WAR

Wikipedia Commons

America 

Plate 6, Copy a

War is Blake's method of separating Truth from Error. The condition of War in Eternity is the clash of ideas or as David Erdman writes in Prophet Against Empire on Page 356, the separation of 'wheat from chaff.'

Blake distinguishes between the Wars of Man which in Eternity are experienced as visionary, and the violent conflicts with which we are familiar. Ololon looking down into our world sees that War has become the vehicle of decay & death. Ideas are meant to be expressions of the Divine Vision and not cause for bitterness and terror.

Milton, Plate 34 [38], (E 134) 

"And Ololon looked down into the Heavens of Ulro in fear
They said. How are the Wars of Man which in Great Eternity       
Appear around, in the External Spheres of Visionary Life
Here renderd Deadly within the Life & Interior Vision
How are the Beasts & Birds & Fishes, & Plants & Minerals
Here fixd into a frozen bulk subject to decay & death?
Those Visions of Human Life & Shadows of Wisdom & Knowledge      
Plate 35 [39]
Are here frozen to unexpansive deadly destroying terrors[.]
And War & Hunting: the Two Fountains of the River of Life
Are become Fountains of bitter Death & of corroding Hell
Till Brotherhood is changd into a Curse & a Flattery
By Differences between Ideas, that Ideas themselves, (which are  
The Divine Members) may be slain in offerings for sin"

Blake writes of the transition from corporeal war to mental war as The Four Zoas is brought to a close "as an extended song of harvest." Erdman furnishes the details. "Enion and Tharmas are at last united, appearing in Eden as innocent boy and girl in Eternal Childhood, he the rivers and seas, she the moon that woos them. ...The clouds of war dissipate and sink into the Seas of Tharmas. "... 

"Urizen combines the drying and cutting operations, and the winnowing is done by Tharmas as Tongue making the honest man's ultimate separation of wheat from chaff, exulting over the downfall of the great Whore and and all her "Kings & Councellors & Giant Warriors":

Four Zoas, Night IX, Page 134, (E 402)
"O Mystery Fierce Tharmas cries Behold thy end is come            
Art thou she that made the nations drunk with the cup of Religion
Go down ye Kings & Councellors & Giant Warriors
Go down into the depths go down & hide yourselves beneath
Go down with horse & Chariots & Trumpets of hoarse war

Lo how the Pomp of Mystery goes down into the Caves              
Her great men howl & throw the dust & rend their hoary hair
Her delicate women & children shriek upon the bitter wind
Spoild of their beauty their hair rent & their skin shriveld up
Lo darkness covers the long pomp of banners on the wind
And black horses & armed men & miserable bound captives          
Where shall the graves recieve them all & where shall be their place
And who shall mourn for Mystery who never loosd her Captives
Let the slave grinding at the mill run out into the field
Let him look up into the heavens & laugh in the bright air
Let the inchaind soul shut up in darkness & in sighing           
Whose face has never seen a smile in thirty weary years
Rise & look out his chains are loose his dungeon doors are open
And let his wife & children return from the opressors scourge
They look behind at every step & believe it is a dream
Are these the Slaves that groand along the streets of Mystery    
Where are your bonds & task masters are these the prisoners
Where are your chains where are your tears why do you look around
If you are thirsty there is the river go bathe your parched limbs
The good of all the Land is before you for Mystery is no more
Then All the Slaves from every Earth in the wide Universe        
Sing a New Song drowning confusion in its happy notes
While the flail of Urizen sounded loud & the winnowing wind of Tharmas
So loud so clear in the wide heavens & the song that they sung was this 
Composed by an African Black from the little Earth of Sotha"

After referring to the above passage near the end of the Four Zoas, Erdman continues: 

"This is the end so long foretold, and now Tharmas recites the beginning foretold in America, repeating Blake' paraphrase of the second and third demands of the Declaration of Independence, Life having been attained. The slaves and prisoners attaining Liberty are urged to pursue their Happiness as earth-owners, free of religion's tithes: The good of all the Land is before you for Mystery is no more"

Declaration of Independence

"all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

America, Plate 6, (E 53)

"The morning comes, the night decays, the watchmen leave their stations;
The grave is burst, the spices shed, the linen wrapped up;
The bones of death, the cov'ring clay, the sinews shrunk & dry'd.
Reviving shake, inspiring move, breathing! awakening!
Spring like redeemed captives when their bonds & bars are burst; 

Let the slave grinding at the mill, run out into the field:
Let him look up into the heavens & laugh in the bright air;
Let the inchained soul shut up in darkness and in sighing,
Whose face has never seen a smile in thirty weary years;
Rise and look out, his chains are loose, his dungeon doors are open.     
And let his wife and children return from the opressors scourge;
They look behind at every step & believe it is a dream.
Singing. The Sun has left his blackness, & has found a fresher morning
And the fair Moon rejoices in the clear & cloudless night;
For Empire is no more, and now the Lion & Wolf shall cease." 

Matthew 3

[11] I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that
 cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to 
bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire:
[12] Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and 
gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with 
unquenchable fire.
[13] Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him.