Essay - Paradise Lost After Dante Alighieri 'Inferno,'—which is a Physical Description...

Paradise Lost

After Dante Alighieri "Inferno,"—which is a physic*****l description of hell that is a feast for the senses (Blake, 1994) ********** accusatory tone goes so far as to aver that thought there might be hints of poetic license in how Milton created the character of Satan, Milton might be operat*****g as a vessel ***** Satan. The exact quote is: "The rea*****n ***** wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels and Gods, and at li*****rty w*****n of Devils and Hell, ***** because he was a true poet and of the Devil's Party without knowing it." Strong words indeed.

One might argue that in portray*****g the Devil, Milton was being true to what was wr*****ten in ***** Bible. After all, Ezekiel (28:15) states that "You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created till wickedness was found in you." This shows that ***** was first created as an Archangel complete with all ***** powers, but somehow iniquities entered in***** him. The expectations as in any religious missive or religion are that good and evil exists and ***** good eventually triumphs over evil. The problems that Blake and many others have are due to the kind ***** power that is given ***** Satan's character. Blake complains that the ***** of ***** Messiah ***** ambiguous. It is the name given to the archangel (***** Satan) ***** Jesus Christ. There ***** some instances where the disgust fac*****r is perpetrated through graphic (almost pornographic prose). ***** has incestuous relations with his daughter-Sin who bears the progeny Death. T***** triumvirate (Satan-Sin-*****) is very powerful and its taints are cast on humankind.

*****'s Satan functi*****s as an *****tagonist or the anti-hero. Anti-hero's in most epics are looked on as rebels and they garner a measure ***** sympathy.

Milton's Satan is shown as ***** possessed of a similar awareness ***** the long soliloquy in Book IV ***** Paradise Lost (IV:32-113). Consider the following extract:

Which way I flie is Hell; my self am *****

And in ***** lowest deep a lower deep

Still threat'ning to devour me opens wide,

To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heavn'n.

A ********** at last, relent is there no place

Left f***** Repentance, none for Pardon left?

None ***** but by subm*****sion; and that word

Disdain forbids me, ***** my dread of shame

Among the Spirits beneath (*****V.75-83)

In a sense, Satan's malfeasance can be construed (as ***** narrative is developed ***** Milton) as rebellious because Satan was created through inequality of rank and power. The Archangel did not see the reason for that. Percy S*****ey, in an essay "On the Devil, and Devils," wrote that ***** Devil owed a lot to Milton. (Curran, 1997) While ***** presented the Devil as ***** very embodiment of evil, ***** clothed him with "the sublime grandeur ***** a gr*****ceful but tremendous spirit." Milton made Satan a Rom*****ntic hero. There is no doubt that Milton (personally) Satan to be ***** villa***** that w***** responsible for the fall of man from *****.