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XXII.—The Theme of Death in Paradise Lost
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
The theme of Milton's epic, we are told at the beginning of the poem, is man's disobedience, which brought death into the world. If there is a central doctrine in Paradise Lost, it would seem to be that death is the inevitable result of sin. The voice of God declares with severe emphasis that man, once become sinful,
- To expiate his treason hath naught left,
- But to destruction sacred and devote,
- He with his whole posterity must die.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright
- Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1917
References
1 Paradise Lost, iii, 207 sq.
2 Ibid., iv, 197.
3 Ibid., xi, 59 sq.
4 Cf. Kenyon's speech in The Marble Faun, ch. l.
5 Paradise Lost, xii, 473 sq.
6 Chapter xii.
7 Chapter xiii.
8 Milton seems to have made the acquaintance of this idea in Calvin's Psychopannychia (Opera, ed. Baum, Cunitz, Reuss, vol. v, p. 168), a tract written in 1534 against the idea. The doctrine had been taught by certain of the early Anabaptists, whom Calvin felt it necessary to answer.
9 Chapter xi.
10 Marjorie Barstow, “Milton's Use of the Forms of Epic Address,” Modern Language Notes (February, 1916), xxxi, p. 120.
11 Paradise Lost, iv, 660.
12 Ibid., iv, 440.
13 Ibid., iv, 635.
14 Ibid., ix, 820.
15 Ibid., x, 985.
16 Ibid., xi, 461 sq.
17 Ibid., xi, 549.
18 See Paul Chauvet, La Religion de Milton, Paris, 1909. Also Margaret Lewis Bailey, Milton and Jakob Boehme, New York, 1914, Chapter iv.
19 Christian Doctrine, Chapter xi.
20 Paradise Lost, xi, 268 sq.