by John Milton
356. as first he stood: since he initially saw Adam and Eve (l. 288).
360. mold: shape, pattern; also, Earth as humanity’s native element.
361–62. to Heav’nly spirits bright/Little inferior: “Scarce to be less than gods thou mad’st his lot” (Ps. 8.5, Milton’s translation; cp. Heb. 2.7).
370. for so happy: for being as fortunate as you are; cp. “for Heav’n” (l. 372).
376. strait: intimate; also constricted.
380–83. he … kings: Cp. Matt. 10.8, Isa. 14.9.
382. her widest gates: her gates as wide as possible.
387. for: instead of.
389. public reason just: legitimate concerns of state, such as honor and empire. Cp. SA 865–70.
402. lion: Cp. 1 Pet. 5.8; Euripides, Bacchae 1015.
410. Turned him all ear: Satan turns eagerly to hear human speech. The phrasing also suggests Raphael’s account of spiritual bodily function, 6.350. Cp. Masque 560. “All ear” is a common expression in Italian (tutt’ orecchi).
411. Sole … sole: only … peerless. The repetition of sole and part invites wordplay touching the origin of Eve and paradisial marriage.
425. whate’er death is: For unfallen Adam, death has no meaning beyond pronounced penalty (l. 427). After the Fall, the concept of death will be gradually fleshed out, culminating in Michael’s gruesome visions of mortality (11.444–47, 462–65).
447. odds: amount or ratio by which one thing exceeds or falls short of another; common diction in Shakespeare, where it often concerns characters in competition.
451. on: per the first edition; the second reads “of.”
460–69. Eve’s narration formally echoes and significantly varies Ovid’s tale of Narcissus (Met. 3.415ff).
466. pined: from the Latin noun poena, meaning “penalty in satisfaction for an offense or in consequence of failure to fulfill an obligation.” As an intransitive verb, pine means “to languish with intense desire.” As a transitive verb, it means “to cause pain or anguish” or “to grieve.” Cp. Satan at lines 511 and 848.
470. stays: awaits. This line is echoed by Satan at PR 3.244.
478. platan: plane; a favorite shade tree of the Greeks and Romans, commonly described as barren (Vergil, Georg. 2.70, 4.146). Plato presents Socrates as reclining beneath a spreading plane tree (Phaedrus 230a). Horace calls it caelebs, which used of men means “unmarried” and of trees “without vines” (Odes 2.15.4). Despite the conjugal arc of Eve’s narrative, Fowler maintains that Adam’s association with the plane tree owes not to its classical association with “erotic love” but to a “well-known allegory” that made it a symbol of Christ, Adam’s “head.”
480–89. Than … yielded: Eve flees Adam as Daphne flees Apollo (Met. 1.502ff). As with preceding situational references to Tantalus (ll. 331–36) and Narcissus (ll. 460–69), another classical myth of frustration is undone.
486. individual: inseparable, distinctive.
487–88. Part … half: Cp. Horace, Odes 1.3.8, 2.17.5.
493. unreproved: not subject to rebuke. Eve’s eyes work differently at 9.1036.
499–501. Smiled … flowers: The simile recalls Vergil’s account of Aether embracing his wife and of showers quickening seed in the earth (Georg. 2.325–28).
500. impregns: impregnates.
505–35. Satan’s third soliloquy of the book. Like Shakespeare in Othello, Milton insists that his audience share the development of his villain’s strategy.
508–11. thrust … pines: Satan’s account of torment by unfulfilled … longing continues the epic’s extensive correlation of the spiritual with the erotic (cp. 10.992–98).
511. Still: always; cp. 53–56; pines: torments (transitive, with Satan as the understood object); cp. 466n.
515–22. knowledge … ruin: Critics debate the sincerity of Satan’s sentiments: whether his indignation is genuine (Empson 1965, 69) or a rehearsal of his rhetorical strategy (Broadbent 151). But Satan is capable neither of sincerity nor of being merely strategic.
530. A chance but chance: “Perhaps luck …”
539. utmost longitude: farthest west.
541. right aspect: square attitude; the setting sun is perpendicular to the vertical gate.
548. Still: continually.
549. Gabriel: “God is my strength” (Hebr.); see lines 1006–10. Widely deemed one of the four archangels (with Uriel, Raphael, and Michael), Gabriel appears in Scripture to aid Daniel and foretell the birth of John the Baptist and Jesus (Dan. 8.16, 9.21; Luke 1.19, 26). Jewish traditions identify him as one of the three angels (with Michael and Raphael) who share a peaceful meal with Abraham (Gen. 18). He is also accounted the guardian of Paradise and the angel responsible for ripening fruit.
555. even: Newton was the first to explain the play on even: “His coming upon a sunbeam was the most direct and level course that he could take; for the sun’s rays were now pointed right against the eastern gate … where Gabriel was sitting.” Homer similarly compares Athena’s descent to a shooting star, a sign portentous to mariners (Il. 4.74–79).
557. thwarts: crosses. Aristotle explains shooting stars as combustible exhalations drawn from the earth and ignited aloft either through compression and condensation or by their own quickening motion. The natural motion of fire is upward, but strong winds, thought to originate at high altitude, propel the ignited vapors downward. Their oblique (thwart) path results from the combination of their natural motion and the wind’s downward compulsion (Meteorology 1.4). Cp. Vergil, Georg. 1.365–67.
558. Impress: mark by exerting pressure.
561. The practice of establishing orders or divisions (courses) by lot is common in Scripture, especially in accounts of temple duties (1 Chron. 23.6–26; Luke 1.8).
567. described: observed, spied (per a seventeenth-century confusion of describe and descry).
568. airy gait: flight path as well as comportment in flight (cp. 3.741).
580. vigilance: guard or watch; metonymy is an apt figure for designating angels, whose entire subjectivity is perfectly aligned with function (cp. l. 410, 6.350–51).
591. slope downward: Because the sun has continued to sink, Uriel no longer follows a flat trajectory. The moment thus occurs just after the balance point of equinoctial day and night.
592. whether: First and second editions have “whither.”
592–97. whether … attend: Milton will not choose between the Copernican cosmos and the Ptolemaic, which requires the sun to revolve around the earth at unbelievable velocity.
594. Diurnal: daily; voluble: rolling (Lat. volúbilis).
603. descant: counterpointed song.
605. Hesperus: the evening star, Venus.
606–9. Milton plays on clothing as a vehicle for light, here culminating in the moon’s paradoxical disrobing (cp. L’All 60–62, Il Pens 122–25, Masque 188–89).
608. Apparent: “readily seen,” but also “heir” (to Hesperus, the brightest light in the night sky until the moon’s appearance).
628. manuring: cultivation by hand (Lat. manus: hand).
635. author and disposer: source and ruler.
640. seasons: periods of time, occasions.
642. charm: delightful harmony.
648. solemn bird: nightingale; cp. 7.435.
661. These: Early editions have “Those.” Citing lines 657 and 674, Newton substituted “These.”
665–67. Lest … things: Previously, Satan persuaded Chaos and Night of his intention to return the newly created world “to her original darkness” and the possession of Night (2.982–86; cp. 10.415–18). It is axiomatic in this epic that, without light, chaos would come again.
667–75. Neoplatonic astrology classified animals, vegetables, and minerals according to the predominant stellar virtue, or astral power, that tempers (strengthens, attunes) them. Such influence was supposedly mediated by streaming ether. After the Fall, the cosmos is adjusted so that the stars’ influence is not always kindly, or naturally favorable (cp. 1
0.651ff). Their postlapsarian fire can be soft (gentle) as here, or severe (cp. 2.276).
685. rounding: making the rounds (literally, since the Garden is circular).
688. Divide the night: into watches. Roman armies sounded a trumpet when changing the watch; angelic guards do it to multipart music (full harmonic number).
690. blissfull bower: Cp. Spenser’s account of the bower within the Garden of Adonis where Venus sequesters the mortally wounded Adonis from “stygian gods” (FQ 3.6.43–49).
694. Laurel and myrtle: plants sacred to Apollo and Venus, respectively. Cp. Vergil, Ec. 2.54–55.
701. Crocus, and hyacinth: Atop Mount Ida, the hoodwinked Zeus beds the scheming Hera on these freshly risen flowers (Il. 14.348).
703. emblem: in the classical sense of a surface with inlaid ornamentation, a mosaic.
705. shady: The first edition has “shadier,” preferred by some editors.
707–8. Pan or Silvanus … Faunus: pastoral hybrids, half man and half goat, associated with secret retreats and fecundity. For Pan as a nature god, see 266n.
708. close: secluded, exclusive.
709. flowers: a rare instance where the two-syllable pronunciation is intended.
711. hymenaean: wedding song (after the classical marriage god, Hymen). Cp. L’All 125–28; Elegy 5 105–8.
712. genial: of or relating to marriage; nuptial. In Adam’s version, the voice of Eve’s “Heav’nly Maker” guides her to Adam (8.484–86).
714–19. Pandora: “all gifts” (Gk.); her story was frequently deemed an analogue of the Fall. After Prometheus (“Forethinker”) steals heaven’s fire for humanity’s sake, Pandora is divinely contrived to bring misery upon the world. Bearing a sealed jar containing the world’s ills, she is conducted by Hermes to Prometheus’ brother, Epimetheus (“Afterthought”)—”the unwiser son.” After Epimetheus marries her, the evils are released from her jar (Theog. 570–612; Works and Days 54–105).
717. Japhet: Christian mythographers identified Iapetus, the Titan father of Prometheus and Epimetheus, as Noah’s son Iaphet (Gen. 9.18–10.2).
719. authentic: possessing in itself the basis of its existence; genuine, original. Cp. 3.656.
724. pole: sky.
724–35. Thou … sleep: Cp. Ps. 74.16–17. Milton shifts seamlessly from describing the prayer to quoting it.
733. fill the Earth: Cp. Gen. 1.28.
735. gift of sleep: Cp. Homer, Il. 9.713; Vergil, Aen. 2.269; Ps. 127.2.
736–38. This … best: For early readers, the Puritan edge of this prescription for piety would have been keen; cp. 12.534–35.
736. unanimous: literally, one-souled.
739. Handed: hand in hand, as at line 689.
741–43. nor … refused: The use of rites to mean marital sex was a commonplace warranted by St. Paul’s account (Eph. 5.32) of the bodily union of husband and wife as a “mystery” symbolizing Christ’s union with the Church (cp. 8.487; Shakespeare, ADO 2.1.373, OTH 1.3.258; Jonson, Hymenaei 137). The reverence expressed here for conjugal coition is ordinarily reserved for sacraments. In related passages, it extends to human genitalia (“mysterious parts”) and the “genial bed” (l. 312, 8.598). Insistence that Adam and Eve participate mutually, neither turning away nor refusing, suggests another scriptural source for this passage. Rite was often spelled right (cp. CMS, Masque 125) and included a strong sense of moral obligation. St. Paul deemed refusal of spousal “due benevolence” fraudulent (1 Cor. 7.3–5). Cp. “the starved lover … best quitted with disdain” (ll. 769–70).
741. I ween: I believe; “used parenthetically rather than as governing the sentence; in verse often a mere tag” (OED 1.h). Seventeenth-century retellings of Book 4 suggest that Milton’s conviction found a sympathetic audience. Dryden’s Satan thus imagines Eve as Semele to his Jove: “Have not I, like these, a body too, / Form’d for the same delights which they pursue? / I could (so variously my passions move) / Enjoy, and blast her in the act of Love” (State of Innocence 3.1; cp. Hopkins, Primitive Loves 135–235).
744–49. hypocrites … man: These lines concentrate allusions to various scriptural passages on marriage: 1 Tim. 4.1–3 (hypocrites), 1 Cor. 7.1 (commands to some), Gen. 1.28 (Our Maker bids increase).
751. propriety: exclusive possession or right of use; ownership. Wedlock is a prelapsarian institution, unlike private property (with the exception of the nuptial bower).
756. all the charities: affections; “comprehends all the relations, all the endearments of consanguinity and affinity” (Newton).
760–65. Perpetual fountain … revels: The references and diction—fountain, golden shafts, lamp, purple wings—are erotically charged and culturally diffuse; cp. 8.511–20. Reigns here and revels translates a description of love by Marino (L’Adone 2.114), a sensuous Italian poet noteworthy to Milton on account of his patron, Manso, whose acquaintance Milton prized. See Manso, Damon 181–97.
761. bed is undefiled: Cp. Heb. 13.4.
763. love: Cupid, whose golden arrows (shafts) infuse love.
768. Mixed dance: men and women dancing together, a practice frowned upon by Puritans, including Milton; cp. Of Ref (Yale 1:589). masque: masquerade ball.
769. starved: deprived of love, but also of warmth; cp. 2.600.
770. quitted: repaid; cp. line 51.
773. repaired: restored.
774. Blest pair: translates Vergil’s celebration of Nisus and Euryalus (Fortunati ambo!), intimate friends slain by the enemy at rest in each other’s arms (Aen. 9.446).
775. Note the repetition of no and know.
776–77. shadowy … vault: The earth’s globe casts a conical shadow into the night sky, which, reaching from horizon to horizon, is portrayed as an arch (vault). At this moment, the shadowy cone, moving in diametrical opposition to the sun, has ascended halfway from the eastern horizon toward its midnight zenith. It is therefore nine o’clock, equinoctial time, the start of the second watch (ll. 779–80). Line 777 occurs halfway between line 539, where “the sun in utmost longitude begins its descent beneath the horizon, and 1015, the last line of Book 4,” which occurs at midnight (Fowler).
778. ivory port: Recent editors identify this phrase as an allusion to the ivory gate of the realm of sleep, from which false dreams proceed according to Homer and Vergil (Od. 19.562–67; Aen. 6.893–96). A significant connection with the guards’ imminent interruption of Eve’s dream is then proposed. Such a connection is strained. Guards, not personified dreams, issue from this ivory port, which is the gate not of sleep but of Paradise (made of the white stone alabaster [l. 544] and thus like ivory in color).
782–85. Uzziel: “power of God” (Hebr.). Standing at the eastern gate, Gabriel splits the guard to check the northern and southern perimeters of the Garden until they meet again full west. Shield and spear translate a Greek idiom designating left and right.
788. Ithuriel and Zephon: “Discovery of God” and “Lookout” (Hebr.). Their names denote their roles as they search the interior of the Garden.
791. secure: unsuspecting.
793. Who: one who; that is, Uriel (see l. 555).
798. these: Ithuriel and Zephon.
802. organs of her fancy: Satan delves into Eve’s psyche to manipulate her fancy or imagination, the faculty that produces mental images (phantasms). Cp. “raise up the organs of her fantasy” in WIV 5.5.55. Organs retains its Greek sense of “instruments”; it may also include the specific sense of “musical instrument.” In Milton’s time, the plural organs could mean “pipe organ.” In effect, Satan plays upon Eve’s mental apparatus as if it were a set of pipes, attempting to forge illusions in a manner reminiscent of the erection of Pandaemonium (1.708ff). Cp. PR 4.407–9.
804–9. inspiring … pride: If unable to play directly on Eve’s imagination, Satan hopes to unsettle the perfect humoral balance (temper) of her animal spirits. These spirits were thought to originate from the blood and carry sensory data to the brain. Breathing venom into (inspiring) her ear, he aims to pr
ovoke distempered impulses and grandiose designs (high conceits).
812. celestial temper: The spear, like incisive Ithuriel, was produced (tempered) in Heaven.
815. Lights: lands on and ignites; nitrous powder: gunpowder.
816–17. ready for a barrel (tun) and storage in an arsenal (magazine) as preparation for (against) war; smutty grain: cereal grain blackened by a parasitic fungus.
821. grisly: gruesomely horrible; applied to Death (2.704) and Moloch (Nat Ode 209), both of whom are also described as kingly.
830. argues: is reason to think.
835–43. Zephon’s retorted scorn makes pointed and repeated use of the second person singular (form of address used with inferiors).
836. Bentley would transpose undiminished brightness, for reasons grammatical.
845–47. Severe … is: Satan reacts similarly to the sight of Eve (9.459–62). Cp. Vergil’s description of the grave rebuke delivered by the youthful and beautiful Euryalus (Aen. 5.344) and Dryden’s distillation in Hind and Panther: “For vice, though frontless and of hardened face / Is daunted at the sight of awful grace” (3.1040–41).
848. Virtue … lovely: It is a commonplace of Platonically inspired philosophy and poetry that beauty is the aesthetic expression of virtue or goodness. pined: grieved; see 466n.
858–59. like … curb: The simile echoes Hermes’ account of Prometheus (Aeschylus, Prom. 1008).
862. half-rounding: See 782–85n.
868. shade: trees.
870–71. Verity and Fowler take Gabriel’s easy recognition of Satan as validation of his aristocratic slap at Zephon (l. 830), but Gabriel goes by gait, bearing (port), and demeanor, which Zephon had little chance to observe before Satan identified himself.
879. transgressions: both “sins” (as in l. 880) and “boundary crossings”; though sentenced to Hell for his crimes, Satan now trespasses in Paradise (see l. 909). charge: responsibility; child or member of a minister’s congregation under protection.
880. approve: agree; try or test (see Satan’s rejoinder, l. 896).
886. esteem of wise: reputation for good sense.