Paradise Lost
Books IX – X
English OCR 2710
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Contents
Book IX Plot
3
Book X Plot
3
The Characters of Paradise Lost
4
Passages Relating to themes
9
Milton’s Inheritance
12
Milton’s Religious Context
17
Milton and the critics
22
Essays on themes
25
Paradise Lost Quotations
36
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Book IX Plot
BY NED ALLEN
The book opens with a personal prologue and a restatement of the poem's central theme. The
poem is said to be, from here on, of the tragic mode. What Milton has to relate is, moreover, epic,
and he means to demonstrate how the Fall - a Christian story - is superior to other stories in which
legend and myth play a significant part. It is thanks to his celestial (heavenly) muse that he is able
to commit his thoughts to paper.
The action starts with Satan, compassing the earth, soliloquizing on his torment. He finds a way to
sneak in to Paradise and adopts the guise of the serpent.
As day dawns, Eve suggests that they divide their labours in the garden to work more effectively,
unheeded by the distractions of 'smiles' and 'casual discourse' (222-23). Adam admits the sense of
Eve's suggestion, and despite voicing at some length his fear for her safety, and the pair debating
whether virtue were better left untried, he eventually allows her to go. The narrator declaims
against this folly, unable to let the 'event perverse' (405) pass without comment.
Satan catches sight of Eve - the 'fairest unsupported flower' (432) - and he is momentarily
disarmed. But he gains her attention and begins his fraudulent temptation. Eve marvels at the
serpent's human voice and Satan leads her to the tree which he claims gave him the power of
speech. She resists when she discovers it is the one forbidden, but Satan commands her to look at
him, and to see that the tree has yielded him a 'life more perfect' (689). Astonished by Satan's
command of reason, persuaded by his flattery, and in hunger of knowledge and godhead, Eve
begins to persuade herself to succumb, and plucks and eats the 'intellectual fruit' (794). She
considers keeping it for herself, but decides finally to share all and brings her spouse a sample.
Adam is horrified. However, he cannot bear to be separated from Eve, even if this means death,
and he reconciles himself to what seems necessary: he completes the 'mortal sin | Original' (1003)
by eating the fruit himself.
Adam and Eve later wake to find themselves naked and miserable. They cover themselves,
ashamed, and weep at the discord of the post-lapsarian world. The book leaves them arguing and
casting blame at one another.
Book X Plot
BY RUTH RUSHWORTH
God sends his Son to have just words with Adam and Eve, giving them their sentences - for Eve,
pain in childbirth; for Adam, hard toil; and for both (ultimately) death.
Meanwhile in Hell, Sin and Death, feeling Satan's victory, build a bridge across Chaos to ease their
passage into the mortal world. Satan returns victorious and relates his tale of success, just
moments before he and his followers receive their sentence and are turned into snakes.
At the end of the book, Adam and Eve begin to reconcile with each other and to repent of their
actions, offering up supplications to God to spare their offspring. God has promised that the Son
will one day redeem man's wrong, but for the minute, things look pretty bleak for Adam and Eve.
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THE CHARACTERS OF PARADISE LOST
Satan
BY NICHOLAS ZENG
'O, speak again, bright angel!'
~William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, II.ii.26
Romeo and Juliet may be the last place you would look for a literary inspiration for Satan, and I
don't think it was one for Milton (we can't completely rule out the possibility, but I think we can
safely agree it is considerably less likely than England winning the World Cup). But looking at this
famous quote gives us a number of interesting ways of thinking about Satan's character
in Paradise Lost.
Satan used to be one of the most important of God's angels, but rebelled when God declared the Son to
be above all the angels in glory. Satan persuaded a third of the angels to rebel with him, and declared
war on God. Satan was defeated by the Son and cast into Hell with all the other rebel angels.
Light-bringer
'Lucifer' means 'light-bringer' in Latin, which is not far away from Shakespeare's 'bright Angel', but
'Satan' means 'the adversary' in Hebrew. In fact, he is first described to us in Paradise Lost as 'the archenemy, | And thence in heaven called Satan' (I.81). He is defined only by his opposition and relation to
God and is often presented with reference to his former beauty: 'the excess | Of glory obscured' (I.593).
We are never allowed to forget that he was once a glorious angel of God, good rather than evil. We are
constantly reminded by the 'bright angel' motif that Satan was created by God, but then opposed him; a
failed creation, if you like. We are led to St. Augustine's idea that evil is not an essential attribute,
something existing in itself, independent and exclusive from that which is good. Evil is rather something
chosen, acting through free will in conscious opposition to God's will.
Free will
The allure of free will is where the attractiveness and power of Satan's character lies. Satan may be quite
useless when it comes to fighting the ten thousand thunders of Christ's fury, but in his will he is free and
in his mind he is supreme: 'What though the field be lost? | All is not lost; the unconquerable will'
(I.105). Satan was defeated but not defeated, or to draw a slightly blasphemous parallel to Saint Paul, he
was 'perplexed, but not in despair; [...] cast down, but not destroyed' (II Corinthians, 4.8-9). We may
indeed argue that he (Satan, not Paul) is deluding himself when he preaches 'the mind is its own place,
and in itself | Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven' (I.254) - this is a clear case of sour grapes;
Satan is exiled from heaven and pines for lost joys. But in hell, Satan is sovereign and free from having
to worship the Son. When Satan comes into Eden, he is tormented by 'the hot hell that always in him
burns' (IX.467). One may choose to read this as the narrator's sardonic comment on Satan creating 'a
hell of heaven', but this mental extension of the physical torment of hell as well as trapping him, also in
a way represents Satan's freedom: this is a hell of Satan's own choosing and creation, caused 'in him' by
his hate and envy of everything good. Satan's mind is not only unconquerable and unconditionally
opposed to God, it also influences other minds to use their free will to oppose the will of God. And this
is where the 'speak again' of the opening quotation needs to be considered. Speaking is what Satan does
extremely well; his speeches in the first two books of Paradise Lost are a rich store of quotes for any
motivational speaker. We must never forget that the two major events of the poem are created through
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the persuasive speech of Satan - he convinces the angels to take up arms, and convinces Eve to eat the
fruit. In the former achievement he takes a third of the heavenly host with him, in the latter he takes the
whole of the human race (or so he thinks until Christ spoils his party). Satan is charismatic, eloquent,
and unanswerable; the bright angel speaks again and again, tempting with knowledge, tempting the
reader, as he tempted Eve, to think, question, explore, reinterpret, and to eat of 'this intellectual food'
(IX.768) and 'make wise' (IX.778), to be won over by the power of the free-willed mind and make it 'its
own place'.
Satan's speeches
I suspect that the pious Milton was uncomfortable with how attractive a character Satan was
becoming, and so gradually reduced the role of Satan's speeches as the poem progressed
(although of course, this is just my opinion). In Books I and II, Satan reigns supreme as he
addresses the fallen angels in direct speech. In contrast, when Raphael tells Adam about Satan's
revolt in heaven, Satan's oratory comes to Adam (and the reader) as reported speech. The
narrative conventions of the poem demand this, and we would scarcely expect Raphael to
misrepresent Satan's words, but still the oratorical power of Satan is mediated through the
medium of the tale-teller. There is nobody to question Raphael, nobody to protest at errors or
omissions, and no chance for Satan to defend himself or tell his side of the story. In the next
instance of Satan's speech, he speaks to Eve in 'human voice' (IX.561). It is a plea, rather than a
speech; rather than commanding and rousing his troops to action, he is now convincing a woman
to eat fruit. In one sense this is a step down, but it does also demonstrate another kind of power;
one of persuasion and subtlety. The final humiliation comes in Book X, when Satan and his troops
are turned into serpents, and deprived entirely of the power of speech:
he would have spoke,
But hiss for hiss returned with forkèd tongue
To forkèd tongue.
(X.517)
In Books I and II, Satan's speech dominated the narrative, and the action of the poem stopped while he
had his say. Now the words of the narrative swallow him up - 'to serpents all as accessories' (X.520).
The sibilant 's' sounds of this description mockingly imitate his speechless hissing. Satan has been
silenced completely and humiliatingly for the rest of the poem. It seems to me that the only way to give
God's life-giving word prominence is in a monologue. Satan's speech must be silenced, as its immense
power over the poem and the reader is too attractive and too great a competitor. There is only room for
one king at the end of this poem, one majesty, one talk.
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Sin and Death
BY BETH SIMS
Sin
Sin is an allegorical character, met by Satan at the gates of Hell in Book II of Paradise Lost. She holds
the key to Hell's gate and opens the gate so that Satan (her father) can pass through on his way up to
heaven. Sin has no mother but was born out of Satan himself at his rebellious assembly in heaven, both
an allegorical representation of his sin against God and a parody of God's creation of the Son. Sin is
'woman to the waist' (II.650) and has a fish's tail, but she shifts shape and is constantly re-forming and
breeding, giving birth to dog-like young. She has no control over these changes but is held captive by
cruel pregnancies in a body in perpetual labour, cursed by her own fertility. Satan raped his daughter in
heaven, and she gave birth to Death.
Death
Death is a shadow-like character who appears in Book II of Paradise Lost, but is only mentioned
briefly and fleetingly. Allegorically, he is the consequence of Satan's sin. He is not as sad a figure
as Sin because he is empowered and in control of his condition. However, Death is malicious and
armed, an aggressive character, carrying arrows and darts. Rather than suffering himself, Death
takes pleasure in human pain and also in inflicting this pain. The only thing he fears is the Son who
is fated to destroy him.
Adam and Eve
Before the Fall, Adam and Eve coexist harmoniously in Eden, almost as one flesh and spirit, but they
become more distinct from each other throughout the course ofParadise Lost. Eve is alienated from
Adam and also defined by experiences she has on her own. She has a dream which she can only share
with Adam by telling him about it, and then, alone, she encounters Satan and tastes the fruit from the
Tree of Knowledge. Eve shares the fruit with Adam, but the whole experience is different; the seduction
by Satan is not felt, but related second-hand. Adam and Eve are created by the same God and
have nature in common, but in some ways nurture separates them. After the fall, their love turns to
blame. However, in realizing and repenting of their sin, they learn of forgiveness, and are reunited in a
relationship of mutual support in the face of hardship, wending their solitary way out of Eden hand in
hand.
Adam
Adam is the first man and the father of mankind. He prefigures the human race, representing the
perfect male form. Adam is all fathers, sons and brothers rolled into one. Formed in the image of
God, he is God-like, but not a God. Neither is he flawless as he is a kind of replica, inferior to his
maker. Adam is created with free will and so has to make a choice whether to be obedient to God
and refuse the apple, or to follow Eve. His fond (which also means foolish) love for Eve is his
downfall. Adam is superior to Eve - he was created in the image of God, she in the image of man,
and Adam is even called her 'author' - but he does not initially assert his authority. Adam is too
trusting of Eve, taking the fruit she offers to him, and too devoted, choosing to share her fate
against the command of God.
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Eve
Eve embodies every mother, daughter and sister. Other women are compared to her, like Mary,
mother of Jesus, who is described as a 'second Eve' (X.183). She is beautiful and slender, a fair
creature with golden hair.
Milton's Eve is Adam's counterpart and other half but she is crucially not Adam's equal. This
imbalance between the couple, with Eve as the more submissive and subordinate of the two, is
evident in Paradise Lost both before and after the Fall, before Eve does anything wrong. This is in
contrast to the story in Genesis in which it is only after the Fall that Eve seems second-rate in
relation to Adam.
Eve is blamed for the Fall because she is tempted by Satan to taste the fruit from the Tree of
Knowledge. She is tricked, but it is, at least in part, her own fault; she wanted to be tested, to
prove herself, and so put herself in harms way, and, once the idea is suggested by the serpent,
she persuades herself and then Adam to eat the fruit. She is portrayed as innocent, making a
childish mistake in her inexperience in dealing with falsehood, but at the same time she is
characterized as foolish in more adult ways, as both sexualized and vain. When she is first
introduced to Adam she is narcissistically distracted by the sight of her own reflection in a pool of
water. This is a symptom of Eve's susceptibility to be lead astray and demonstrates that some of
her main failings, being inclined to distraction and following her desires, are present in Eve before
as well as after the Fall. It is her combination of naivety, greed and self-importance which make
Satan's suggestion so successful.
This negative view could be explained by the fact that Milton was writing from a post-lapsarian (i.e.
post-Fall) perspective. The view of women and their sexuality was tainted by the Fall, and
centuries of blame traditionally placed at Eve's feet. It is impossible to imagine Milton treating Eve
in a way that is not partly misogynistic because he is writing a story which is fundamentally antifemale. However, Raphael calls Eve, 'mother of mankind' (V.388), alluding to the idea of felix
culpa or 'Fortunate Fall'. Eve may bring about the Fall of Man, but this in turn brings about the
coming of Christ.
God
BY EILY-MEG MACQUEEN
Milton's presentation of God in Paradise Lost has sparked one of the most controversial and longrunning literary debates. The debate has achieved this status because readers and critics find it
difficult to view God as just a character in a fictional poem. The debate surrounding Milton's
presentation of God is wrapped up in our knowledge and speculation about his religious beliefs and
is also affected by the beliefs of critics themselves.
It is an extremely tricky business to attempt to represent God in literature. Caution over this
difficulty perhaps explains God's absence from the first two books ofParadise Lost and the
conventional descriptions when he does appear. He is 'the almighty Father' (III.56) and 'the great
creator' (III.167), and his actions are cast in a traditional, impressive and positive light, for
example, 'Thus while God spake, ambrosial fragrance filled | All heaven' (III.135). In the whole
of Paradise Lost, a surprisingly low number of lines are dedicated to God. He does not
communicate directly with Adam and Eve, instead sending the Son or angelic messengers to speak
to them. Yet his decision to send Raphael in Book V and Michael in Book XI confirms the idea of a
God who is involved with, and cares about, his creation, and his forgiveness of Abdiel in Book VI
and acceptance of Adam and Eve's prayers in Book XI also reveals a forgiving side.
Yet, Milton's presentation of God is not always so cautious. He does not allow his God to remain a
vacuous cliché, but rather, has him speak independently. George Miller acknowledges the risk
involved in this when he says, 'Milton made a bold decision in allowing God to speak in Paradise
Lost. No matter what God said or how he said it, someone was likely to object to the
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representation.'1 And so they have. Some complain that when God does speak, starting in Book III,
his speech is dull and unpoetic. This is perhaps because God's absence in the first two books allows
another character to steal the limelight; Satan. Satan's speeches are so lively and persuasive that
we are tempted to predominantly associate a poetic and grand style of speech with him. Yet, if we
look at God's first words, he also uses the rhetorical features present in Satan's speech. For
example, the asyndeton (listing without conjunctions) and use of synonyms seen in Satan's
question, 'Is this the region, this the soil, the clime...' (I.242), are present in God's description of
the adversary:
whom no bounds
Prescribed, no bars of hell, nor all the chains
Heaped on him there, nor yet the main abyss
Wide interrupt can hold.
(III.81)
The problem with having God speak in Paradise Lost is that speech is the best indicator of a character's
opinions and personality. For example, several critics, including A.D. Nuttall, complain that when God
first speaks, his words, 'Only begotten Son, seest thou what rage | Transports our adversary' (III.80), are
cruelly punning at the expense of the fallen angels, using the etymological source of movement in
'transports' to mock the devils' physical attempt to climb into heaven.2 However, what is clear about the
effect of God's sporadic but influential appearances in the poem is that they are controversial; we are all
invited to make up our own minds about the role and character of God in Paradise Lost.
The Son
BY KATHARINE FLETCHER
Christ, usually referred to as 'the Son', is the 'one greater man' (I.4) who will restore mankind
after the Fall of Adam. He is the poem's hero, but his heroism is largely a quiet one. The great
heroic act of the poem comes when the Son answers God's call to the heavenly powers for one to
offer satisfaction for man's crimes, 'death for death' (III.212). The Son offers to become mortal
and give his life to redeem man's:
Behold me then, me for him, life for life
I offer, on me let thine anger fall;
Account me man.
(III.236)
As this is a decision and a conversation rather than a dramatic act - the crucifixion itself takes
place long after the events of Paradise Lost- it is easy to let it slip into the background. However,
throughout the poem, the anticipation of Christ's sacrifice and man's redemption softly breathes
hope and gives meaning to the Fall; after all, without the Fall, there would be no need for the Son's
sacrifice which is seen by Christians (including Milton) as the fullest example of God's love for
mankind. (This idea is known as the Fortunate Fall or felix culpa.)
The Son also has other roles in Paradise Lost. In Book X, he acts as an intermediary between man
and God, bringing judgement from God to Adam and Eve, but also interceding for them, making
sure God hears their prayers for forgiveness. God describes the Son as 'Man's friend, his mediator'
(X.60).
The Son is also the Word of God, a theological idea which means that the Son is the agent by
which God makes things happen, as we see in the story of Creation, narrated to Adam by Raphael
in Book VII. It is the Son who defeats Satan in the battle in heaven, narrated in Book VI.
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Passages relating to themes
1. Opening
No more of talk where God or angel guest
With man, as with his friend, familiar used
To sit indulgent, and with him partake
Rural repast, permitting him the while
Venial discourse unblamed: I now must change
Those notes to tragic; foul distrust, and breach
Disloyal on the part of Man, revolt,
And disobedience: on the part of Heaven
Now alienated, distance and distaste,
Anger and just rebuke, and judgement given,
That brought into this world a world of woe,
(ix, 1-11)
2. Satan’s guile and the inevitability of the fall
… dictates to me slumbering; or inspires
Easy my unpremeditated verse:
(ix, 23-24)
Now improved
In meditated fraud and malice, bent
On Man's destruction, maugre what might hap
Of heavier on himself, fearless returned.
(ix, 54-57)
Him after long debate, irresolute
Of thoughts revolved, his final sentence chose
Fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom
To enter, and his dark suggestions hide
From sharpest sight: for, in the wily snake,
Whatever sleights none would suspicious mark,
As from his wit and native subtlety
Proceeding, which in other beasts observed
Doubt might beget of diabolic power
Active within beyond the sense of brute.
(ix, 87-96)
… but I in none of these
Find place or refuge; and the more I see
Pleasures about me, so much more I feel
Torment within me, as from the hateful siege
Of contraries;
(ix, 118-122)
… of these the vigilance
I dread; and to elude, thus wrapped in mist
Of midnight vapour glide obscure, and pry
In every bush and brake, where hap may find
The serpent sleeping, in whose mazy folds
To hide me, and the dark intent I bring.
O foul descent! That I who erst contended
With gods to sit the highest, am now constrained
Into a beast, and mixed with bestial slime,
This essence to incarnate and imbrute,
That to the highth of deity aspired;
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But what will not ambition and revenge
Descend to? Who aspires must down as low
As high he soared, obnoxious first or last
To basest things.
(ix, 157-171)
That space the evil one abstracted stood
From his own evil, and for the time remained
Stupidly good, of enmity disarmed,
(ix, 463-465)
3. Gardeners in paradise
The only two of mankind, but in them
The whole included race, his purposed prey.
(ix, 415-416)
But with such gardening tools as art yet rude,
Guiltless of fire had formed,
(ix, 388-392)
… for much their work out-grew
The hands' dispatch of two, gardening so wide
(ix, 202-203)
… both by thee informed I learn,
And from the parting angel overheard,
As in a shady nook I stood behind,
Just then returned at shut of evening flowers.
(ix, 275-278)
… but Delia's self
In gait surpassed, and goddess-like deport,
Though not as she with bow and quiver armed,
How are we happy, still in fear of harm?
(ix, 326)
4. Epic similes
As when of old some orator renowned
In Athens or free Rome, where eloquence
Flourished, since mute, to some great cause
addressed,
Stood in himself collected, while each part,
Motion, each act won audience ere the tongue,
Sometimes in highth began, as no delay
Of preface brooking through his zeal of right.
So standing, moving, or to highth upgrown
The tempter all impassioned thus began.
(ix, 670-678)
Forth issuing on a summer's morn to breathe
Among the pleasant villages and farms
Adjoined, from each thing met conceives delight,
The smell of grain, or tedded grass, or kine,
Or dairy, each rural sight, each rural sound;
If chance with nymph-like step fair virgin pass,
What pleasing seemed, for her now pleases more;
She most, and in her look sums all delight.
Such pleasure took the serpent to behold
This flowery plat,
(ix, 445-456)
As one who long in populous city pent,
Where houses thick and sewers annoy the air,
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Reading critically
So glistered the dire snake, and into fraud
Led Eve our credulous mother, to the tree
Of prohibition, root of all our woe;
(ix, 643-645)
Yet Milton’s grandeur and his subtlety … often co-exist in the very same lines, which makes it particularly important
not to cordon off the poem from meddling practical critics. The following lines would generally be agreed to belong
to Milton’s sterner style, but their bareness is combined with local subtlety to produce an effect of astonishing breadth
and power:
So glistered the dire snake, and into fraud
Led Eve our credulous mother, to the tree
Of prohibition, root of all our woe;
These lines stamp themselves at once as in the Grand Style. What is remarkable, though, is that they are verbally
subtle and active without any fussiness or any blurring of the grand austerity. I am thinking not only of the sombre
gleam in the pun on root; but also of subtler effects: the playing of the bright glistered against the dark dire, for instance.
Or the superb use of the curt ‘snake’. (Milton calls it the serpent fifteen times in Book IX; but the snake only three
times: once literally, before Satan enters it; and twice with calculated brutality: ‘So talked the spirited sly Snake’, and
here.)
There is the superbly suggestive diction: ‘our credulous Mother’, which must be one of the finest, most
delicate, and most moving of all the oxymorons in the poem. A mother ought to be everything that is reliable and
wise – here she is credulous. And our clinches the effect; credulous is pinioned on each side (‘our … Mother’), and the
full tragic pathos of the oxymoron is released …
There is the majesty of ‘the Tree of prohibition’ – no mere stilted Latinism, since it is literally true: the Tree is
not just ‘the prohibited tree’ but the Tree of all prohibition. And there is at this fatal moment the ringing echo of the
opening lines of the poem in ‘all our woe’. But perhaps the most irresistible of all the effects here is syntactical. ‘Into
fraud led Eve …’ overlaps magnificently with ‘… led Eve to the Tree’, so that what begins as a moving and ancient
moral metaphor (lead us not into temptation) crystallizes with terrifying literalness. There is a touching change of
focus, superbly compressed and yet without a shock or a jerk.
Christopher Ricks, Milton’s Grand Style (Oxford, 1963)
5. A hangover in paradise?
Soon as the force of that fallacious fruit,
That with exhilarating vapour bland
About their spirits had played, and inmost powers
Made err, was now exhaled, and grosser sleep
Bred of unkindly fumes, with conscious dreams
Encumbered, now had left them; up they rose
As from unrest, and each the other viewing,
Soon found their eyes how opened, and their
minds
How darkened; innocence, that as a veil
Had shadowed them from knowing ill, was gone;
(ix, 1046-1055)
Thus they in mutual accusation spent
The fruitless hours, but neither self-condemning,
And of their vain contest appeared no end.
(ix, 1187-1189)
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Paradise Lost: MILTON'S INHERITANCE
BY EWAN BLEIMAN
Anachronistic Neologism
A rather often stated paradox about Milton is that, in creating one of the most seminal works in the
English canon, he pushed the development of literature forward whilst looking backwards - to the
Civil War, to his precedents in English epic, to the classics and ultimately to the Bible. The poem
celebrates that which is lost in both subject-matter and Milton's use of language; like Spenser
before him, he resuscitated archaic words, formed new Latin-sounding creations and wrote in a
syntax and grammar that is convoluted, and has never been easy to read. It is comforting to think,
when reading Paradise Lost, that generations of readers and critics before you have got lost in its
verse-paragraphs, have struggled to identify where on earth the verb actually is. Because of its
anachronism and highly 'poetic' style, T.S. Eliot famously described Paradise Lost as an undeniably
great work that had, however, held back English poetry for years: even in the twentieth century, it
represented 'an influence against which we still have to struggle'. Just as the poem confronts both
the danger and the romance of revolution, it was forged from the influence of previous works into
something at once new and reactionary, pushing forward whilst looking back.
Quotation and Invocation
Perhaps the most important of Milton's influences in writing Paradise Lost is the classical epic form.
Milton was clearly interested in the investigation of classical genres and their relation to an English
poetry still trying to decide where it stood: amongst the Greek and Roman classics, with the
influential Italian and French literatures, or following the British vernacular tradition back to
Chaucer and his contemporaries. Indeed, the first of the poem's invocations to the Muses seems
almost hyperactive in its referencing, compressing together Milton's many influences:
Sing heavenly Muse, that on the secret top
Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire
That shepherd, who first taught the chosen seed,
In the beginning how the heavens and earth
Rose out of chaos: or if Sion hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flowed
Fast by the oracle of God, I thence
Invoke thy aid to my advent'rous song,
That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above the Aonian mount, while it pursues
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. (I.6-16)
The second line seems almost like a joke, a trick on the reader. Homer, Virgil, Dante, Chaucer and
Spenser (amongst many others) all opened their epic poems with prayers for help from the Greek
Muses, the goddesses who embodied and inspired the arts and those who practiced them. Whilst to
later, Christian, poets there is always a hint of Christianity read anachronistically into these pagan
invocations, Milton here catches the reader out by subverting convention and making it explicitly
Christian: the 'secret top' is not of Parnassus, the home of the Muses, but of 'Oreb, or of Sinai',
where Moses received the Ten Commandments. A studied, conventional archaism becomes in
Milton's hands not just a requirement of the epic form, but a tool to show his relation to it: he
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desires to soar 'Above the Aonian mount', to surpass rather than merely to follow the epic
tradition.
Rewriting Convention
In some ways the invocation can be seen as a conscious act of rebellion, even in its imitation of
previous conventions: Milton not only 'blasphemes' against the Classical tradition but also, in
invoking Christian divinity, makes a bold gesture. Contemporary theological and poetic theory saw
Christian invocation of God as over familiar, as poetry was considered by some an unsuitable place
for prayer. The whole invocation is a kind of collage, putting the Biblical 'in the beginning' in a
setting that seems borrowed in style from the Italian epic poet Dante. Significant, too, in our
understanding of Milton's relation to his poetic forefathers is line 16, where he promises to pursue
'Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme'. Ironically, this line staking a claim to new ground is
actually a translation, and a very literal one at that, from Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso,
another incredibly influential Italian epic ('Cosa non detta in prosa mai, né in rima'). What we have
here is an intense self-consciousness of style and of genre: where Chaucer, inTroilus and Criseyde,
sidesteps the issue of the morality of invoking a false God, Milton seems to investigate even the
most conventional aspect of his form and tune it to his own ends. The invocation uses fragments of
other work to fit a conventional shape to make a picture that is altogether new. It is here that we
find the answer to the paradox of Milton's revolution in being reactionary: the first truly Christian
Epic.
The Epic Tradition
It is worth considering what exactly we mean by 'epic' poetry - how much we can gain from
thinking about Paradise Lost as an epic, and how fixed the 'rules' of genre really are. Milton was
clearly interested in regulated literary form and the distinctions between genres. In some ways, he
represents the end of a certain trajectory in English literature as well as the beginning of one: he
wrote his sonnets decades after the form's heyday, his pastoral Lycidas well after the late sixteenth
century fashion for the genre, and his great epic Paradise Lost nearly eighty years after Spenser's
definitive English epic The Faerie Queene. Literary critic Colin Burrow has described the publication
of Milton's poem as 'deliberately untimely'. It's clear that Milton was not merely following literary
conventions and fashions, but rather reviving and re-evaluating the judgments made by
Renaissance literary theorists like Sir Philip Sidney, and classical philosophers like Aristotle.
We could spend a long time worrying about the exact definition of the epic, but it can be summarized
quite simply: most of the time, an epic is what announces itself as such by its length and generally grand
scope, and its conformity to several conventions. Not all of these need be in evidence, and epic seems
generally a less regulated form than pastoral, comedy or dramatic tragedy. Most epics, however, have a
strong single central character, a scope that encompasses various locations and often includes elements
of the supernatural or divine, a narrative opening in media res (in the middle of things), and use long,
rhetorically formalised speeches rather than the more naturalistic speech found more often in drama.
Milton's Epic
Milton was by no means the first poet to set Christian matters in the epic frame: in the fourteenth
century, William Langland's Piers Plowmanpresented Christ as a chivalric knight fighting for
mankind, while in the 1590s Spenser wrote into The Faerie Queene (amongst endless Christian and
philosophical allegories) an allegory where the Redcrosse Knight is both St. George and Christ,
linking medieval romance to biblical allegory and to neoclassical epic. But in Milton we do not
13
merely find a redeployment of the epic form to Christian ends: he at once provides English
Literature with its most perfect epic (students and academics will argue the comparative greatness
of Spenser and Milton for centuries; but where The Faerie Queene is idiosyncratic, singular and
unfinished, Paradise Lost fulfils most of the requirements for a 'proper' epic), and essentially kills
off the form.
As an example of Milton's simultaneous use and subversion of epic convention, we need look no
further than Milton's Satan cast as epic hero. That he is the 'hero' of the poem is undeniable in as
far as he is its most present character, the figure we follow most often and the progenitor of the
poem's main action. Perhaps the tendency for generations of readers to find him sympathetic is
actually a result of our conventionalised response: we find him heroic because of the perspective
that comes from his role, because he is given the chance to speak at greater length than others
and because he is the subject of conventions fitting for a hero (his spear, for example, is described
at length, just as Homer famously describes Achilles' shield). The material and form of the poem
cannot be seen as two separate edifices: we find Satan heroic because Milton has decided to write
this tale as an epic poem, and so we align Satan with other, earlier heroes and respond to the
accepted conventions of the genre.
Rethinking Genre
So Paradise Lost is both a consummate example of Milton's literary heritage and scholarly interest
in form, and an anti-epic, seeking to surpass, rewrite and rethink that which has gone before. Do
we find Satan noble just because he is the hero of Paradise Lost, or was he written as the hero
because Milton thought him noble? Can we be tricked into false moral judgment by responding to
convention, by treating the Bible like other literature? Does generic literature (and all literature is
to some extent generic, even if that genre is 'The Novel') always have certain moral judgments or
sympathies implicit in its conventions? These are all questions that Milton confronts when he uses
the epic form, and ultimately we must follow his example in reading the poem: there is no
authoritative voice in Paradise Lost. If we see even the voice of the narrator as an exercise in form,
then we are faced with the ultimate significance of Paradise Lost as Christian epic: the revelation of
the power of the form and of poetry to bewitch the reader by its majesty and its associations to
previous works, but also the imperative of its readers to think beyond what they are told, to read
critically and to be aware of the implications of form and genre.
Further Reading
Colin Burrow's Epic Romance: Homer to Milton (Oxford, 1993)
provides a useful overview of how millennia of poets have interpreted the form, and is useful
for thinking about Milton's place as a crossroads, ending one tradition of literature and forcing a
crux in the development of the canon.
The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry by Harold Bloom (1973)
is notorious, and worth reading with a critical mind: it looks at Milton from both sides, and places
him at the centre of a larger theory of how poets influence one another.
14
MILTON'S RELIGIOUS CONTEXT
BY DAVID PARRY
Introduction
In October 1656, the Quaker leader James Nayler rode into Bristol on a donkey, imitating Jesus
Christ’s entry into Jerusalem. Women surrounded Nayler, laying palm leaves in front of him. This
incident was debated in parliament for six weeks, many MPs arguing that Nayler should be put to
death for blasphemy. In the end, a more lenient punishment was decided upon, and Nayler had his
tongue drilled through.
Welcome to the seventeenth century!
In the past couple of years, religion has become headline news in a way that (at least in the UK) it
hasn’t been for decades. This has taken politicians, journalists and academics by surprise, and
many are struggling to catch up. In the academic world this has led to a new interest in writers like
Milton.
In our time, we have a view of reality which separates out the public space of ‘facts’ (where we put
science and politics) and the private space of ‘values’ (where we put morality and religion). This
distinction was less sharp 400 years ago. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century writers frequently
used ‘religious’ arguments and quotations from the Bible to defend ideas about politics, literature
and even fishing.
Milton cannot be understood out of his religious context. When he was a young man, Milton was
preparing to become a clergyman in the Church of England, as his parents had intended. However, he
later decided that because ‘tyranny had invaded the Church’ he could not be ordained in the Church of
England with a good conscience (The Reason of Church-Government, CPW I.823). Why was this?
Well, to explain this, we need to go back to the sixteenth century, the century before Milton.
The Reformation
In the later Middle Ages, many people in Europe were concerned about problems in the church
including corruption, low educational standards for priests, and religious apathy among the general
population. In the early sixteenth century, some people, such as Martin Luther in Germany and
John Calvin in France and Switzerland, started to argue that the root problem in the church was
that its message had drifted from the original message of Jesus Christ and his first followers.
Around this time the Bible was printed and translated into national languages (not just Latin) and
so became available to a wider audience than ever before.
The reformers argued that the Bible teaches that we enter into a relationship with God which
brings us eternal life and the forgiveness of sins simply by putting our trust in Jesus Christ and his
sacrifice of himself for our sins. They held that this message had become confused by the Church’s
emphasis on religious observance, good works, and the financial support of the Church as means
of attaining salvation, ideas which suggested that people could buy their way into God’s good
books. Some reformers stayed loyal to the Catholic Church, and instigated changes collectively
known as the Counter-Reformation, but many reformers left or were expelled from the Church and
began founding their own churches. Those who belonged to these reform movements outside the
Catholic Church became known as Protestants.
15
The Reformation was a messy business, which was tangled up with all kinds of economic, political
and personal motives. Non-theological reasons for becoming Protestant might include cashing in on
the market for selling books on these controversial ideas, or, for kings and princes, increasing your
political power by ditching the authority of the Pope. In England, Henry VIII broke away from the
authority of the Pope and made himself ‘the only supreme head on earth of the Church of England’
(Act of Supremacy, 1534). This was largely motivated by political reasons related to his divorce of
Catherine of Aragon and subsequent marriage to Anne Boleyn. Henry VIII wasn’t too interested in
the new religious ideas floating around, and, in fact, was strongly opposed to some of them, but
his break with the Pope opened a door through which Protestant theology started to come.
Henry’s son Edward VI and his advisers promoted a much more thorough form of Protestantism
when he came to the throne in 1547. However, when Edward died in 1553, the pendulum swung
right back the other way. When Edward’s sister Mary came to the throne, she gave England back
to the Pope, and started burning Protestants. Unsurprisingly, many Protestants ran away to places
under Protestant control in Europe, such as parts of Switzerland and Germany. When Mary died in
1558, and her Protestant sister Elizabeth became queen, these people came home. You would have
thought they would be happy...
Puritanism
Well, some of them were. But after a while things started to bother some of the returning
Protestant leaders. Elizabeth made England Protestant (again), but for some, it wasn’t Protestant
enough. Elizabeth wanted to hold the country together and so tried to manage the national church
in a way that included as many people as possible. Because of this, the Church of England signed
up to a Protestant theology, but many of the outward features of the old church stayed the same –
such as bishops, ministers wearing robes, and using a written service book. For some people these
things could be used perfectly well in a Protestant context, but others thought that because they
couldn’t find these things in the Bible, they shouldn’t be used. These people are often known as
Puritans. Church historian Patrick Collinson has called the Puritans ‘hot Protestants’, meaning
people who were keen to reform the Church of England further to be more extremely Protestant.
Different scholars have suggested different ways of defining Puritanism. Some of the common
characteristics include emphasis on the importance of preaching and on the importance of spiritual
experience. Milton is often counted as a Puritan, though this depends on which definition of
Puritanism you are thinking of.
When Milton studied at Cambridge, his college, Christ’s, was a stronghold of Puritanism. Some of
the fellows (i.e. tutors and lecturers) of the college got in trouble with the university authorities for
attacking some of the practices of worship used in the college chapel and for speaking to each
other in English instead of Latin. As the seventeenth century went on, Puritans became concerned
with the way the Church of England, particularly under Archbishop William Laud, was starting to
move back to ritual and ceremonial practices found in the Catholic Church, and was starting to
downplay the importance of preaching from the Bible.
The Puritans often suffered (and still suffer) from a negative stereotype of being miserable killjoys.
While there are some things about some Puritans which might fit this view, such as the Puritan
attack on theatre, many of them lived out their faith in a joyful way and some of them really
enjoyed the natural world and the arts. (Milton fits in here, since he wrote some of his poems to be
set to music and helped to put on shows for the nobility.) All of them believed that ordinary people
were important and wanted the whole population to be educated to understand God’s message to
them.
At the time of the English Civil War (a series of disputes and battles between 1642-51), Puritanism
was generally associated with the Parliamentarian side, and Laudianism with King Charles’
supporters. These religious disagreements contributed to the mix of tensions leading to the wars.
16
When Parliament won the war and set up a republic, the ideas of different Puritan groups had an
input into political decision-making.
One possible explanation for why the republican government didn’t ultimately succeed is that when
the Puritans got into power, they split into their different factions. There was a whole spectrum of
different religious groups in the broader Puritan movement, some more bizarre than others, but
the distinction which is most significant for thinking about Milton is the distinction between
Presbyterians and Independents. The Presbyterians wanted to keep a national church, but to have
it led by a council of ministers (presbyters) who had equal status to each other, instead of by
bishops. The Independents wanted each specific congregation to be able to decide for itself its
beliefs and practices. Milton seems to have moved from working with the Presbyterians against the
bishops, to being disillusioned with the Presbyterian desire to bring in a new system of religious
control. His sympathies probably moved to the Independent side.
Milton’s own beliefs
It’s hard to pin down Milton’s exact beliefs, except to say that he was a strong Protestant who
emphasised the freedom of the individual. It is fair to say that Milton probably held a number of
controversial beliefs, such as the idea that the soul dies with the body and will be resurrected with
the body on the Day of Judgement. He certainly held controversial views on divorce and may well
have had sympathies with Arminianism, a new variant of Protestant theology, which, in contrast
with mainstream Calvinism, emphasised human freedom rather than God’s ruling power over all
things.
Milton probably held heretical views, which contradict orthodox Christian belief, on the Trinity.
Instead of the standard Christian belief that God is one God in three persons – Father, Son and
Holy Spirit – Milton seems to have believed that these were three separate beings, and that the
Son and Spirit were not equal with the Father. These ideas are found in a theological work
traditionally attributed to Milton, De Doctrina Christiana (meaning ‘On Christian Teaching’),
although there is currently some debate over whether Milton wrote it.
These debates about Milton’s theological beliefs influence how we read Paradise Lost, where, for
example, it seems to me that the Son is a being who is greater than the angels but not strictly
equal to God the Father.
Paradise Lost
was written after the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, who returned the Church of
England to how it was in his father’s time before the Civil War. It seemed as if the Puritan cause had
been defeated. We might see Abdiel in Books V and VI ofParadise Lost as representing this Puritan
cause, standing for purity and truth in the midst of a corrupt society. In Book V, lines 809-48, Abdiel
defends a radical obedience to God with ‘zeal’, even though his manner seems ‘out of season’ and
‘singular and rash’ (V.849-51). Many Puritans seemed this way to the people around them. It seems that
Milton became increasingly isolated, politically and religiously, in his later life. Perhaps he saw himself
as an Abdiel figure: ‘Among the faithless, faithful only he’ (Paradise Lost, V.897).
17
MILTON'S POLITICAL CONTEXT
BY GABRIEL ROBERTS
The Political Climate of Milton's Day
The mid seventeenth-century was a time of great social and cultural turmoil. A series of political
and military conflicts, now known as the English Civil War or the English Revolution, was waged
intermittently between Parliamentarians and Royalists from 1642 to 1651.
There were many factors contributing to the tensions between the Crown and Parliament, including
Charles' marriage to the Catholic princess, Henrietta-Maria of France, and his desire to be involved
in European wars. But the most interesting were the ideological questions being raised about the
nature of government and authority. In the seventeenth century, the Crown played a much greater
role in the running of the country than it does today. Parliament's power was growing, but before
the Civil War, it was called and dissolved at the will of the monarch, and used mostly to issue taxes
when the king needed money. Charles I believed in the 'divine right of kings' and ruled fairly
autonomously, but much of Parliament believed that the king had a contractual obligation to the
people to rule without tyranny. Parliamentarians were angry that Charles refused to call a
Parliament for most of the 1630s, during which time he tried to levy what were considered to be
illegal taxes. With Archbishop Laud, he tried to take the Church in the direction of High
Anglicanism, which aroused suspicion that he was trying to revert the country to Catholicism.
In 1649, after years of various political manoeuvres and bouts of fighting, King Charles I was executed
for treason. For the next decade England had no monarch. Initially, a Commonwealth was formed and
England was ruled by a republican government, but in 1653 Oliver Cromwell became Lord Protector,
essentially a military dictator. He was succeeded by his son Richard in 1658, but because of faction
fighting and Richard's lack of popularity as a leader, the republic failed. Charles II, the executed
monarch's son, was declared King in the Restoration of 1660.
Milton
In 1641 Milton published Of Reformation Touching Church-Discipline in England, marking the
beginning of a career of political prose writing which would last almost until his death in 1674.
Close analysis reveals a subtle change in his thought away from the youthful orthodoxy which had
led him to consider ordination as a priest, and towards the increasingly heretical and subversive
theology which typifies his later writings. However, the general thrust of his political writings is
towards Puritan reformation in the church, and the replacement of the monarchy with a free
commonwealth. His enduring support for Cromwell resulted in his appointment in 1649 as
Secretary for Foreign Languages, a position which involved acting as the voice of the English
revolution to the world at large. He remained stalwart in his belief in the republic,
publishing The Readie and Easie Way to Establish a Free Commonwealth only a few months before
Charles II's return in May 1660.
Milton's thought always appears highly integrated, and his political views cannot easily be separated
either from his religious beliefs or from his poetry. An understanding of the politics of Paradise
Lost must therefore be informed by an awareness of Milton's political life, his work as a prose writer,
and the subversive elements of his theology.
18
On Kingship
Milton's political views can be seen with particular clarity in relation to the execution of Charles I.
Arguments both for and against Charles' reign exhibit a distinctively legal approach to scriptural
exegesis (i.e. to the systematic interpretation and citation of passages from scripture). During his
trial, Charles refused to make a plea to the court, claiming that no court could possess the
necessary authority to try him. In thus denying the accountability of the monarch either to his
subjects or to the law, Charles asserted that his rule was divinely ordained. The belief that the
monarch is answerable only to God finds Biblical support in the Old Testament's records of God's
endorsement of the kings of Israel and Judah, and in the New Testament in Romans 13:1-2.
Writing in The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (which was published only a month after Charles'
execution in January 1649 and which serves primarily to justify the regicide), Milton adopts a
markedly different interpretation of scripture:
No man who knows aught can be so stupid to deny that all men naturally were born free, being the image and
resemblance of God himself, and were, by privilege above all the creatures, born to command and not to obey.
(CPW, III.198)
The emphasis here is upon the nature of the created order, and upon man's position as part of the
divine hierarchy. Milton argues that a tyrannical ruler contradicts this divine order, and that the
role of the king is primarily to maintain this order, rather than to destabilize it. Arguing
conceptually, historically and legally, Milton claims that the king must be understood as a servant
of the people, bound to their service by the vows made in his coronation. He argues:
It follows that to say kings are accountable to none but God, is the overturning of all law and government [...] for if
the king fear not God, [...] we hold then our lives and estates by the tenure of his mere grace and mercy, as from a
god, not a mortal magistrate. (CPW, III.204)
Milton's argument is sublimely clever. He contends that for the king to make himself answerable only to
God is to make himself a god, heretically contradicting the divine ordering of creation. However, whilst
Milton's argument contains a cunning blend of biblical exegesis and political pragmatism, his influence
from classical sources is clear. His definition of a monarch is rather incongruously drawn from Aristotle,
and his repeated emphasis on the idea of tyranny evokes both Greek political thought and Latin writers
such as Plutarch and Tacitus. The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates thus serves as a useful microcosm
for broader aspects of Milton's politics: the blend of politics and religion, the importance of textual
learning in his thought, and the unification of biblical and classical references, which would come to its
fullest expression in Paradise Lost.
Poetry and Politics
It is important to recognise that just as Milton's political writings attain an extraordinary forcefulness
through the use of literary devices, his poetry often overflows with political fervour and antagonism.
Writing in Areopagitica, a tract denouncing restrictive censorship, Milton famously describes 'a noble
and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks'; he
goes on: 'methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at
the full midday beam' (CPW, II.558). The imagery is poetic, and the tone is elevated. The reverse effect
can be found in many passages of Milton's poetry. In the penultimate speech of Samson Agonistes,
Samson (before leaving to massacre the Philistines by pulling their temple down on their heads) argues:
19
'Masters' commands come with a power resistless | To such as owe them absolute subjection' (1404). In
his consideration of divine authority, Samson seems to adopt the tone (and even the arguments) of
Milton's early political writings. Both Samson contemplating mass murder and Milton attempting to
justify regicide seem to fall into the same state of mind, and to share a common means of expression.
Politics in Paradise Lost
In attempting to situate Paradise Lost in its political context we face a particular critical choice,
which rests upon the kind of context which we have in mind. On the one hand, we can examine the
stylistic and argumentative similarities between sections ofParadise Lost and Milton's more
explicitly political writings. On the other hand, Paradise Lost can be read as a political allegory,
which is to say that events and characters in Paradise Lost can be aligned with aspects of the
political context of the poem's creation.
Satan's speeches provide the strongest example of a distinctively political voice appearing in the
poem. When he addresses the fallen angels Milton draws on rhetorical techniques which are wellestablished in his political prose.
Is this the region, this the soil, the clime, […]
That we must change for heaven, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? (I.242-5)
Here Satan uses a series of rhetorical questions with progressively more contracted syntax in order
to assert his point. But Milton's rhetorical sophistication also allows him to weave subtle flaws into
Satan's arguments, expressing his corrupted nature at a particularly detailed level. When in Book
IX Satan persuades Eve to eat the fruit, Milton strikes a fascinating balance between making Satan
convincing and making sure that his arguments are misleading. For example:
Indeed? Hath God then said that of the fruit
Of all these garden trees ye shall not eat,
Yet lords declared of all in earth or air? (IX.656)
Satan deliberately misunderstands Eve in order to make God's restriction appear more
authoritarian and perverse. But more than this, he implies that there is a contradiction between
Adam and Eve having been created as lords over the world and their being restricted from eating
the sacred fruit. The implication is gentle, and avoids direct criticism of God, instead putting
pressure on Eve to justify God's prohibition. These examples also demonstrate Satan's ability to
modulate between different kinds of rhetorical questioning, much as Milton's prose works combine
both blistering interrogation, and the barbed, faux-naive attitude which Satan adopts towards Eve.
But the stylistic similarities between passages of Paradise Lost and Milton's political works are not
mere chance. They arise in part because the characters in Paradise Lost find themselves in situations
which genuinely are political. In directing the Son to create earth, God the Father is conducting an act of
rulership, which is inescapably political. Likewise, Satan's attempts to rouse the fallen angels in Book I
really are reminiscent of Milton's desire to rally support for the Cromwellian government. These broader
political parallels lead us towards a more allegorical interpretation of the poem as a whole. We can
begin to see how the great debate in Book II might be read as a political satire, mocking the tiresome
debates which Milton conducted in his youth. Similarly, the interaction of Adam and Eve is a
fascinating study of gender politics, whilst the relationship between God the Father and God the Son
presents an obvious ideal of kingship and the delegation of power. But the danger of such readings is
that they quickly lose their specificity. The figure of Satan especially accommodates a wide variety of
different allegorical interpretations. He can be seen as a false leader to the fallen angels, his enforcement
of his own will on the great debate in Book II recalling Charles I's willful disregard for parliament. But
alternatively, he can be seen to represent something of Milton and Cromwell in their revolutionary
struggles against the king. At a slightly more general level he can even be seen to represent the failure of
20
any political discourse in this period, and of religious culture which attempts to exist apart from divine
authority and biblical revelation. The problem is that Satan is primarily identified as a force of rebellion
against God, and Paradise Lost rarely seems to require us to construe him as anything else.
Closing thoughts
An understanding of the politics of Paradise Lost clearly depends on an understanding of the politics of
the English Civil War and particularly of Milton's position in it. The application of this knowledge to the
text of Paradise Lost is perhaps most effectively conducted through an appreciation of the interplay of
ideas between Milton's poetic and political writings. Allegorical interpretations, although interesting and
to some extent the natural result of a stylistic analysis of the poem's politics, must be carefully qualified.
Although Paradise Lost is very much a poem of its times, it is important to remember that its setting is
metaphysical and its direct concern religious.
Further Reading
Stephen M. Fallon, Milton among the Philosophers: Poetry and Materialism in SeventeenthCentury England (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991).
This is a useful book dealing with Milton's intellectual historical context. It covers Descartes and
Hobbes in especially good detail, but also reflects interestingly on the nature of fictive writing and
allegory in such contexts.
William J. Grace, Ideas in Milton (London; Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press,
1968).
This book gives a very clear summary of Milton's humanist, theological and religious background,
and breaks the topics down into very manageable chunks. It makes a very good reference tool,
and gives some quite original readings ofSamson Agonistes and Lycidas.
Stevie Davies, Images of Kingship in Paradise Lost: Milton's Politics and Christian Liberty,
(Missouri: University of Missouri Press, 1983).
Although this book probably does too little to get beyond the dichotomy of Christian freewill and
oppressive institutional power structures it does give a clear idea of the different notions of
kingship with which Paradise Lost engages. This is probably best used simply to dip into.
Barry Coward, The Stuart Age: England 1603-1714, 2nd edition (London: Longman, 1994).
Although quite dense, this book puts forward a clear account of the history of the seventeenth century,
including chapters on the Civil War and Restoration which can be read in isolation. Its approach is
excellent as Coward does not try to separate political, religious, social, economical or intellectual
strands,
but
instead
looks
at
the
whole
picture.
21
MILTON AND THE CRITICS:
The Reception of Paradise Lost
BY SOPHIE READ
Publication
In 1667 John Milton published Paradise Lost, perhaps the greatest long poem in the English
language. It was recognised as an extraordinary achievement shortly after it appeared, and has, in
the three hundred and fifty years that people have been reading and thinking about it, provoked a
great deal of critical debate. Despite its current canonical status, a favourable reception
for Paradise Lost in the late seventeenth century was no foregone conclusion, and its reputation
has fluctuated surprisingly ever since.
With the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Milton was out in the cold: as a staunch republican,
a supporter of Cromwell and an apologist for the regicide, he was lucky to escape execution for
treason. His unorthodox views on various sensitive subjects, including divorce (he was in favour)
were well known: Milton was an active writer of political pamphlets as well as a poet, and he had
many influential enemies. England in 1667 was reeling from the events of the previous year, when
plague and fire had swept the capital, causing a devastation many people thought was divinely
inspired; a biblical epic from a blind, grim old controversialist was by no means certain of being
sympathetically received, as the poet's wish that his poem might 'fit audience find, though few'
(VII.31) perhaps recognises. In spite of this unwelcoming climate, whenParadise Lost appeared, it
was hailed as a work of genius, even by Milton's political opponents. The audience was not few, but
was it fit?
Contemporary Response
From the start, this epic poem attracted a number of disobedient readers. One of the first major
responses was an adaptation for the stage by John Dryden, The State of Innocence (1671). He
sought and received Milton's permission to put Paradise Lost into rhyme (unconvinced,
presumably, by the comments on the 'troublesome and modern bondage of rhyming' in the note
on the verse), and his version outsold the original until the end of the seventeenth century.
Dryden's political affiliation (he was a royalist) prompted him to play on a crux in Milton's poem:
Satan, who disdains servitude and tries to overturn his monarch, becomes in Dryden's rewriting an
unmistakeable portrait of Oliver Cromwell, the king-killer. He also believed that the fallen angel,
and not Adam, was the hero (in the sense of his structural position as the protagonist of the epic),
and weighted his adaptation accordingly.
This was not an isolated instance of wishful interpretation. Contemporary readers who thought
there was a whiff of sulphur about the unrepentant republican poet were not surprised to find
these sentiments in the mouth of the arch-fiend; and there were those who believed that Milton
was in fact disowning his previous stance by associating it with Satan. Neither reading does justice
to the complexity of Paradise Lost, but this does identify what was to become a recurrent theme in
later responses to the poem: the contested interpretation of Satan, its eloquent anti-hero.
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The Early Eighteenth Century
Milton's epic achieved classical status in the last years of the seventeenth century, when it was
published with explanatory notes - the first poem in English to be so presented. Twenty years
later, its position was consolidated by an influential series of articles written by Joseph Addison in
the Spectator (a daily paper). This, however, did not protect the poem from interference: in 1732,
Richard Bentley (one of the earliest textual critics in England) produced an 'emended' edition, in
which he argued that the blind poet had employed an incompetent amanuensis, and that as a
result many errors of wording and logic had crept into the published version. Bentley's unjustified
and insensitive revisions attracted widespread ridicule - not least from Alexander Pope, who
pilloried him in the Dunciad (a satire against dull poets). These revisions reflected, however, a
feeling that Paradise Lost, though a national classic, was somehow unorthodox in its theological
and philosophical outlook. Pope's poem, and indeed his earlier work Rape of the Lock, show
another kind of response to Milton. They are 'mock-epics', and re-deploy elements of Milton's style
(and, of course, that of his classical antecedents) to comic ends. Milton's achievement was felt to
be so great that no contemporary poet could rival or match it: writing a serious epic would be out
of the question.
Romantic Milton
At the end of the eighteenth century and the start of the nineteenth, the complex poetic response
to Paradise Lost turned once again to the figure of Satan. Milton was hugely important for the
Romantic poets, for his political stance as well as the model of his writing. As far as Coleridge was
concerned, he sat, with Shakespeare, on 'one of the two glory-smitten summits of the poetic
mountain'. Though some writers, notably John Keats, were uneasy under his influence, Milton was
widely read and highly regarded. 'Milton!', William Wordsworth opens his sonnet on London, 'thou
shoulds't be living at this hour:| England hath need of thee'.
Such straightforward veneration, however, was not to be the lasting legacy of Romantic
interpretations. William Blake voiced a thought that had been troubling readers almost since the
poem's publication, and has dogged it ever since. Noticing that Books I and II are rather more
absorbing than Book III, Blake concluded: 'The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of
Angels and God, and at liberty when of Devils and Hell, is because he was a true Poet and of the
Devil's party without knowing it'. Whatever Milton's intention - and Blake here concedes that the
effect was not deliberate - the power of the poetry glamorizes the figure of Satan at God's
expense. Shelley went further; ignoring the theological constraints of Milton's framework, he
considered the divine and the diabolic as literary characters, and decided that Satan came out
rather better. 'Milton's Devil as a moral being' is, he writes, 'far superior to his God'. Satan's noble
striving against immense adversity, his valorization of the individual, had greater appeal than what
Shelley read as God's cold and certain execution of the preordained plan of the devils' (and Man's)
destruction. Such an impression, Shelley believed, could not have been accidental: 'this bold
neglect of a direct moral purpose is the most decisive proof of the supremacy of Milton's genius'.
Critical Controversy
Blake's and Shelley's views, corroborated by Satan's powerfully persuasive rhetoric, have enjoyed
some currency with subsequent readers, though the Romantics' admiration has not always been
echoed along with their interpretations. The early years of the twentieth century saw the study of
English literature institutionalized as a degree subject in the universities: an enterprise to which
Milton, in some ways the country's first classic poet, might have been central. There emerged,
however, a growing antipathy towards Milton's 'stifling' presence, and it expressed itself in a desire
to dislodge him from the pre-eminent position he had come to occupy. F. R. Leavis, an influential
23
Cambridge critic and teacher, had little time for Milton. T. S. Eliot objected to Milton as a man
('Milton is unsatisfactory'), as a poet ('Milton writes English like a dead language'), and as an
inspiration ('Milton's bad influence may be traced much further than the eighteenth century').
Milton found a passionate advocate in Christopher Ricks, whose seminal 1967 work Milton's Grand
Style still, however, needed to adopt a defensive stance. Harold Bloom, writing a few years later,
proposed Milton's very mastery of the language as an explanation for these responses; he is,
Bloom believes, 'the great Inhibitor, the Sphinx who strangles even strong imaginations in their
cradles'.
Serious objections to Milton's style and his place in the canon were not generally sustained. But the
years that followed saw a new iteration of the old dispute over the interpretation of Paradise Lost.
The poem was accepted as a great work, but the reasons for this greatness were contested.
In Milton's God (1961), William Empson set about refuting the attempts of C. S. Lewis and others
to rehabilitate the character of God and to maintain that Milton succeeded in his avowed intention
to 'justify' the divine purpose. Empson concluded, after an idiosyncratic and spirited demolition of
God's motives and actions, that 'the reason why the poem is so good is that it makes God so bad'.
The critical battle lines were firmly drawn, and no negotiation seemed possible. Either Milton was
on God's side and any attempt to suggest otherwise was unchristian and perverse, or Paradise
Lost was a veiled critique of the heavenly hierarchy, and Satan's charisma and plausibility a result
of Milton's sympathy for his plight. In 1967, Stanley Fish publishedSurprised by Sin: The Reader in
Paradise Lost, which tried to reconcile these opposing viewpoints by arguing that the true hero of
the poem is in fact the reader: seeing God as malevolent or Satan as attractive is simply an
indication of a fallen state, and part of the poem's purpose.
Fish was not entirely successful (his book provoked much controversy of its own) and these disputes
have not, even now, been resolved. In the last decades of the twentieth century there was a movement
away from addressing the question directly, and works on Milton's theology (e.g. Robert
Entzminger's Divine Word), politics (e.g. Milton and Republicanism, a collection edited by Quentin
Skinner, among others) and language (e.g. John Leonard's Naming in Paradise) started to take
precedence. New and important works on Milton continue to appear, and testify to the centrality in the
canon of this rich and difficult epic. There is, it seems, still much to say about Paradise Lost.
24
Essays on Themes
Self-reference, Allusion, and Inversion —George Herbert, "The H. Scriptures II"
In the context of her work on Milton’s polemics (Milton and the Revolutionary Reader), Sharon Achinstein has characterized
Milton as "a writer compelled to show readers how to act by reading . . . the enemy argument properly," which is to say that,
by cross-examining the opposition’s logic point by point and challenging his audience to do likewise, "he show[s the
politically naive] how criticism ought to be conducted." If he is successful, the fit readers of Paradise Lost will come away
from the text knowing not only what is wrong with the rationalizations offered by Satan, Adam, and Eve, and why
(regardless of how seductively plausible it may seem to be at the outset) the reasoning of their exculpations is specious, "but
also how to perform similar critical acts [themselves] in the future"(Achinstein, 146-7)—a crucial capability in a world in
which even the most innocuous of truths could be no longer be relied upon as given, and in which all of the received
epistemology (geocentrism, heavenly perfection, divine right kingship, the sacredness of the Bible, the infallibility of the
Pope, etc.) had been refuted or cast seriously into doubt. Like Herbert, Milton was intimately familiar with the selfreferentiality of the Bible, and conscious of the way in which, for example, the Old Testament Pascal lamb becomes the New
Testament Agnus Dei, or the Lenten triumphs of One Just Man in the wilderness subsume, amplify, and supersede the trials
and achievements of all of the solitary heroes (Noah, Moses, Abraham, Job) who have gone before, and he reverently
appropriated such biblical techniques to justify the ways of God to men. As Fish suggests in "Driving from the Letter,"
Milton’s rhetorical strategy "involves encouraging the reader to a premature act of concluding or understanding which is then
undone or upset by the introduction of a new and compelling perspective"; this "happens not once, but repeatedly" (243), so
that, by means of his deft manipulation of language and imagery along the lines suggested by the matrix that follows, Milton
induces the reader again and again to recapitulate Fish’s now-classic model, "Adam is wrong, no, he's right, but then of
course, he is wrong, and so am I" (Fish, Surpris’d by Sin, 38-43). My intent in compiling this matrix of self-referential,
allusive, and inverted lines and images in Paradise Lost is to demonstrate by means of tabulated comparison and contrast
both the mechanics of the rhetorical and semiotic entrapment that I believe Milton is striving throughout the epic to teach us
to avoid (demonstrating by object lesson how easy it is to fall victim to "words cloth’d in reason’s garb"), and to illuminate
the tacit warnings he so subtly imbeds within the body of the epic itself, alerting those readers who are members of his "fit
audience though few" to the fact that all is not as or what it seems, nor is it what it should be, no matter how often or how
gloriously it may seduce us at first glance.
This matrix is the product of twenty five years of reading and re-reading Paradise Lost, a work that continues to awe me not
only in terms of the magnitude and depth of its self-referentiality, but also by virtue of the skillfully subtle manner in which
Milton purposefully subverts and deconstructs his own text to teach his readers how to perform such analytical tasks on their
own. The richness of Milton’s self-allusion will not be surprising to the any of the scholars intimately familiar with the poem,
though the variety of its subtleties may be, and these in turn may suggest other connections not dealt with here. As a
reference tool to supplement other critical readings, the matrix should also prove valuable to any new reader struggling to
comprehend the mechanism whereby the poet reassures us that Satan is not the hero of Paradise Lost, and attempts to justify
the ways of God to men in an endeavor to teach himself and us what Christian heroism ought to be.
Satan’s Rhetoric and Protestantism
Satan mixes elements of each of these theories of the relation of subject to ruler into his rhetoric. In justifying his, and his
faction's, rebellion against heaven's king, Satan portrays himself as a prince entitledand even required to resist an unjust
monarch who is grasping for absolute power and thereby attempting to usurp that portion of the "higher power" or
"governing authority" that belongs to the lower magistrates: "A third part of the Gods [again, read "Gods" as elohim in
Calvin's sense of gods, magistrates, or judges], in Synod met / Thir Deities to assert, who while they feel / Vigor Divine
within them, can allow / Omnipotence to none" (VI. 156-159).
The picture of heaven's king as a grasper, a usurper of powers not rightfully his own, is common to those who follow Satan's
lead. Nisroch, "of Principalities the prime," addresses Satan as "Deliverer from new Lords, leader to free / Enjoyment of our
right as Gods" (VI. 451, 452). Satan himself characterizes the pronouncement of the Son as the great Vice-gerent as a
usurpation of power rightfully belonging to others: "Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers, / If these magnific
Titles yet remain / Not merely titular, since by Decree / Another now hath to himself ingross't / All Power, and us eclipst
under the name / Of King annointed . . . "(P.L. V. 772-777). Satan goes on to characterize this shift in heavenly politics as a
demand for "Knee-tribute yet unpaid, prostration vile, / too much to one, but double how endur'd, / To one and to his image
now proclaim'd?" (V. 782-784).
25
The political balance of Stephen Marshall's "Letter" is at work here in two ways: Satan is characterizing the heavenly system
as having been one in which (until the usurpation) the threefold power of enacting laws, making wars, and judging "causes
and crimes" had been shared by the king and parliament, the heavenly king and his heavenly princes and magistrates; the
"Father infinite" of V. 596 is characterizing the heavenly system as one in which the threefold power is contained in one
ruler, the heavenly king. By claiming to defend their right to rule, to defend "those Imperial Titles which assert / Our being
ordain'd to govern, not to serve" (V. 801, 802), Satan and his followers are claiming their rights under a system of
government which holds that it is the duty of lesser magistrates to hold the king in check. This fits quite nicely with Calvin's
insistence that the only lawful political resistance to a tyrannous king could come from lower magistrates acting in concert
with one another. It is, in fact, the sacred duty of such magistrates to resist tyranny, as is spelled out quite clearly in the
following passage:
I am so far from forbidding them to withstand, in accordance with their duty, the fierce licentiousness of
kings, that, if they wink at kings who violently fall upon and assault the lowly common folk, I declare that
their dissimulation involves nefarious perfidy, because they dishonestly betray the freedom of the people,
of which they know that they have been appointed protectors by God's ordinance. (Institutes of the
Christian Religion, IV. xx. 31, p. 1519)
That Satan claims to be fighting against tyranny is made clear by his numerous references to the Father as a tyrant: Hell is the
"Prison of his Tyranny who Reigns / By our delay"; the Father is "our grand Foe, / Who now triumphs, and in th' excess of
joy / Sole reigning holds the Tyranny of Heav'n" (I. 122-124). The key here is the phrase "Sole reigning." In a system in
which lesser magistrates or princes had real power, the monarch would not be in a position of exclusive and absolute reign.
This makes sense of Satan's famous "Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n" in a way that does not require that Satan be
pictured as being himself an absolute ruler, a tyrant who rails against tyranny. Despite the "Oriental" descriptions of Satan
given by the narrator at the beginning of book II, the "Throne of Royal State," the "Barbaric Pearl and Gold" that the
"gorgeous East with richest hand / Show'rs on her Kings," Satan justifies, and maintains, his power by appeal to what he and
his followers represent as the king-in-parliament model of heavenly government: the system of "Orders and Degrees" that
"Jar not with liberty" (V. 792, 793) to which Satan refers when he tells his fellow fallen angels that the "just right and the fixt
Laws of Heav'n / Did first create your Leader" (II. 18, 19). As we will see later, however, Satan appeals to this system
precisely in order that he may establish a tyrannical rule over his fallen compatriots, imposing a top-down system in Hell
after having explicitly rejected and rebelled against such a system in Heaven.
What is distinctly missing from Satan's political rhetoric is any mention of those who are ruled. Over whom, after all, do all
of these "Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, [and] Powers" reign? If "those Imperial Titles" indicate that the angels
were "ordain'd to govern, not to serve" (V. 801, 802), whom are the angels governing? Each other? William Empson
somewhat whimsically suggests a solution to this problem by postulating the existence of what he calls "the vast dim class of
proletarian angels who are needed so that angels with titles may issue orders" (Milton's God 60). Before the creation of Adam
and Eve on a new-made Earth, one might ask the same question about the reign of the Father. Over whom, besides these
"Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, [and] Powers" does the Father reign?Does the Father reign if there are no
subjects but angelic princes and magistrates?
Protestant political theory, at least as it appears in Calvin, Luther, Mh ntzer, and Marshall, assumes as a given that magistracy
and the power thereof is designed for the good of those who are ruled, basing this claim on Romans 13:4, where the
magistrate is described as "the minister of God to thee for good." Marshall describes a proper Magistracy as one set up "with
a sufficiencie of power and authority to rule for the publicke good" (3). However, in Paradise Lost, there appears to be
no public, much less a public good, until the rebellion by Satan, and the subsequent creation of Adam and Eve on Earth. Until
this radical break, heaven appears to have been little more than a gigantic May Day parade with only Party members in
attendance. There is only dictatorship, no proletariat in Milton's prelapsarian heaven.
Milton's Critique
All of this, of course, is from Satan's point of view, and Satan is mouthing the very Protestant political cliches that Milton
tears down in Tenure of Kings and Magistrates, his justification of the ways of the regicides to men. Why? Why does Milton
have his Satan sound so much like Calvin, so much like Stephen Marshall, in his descriptions of the roles of princes and
magistrates in relation to a king? Because Milton wants to ground his theory of political power in the very private persons
whom Calvin and Luther so despise, the ruled (who do not themselves rule) that are conspicuously absent from pre-rebellion
heaven. For Milton, it is "all men" who are "born to command, and not to obey" (TKM 754), not merely those who possess
"Imperial Titles" as it is for Satan, or special "magistrates of the people, appointed to restrain the willfulness of kings" as it is
for Calvin, or the "representative body of a State" as it is for Marshall. Milton casts the people in the role of Mh ntzer’s
"elect," those "true friends of God" who take seriously their duty to God's church, and themselves have the power to oppose
those "godless rulers who should be killed."
Milton is far more radical than his own Satan. Next to Satan's relatively mainstream rhetoric of "justified" rebellion against a
tyrant, Milton's arguments glow white-hot by comparison. Where Satan grouses in reference to heaven's king, "Whom reason
26
hath equall'd, force hath made supreme / Above his equals" (PL I. 248, 249), Milton brooks no use of the word equals. Much
less than being the equal of the people, the king or magistrate is the servant of the people:
since the king or magistrate holds his authority of the people, both originally and naturally for their good in
the first place, and not his own, then may the people, as oft as they shall judge it for the best, either choose
him or reject him, retain him or depose him, though no tyrant, merely by the liberty and right of freeborn
men to be governed as seems to them best. (TKM 757)
Milton holds on to God's role in this cycle of power by arguing that "the right of choosing, yea of changing their own
government, is by the grant of God himself in the people" (TKM 757), which differs from Satan's claim to be "self-begot,
self-rais'd (V. 860). Even more interestingly, Milton's claim differs from the political structure of pre-rebellion heaven as
described in Book I of Paradise Lost. The angels who "sat as Princes, whom the supreme King / Exalted to such power, and
gave to rule, / Each in his hierarchy, the Orders bright" (I. 733-737), receive their power from their ruler. The kings and
magistrates of Milton's theory of power in TKM receive their power from the ruled. Of the Protestant theorists dealt with
here, only Stephen Marshall allows for the possibility that the "supreme authority" mayever lie with the people: when the
three branches of power (legislative, judicial, and executive) meet "in the body of the people, as in the ancient Roman
Government, there is the highest power which every soule is forbidden to resist" (14).
Ultimately, Milton's attempt to ground the source of political power in the people (with God retained merely as the granter or
giver of such power) in TKM threatens to undermine the entire top-down structure of political power relied upon not only by
Luther, Calvin, Mh ntzer, and Marshall, but by Satan and even God himself in Paradise Lost. If the people may choose or
reject, retain or depose a ruler, "though no tyrant, merely by the liberty and right of freeborn men to be governed as seems to
them best," why may not, by the same logic, the people choose or reject, retain or depose a God, whether or not that God is
conceived of as a tyrant? Why may not Satan and his followers choose or reject, retain or depose a God?
Milton seems aware of, and anxious about, this possibility. In his Defense of the People of England, Milton makes a rather
curious non-response to the insinuation by Salmasius that in defending the execution of Charles I, Milton has become caught
up in a logic that implies that "God himself would have had to be called king of tyrants, and indeed would be the greatest
tyrant himself":
On your second conclusion I spit, and wish that blasphemous mouth of yours might be closed up, as you
are asserting that God is the greatest tyrant. (99)
Angrily throwing Salmasius’ charge back at him is not an argument. Milton seems to wish to rest on an a priori notion of
God’s goodness as a given, but when the charge is made that he undermines that given through his defense of the regicide,
more is required than bluster and charges of blasphemy.
Furthermore, what is to prevent Hell's legions from choosing or rejecting, retaining or deposing Satan himself? Satan seems
to realize that this possibility has now been made available since the rebellion in heaven, which is why he appeals
immediately to the system of "Orders and Degrees" that "Jar not with liberty" (V. 792, 793) when he tells his fellow fallen
angels that the "just right and the fixt Laws of Heav'n / Did first create [me] your Leader" (II. 18, 19). This may also explain
the speed with which Satan moves to cut off the opportunity for any of the other fallen angels to step forth as his rival in the
debate in Book II, as he "prevented all reply, / Prudent, lest from his resolution rais'd / Others among the chief might offer
now / (Certain to be refus'd) what erst they fear'd; / And so refus'd might in opinion stand / His Rivals, winning cheap the
high repute / Which he through hazard huge must earn" (II. 467-473). The reference to "opinion" is crucial: in a truly topdown system of political power, a system in which magistratical power was truly from God (God taken here in the sense of
an unquestioned and unchallenged power, neither of which the God of PL has proven to be), "opinion" would be irrelevant.
So also would be any question of earning "high repute." In a sense, Satan is trying, through appeals to the pre-rebellion
system of an unquestioned top-down distribution of power, and through quick action to prevent anyone else from taking
advantage of what Satan realizes is the new bottom-up political order, to stuff the genie that he let loose through rebellion in
heaven back into a hopelessly smashed bottle. Satan's Protestantism and its concomitant political rhetoric is an attempt to
preserve a system of power that, in truth, no longer exists, and merely serves as a justification for tyranny.
The view that would have this debate in Hell "cooked" by Satan and Beelzebub, seems to me to be overly invested in the
game that William Empson describes as "the modern duty of catching Satan out wherever possible" (Milton's God 74).
Sharon Achinstein describes this scene in what seems the typical manner: "In Paradise Lost, Satan's tyranny consists partly
in not allowing free debate. [Where, then is the "free debate" in Heaven?] For the debate in hell is not really a free exchange
of ideas; Satan wrote a script in which Beelzebub would propose his plan, and then Satan himself 'prevented all reply'"
(Milton and the Revolutionary Reader 203). I tend to agree with Empson that for Satan "to arrange with his known friend to
propose his plan, and then speak for it himself at once, is not underhand behavior" (56). It seems rather a strain to get the idea
of "writing a script" from these lines: "Thus Beelzebub / Pleaded his devilish Counsel, first devis'd / By Satan, and in part
propos'd: for whence, / But from the Author of all ill could Spring / So deep a malice . . . "(PL II. 378-382).
Milton uses Satan to critique tyranny. That much is commonplace. It is the way in which Milton uses Satan that is the
interesting point. The Romantics were right, to a point. Satan's critiques of the "Tyranny of Heav’n" are stirring, even
27
devastating criticisms, which no amount of Arminian apologism will fully deflect. However, Satan himself is a tyrant,
perhaps doubly so, because in establishing his Infernal monarchy, he appeals to the very system of power that he once
rejected. He appeals to this system of power in the language of 16 th- and 17th-century Protestant political theories, theories
that emphasize the political rights of princes while denying such rights to "private persons." Satan fits in quite nicely with
those "dancing divines" Milton criticizes so harshly in TKM, hypocrites who use "the same quotations to charge others,
which in the same case they made serve to justify themselves" (753). However, it is not Satan that Milton is holding up for
criticism. Why bother with such an easy target? It is the "dancing divines" and the tradition out of which they have sprung
and from which they argue that Milton is attacking by allying them with Satan. Luther’s call in Wider die räuberischen und
mörderischen Rotten der andern Bauern ("Against the Thieving and Murdering Hordes of Peasants") to "cut, stab, choke,
and strike the . . . peasants" is Satanic. Calvin's denial of the rights of the people to "undertake anything at all politically" is
Satanic. Mh ntzer’s formulation of political power in which only the princes may be counted among the "elect," or among the
"true friends of God" is Satanic. Even the theory of Milton's former teacher, Stephen Marshall, to the extent that it denies the
people as the origin of political power is Satanic.
Satan is Milton's indictment of the failures of Protestant thought up to his day. Satan’s infamous "Better to reign in Hell, than
serve in Heav'n," and his subsequent rise to monarchy and tyranny form a curious and compelling metaphor for the Protestant
Reformation, a rejection of Papacy that set up Prelates and Presbyters in the places of Bishops, Cardinals, and Popes. Milton
puts Protestant rhetoric into Satan’s mouth as an indictment of everything that had, in his view, gone wrong with the attempt
to reform the Church. Milton’s darkest implication is that both Catholics and Protestants serve the same Lord. Meet the new
boss. Same as the old boss.
Before and After the fall
In Paradise Lost, Milton treats sensuality as an inherent part of human nature, celebrating the "wedded Love" of Adam and
Eve (IV, 750). There are two scenes in Paradise Lost that describe Adam and Eve making love and falling asleep. The first
passage describes the prelapserian bliss of Adam and Eve and their "Nuptial Bed" (IV, 710). The second describes the lustful
hunger of the pair immediately following the eating of the "fallacious Fruit" (IX, 1046). These seemingly similar passages
contain subtle differences that contribute to a difference in tone which best illustrates the shift in perception due to the Fall in
all of Paradise Lost.
The first passage is characterized by a tone of holiness, solemnity, and spirituality. Before retiring to their bower Adam
and Eve give praise and thanks to God, creator of all. When Eve decorates their bed, "heavenly Choirs" sing the hymenæan,
celebrating the sanctity of marriage (IV, 711). The poet emphatically affirms the sanctity of "connubial Love" (IV, 743) by
saying "God declares [it] / Pure" (IV, 746-7), and by calling it "mysterious Law" (IV, 750). His word choices, "undefil'd and
chaste" (IV, 761), "true" (IV, 750), and "blest" (IV, 774) lend further support to the claim. It is also of note that Milton chose
to use the word "pure" four times in a space of less than twenty lines (IV, 737, 745, 747, 755). This is love founded "in
Reason, Loyal, Just, and Pure" (IV, 755). It stands in contrast to "adulterous lust" (IV, 753) and "loveless, joyless, unindear'd,
/ Casual fruition" (IV, 766-7).
The contrasts to the second passage are staggering. Adam and Eve do not pray to God before retiring. They are
misdirecting devotion to other things. The Adam and Eve who before displayed humility, now display arrogance and egotism
in what they perceive their newfound superiority. Adam wishes there were ten more forbidden trees, should they all bear fruit
as pleasurable; how blithely he admits he would transgress against God tenfold should the opportunity for pleasure present
itself! One must also not disregard the fact that Eve paid worshipful homage to the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil
before approaching Adam, bowing to it as to a deity. Adam, conversely, is later admonished by God: "Was shee thy God,
that her thou didst obey" (X, 145). Lovemaking in the first instance is sanctioned by God, even endorsed by him: "God
declares/ [it] pure…./ Our Maker bids encrease" (IV, 746-8). "Saints and Patriarchs" (IV, 762) are used as evidence, as is
Love, personified as an angel with purple wings. There is no such sanction in the second passage; there is indeed no divinity
present. There are only the "fallacious Fruit" (IX, 1046) and the ravenous pair. The tone is one of transgression, magnified by
the greedy speech of Adam about the fruit, and the two references to the "forbidden" in consecutive lines (IX, 1025-6).
The lovemaking in the second passage is not a consummation of the pair's "mutual love" (IV, 728), but "of thir mutual
guilt the Seal" (IX, 1043). The "mutual guilt" is, of course, the transgression of eating from the forbidden Tree. The second
sin that "seals" the first (that is, reaffirms it; solidifies it) is the sin of lust, one of the seven cardinal sins. One must realize
that Milton is not damning sensuality in its physical expression of mutual, spiritual love. What is opposed here is the
carnality of desire; sex that is an expression of lust, not of love. The love in the first passage is the familial love of "Father,
Son, and Brother" (IV, 757). It is caritas, a holy love inherently "godly," as the love of Father and Son (God and Jesus)
suggests. The second passage illustrates concupiscence, the "adulterous lust…driven from men/ Among the bestial herds to
range" (IV, 753-4). "[M]utual love" (IV, 728) has turned into mutual lust:
Carnal desire inflaming; hee on Eve
Began to cast lascivious Eyes; she him
28
As wantonly repaid; in Lust they burn.
(IX, 1013-15)
The terms emphasizing purity are here exchanged for ones evoking the idea of sin, such as "lascivious" (IX, 1014) and
"wantonly" (IX, 1015). These are underscored by imagery of fire and burning, at once evoking images both of lust, and
consequently of hell: "inflaming" (IX, 1013), "burn" (IX, 1015), "inflame" (IX, 1031), "Fire" (IX, 1036).
This "Carnal desire" (IX, 1013) is also described by Milton in terms of hunger. The passage is not only preceded by the
eating of the fruit, but images of consuming and eating pervade the passage in terms like "taste" (IX, 1017), "savor" (IX,
1019), "Palate" (IX, 1020), "relish, tasting" (IX, 1024), etc. The two in a sense gorge on each other until they have "thir fill of
Love" (IX, 1042). This motif is not evident in the first passage—it is as if the spiritual "delicious place" (the idea of Paradise)
of the first passage (IV, 729) has been made physical or carnal in the second: "delicious Fare" (a tangible part of Paradise)
(IX, 1028). It must also be noted that where the first passage is situated in a divine Paradise, the second passage mentions
"Earth's softest lap" (IX, 1041)—the Fall has already debased and transformed the divine into mortal. It is fascinating how
Milton describes the pair as though they were intoxicated by the "fallacious Fruit" (IX, 1046). The Fruit has filled them with
"exhilarating vapor bland" (IX, 1047), and "unkindly fumes" (IX, 1050) which "[a]bout thir spirits had play'd" (IX, 1048).
One cannot help but feel that Milton's choice, also, of the terms "blissful bower" (IV, 690), and "inmost bower" (IV, 738) in
the first passage and the corresponding "imbowr'd" in the second passage (IX, 1038), is significant. It is befitting Milton's
sense of irony that the "blissful bower" (IV, 690), the "holiest place" (IV, 759), has turned into "The Bower of Bliss."
The first passage casts lovemaking in a solemn light referring twice to "Rites" (IV, 736, 742), bringing to mind holy
rites and services. Lovemaking is preceded by the decorating of the marriage bed by Eve, the singing of the hymenæan, and
the prayer to God. These are followed finally by the "Rites/ Mysterious of connubial Love" (IV, 742-3). A second occurrence
of the word "mysterious" (IV, 750) supports the lovemaking as almost a divine mystery or sacrament. The second passage is
devoid of such solemnities, instead sporting words connotative of games, plays, and frivolities: "dalliance" (IX, 1016), "let us
play" (IX, 1027), "toy" (IX, 1034), "disport" (IX, 1042), "amorous play" (IX, 1045), "play'd" (IX, 1048). This kind of
"Casual fruition" (IV, 767), admonished against in the first passage, is treated as "common," whereas the love in the first
passage is holy love, love that only occurs in Paradise:
Hail, wedded Love, mysterious Law, true source
Of human offspring, sole propriety
In Paradise of all things common else.
(IV, 750-2)
The "commonness" is accentuated when one remembers that in the first bed the pair were showered in Roses, the precious
flowers symbolic of love—in the second bed they lie on a "couch" of "Pansies, and Violets, and Asphodel,/ And Hyacinth,"
common flowers all (IX, 1040-1). Their cheapened love is befittingly consummated on a cheaper bed.
The tone difference is most plain following consummation of the physical act. Following lovemaking in the first
passage, Adam and Eve:
[L]ull'd by Nightingales imbracing slept,
And on thir naked limbs the flow'ry roof
Show'r'd Roses, which the Morn repair'd.
(IV, 771-3)
Already blissful, their lovemaking has affirmed and created more joy—lovemaking is really "the Crown of all [their] bliss"
(IV, 728). They fall easily into sleep, a sleep they share naked, embracing. This sleep is innocent and restful, a gift from God
(IV, 736).
Here lies the greatest difference between the two passages: the joy is absent in the second passage. The lovemaking has
been "loveless, joyless, unindear'd" (IV, 766), nor is the sleep that follows restful. Lovemaking before the Fall was equivalent
to heaping bliss upon bliss—after the Fall it is only solace, to make one, temporarily, almost forget the guilt and shame of
sin. It is but little comfort when followed by "dewy sleep" (IX, 1044) "grosser sleep/… with conscious dreams" (IX 104950), from which they rise "[a]s from unrest" (IX, 1052). The sins and the Fruit have opened Adam and Eve's eyes, and
darkened their minds: in the harsh light of the dawn of knowledge, how clear and unsparing is the truth they must face (IX,
1053-5). Mystery, the veiled innocence, has been taken away leaving the pair naked to the unrelenting reality of their
transgression (IX, 1054-5).
In the first passage the two are united, almost like one mind and one body. Many are the references to "both" (IV, 720,
721), "mutual" (IV, 727, 728), and "unanimous" (IV, 736). Of lovely, tender detail, Milton describes how the pair lay side by
side, and slept embracing. This prelapserian pair holds hands (IV, 739) on numerous occasions, signifying unity. It is a
significant fact when one considers that the pair let go of each other's hand for the first time right before the fall when Eve
29
decides to go alone. The love shared by the prelapserian Adam and Eve is founded "in Reason, Loyal, Just, and Pure." They
are reason and sense united. After the Fall, they are in discord (as events after the second passage prove), that is, sense and
reason are unbalanced. The knowledge gained is too potent for the two who do not know how to reconcile it, or mend the
unity. That the post-lapserian Adam must seize Eve's hand to lead her to bed is most illuminating. Whereas in the first
passage the couple is naturally united, in the second they must consciously decide to attach to each other. It is a grim,
infinitely sad picture Milton paints of two people, now separated by a gulf, who desperately attempt to cling together against
all odds. Yet perhaps the most important point is that they do attempt to unite again, that they do hold on. It is due to this that
the image of Adam and Eve leaving Paradise is so moving and so hopeful:
They hand in hand with wand'ring steps and slow,
Through Eden took their solitary way.
(XII, 648-9)
The two passages are undeniably similar—it is not rash to assume that they did not come to existence by accident, but
were part of Milton's plan. It is precisely the similarity of the passages that makes the differences so clear and meaningful.
Yet it is not the numerous details of the passages, which could only entertain interest for a moment, but the tone created by
those selfsame details. It is the subtext, the "in-between-the-lines," that is fascinating. It is in these two passages that Milton,
through the treatment of sensuality before and after the Fall, uncovers the heart and consequences of the Fall. He describes
the joy once experienced in Paradise: a joy man no longer knows how to find or enjoy, having lost his innocence in search for
other, perhaps less important knowledge. Paradise Lost offers sentence in the form of moral teaching, and solas in its hopeful
end. Still, it cannot but leave a note of sadness in the knowledge that all earthly pleasure is but meager solace compared to
the bliss we have lost. Paradise Lost, itself, though impressive in multiple ways, has maintained and will maintain its
fascination for readers exactly for that subtext—the author's voice painting a masterpiece on a canvas of human emotion.
The Acoustics of Hell
What does Hell sound like? As a rule, modern fictional depictions of Hell imagine it as unbearably, chaotically, and
incessantly noisy. In this, they are in accordance both with Biblical and classical sources, as well as with almost all the
medieval and Renaissance beliefs about Hell. There is, however, one striking exception to this general rule - Paradise Lost.
Milton's epic has a hell in which sound works in quite different, quite unexpected ways: and while the poem's hell has been
studied extensively in terms of its visual and iconographic significances, and while individual sounds there have been
considered in detail, the home of Milton's Satan has not often been thought of in terms of a complete acoustic environment.
This article will explore the soundscapes of Hell in the hope of establishing that they are almost unique in Renaissance
literature; of relating them to the more widely studied sounds of the rest of the poem’s universe; and of suggesting a new
approach to the difficult question of how far Paradise Lost can be considered as an acoustic artefact.[2]
Hell, whether classical or Christian, has always been perceived as an exceptionally loud place. St. Matthew's allusions to an
"outer darkness", where "there shall be weeping [or 'wailing'] and gnashing of teeth" are among the most useful Biblical
quotations in developing an idea of Hell, and this acoustic image was given a prominent position in many Renaissance
discussions of the place, including the probably Miltonic De Doctrina Christiana.[3] In the classical tradition, similarly,
Aeneas' first perception of Hell is an aural one: "From here are to be heard sighs, and savage blows resound: then the scrape
of iron, and dragged chains. Aeneas stopped, terrified, and drank in the din."[4] Later Christian epics followed the lead of
Virgil and St. Matthew, as in Dante's first experience of Hell:
Here sighs and cries and shrieks of lamentation
echoed through the starless air of Hell;
at first these sounds resounding made me weep:
tongues confused, a language strained in anguish
with cadences of anger, shrill outcries
and raucous groans that joined with sounds of hands,
raising a whirling storm that turns itself
forever through that air of endless black,
like grains of sand swirling when a whirlwind blows.[5]
What is interesting about Dante's hell is the endlessness of the sound: it contains human voices and human non-vocal sounds
blended together and made so continuous as to become almost an atmospheric condition. For Dante, as for Aeneas, the sheer
level of sound is physically shocking. In this, Dante was in accordance with popular medieval belief, since as Eileen Gardner
notes, medieval dream-visions of Hell generally mention the "horrendous noise" there as one of its most prominent
features.[6]
Nor was this exclusively a medieval phenomenon, since Renaissance discussions of Hell also stressed the acoustic aspects in
the context of a belief that all senses would be perpetually tortured there. For instance, William Sharrock dwells on "the
30
variety of noises that shall be found in the howlings and drummings of Tophet", while Christopher Love states that "the ear
shall be tormented with the yellings and hideous outcries of the damned", and John Bunyan predicts that the devils
themselves will be "howling and roaring, screeching and yelling in such a hideous manner, that thou wilt be even at thy wits'
end".[7] Similarly, Renaissance literary treatments of Hell almost always consider Hell's incessant, multifarious noisiness
part of its horror. This tradition is very widespread: to pick a few representative examples, poets including Ariosto, Tasso,
Marini, Spenser, Phineas Fletcher, and Joseph Beaumont included noisiness as part of the terror of hell or hell's gate.[8] The
same motif can be found in Elizabethan drama (Kyd), Caroline poetry (Thomas Heywood), and Restoration prose allegory
(Bunyan).[9] In short, descriptions of Hell before and indeed after Paradise Lost tend to stress the intensity, variety, and
continuousness of background noise going on there. So well established is this trope, indeed, that Abraham
Cowley'sDavideis, a comparatively close relative of Paradise Lost, seeks to make poetic capital out of the absurd idea that
the noise in Hell could ever be interrupted. When Satan finds out about David, he gnashes his iron teeth, and howls in fury:
A dreadful Silence filled the hollow place,
Doubling the native terror of Hell's face;
Rivers of flaming brimstone, which before
So loudly rag'd, crept softly by the shore;
No hiss of Snakes, no clanck of Chaines was known;
The Souls amidst their Tortures durst not groan.[10]
This is characteristic of Renaissance presentations of Hell in the variety of the noise, which includes not just products of the
vocal cords - howling and groaning - but a range of other more environmental noises, such as the continuous, non-linguistic
raging of rivers of brimstone. Cowley's paradoxical presentation of a moment of silence in Hell neatly reveals the
assumption about the 'normal' acoustic of hell.
Milton, however, has other ideas. The narration proper of Paradise Lost opens on a lake of fire, covered with the forms of
fallen angels 'rolling in the fiery gulf' of "ever-burning sulphur" (1.55, 69). Thus, the first auditory indication of the poem
might seem a little surprising: Satan "with bold words / Breaking the horrid silence thus began." (1.82-3). There are two
effects here. One is the small surprise involved in adjusting our mental model of this scene - no groaning from the devils or
crackling from the flames. On the other hand, "horrid silence" is an oxymoron, and a bold one, to judge from the derision
suffered by John Dryden after his use in 1660 of the phrase "horrid stillness".[11] How can the mere absence of noise be
considered horrid? Clearly the phrase is in some sense analogous to "darkness visible", but the true force of Milton's use of it
here takes a long time to emerge through the poem.
As for silence, a prominent motif in A Masque, Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes, it has been the
subject of a good deal of recent Milton criticism. By and large, these articles are concerned with the semiotics of silence:
silence as a conscious decision not to speak, or silence as an element within or marking the edge of a linguistic system. Jean
E. Graham, and Fran Sendbuehler, have examined how silence for Milton is inflected in terms of gender: Ken Simpson has
considered problems of ineffability in Paradise Regained relative to Quaker ideas of silence.[12] Shirley Sharon-Zisser
argues that in Paradise Lost an Augustinian model applies: language is the province of humans, and that silence is therefore
either a "suprahuman form of nonverbal signification" or "the signification of entities at the other end of the Great Chain of
Being". Thus silence is not in itself morally evil, unless it is the result of humans failing to fulfil their duty to praise God in
speech, and silence can represent the ineffably divine as well as the subhumanly inarticulate.[13] These approaches work
very well as commentaries on language, but they all depend to some extent on the axiom articulated by Derrida that all
speech is a subset of writing and "writing in general covers the entire domain of linguistic signs".[14] As a result, they run
the risk of implying that all sound that matters is language and that all silence should be considered as an opposite of
language. An "acoustic" approach offers greater conceptual freedom because it can offer a broader, less prescriptive
definition of what the silence is not.
Throughout the rest of Book I, for instance, the devils set about making a huge variety of noises, sounds, and music. They
talk, shout, create "the warlike sound / Of trumpets loud and clarions... Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds" (1.531-2,
540). They then march in silence "To the Dorian mood / Of flutes and soft recorders: such as raised / To height of noblest
temper heroes old" (1.550-2). They even create sounds using less conventional instruments: they "fierce with graspèd arms /
Clashed on their sounding shields the din of war, / Hurling defiance toward the vault of heaven." (1.667-9). They build
Pandemonium, famously, to the accompaniment of "sound / of dulcet symphonies and voices sweet" (1.711-2), and the
reader hears their "hiss of rustling wings" (1.768) as they squeeze inside it. Book I closes with a moment of what it began
with - silence: "After short silence then / And summons read, the great consult began" (1.797-8). A reader (or hearer) of
Book I, struck by the devils' liking for sounds of all sorts, might well further be struck by other references to this liking
contained in the catalogue of devils, and one in particular placed prominently at the start:
First Moloch, horrid king besmeared with blood
Of human sacrifice, and parents' tears,
Though for the noise of drums and timbrels loud
Their children's cries unheard...[15]
31
This misuse of one sound to drown out another invites application back to the devils in the main narrative. What, exactly, is it
that they are trying so hard not to hear?
Book 2 provides more clues to answer this question as the devils continue this intense auditory activity with applause
(2.290), with rising to their feet en masse ("their rising all at once was as the sound / Of thunder heard remote", 2.476-7), and
with "trumpets' regal sound":
Toward the four winds four speedy cherubim
Put to their mouths the sounding alchemy
By herald's voice explained: the hollow abyss
Heard far and wide, and all the host of hell
With deafening shout returned them loud acclaim. (2.515, 516-20)
While Satan is away, some of the devils vandalize mountains: "Hell scarce holds the wild uproar" (2.541). But others even
play music - though the terms in which this activity is phrased repay attention:
Others more mild,
Retreated in a silent valley, sing
With notes angelical to many a harp
Their own heroic deeds...
Their song was partial, but the harmony
(What could it less when spirits immortal sing?)
Suspended hell...
(2.547-554)
The question of the devils' music has received much critical attention, since Milton has always and rightly been considered a
poet obsessed with music.[16] Throughout Milton's career, but especially in Paradise Lost, he uses music as a synecdoche
for the divine in all its forms, and thus the appearance of music in hell is particularly disturbing. The technical musical pun
on "suspended" has been widely discussed, as has the question of in what sense the devils' song is "partial": possible
overtones of the word include "biased", "incomplete", or, intriguingly, "polyphonic".[17] But what has escaped notice is the
fact that the valley in question is not merely quiet but actually "silent". 'Quiet' would suggest a pleasant pastoral retreat, and
while 'silent' appears at first to offer merely a clumsy variation on that, it actually reminds the attentive reader that the
underlying condition of hell is not bucolic peacefulness but blank silence.
On the basis of these episodes, and Satan's adventures as he makes his way past Sin and Death, certain generalizations can be
made about the acoustic properties of Hell. Firstly, the background condition of Hell is silence: "horrid silence", containing
"silent" locations, run through by the "slow and silent stream" of Lethe.[18] Secondly, what sound there is is created by the
damned. Hell itself, when personified as a geographical location, is actually rather frightened by noise, and its fabric is
figured as vulnerable to and threatened by it, as the following catalogue of examples shows:
At which the universal host upsent
A shout that tore hell's concave, and beyond
Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night. (1.541-3)
Hell trembled as he strode. (2. 676)
I fled, and cried out Death:
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sighed
Through all her caves, and back resounded Death. (2.788-9)
Hell heard the unsufferable noise, hell saw
Heav'n ruining from Heav'n and would have fled
Affrighted. (6.867-9).
Thirdly, Hell is a very echoing space: as we have seen, it reflects the word 'Death' back to Sin, while Satan makes it echo:
"He called so loud, that all the hollow deep / Of hell resounded" (1.315). "All hell had rung", at least hypothetically, of the
projected fight between Satan and Death (2. 723), and Hell shakes at the opening its gate.
On a sudden open fly
With impetuous recoil and jarring sound
The infernal doors, and on their hinges grate
Harsh thunder, that the lowest bottom shook
Of Erebus.
(2.880)
While Earth (4.681, 10.861), Heaven (3.347), and indeed the whole universe (7.257, 562) are also resonant, none of them
responds to sound as often or with quite the same intensity. The echoes in Hell are unusually prominent, and what they bring
back to the damned is only the sound of their own activity.[19] Fourthly, and in distinct contradiction of the third property,
the illusion of a single acoustic community is just that - an illusion. The "cry" of Sin's hellhounds, although appalling to her,
32
appears not to be audible to Satan at any distance (2.654). In Book 10, "dreadful... din" inside the council chamber goes
unnoticed by those outside (10.537). Impossibly, the "wild uproar" threatening the whole fabric of hell is simultaneous with
the "silent valley" and with the music that "suspends" hell.
But even after Satan leaves hell - starting, indeed, immediately as he does so - the poem continues to feed us acoustic
information that changes our interpretation of the Hell episode. The loud noises in hell have seemed extremely loud by local
standards ("deafening", indeed) but as Satan leaves into Chaos, we learn what real noisiness is. Immediately Satan is
discomfited by the "noise / Of endless wars" (2.896-7):
Nor was his ear less pealed
With noises loud and ruinous (To compare
Great things with small) than when Bellona storms... 2.920-3
A universal hubbub wild
Of stunning sounds and voices all confused
Borne through the hollow dark assaults his ear
With loudest vehemence. 2.951-4
This is much more the contemporary interpretation of what Hell ought to sound like, a continuous acoustic assault: and
indeed, when Satan has fought his way through Chaos, one of the signs that he has reached the edge of Chaos is the "less
hostile din" (2.1040). Milton has displaced onto Chaos the sort of acoustic effect normally associated with hell. On the one
hand the stress on this intimidating wall of noise informs us about Chaos, on the other it sets up a noticeable contrast with the
acoustically disappointing Hell he has just left - the Devils may think the sounds of hell are loud, but they are as nothing to
the noise outside.[20] Indeed, as we shall see, both Earth and Heaven are always accompanied by sounds of some
description, which though less overpowering than those of chaos, are equally continuous and ever-present. It is worth
discussing the sounds of Earth and Heaven here, because they strengthen our impression of the acoustic barrenness of hell.
An interesting thing about Eden is that there is a constant low-intensity background noise. In Truax's terms (cited Smith, 51),
Eden offers a much richer acoustic ecology than hell - a larger number of co-existing, quiet sounds, set against Hell's few but
'deafening' ones. Adam and Eve both independently claim that sounds have been part of their consciousness since their very
first moments: for Eve, a "murmuring sound / Of waters" (4.453-4), for Adam, the sound of waters and the "warbling"
(8.265) of birds. The birds and the waters are also mentioned together with the noises made by vegetation in the opening
description of Eden: "vernal airs... attune / The trembling leaves" (4.263-66): a further programmatic description of Eden
again mentions the trio of sounds (5.5-8). As well as the natural sounds which occur round the clock, Adam notes the songs
sung apparently by patrolling angels at night (4.682-687). On top of this background, Adam and Eve pray in a spontaneous
register between prose and song (5.150) which includes a promise never to be silent in God's praise (5.202). Each of the
numerous times complete silence seems about to occur, we are told, belatedly, of something breaking it: "Silence... all but the
waking nightingale; / She all night long her amorous descant sung".[21] Pre-lapsarian Eden is never empty of sounds, and
repeatedly our expectation that it might ever be silent is raised only to be denied. If we restrict ourselves to the question of
environmental sounds, it remains true to say that there is no such thing as a moment in Eden when nothing can be heard.
As for Heaven, it, of course, is never silent. Or rather, on its very first appearance in the poem, "silence was in heaven"
(3.218), as the Son volunteers to die for Mankind, a moment the uniqueness of which only becomes apparent as we learn
more about Heaven in the rest of the poem. From that moment on, Heaven is always full of noise, starting with a
"shout/Loud": "Heaven rung / With jubilee, and loud hosannas filled/ The eternal regions" as the angels "Their happy hours
in joy and hymning spent" (3.345-9, 417). Music in Heaven continues throughout the Sabbath as well (7.595), sung and
played on a wide variety of instrumentation (7.594-600), and even if Heaven's night is "friendliest to sleep and silence", the
singing does not stop (6.657, 668). During the war in heaven, that remarkably noisy contest settled (according to Satan) by a
sonic superweapon, normal rules seem suspended and less stress is placed on the idea of continuous noise.[22] But otherwise,
it is emphatically Heaven, and not Hell, that we find filled with continuous sound.
The implications of this music in heaven have again received critical attention, and again, the tendency has been to think in
"logocentric" terms, as if there were language, and then as a separate and unrelated category, non-linguistic sound: using, for
instance, Milan Kundera's formulation that music is the anti-Word.[23] What an "acoustic approach" can bring to this
discussion, though, is the observation that Paradise Lost confounds language and music with all other sorts of noise into a
continuum of just the sort theorized by Bruce Smith elsewhere in this issue: a continuing round from sound to music to
speech to sound.[24] In Paradise Lost, imagery blurs the line between sound and music. The gates of Heaven move with
"harmonious sound" (7.206): even the singing of birds is a "charm" (4.651): even leaves have been attuned: there is a
continual pun between the musical and atmospheric senses of "air" (4.263: 8.515).[25] Adam and Eve's prayer is both music
and speech (5.150), and there is no clear dividing line between the two before the Fall. And speech is confounded with the
most ambient of ambient sounds within that very prayer: the three main noises of Eden, the birdsong, the noise of running
water, and the sound of the wind, are reconstituted as language, "praise" of God by the winds and the rivers and the birds
(5.193-9). Paradise Lost blurs harmonious sound and music and speech together, and they are all a synecdoche for the
divine.
33
By corollary, then, separation from the divine is figured as a lack of harmony, or, even worse, as silence. We may note in
passing that the Fall affects Eden's soundscape in interesting ways, "muttering thunder" (9.1002, 10.666) and loud new winds
(10.699, 705) changing the nature of the background noise while Adam and Eve are "strucken mute" (9.1064), but the more
interesting use of sound comes on Satan’s return to a Hell defamiliarised by the events and the soundscapes of Books 3-9.
Once again, Hell fails to fulfil the acoustic expectations raised by almost all other Renaissance depictions of it. Once again,
Satan enters not a noisy environment but a deserted, empty hell much quieter than the chaos he has come through: even the
acoustic inventiveness of the singers and rioters seems to have run out. While Chaos at least was exclaiming and surging,
Hell is "desert... many a dark league" (10.416-7, 437-8: Satan in his oration again remarks on this difference in levels of
sound, 10.479). When he gets to the council chamber, where the devils are consulting, he provokes "loud... acclaim" (455),
commands silence (459), and gives his speech.
A while he stood, expecting
Their universal shout and high applause
To fill his ear... (10.505-6)
But this silence is not broken by shouting, clapping, speech, or music - indeed, within the poem's hell, it is never broken by
any of these things, since the devils in Paradise Lost make no more acoustic interventions apart from one. Instead, there is
only one sound left that the devils can make: a mere "dismal universal hiss" (10.508) and "spattering noise" (10.567).
"Dreadful was the din / Of hissing..." (521-2), and the last presentation of the devils within Paradise Lost sees them restricted
to a "dire hiss" (543), a "long and ceaseless hiss" (573). Just as the moral horizons of Satan and of the devils seem to shrink
in the course of the poem, so the rich range of acoustic activities seen in Books 1 and 2 narrows down in Book 10 to hardly
more than a single monotonous state, what a twenty-first century reader might describe as nothing more than a background
hiss. Milton's hell is unlike almost all other representations of the place in that it is not, as one might expect, noisy - it is, in a
literal sense, deathly quiet - and the full implications of this echoing, ambienceless chamber only become apparent on our
second visit to it. Such silence, one might argue, has an allegorical significance, reflecting the poena damni, the pain of being
separated from God.[26] In Milton's Hell, the poena sensus - the cramming of every sense with agonizing stimuli - is
suspended as far as hearing goes, in order to create a continuing and elegant reminder of the poena damni. In a variant of
Moloch's predicted later behaviour, the devils at this stage are only using sound to cover up what otherwise might be
terrifyingly inaudible. In this connection, the force of the original "horrid silence" becomes more evident, as does the effect
of Milton's almost unique presentation of hell in terms of an absence rather than an excess of ambient sound. Raphael's
prophecy of the devils' long-term fate applies not merely to their fame, but to their acoustic environment: "Eternal silence be
their doom" (6.385).[27]
-Thus, an acoustic approach does open up interesting perspectives on the fictional world of Paradise Lost. But a true
“historical phenomenology” of sound – the challenge outlined by Bruce Smith elsewhere in this issue – would invite us to
consider the question more widely and to look at Paradise Lost itself as an acoustic artefact, and consider how it relates to
the historicized human body. In some ways, this is a much more difficult proposition, and I would like briefly to outline some
possible ways forward.
The first such historicized body, then, is that of John Milton himself. It has kinetic memory of how to play the organ and the
"Bas-Viol".[28] The bass viol, in particular, is more than just a matter of the fingers, but rather of cradling the instrument
with the whole body. Harmony for Milton is not merely an intellectual idea, or even just a matter of the ears, but something
that resonates up and down the entire bodily frame. Milton's body is also, of course, famous for its damaged eyes: the eyes
which are directly described in the poem at 3.23-6. According to one early biographer, "his Ears now were eyes to
him".[29] Thus all the use of aural indications to establish place are open to reading in perhaps simplistic biographical terms.
In this condition, "horrid silence" does have a particular importance: it becomes, even more precisely, an analogue of
darkness visible, reason shut out at another entrance. Another consequence of the damage to Milton's eyes is that the poem
leaves his body not through his hands onto paper, but through his mouth to an amanuensis. In an important sense, Paradise
Lost is an oral artefact. Of course, Milton is eager to stress just how oral his project is: he is singing (1.21, 3.18);
accompanying himself on the harp (3.414); behaving like a nightingale (3.39); not "hoarse" (7.24); making musical "notes"
as much as words (9.6); wishing to possess the "warning voice" heard by St. John (4.1); reporting the Muse's song (1.6) or
her voice (7.2) or her dictation (9.23), at any rate something which he perceives through his ears (9.47); in opposition to the
"barbarous dissonance" of Bacchanals (7.32). These tropes are to some extent conventional and by no means unique to
Milton, but his forceful repetition of them establishes the poem as very obviously and literally a matter of hearing.[30]
Paradise Lost is also, of course, filled with mimetic sound effects, onomatopoeia and mimetic syntax, which only work if the
poem is sounded. As such, it needs a second body to sound it and read it out aloud. And the poem is very interested in the
processes of voicing, of what it means to voice someone else's words (Milton reports the Muse: anyone reading the poem
aloud reports Milton: when the speaker asks to borrow the voice heard by John, it is momentarily unclear whether the person
doing the wishing is Milton or the person reading the poem aloud). Hence, perhaps, Milton's interest in Babel, and the thin
34
line separating speech as a vehicle for language from speech as as "jangling noise" and "hideous gabble" (12.55-6): and in the
contemporary debate about exactly how Satan created his speech when tempting Eve, "with serpent tongue / Organic, or
impulse of vocal air" (9.529-30) - did he directly commandeer the snake's larynx to create speech, or did he use some more
magical power? Paradise Lost is interested in this problem of physics because it bears on the exact interfaces between the
mind and sound waves and the mind again, and because it thus replicates the conditions under which the poem itself is
transmitted.
17. Some of the terms of this debate, though, are strangely familiar. T.S. Eliot, whose essay on Milton gave this article its
epigraph, characterized Milton’s work, together with Joyce, in convenient, perhaps over-convenient, biographical terms: love
of music and defective vision. His account of Milton’s "auditory imagination" (263), while persuasive, clearly also invites
neglect of Milton’s rigorous approach to literal meanings. In undertaking an acoustic approach, one must be careful not to be
drawn into merely making appreciative remarks about melodiousness. However, it is clear that an approach that privileges
sound offers great possibilities for investigation, not only of texts with a very obvious relation to performance and acoustics,
but even for an apparently strongly 'literary' text like Paradise Lost. Paradise Lost is indeed a read-aloud acoustic artefact, a
set of noises. Itself a "speech act" (Sharon-Zisser 209) - could we coin the phrase "sound act"? - it is intended as a
contribution to the cosmic symphony (3.413-5). But it is also an invitation to listen differently, to listen to the sounds that
compose that symphony: and it starts this by exploring the nightmarish possibilities of Hell, a place where all you can hear is
yourself.
Major Themes
Modern criticism of Paradise Lost has taken many different views of Milton’s ideas in the poem. One problem is
that Paradise Lost is almost militantly Christian in an age that now seeks out diverse viewpoints and admires the man who
stands forth against the accepted view. Milton’s religious views reflect the time in which he lived and the church to which he
belonged. He was not always completely orthodox in his ideas, but he was devout. His purpose or theme inParadise Lost is
relatively easy to see, if not to accept.
Milton begins Paradise Lost by saying that he will sing, “Of Man’s First Disobedience” (I, 1) so that he can “assert Eternal
Providence, / And justify the ways of God to men” (I, 25–26). The purpose or theme of Paradise Lost then is religious and
has three parts: 1) disobedience, 2) Eternal Providence, and 3) justification of God to men. Frequently, discussions
of Paradise Lostcenter on the latter of these three to the exclusion of the first two. And, just as frequently, readers and those
casually acquainted with Paradise Lost misunderstand what Milton means by the word justify, assuming that Milton is rather
arrogantly asserting that God’s actions and motives seem so arbitrary that they require vindication and explanation.
However, Milton’s idea of justification is not as arrogant as many readers think. Milton does not use the word justification in
its modern sense of proving that an action is or was proper. Such a reading of justify would mean that Milton is taking it upon
himself to explain the propriety of God’s actions—a presumptuous undertaking when one is dealing with any deity. Rather,
Milton uses justify in the sense of showing the justice that underlies an action. Milton wishes to show that the fall, death, and
salvation are all acts of a just God. To understand the theme ofParadise Lost then, a reader does not have to accept Milton’s
ideas as a vindication of God’s actions; rather the reader needs to understand the idea of justice that lies behind the actions.
Disobedience
The first part of Milton’s argument hinges on the word disobedience and its opposite, obedience. The universe that Milton
imagined with Heaven at the top, Hell at the bottom, and Earth in between is a hierarchical place. God literally sits on a
throne at the top of Heaven. Angels are arranged in groups according to their proximity to God. On Earth, Adam is superior
to Eve; humans rule over animals. Even in Hell, Satan sits on a throne, higher than the other demons.
This hierarchical arrangement by Milton is not simply happenstance. The worldview of the Middle Ages, Renaissance, and
Restoration was that all of creation was arranged in various hierarchies. The proper way of the world was for inferiors to
obey superiors because superiors were, well, superior. A king was king not because he was chosen but because he was
superior to his subjects. It was, therefore, not just proper to obey the king; it was morally required. Conversely, if the king
proved unfit or not superior to his subjects, it was morally improper to obey him and revolution could be justified.
God, being God, was by definition superior to every other thing in the universe and should always be obeyed. In Paradise
Lost, God places one prohibition on Adam and Eve—not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. The prohibition is not so much
a matter of the fruit of the tree as it is obeying God’s ordinance. The proper running of the universe requires the obedience of
inferiors to their superiors. By not obeying God’s rule, Adam and Eve bring calamity into their lives and the lives of all
mankind.
The significance of obedience to superiors is not just a matter of Adam and Eve and the Tree of Knowledge; it is a major
subject throughout the poem. Satan’s rebellion because of jealousy is the first great act of disobedience and commences all
that happens in the epic. When Abdiel stands up to Satan in Book V, Abdiel says that God created the angels “in their bright
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degrees” (838) and adds “His laws our laws” (844). Abdiel’s point is that Satan’s rebellion because of the Son is wrong
because Satan is disobeying a decree of his obvious superior. Satan has no answer to this point except sophistic rigmarole.
Further instances of the crucial importance of both hierarchy and obedience occur in both large and small matters. The
deference with which Adam greets Raphael shows the human accepting his position in regard to the angel. The image is one
of the proper manners between inferior and superior. Eve’s normal attitude toward Adam reflects the same relationship.
The crucial moment in the poem results from disobedience and a breakdown of hierarchy. Eve argues with Adam about
whether they should work together or apart, and Adam gives in to her. The problem here lies with both humans. Eve should
not argue with her superior, Adam, but likewise, Adam, should not yield his authority to his inferior, Eve.
When Eve eats the fruit, one of her first thoughts is that the fruit “may render me more equal” (IX, 823) to which she quickly
adds, “for inferior who is free?” (IX, 826). Her reasoning, from Milton’s point of view, is incorrect. Freedom comes precisely
from recognizing one’s place in the grand scheme and obeying the dictates of that position. By disobeying God, Eve has
gained neither equality nor freedom; she has instead lost Paradise and brought sin and death into the world.
Likewise, when Adam also eats the fruit, he disobeys God. Further, he disobeys by knowinglyputting Eve ahead of God.
Disobedience and disruption of the correct order result in sin and death.
Finally, in the last two books of the epic, Milton shows example after example of people who ignore the responsibilities they
have and try to either raise themselves above God or disobey God’s commands. The result is always the same—destruction.
The first part of Milton’s purpose in Paradise Lost then is to show that disobedience leads to a breakdown of hierarchical or
social order with disastrous consequences. Some have argued that Milton puts himself in a contradictory position in Paradise
Lost, since he supported the overthrow of Charles I. In his political writings, Milton makes it clear that obeying an inferior is
equally as bad as disobeying a superior. In the case of a king, the people must determine if the king is truly their superior or
not. Thus, Milton justifies his position toward Charles and toward God.
Eternal Providence
Milton’s theme in Paradise Lost, however, does not end with the idea of disobedience. Milton says that he will also “assert
Eternal Providence.” If Man had never disobeyed God, death would never have entered the world and Man would have
become a kind of lesser angel. Because Adam and Eve gave in to temptation and disobeyed God, they provided the
opportunity for God to show love, mercy, and grace so that ultimately the fall produces a greater good than would have
happened otherwise. This is the argument about the fall calledfelix culpa or “happy fault.”
The general reasoning is that God created Man after the rebellion of Satan. His stated purpose is to show Satan that the
rebellious angels will not be missed, that God can create new beings as he sees fit. God gives Man a free will, but at the same
time, God being God, knows what Man will do because of free will. Over and over in Paradise Lost, God says that Man has
free will, that God knows Man will yield to Satan’s temptation, but that he (God) is not the cause of that yielding; He simply
knows that it will occur.
This point is theologically tricky. In many ways, it makes God seem like a cosmic prig. He knows what Man will do, but he
does nothing to stop him because somehow that would be against the rules. He could send Raphael with a more explicit
warning; he could tell Gabriel and the other guards where Satan will enter Eden; he could seal Satan up in Hell immediately.
He could do a number of things to prevent the fall, but he does nothing.
From the standpoint of fictional drama, a reader may be correct in faulting God for the fall of Adam and Eve. From a
theological / philosophical standpoint, God must not act. If Man truly has free will, he must be allowed to exercise it.
Because of free will then, Adam and Eve disobey God and pervert the natural hierarchy. Death is the result, and Death could
be the end of the story if Paradise Lost were a tragedy.
Justification of God’s Ways
Eternal Providence moves the story to a different level. Death must come into the world, but the Son steps forward with the
offer to sacrifice himself to Death in order to defeat Death. Through the Son, God is able to temper divine justice with mercy,
grace, and salvation. Without the fall, this divine love would never have been demonstrated. Because Adam and Eve
disobeyed God, mercy, grace, and salvation occur through God’s love, and all Mankind, by obeying God, can achieve
salvation. The fall actually produces a new and higher love from God to Man.
This idea then is the final point of Milton’s theme—the sacrifice of the Son which overcomes Death gives Man the chance to
achieve salvation even though, through the sin of Adam and Eve, all men are sinful. As Adam says, “O goodness infinite,
goodness immense! / That all this good of evil shall produce, / And evil turn to good” (XII, 469–471). The fall of Man, then,
turns evil into good, and that fact shows the justice of God’s actions, or in Milton’s terms, “justifies the ways of God to
men.”
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Paradise Lost Quotations
Self-reference, Allusion, and Inversion

X - (282-5) "Then Both from out Hell Gates into the waste / Wide Anarchy of Chaos damp and dark / Flew
diverse, and with Power (thir Power was great) / Hovering upon the Waters . . ."

IX - (455-70) "That space the Evil one abstracted stood / From his own evil, and for the time remain’d /
Stupidly good, of enmity disarm’d, / Of guile, of hate, of envy, of revenge; / But the hot Hell that always in him
burns”

IX - (120-2) ". . . so much more I feel / Torment within me, as from the hateful siege of contraries; all good to
me becomes bane"

IX - (214) "Let us divide our labors . . . "

IX - (779-81) ". . . what hinders then / To reach, and feed at once both Body and Mind? / So saying, her rash
hand in evil hour / Forth reaching to the Fruit, she pluck’d, she eat . . ."

IX - (779-81) ". . . what hinders then / To reach, and feed at once both Body and Mind? / So saying, her rash
hand in evil hour / Forth reaching to the Fruit, she pluck’d, she eat . . ."

IX - (1000-4) "Earth trembl’d from her entrails, as again / In pangs, and Nature gave a second groan, / Sky
low’r’d, and muttering Thunder, some sad drops / Wept at completing of the mortal Sin / Original . . ."

X - (178) "And dust shalt eat all the days of thy Life."

X - (560-7) ". . . greedily they pluck’d / The Fruitage fair to sight, . . / [of which] not the touch, but taste /
Deceiv’d; they fondly thinking to allay / Thir appetite with gust, instead of Fruit / Chew’d bitter ashes . . ."

X - (634-7) ". . . at one sling/ Of thy victorious Arm, well-pleasing Son, / Both Sin, andDeath, and
yawning Grave at last / Through Chaos hurl’d, obstruct the mouth of Hell / For ever, and seal up his ravenous
Jaws . . ."
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Satan

(460-6) "Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers, / For in possession such, not only of right / I call
ye and declare ye now, return’d / Successful beyond hope, to lead ye forth / Triumphant out of this infernal Pit”

(163-170) "O foul descent! that I who erst contended / With Gods to sit the highest, am now constrain’d / Into a
Beast, and mixt with bestial slime . . . that to the highth of Deity aspir’d . . ."
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Adam
39
Eve
40
The Fall
41
Temptation
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