The poem entitled The Cry of The Children is a poem written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning in

1842. It is a poem about children exploitation. Elizabeth also had concern in social injustice, slavery, and
womens right. She was born in England in 1806 and lived until 1861, which is Victorian Era. In this era,
there was Industrial Revolution where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transport, and
technology had significant effects on the social, economic, and cultural conditions starting in England and
spread to the world. Industrialization created many factories and also capitalism.
While analyzing a poem of children exploitation I found out some interesting facts that happened
to the children at that era. I feel that through the analysis of this poem I could know the facts that I didnt
pay attention to before. How children treated in Industrial Revolution were really horrible. Its still
happening right now, though. Capitalism is awful. I can't imagine how people could be treated like that, just
as awful as slavery. I hate all kinds of injustice and don't understand why people could be so unfair.
"Pheu pheu, ti prosderkesthe m ommasin, tekna;"
[[Alas, alas, why do you gaze at me with your eyes, my children.]]Medea.
Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,
Ere the sorrow comes with years ?
They are leaning their young heads against their mothers,
And that cannot stop their tears.
The young lambs are bleating in the meadows ;
The young birds are chirping in the nest ;
The young fawns are playing with the shadows ;
The young flowers are blowing toward the west
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
They are weeping bitterly !
They are weeping in the playtime of the others,
In the country of the free.

Do you question the young children in the sorrow,

Why their tears are falling so ?
The old man may weep for his to-morrow
Which is lost in Long Ago
The old tree is leafless in the forest
The old year is ending in the frost
The old wound, if stricken, is the sorest
The old hope is hardest to be lost :
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
Do you ask them why they stand
Weeping sore before the bosoms of their mothers,
In our happy Fatherland ?

At the stanza above tells about the suffering of little children are forced to work in when they were young.
Their children are very distressed by their plight, so shed tears every day. Yet they se when they were
small they should have time to play around with their friends. Even those tears that much because they do
not have time to play in their country.
People as if not ask them, why they endure this suffering and tears why children fall (crying). Maybe the
parents have never felt like this since suffering their child, they just feel this pain since they are old. Old
people expect this suffering to an end. They were not able to see the afflictions happen to their child's.

They just want this to end afflictions, but children continue to endure the suffering of this because they are
afraid something will happen to their mother, they do not become orphans.
They look up with their pale and sunken faces,
And their looks are sad to see,
For the man's grief abhorrent, draws and presses
Down the cheeks of infancy
"Your old earth," they say, "is very dreary;"
"Our young feet," they say, "are very weak !"
Few paces have we taken, yet are weary
Our grave-rest is very far to seek !
Ask the old why they weep, and not the children,
For the outside earth is cold
And we young ones stand without, in our bewildering,
And the graves are for the old !"

The faces of the children looked pale sunken on this suffering and their faces looked sad every day.
Children assume this weep very disgusting for them because they have been deprived of their childhood.
For those who are young this world seemed bleak for them. For their parents consider their children's
happiness is already starting to look bleak. Parents are tired of this suffering. they were upset because
why their children should also be able to experience this pain, this pain should be felt only their parents.
They consider themselves better to die than to suffer this every day.

"True," say the children, "it may happen

That we die before our time !
Little Alice died last year her grave is shapen
Like a snowball, in the rime.
We looked into the pit prepared to take her
Was no room for any work in the close clay :
From the sleep wherein she lieth none will wake her,
Crying, 'Get up, little Alice ! it is day.
If you listen by that grave, in sun and shower,
With your ear down, little Alice never cries ;
Could we see her face, be sure we should not know her,
For the smile has time for growing in her eyes ,
And merry go her moments, lulled and stilled in
The shroud, by the kirk-chime !
It is good when it happens," say the children,
"That we die before our time !"
This is the contradiction for the previous lines. First they said the grave-rest is so far away, because they
associate death with relief. Now, the death symbolizes the true death in fact, and the children said it may
happen that they die before their time. It reflects the dangerous conditions they have to face everyday.
There are many children suffer for lung cancer, heart disease, phossy jaw (a disease that began with
toothache and swelling of the gums and jaw. The lower jaw was more commonly affected but sometime
the upper jaw also was attacked. It was most commonly seen in workers in the match industry in the 19th
and early 20th century.), and other physical defects. They tell the story about Little Alice who died last year.

This description shows how Little Alice is happy after her death. She never cries and the smile is
growing in her eyes. Could we see her face, be sure we should not know her, shows that she never
smiles and looks happy like that before, while she was working.
At the end of second stanza, the children added, that its good if they die before their time. The hard life
has made them wants to end their misery as soon as possible, although if it is death, it sounds good for
them.
But they answer, " Are your cowslips of the meadows
Like our weeds anear the mine ?
Leave us quiet in the dark of the coal-shadows,
From your pleasures fair and fine!
Here the children talk about the bourgeois who make them experience staying in dark of the coalshadows, while the bourgeois live in pleasures and all the good things. The bourgeois exploit the
proletariat to work hard, more than they can do, and pay them low, less than they deserve. To gain more
profit, the bourgeois also hires children, to reduce the expense for wages and salary.
The sixth stanza tells about the children who lose their hope. It can be seen from line 67 & 68, If we cared
for any meadows, it were merely to drop down in them and sleep. and line 71 & 72, And, underneath our
heavy eyelids drooping, the reddest flower would look as pale as snow. These children have to wake up
since 4 a.m. in the morning and work until 8 p.m. in the evening. They are sleepy and tired, yet still have to
work. They carry their burden to the workplace where they have to do the same dangerous thing everyday,
as it is seen in line 73-76, For, all day, we drag our burden tiring, through the coal-dark, underground
Or, all day, we drive the wheels of iron, in the factories, round and round. They keep doing the same
endless thing day by day, wake up only to work and at night they sleep just to wake up again the following
day and do the same miserable thing.
The seventh stanza describes about the condition while these children are working. What they do and how
they feel. When all the tools and animals and nature are changing, but they feel nothing changes in their
life, its just like that with no end. The eighth stanza is when the author advises these children not to give
up and surrender to God, to call God to ask for help. Yet the children have lost their hope and faith. In the
tenth stanza they say when they are weeping and sobbing aloud, no human hear them, and only pass by.
In the eleventh stanza they say they have prayed, but God doesnt hear them. Line 121-124, Our Father!
If He heard us, He would surely, for they call him good and mild, answer, smiling down the steep world
very purely, Come and rest with me, my child. But no! say the children, weeping faster. He is speechless
like a stone. They say tears have made them blind.
Now tell the poor young children, O my brothers,
To look up to Him and pray
So the blessed One, who blesseth all the others,
Will bless them another day.
They answer, " Who is God that He should hear us,
While the rushing of the iron wheels is stirred ?
When we sob aloud, the human creatures near us
Pass by, hearing not, or answer not a word !
And we hear not (for the wheels in their resounding)
Strangers speaking at the door :
Is it likely God, with angels singing round Him,
Hears our weeping any more ?
" Two words, indeed, of praying we remember ;
And at midnight's hour of harm,
'Our Father,' looking upward in the chamber,

We say softly for a charm.

We know no other words, except 'Our Father,'
And we think that, in some pause of angels' song,
God may pluck them with the silence sweet to gather,
And hold both within His right hand which is strong.
'Our Father !' If He heard us, He would surely
(For they call Him good and mild)
Answer, smiling down the steep world very purely,
'Come and rest with me, my child.'
At stanza above, the children say, "Who is God that he should hear us, the human creatures near uspassing by, hearing not." This line only reiterates the ignorance that is going on within the country. The
children pray to God and receive no relief. They even cry to those they see everyday, and nothing is done.
They figure that if those they encounter everyday cannot acknowledge their weeping that why would God
be anymore likely to do so.
At stanza above also said that children describe how when they pray the only words they know to pray are
"Our Father." This is meant to show the audience how uneducated these children are as a result of being
forced into work. This is a blaring signal for those in government to realize that these children are being
deprived of their right to an education.
Returns to the childrens lack of faith in God. They express how "His image is the master Who commands
us to work." They have been convinced into believing that is the will of God that they suffer and labor as
they do. They would have faith in God, only "grief has made us unbelieving."
In the next stanza Browning writes of how the children work such long hours laboring in the mines and
factories of these industrial times. "They have never seen sunshine," because they are up long before the
sun and are home after it sets or because they are cooped up in the depths of darkness in the coal mines
of the regions. Browning wants to emphasize the long hours these children are forced to work and the lives
they are losing doing it too. Although they are only children, their experiences, as dismal and rough as they
are, have taught them "the grief of man," with the time spent growing up into manhood.

How long, they say, how long, O cruel nation,

Will you stand, to move the world, on a childs heart,
Stifle down with a mailed heel its palpitation,
And tread onward to your throne amid the mart ?
Our blood splashes upward, O our tyrants,
And your purple shews your path ;
But the childs sob curseth deeper in the silence
Than the strong man in his wrath !
Here its portrayed as if the children ask for how long they have to suffer. They call England the cruel
nation because of the capitalism, and state that this era wont remain forever. They mention how their
blood splash, while cursing this nation.
According to Marxs analysis if the capitalist economy, its believed that capital produces profit, land
produces rent, and labor produces wages, each getting fair share. It was natural for landowners and
factories owners to make more profit. However in fact, its found that in order to gain as much profit as they
can, the factories owners exploit the workers to work longer and harder without equal payment. It can be
seen in the condition in England where the savage exposure of exploitation happens in the growing
factories and industrial enterprises, includes children. If each getting fair share, why these factories owners
employ the children? Because they know they can pay them cheaper. Marx said that workers actually have
to have freedom to choose the work they want, the job they wish to do. Meanwhile, the workers still have

no capital or land or factory to run, so they only can work as labor as the only choice. This shows how the
capitalism put the proletariat in the lowest stage of freedom.
Even if they want to choose, they have no choice, so do the children. In this poem, the children are the
representation of the unfair condition. In larger scale, actually this poem represented all proletariat,
children and adults. They suffer for the same sorrow, due to the poor work condition and the effect of
industrialization.
Conclusion
For as the conclusion of the poetry, the author portrayed the condition of capitalism that exploited lower
class people, focused on the children. This condition happens in Industrial Revolution era in Britain, where
the bourgeois as the landowners or factories owners employ the proletariat as labors. They have to work
as labors because they have nothing to earn money; they have neither capital nor land. They only can sell
their labor power. The bourgeois goal is to earn as much profit as they can, so they also hire children and
women to make them get more surplus, because its cheaper. This condition creates great suffer for the
proletariat, especially the children, as its represented in this poem. From the analysis, it can be seen how
the children have to work 16 hours a day, from 4 a.m. in the morning. They are so young, even the fouryear-old children have to work. They have no time to play or study, because they do the same dangerous
thing everyday. Death is near to them, as if its in front of their eyes, yet they kind of hope for it. Because of
the desperateness of endless suffer; they think death will be the great relief for them. They have no choice,
so do the other lower class people. It leads to the thought that in capitalism era, the lower class will always
become the powerless while the upper class is always powerful.