Which line expresses the hopelessness in London?

• A. The voices of hope echo in the streets
• B. In every cry of every man, In every infant's cry of fear...
• C. The mind-forged manacles I hear
• D. The morning air is bright

Answer: (C)

This line targets the feeling of hopelessness by showing that oppression lives inside people as mental chains. Blake uses the image of “mind-forged manacles” to tell us that the obstacles to freedom aren’t just physical barriers—they’re formed by the way society trains people to think: to fear authority, to accept misery, to conform. The word “mind-forged” signals that these constraints are internalized, durable, and invisible, so escaping them seems almost impossible. Hearing these chains implies a shared, unrelenting sense of bondage in London, a city where freedom feels unattainable.

In the poem, the bleak mood comes from this inner imprisonment as much as from outward suffering. Other lines either lean toward literal hardship or fleeting brightness, which don’t capture the same depth of psychological constraint. The line about “mind-forged manacles” is the clearest articulation of the hopelessness Blake sees—the sense that oppression has taken root in the mind itself, leaving little room for true release.