee!
Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Background and Analysis of This Poem

William Blake's The Lamb was first published in Songs of Innocence in 1789, before being included in the later combined volume Songs of Innocence and of Experience. It is one of Blake's best-known poems, partly because it seems so simple: a child speaks to a lamb and asks who made it. The Poetry Foundation presents the poem as a tender lyric of creation and blessing, while the William Blake Archive offers access to Blake's illuminated versions of Songs of Innocence and of Experience, reminding readers that Blake's poems were originally visual artworks as well as printed texts. The lamb, the childlike speaker and the gentle rhythms all belong to Blake's vision of innocence, but innocence in Blake is never mere cuteness. It is a way of seeing the world as alive with divine presence.

The poem is built like a child's catechism. The first stanza asks a question again and again: who made the lamb? The speaker notices the creature's life, food, soft wool and tender voice, and sees these not as ordinary facts but as gifts. That repeated question gives the poem its devotional shape. The child is not asking because the answer is unknown in any anxious way. The question becomes a form of wonder. To ask who made the lamb is to pause before the mystery of life itself, and to treat even a small animal in a field as worthy of reverent attention.

The second stanza answers the question by linking the lamb, the child and Christ. The creator is called by the lamb's own name, because Christ is traditionally associated with the Lamb of God. This gives the poem its central Christian symbolism. The lamb is not only a creature made by God; it also becomes an image through which divine gentleness, innocence and sacrifice can be understood. The child speaker shares in that same innocence, creating a tender circle between maker, creature and human voice. Blake's poem suggests that creation is not cold machinery, but kinship.

The poem's musical quality is essential to its meaning. Its repetitions, short lines and soft sounds make it feel like a song, prayer or nursery rhyme. That simplicity is not a lack of sophistication. It is Blake's way of placing us inside the consciousness of innocence. The speaker's world is coherent because everything points back to a loving creator. Lamb, child, meadow, stream and valley all participate in one gentle order. The form itself seems to enact that harmony: question and answer, call and response, blessing and delight.

Yet The Lamb becomes even richer when read beside Blake's later poem The Tyger, its great companion from Songs of Experience. The Tate notes that The Tyger is the contrary poem to The Lamb, setting the meek and mild vision of creation against a frightening, fiery question about power and terror. Together, the two poems ask whether the same divine source can create both tenderness and dread. The Lamb gives us the answer of innocence: creation is gentle, blessed and knowable. The Tyger later disturbs that certainty without simply cancelling it.

For modern readers, The Lamb remains moving because it restores the seriousness of gentleness. The poem does not argue loudly or explain doctrine at length. It kneels beside a small creature and finds there a complete spiritual vision. Blake asks us to see humility, softness and wonder not as childish weaknesses, but as forms of knowledge. The lamb's importance lies in its simplicity. In a world often drawn to force, cleverness and suspicion, Blake's poem reminds us that innocence can be profound, and that a child's question may open onto the deepest mysteries of creation.