MILTON'S

TREATMENT

OF SATAN IN PARADISE LOST

The question in how far what we know of a poet's character can be used to explain or interpret his work, is not easily answered. Nor is it the aim of the present essay to present an analysis of Milton's personality, or a detailed study of the connections between his personality and his work. There are, however, some traits in Milton's character, that obviously play an important part in Paradise Lost, and the extent to which they do so, will, in our opinion, bear further investigation. T h e most conspicuous of these traits is, no doubt, his pride. In his introduction to the Oxford Book of Christian Verse, Lord David Cecil says : "Pride was to Milton the mark of a superior nature". Saurat, who thinks of Milton as a man whose basic emotions were a monumental pride and powerful egotism 1, comes to thisconclusion: "Because of his peculiar pride, his egotism will always need to be identified with something g r e a t . . . And Milton will end by identifying himself with God" 2 How important the latter part of this statement is, we shall see presently, after we shall have reached similar conclusions in connection with Mib ton's chastity and stoicism. Another trait which, in this connection, deserves our attention is Milton's sensuality; an important part of his life was taken up by the struggle against his desires to "Sport with the tangles of Neaera's hair". In the Comus period, Milton extols chastity as a Saintly virtue, which turns "the unpolluted temple of the mind by degrees to the soul's essence, till all be made immortal" a. From this passage in Comus, we may conclude with Tillyard, that chastity was to Milton "the essential means by which the human soul reaches out to divinity" ~. Milton's puritan belief may, to a certain extent, have been the cause of this valuation of chastity, but there may be more to it; Professor Herford 5 rightly remarks; "Milton's chastity, sublime and exalted as it is, is at the bottom a selfregarding virtue". Milton must have felt that his sensuality was one of his weak spots, and therefore he armed himself against it by adopting the principles of chastity, as he armed himself against any other irrational forces by inclining to stoicism. In his book Lucifer and Prometheus 6, Dr. R. J. Zwi Werblowsky defines the ideal of stoicism as " T h e completely rational man, who is beyond the reach of all the irrational realities of this world, who is Unmoved and unmovable and hence equal to God, because I. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Denis Saurat: Milton, Man and Thinker (I925) , p. 342. Saurat, p. 48. cf. Comus I1.452-461. E. M. W. Tillyard: Milton, 6th impression (I956), p. 379. Herford: Dante and Milton, The John Rylands Library Publications. Dr. R. J. Zwi Werblowsky: Lucifer and Prometheus 0952), p. 42.

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sufficient unto himself". Milton may have considered his chastity as "the essential means by which the human soul reaches out to divinity", but with Werblowsky's definition in connection with his stoicism in mind, we may even go further and say that it (the soul) actually becomes equal to God. And so this definition shows (as Saurat's statement about Milton's identifying himself with God also did) that Milton is not only guilty of pride, but even of the original sin of the Greeks, hubris, the sin of aspiring too high, of overstepping one's bounds and losing all sense of proportion because of one's pride, skill, power or good fortune, and so becoming arrogant towards God and Man. As we shall see, both this Greek original sin, hubris, and the Hebraic original sin of indulging in sensuality - that is, allowing oneself to be drawn to the level of animal existence and being infidel to a spiritual calling -, play an exceedingly important part in Paradise Lost. Both hubris and sensuality were extant in Milton's mind and, as these two sins are exactly one another's opposites as reactions to the birth-process of human consciousness, as Jung's psychology has sufficiently proved, this could not but give rise to a conflict. One aspect of Paradise Lost is that it is a projection of this conflict. A second exceedingly important fact connected with Milton's stoic inclinations, is that he controls the irrational realities of this world, the upsurging passions that find their origin in the dark recesses of the subconscious mind, by reason, the product of the conscious mind, which is superimposed. We shall presently see that an important aspect of Milton's Satan is, that he is partly a personification of these passions, striving up (mark the hubris aspect), from Hell. Looking at it from this angle, we may go on to say, that Satan's antagonists, God and Christ, are Reason, the product of the conscious mind; in which picture, Hell stands for the subconscious- and Heaven for the conscious mind, so that the whole of the human soul would offer a picture, analogous to the Ptolemaic geography of the universe, which Milton uses in Paradise Lost. But before coming to such conchisions, it is our aim to subject Milton's treatment of Satan, in chronological order, to a close scrutiny, thereby tracing at the same time the result of the fascinating struggles and conflicts to which we have been alluding. The difficulties that lead to Man's fall in Paradise, start when God announces that, henceforth, his Son shall be head of all the angels in Heaven. Satan is then led by his pride, to refuse to look upon the Son as his Lord and to bend his knees for him, and with the aim of starting a rebellion, he secretly commands his subordinate to assemble the host that is under their command in the North of Heaven. This pride is Satan's besetting sin; all his later actions are determined by it. When in a powerful speech, in which the basic emotion, again, is pride, Satan incites his host to rebellion, Abdiel fervently opposes him:

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"Shalt thou give Law to God, shalt thou dispute With him the points of libertie who made Thee what thou art" (book 5, 11,822 ft.) To which Satan protests that he was not created by God, but selfbegot and selfraised, thus committing the heresy of disclaiming the creatorcreature relation between himself and God, a relation which makes Satan's hubris even worse than that of the Greek Prometheus, since between him and Zeus this relation was absent. There is, however, a certain ambivalence in the way in which Milton treats Satan, for although Milton makes him the great exponent of pride and other evil passions, he also depicts him as a powerful, daring, gigantic, energetic, magnificent and awe-inspiring hero. That Milton gives Satan all these qualities, can be seen when he describes Satan on his throne, preparing to make his first speech. (book 5, 11.757 ff.). He sits down on a seat. "High on a Hill, far blazing", which gives us an impression of the great energy that, as it were, radiates from Satan. "As a Mount raised on a M o u n t " His being compared to a mount gives us an impression of his gigantic dimensions and weight, and this impression is strengthened by his being raised on a mount. The mass is put in motion, we feel the enormous power which this lifting up of Satan's bulk implies. Moreover, we now have to look up to Satan, and hence he becomes awe-inspiring. Milton places Satan on a mount, "with Pyramids and Towrs From Diamond Quarries hew'n & Rocks of Gold". Again we see great masses; Pyramids, Towers, Rocks of heavy gold, and a powerful motion is again suggested by " h e w ' n ' . The hard brilliance of diamonds and the rich splendour of gold add to the magnificence of this baroque picture. Also, (in book 6, 11.64 ff.), when the two armies in Heaven move to meet one another, it cannot but strike us that Milton, when talking of the Heavenly Host, compares it to birds flying; he describes the sound of instrumental harmony and evokes pictures of hills, vales, woods and streams, (rather peaceful and unheroic), but that he does not give us a clear picture of the host itself. When he is talking of Satan's army, however, (book 6, 11.79 ff.) we get a much more splendid and heroic picture of the sweeping movement of this army, the details of the crew's armour adding much to the vividness, and when Satan comes into view, we get the impression that Milton could not depict any of his protagonists in a more heroic, powerful and awe-inspiring way (book 6, 11.99 ff.)

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"High in the midst exalted as a God Th'Apostat in his Sun-bright Chariot sate Idol of Majestie Divine, enclos'd With Flaming Cherubim, and Golden Shields; Then lighted from his gorgeous Throne, for now 'Twixt Host and Host but narrow space was left A dreadful interval and Front to Front Presented stood in terrible array Of hideous length: before the cloudy Van On the rough edge of battel ere it joyn'd Satan with vast and haughtie strides advanc't Came towring armd in Adamant and Gold" In reading Paradise Lost, we may notice, that often when Milton feels that he has allowed his passions and emotions to make Satan too magnificent, he immediately makes up for this by adding a rational comment, with the intention to neutralize the effect to some extent. But in this passage of practically unsurpassed descriptive poetry, he does not add one word to detract from Satan's splendour; evenAbdiel is led to exclaim: "O, Heav'n! That such resemblance of the Highest Should yet remain, where faith and realtie remain not". (book 6, ll.iI 4 ft.) Immediately after this, however, one stroke of Abdiel's sword sends Satan staggering back, in which scene Milton again exploits all the possibilities of baroque art to suggest enormous power. The point Milton wants to make here, is that Evil is all the more dangerous, because it is often so fascinatingly attractive, but that yet, it is overcome by Good: The underlying idea being, that in Heaven, contrary to what we see in our post-lapsarian world, goodness is directly connected with power, so that wat is good, must needs be most powerful. The same holds good for Satan's fight with Michael. Satan, led by his pride again, shows great courage by dauntlessly seeking out Michael to enter into fight with him. But yet Michael wins; Satan is wounded badly and has to be carried to his chariot. This is the turning-point of the battle, and although Satan's party is not utterly defeated, the Heavenly Host can be said to have won the first day of battle. What rather astonishes us, however, is, that in the end, Satan's army and the Heavenly Host prove to be of equal strength, even though Satan's party is more vulnerable, being subject to pain and wounds, so that the odds are against it, and also in %pite of the fact, that God, in so many words, had given it as his command to the Heavenly Host to subdue by force, " W h o reason for thir Law refuse" 1. But in the end, goodness has to win and so the Messiah puts a stop to the battle and, parading God's i. P . L . b .

61, 41 .

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omnipotence, overcomes Satan's army and drives the rebels out of Heaven. Goodness being victorious because it goes hand in hand with power, is the rational aspect of the battle; however, let us now pay attention to the emotional side. The Heavenly Host and the Messiah may have been victorious, but theirs was not a heroic victory; they were invulnerable, not subject to pain and wounds, and, moreover, they fought in the snug certainty that God's omnipotence would lead them to a victory. Satan, on the other hand, struggles against something that is decidedly stronger t h a n himself, and this, our feelings tell us, is heroic. Satan is as much of a hero as those of the ancient epics, who were equally dauntless in desperate situations. He proves to be a great and brave army-leader of enormous energy, showing great mental fortitude. He never loses courage, he seeks out the strongest antagonists in battle, by both word and deed he encourages his men when they are downcast and tired after the first day of battle, and, inventing the gun, he leads his party almost to a victory by his resourcefulness. When he sees the results of his invention, he stands boasting and laughing at his enemies; this may be overweening pride, but we can easily forgive it; Odysseus would have done the same. In his struggle against God and the Messiah, Satan is exclusively led by his passions, a thing which Milton - who felt that, but for his acquired stoicism, he might now and then give in to the same weakness -, throughout Paradise L o s t strongly condemns. Reason should always control one's actions; it is because of this principle, (which, perhaps, already points to Neo-Classicism) that God wants Abdiel, aided by a host of friends, equal in number 1) to Satan's crew, to subdue "By force, who reason for thir Law refuse Right reason for thir Law and for thir King Messiah, who by right of merit Reigns" (book 6, 11.41 ft.) and to cast them into Chaos. Immediately before the battle, in Abdiel's speech, Milton reintroduces the idea that reason should control the passions, but Satan continues impervious to reason. As ever, he is led on by his passions, of which the chief is pride. Because Of this, he denies the fact that God is his creator, and because of this, he contemptuously disregards the possibility that he might prove to be weaker than God, whose host he holds in derision. Our reason tells us that Satan's rising against God, his father, and trying to equal him was a great sin and, moreover, a foolish thing to do, because God is omnipotent. Satan is proud and ambitious, t'is a grievous fault! But our emotions respond to Satan's being a product of his emotions. And we expect Milton to have responded similarly, for was not Milton proud and ambitious as well? Milton strongly condemns Satan's lack of reason, but when he does so, it is his rational faculty that condemns, not his emotional faculty. 'And since the I.

P.L. b. 6 1.49.

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poetry as we see it in Paradise Lost is largely a product of the emotional faculty, Satan could not but become a hero. That Milton sometimes does forget reason and is led away by his passions, can be seen in his comments on Belial's speech in Book II (1.226). Belial's speech bespeaks of reason and sound common-sense, but Milton says : " T h u s Belial with words cloath'd in reasons garb Counsel'd ignoble ease and peaceful sloth" In accordance with the epic tradition, the poem Paradise Lost begins in the middle of the chronological story, and what preceded in time, is told by one of the characters, Raphael in this case. This makes for greater unity, but it also lays emphasis on the middle part of the story (taken chronologically), which is not related by one of the characters, but represented directly by the poet and so becomes more vivid and dramatic. (Dramatic to be taken in this sense, that, in a play, this part would be acted, whereas what went before would be related.) Now, at the beginning of the poem Paradise Lost, which, as it has been our endeavour to make clear, is at the same time the beginning of the "direct, dramatic action", we see Satan just after his fall, in the flames of Hell, that is, at his lowest point. And from then on, as the "dramatic action" proceeds, we see Satan struggling up with great difficulty, from the bottom of Hell. He defies God's word, which has condemned him to Hell for ever, and, overcoming enormous difficulties, he actually succeeds in escaping from Hell and crossing Chaos, finally reaching his destination, earth. This means that, either consciously or not, Milton lays emphasis on Satan's positive achievements, his struggling up, whereas Satan's fall, related by Raphael, is, as it were, represented at one remove. And so the construction of Paradise Lost, too, adds to the heroic impression Satan makes on us. In the Hell passage, Milton fully exploits the possibilities of baroque art in his description of the fallen Apostate, who, aware of the graveness of the situation in which he now finds himself, has lost none of his great qualities. He is still a gigantic, powerful and heroic leader. He has lost none of his courage and none of his energy, nor has his host, which, once more, displays splendour and strength; he is even capable of grim humour, calling out to his warriors, when they stiU lie prostrate in the lake of fire : "or have ye chos'n this place After the toyl of Battel to repose Your wearied vertue, for the ease you find To slumber here as in the Vales of Heav'n" (book I, 11.318 ff.)

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It is Satan, who first devised and in part proposed the plan to seduce Man, thus showing his resourcefulness again, and it is also Satan, who undertakes to perform the difficult task of escaping from Hell, struggling up through Chaos and causing Man's fall, thus showing his courage, but also his ever-present pride and ambition, as appears from his determination that no one shall share his glory: "This enterprise none shall partake with m e " 1. So far, Milton has had ample opportunity to show that Satan was guilty of the sin of hubris, but to make him the genuine exponent of evil, Milton wanted to combine this Greek original sin with the Hebraic original sin, namely, sensuality. There being no procreation in Heaven, however, and hence no sex-differentiation, Milton could not show this aspect of Satan there. But as soon as, in the Gate-of-Hell passage, we meet Satan's allegorical daughter, Sin, Milton pounces upon this opportunity to show sensuality in Satan in its worst aspect, by relating his incestuous passion for his own daughter, the result of which was the birth of Death. The Gate-of-Hell passage shows us yet another new aspect of Satan, namely subtlety. He has now learnt, that power alone will not lead him to success, and so he flatters Sin and Death and makes them promises, and thus, by this as yet still crude form of subtlety, he persuades them to open the gate. As we shall see, it is essentially this subtlety, but then in a more refined form, which will make Satan successful in seducing Man in Paradise. But before tracing Milton's treatment of Satan in Paradise, let us have a closer look at the Mount Niphates speech. There is, in this speech, a marked change of atmosphere; it stands quite apart from what goes before, and it is only with difficulty that we can bring the psychology Satan betrays here in accord with what we have seen of it so far. W e may well ask what could be the reasons of this change. One reason, of course, may be that this speech was a prefabricated whole. Milton originally designed to write a tragedy on the Fall, and this speech was intended to begin it. But Milton was critical enough about his own work and he would hardly have inserted this speech, if the change in tone could not be justified and if the speech had no function in this poem. The fact is that, in the Heaven and Hell passages, Satan is always speaking to others and, being proud and selfconscious and moreover a leader, he wants to show himself a brave, determined hero, who is never subject to hesitations, who fights for "the cause" and not for personal purposes. So there, we see Satan in the light in which he wants himself to be seen. But in the Mount Niphates speech, he is alone and thinks himself unobserved, and so he gives vent to his otherwise hidden emoL P. L. b. 2 1.465-466.

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tions. Therefore, we do not see Satan from without here, but from within; his being alone quite justifies the change. The function of the Mount Niphates speech is twofold. Satan, here, is shown to have a fuller character than we have seen so far; as soon as we are enabled to look behind his heroic facade, we see that even he has his inner conflicts. Satan admits the goodness and greatness of God. Yet, first he curses God's love saying that that caused all the trouble, but then he realizes that it was all his own fault, not God's: "Be then his Love accurst, since love or hate, T o me alike, it deals eternal woe. Nay curs'd be thou; since against his thy will Chose freely what it now so justly rues" (book 4, 11.69 ft.) The passage strongly reminds us of the last inner conflict of Marlowe's Faustus, whose thoughts follow much the same lines: "Cursed be the parents that engendred me! No, Faustus: curse thyself!" Both admit that they have been wrong, but, although they would like to repent, there is no return. For Faustus it is too late, and for Satan too, in a way, because his pride will not allow him to make amends. So Satan has to persist in doing wrong, knowing quite well what he is doing, which makes his sin all the worse. Although the tragic aspect of Satan's having to persist in what he knows is wrong and our awareness of a fuller character might tend to awaken our sympathy, Milton gains two things: Firstly, by persisting Satan becomes more evil, he banishes all thoughts of good from his mind and, in so many words, chooses Evil to be his Good ~. Secondly, Satan becomes less heroic because the heroic aspect is no longer singled out. When we see the whole psychologic get-up of any person, with its background of motives and experiences, the heroic aspect is bound to suffer. If Milton were to have let the fall of Man be caused by a Satan whom he thought of as good and heroic, that would have been tantamount to his applauding the destruction of Man! And so he gives Satan a more complete, and hence less heroic, character, while the greater completeness also brings his greater evil to the fore. Seeing that the traditional story of the Fall has it that Satan transformed himself into a serpent, Milton gratefully accepted this idea, and transformed his Satan, while in Paradise, into all sorts of animals; thereby safeguarding himself against any untoward circumstances, which might still tend to make Satan heroic. This is also where the subtlety, to which we have been referring, comes in. Because we are only too easily deceived by subtle cunning, we hate it and think it definitely unheroic. T h e scene is now set for the action in Paradise; Satan has become evil, unheroic and subtle. I. P. L. b. 4 1.IIO.

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Critics do not always seem to have realized how extremely subtle Satan's course of action in preparing and working the Fall actually is. Satan cunningly enters Paradise unobserved, he changes himself into all sorts of animals, and finally into the toad, which has often been used as a symbol of lechery, and inspires Eve with a dream. A dream, which, as we shall see, was to prove fatal to mankind, being to a very great extent the cause of Man's fall. It should be noticed, that Satan whispers in Eve's ear through the symbol of lechery. He flatters her, whereat, in her dream, she rises and goes to the tree of knowledge, where she finds Satan, disguised as an angel. Satan eats the fruit, highly praising its effect on him. Then he invites Eve to eat also, saying that it would raise her to the level of the Gods, thereby inspiring her with the sinful desire of disobeying God's command and committing hubris. But this is not the only desire with which he inspires her. Once hubris had been introduced, sensuality could not but folIow. When Satan holds the fruit to Eve's mouth, its effect is almost that of an aphrodisiac : "the pleasant savourie smell So quick'nd appetite, that I, methought, Could not but taste. Forthwith up to the Clouds With him I flew, and underneath beheld The Earth outstretcht immense, a prospect wide And various: wondring at my flight and change To this high exaltation" (book 5.11.84 ff.) If we bear in mind that dreams are ultimately wish-fulfilments, and that it was Satan who inspired Eve with the wishes we shall presently analyse, we shall come to the conclusion, that by this dream, Satan prepared the fall of Man with unsurpassed subtlety. Eve's flying up may contain an element of hubris again, but there is more to it. Freud, in a lecture on symbolism in dreams, delivered in i9i 7 at the University of Vienna 1, says: ,,Dreams of flying, must be interpreted as dreams of general sexual excitement, dreams of erection. One psychoanalytic investigator, P. Federn, has established the truth of this interpretation beyond doubt: but besides this, Mourly Void, a man highly praised for his sober judgement, who carried out the experiments with artificial postures of the arms and legs, and whose theories were widely removed from those of psychoanalysis (indeed he may have known nothing about it) was led by his own investigations to the same conclusion. Nor must you think to Qbject to this that women can also have dreams of flying; you should rather remind yourselves that the purpose of dreams is wish-fulfilment, and that the wish to be a man is frequently met with in women, whether I. Quotation from the Authorized English Translation of the original text. Perma Books (P. 2o2. S) Sigmund Freund: A General Introduction to Psycho-Analysis, p. I62.

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they are conscious of it or not." W e may conclude from this, that Eve was now inspired by Satan with the wish to be a man; and as she knew only one man, this is tantamount to saying, a wish to be Adam, or at any rate to be equal to Adam, and no longer his subordinate, Moreover, she now has extremely pleasant associations with the fruit and its smell and she has been inspired with hubris. Seeing all this, we are not surprised, when, on the fatal day, Eve expresses her desire to work alone, that is, independent of Adam; she rationalizes this desire, saying that, if they work together, they will talk too much and work too little. Adam protests that they were not created for "irksome toil", and says that he is afraid that harm should befall Eve when separated from him. Eve's reply is exactly what we expect: "But that thou shouldst my firmness therfore doubt .......... because We have a foe May tempt it, I expected not to hear" (book 9.11.279 ft.) On the one hand she wants to be as firm as Adam, and on the other,. she wants to be tempted by this foe. Adam then reluctantly lets her go, saying: "Seek not temptation then" 1, thereby actually touching upon the heart of the matter, for Eve does seek temptation; the result of her dream, her pleasant associations with the fruit, aided by the desire, with whicl~ Satan has inspired her, to be Adam's equal, and to prove this by working alone, urges her towards temptation. E. M. W. Tillyard, in his book "Milton" 2, protests that "Satan hopes to find Eve alone, and does so by a lucky chance"; he remarks, however, that here, "Chance does not disagree with character". Seeing the aforementioned facts, we would be inclined to think, that there is no question of chance here, but of the result of the truly devilish subtlety with which Satan prepares first Eve's, and thereby Adam's fall, well aware of the fact, that Man's (That is Adam's but also Milton's) love for Woman is his most vulnerable spot. The same arguments offer a solution, when Tillyard wonders that although Eve is "fully warned and confident in her own strength to overcome any temptation, anxious even to prove her individual worth a . . . . her mind quite belies her apparently sober preparedness when the actual temptation occurs", and that "there is not any need of a great wave of passion to overwhelm her resolution" 4. T h e fact that Eve is anxious to prove her individual worth is a direct outcome of the seductive dream; she has a subconscious desire to be overcome and to taste the fruit which awakens such pleasant associations in her, and that is exactly why there is no need of a "great wave of passion to overwhelm_ her resolution", that is why she "shows little strength of feeling", that is~ ~. 2. 34.

P. L. b. 9 1.364. p. 253. P. 259-260. The italics are mine. p. 26o.

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also, the cause of the triviality of mind to which Tillyard largely attributes her ruin. Eve is by no means shallow in her reply to the serpent: "Serpent, thy overpraising leaves in doubt The vertue of that Fruit, in thee first prov'd" (book 9.11.615 ff.) on the contrary, her reply gives evidence of wit and critical judgement, but immediately following these lines, she asks: "But say, where grows the Tree, from hence how far?" (book 9.1.617) thereby even taking the initiative to repair to the tree. Then, just before Eve's fall, Milton, as if he were composing music, brings in his leitmotif; he compares the Serpent, Satan, who, we have seen, is among other aspects the personification of hubris, of aspiring too high, of overstepping one's bounds, to a flame, to fire, the only element whose tendency is upwards, fire, which, like knowledge, confers might and mastery on man, but which, if not kept in proper control may mean destruction, fire "Which oft, they say, some evil Spirit attends Hovering and blazing with delusive Light Misleads th'amaz'd Night-wanderer from his way To Boggs and Mires, & oft through Pond or Poole, There swallow'd up and lost, from succour farr. So glister'd the dire Snake and into fraud Led Eve our credulous Mother" (book 9.11.638 ff.) Eve, having not yet tasted the fruit of knowledge, is, it is true, still a nightwanderer - Milton once more betrays his none too high opinion of life in Paradise here - but the flame of hubris and knowledge will cause her destruction. We know now that Satan's devilish plan is going to succeed. Satan now follows the same course of action as he did in the dream; he flatters her, he works on her pride in a hubris-inspiring speech, in which his various arguments for her eating the fruit directly contradict one another. But it will be clear now, why his words "into her heart too easy entrance won". Added to the hubris aspect, we now, on the hottest hour of day, see the physical desires, too, get the better of Eve: "An eager appetite, rais'd by the smell So savourie of that Fruit, which with desire, Inclinable now grown to touch or taste, Sollicited her longing eye" (book 9.11.74o ff.)

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For a moment she is still in doubt, but failing to see the flaws in Satan's arguments, "Forth reaching to the Fruit, she pluck'd, she eat" 1. And while Eve, committing the hubris of imagined Godhead, "greedily ingorged without restraint" 2, Satan, still in the form of a serpent, slyly slinks back to his thicket, leaving the scene of his wicked deeds. His presence in Paradise is no longer needed, for Adam's fall will follow Eve's automatically. It has been protested, that Satan gradually decreases as the poem goes on. It should be noted, however, that in the scene of altercation between Gabriel and Satan, when the latter is found out while inspiring Eve with the dream, and drops his animal disguise, Satan, although n o w not a magnificent leader, but a "grieslie King" 3, is still depicted as enormously powerful. He is still of "Regal port" ~, and Gabriel has to warn his squadron to stand firm. W h e n Gabriel threatens him, Satan does not give heed, and when there is almost a fight, Milton first describes the angelic squadron (just as, before the battle in Heaven, he first described the Heavenly Host) and only after he has shown against what force Satan would have to fight, he describes Satan himself (in Heaven first his host and then himself). It will be realized, that this order is greatly to Satan's advantage, it enhances the impression he makes. But the comparison with the onset of the battle in Heaven (book 6.11.64 ft.) can be followed up even further; once more, Milton fails to find a heroic comparison when talking of the Heavenly Party. In Heaven he compared it to birds, now he compares their spears to ripe, and hence top-heavy ears of corn, that stand waving, bending and swaying in the field 5, so that we are led to believe, that the angels will hardly be able to put up a fight. But Satan, though not having the magnificence of Heaven anymore, gives an impression of imposing power. H e "stood Like Teneriff or Atlas unremov'd His stature reacht the Skie, and on his Crest Sat horror Plum'd: nor wanted in his graspe What seemd both Spear and Shield" (book 4.11.986 ff0 Milton's emotions are on Satan's side again, but his reason does not agree, and so he has to find a way out; the scene ends in the anti-climax of a celestial sign which shows Satan that he is weaker, and therefore he has to fly off. But Satan's being weaker, is in direct contradiction with the way in which Milton has described the scene, and so the solution is rather unconvincing. t. 2. 3. 4. 5.

p. L. b. 9 1.78i. P. L. b. 9 1.79i. P. L. b. 4 1.82i. P. L. b. 4 1.869. P. L. b. 4 1-98o.

Rigter - Milton's Treatment of Satan in Paradise Lost

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Satan, after having opened up earth to his allegorical offspring, Sin and Death, triumphantly returns to Hell and proudly relates his success. He and his companions are then changed into snakes, and have to chew the bitter ashes which are the fruit of ambition. But this proud, triumphant, victorious Satan must (all the more so because of his success) still have had enormous power and energy at his disposal. And so we are left with a feeling of unreleased tension, when, all of a sudden, he is crudely forced into the shape of a serpent. From a rational point of view, it is quite right of ccurse; it is God's command. God and Christ in Paradise Lost are the great exponents of Reason, which, in Milton's philosophy, must be omnipotent. By this omnipotence, Satan is, by force, kept once more in the place from where he struggled up, namely, Hell. And Satan, as we have seen, stands largely for the emotions. Hitherto, we have repeatedly seen that there is a conflict between reason and emotion in Milton, when writing about Satan. This same conflict is showing, when he writes of the FatI of Man. But again we must look further; this conflict in Milton is the psychological basis of the whole of Paradise Lost. If, finally, we leave the level of the religious story proper now, we come to another level in Paradise Lost, to which we have already been alluding in the beginning of this essay. After what we have seen, an elemm!tary knowledge of psychology and psychologic symbolism, will suffice to make us realize that here, we have to do with the projection of a case of repression. The emotions or irrational impulses (Satan) have struggled up from the dark depths of the subconscious (Hell), they have proved too strong for the person whose mind is concerned (Milton), and who is depicted as a rather tiny being (Adam) in the midst of his own conflict. When the person (Milton) sees the havc-c the emotions or impulses have worked, his reason (God and Christ), which resides in his conscious mind, that is filled with the Heavenly light of the Ratio, (Heaven), presses back the unpleasant but extremely powerful impulses to the subconscious again. The result is a feeling of unreleased tension. Satan has been subdued for the time being, but he is by no means defeated. We may conclude by dwelling for a moment on the much-mooted problem: "Is Satan The Hero of Paradise Lost?" That Satan, in the greater part of Paradise Lost, is treated as a hero, will have become clear from the relevant passages in this essay; whether he is "The Hero of Paradise Lost", is, however, quite a different matter. Milton's emotional faculty tends to make him The Hero, but his rational faculty condemns him, and the reader of Paradise Lost is inclined to value Satan according to similar principles. So that the problem is really shifted to the individual minds of the separate readers, and the valuation of Satan depends on whether, either the emotional faculty, or the rational faculty, predominates in the indiVidual reader's mind. Neophilbtogus, XLII. ao

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R i g t e r - M i l t o n ' s T r e o t m e n t o f S a t a n in P a r a d i s e L o s t

This makes it clear, why, on the whole, the Neo-Classicists were inclined to be Anti-Satanists, whereas the Romantics, who set greater store by the emotional faculty, were inclined to be Satanists. This also makes it clear, why a final conclusion is not likely to be ever reached, unless this conclusion were to consist in seeing through the judgement of both sides. Rotterdam. G. H. R I G T E R.

HET LATIJNSE EPtTAPHIUM IN HET NEDERLANDSE VOLKSBOEK VAN TIJL UILENSPIEGEL Noctua et ab speculo vix noxior eutropelusque Deposuit, testans ridiculosus homo. Ne stat(,) ne sedeat iaceatque(.) ferant tumulo eius[,] Vel seclaris vel spiritualis eum(.) Dormitat in Christo cum Christi fidelibus hic nam(:) Aut cadit aut stat hero servus, ut ipse suo. Her epitaphium waarvan wij de tekst met aangegeven veranderingen in de interpunctie afdrukken, staat aan her einde van het volksboek van Tijl Uilenspiegel, dat in eerste druk van Michiel Hillen van Hoochstraten anno I52o te Antwerpen verscheen. 1 Boven het epitaphium staat een houtsnede, voorstellend een uil die met zijn klauwen een spiegel vasthoudt. De geschiedenis vermeldt, dat deze uil-en-spiegel ook op de grafsteen van Tijl was afgebeeld, maar boven een ander, tweeregelig, grafschrift. 2 Her Nederlandse volksboek is de enige uitgave die bovendien het Latijnse epitaphium bevat dat onze aandacht vraagt. De oudste, Hoogduitse, uitgave, in 15 I5 te Straatsburg verschenen, 3 en de door Servais Kruffter te Keulen gedrukte tekst 4, de twee uitgaven waarop her Nederlandse volksboek teruggaat, vermelden slechts het korte grafschrift. Gemakkelijk lopen de hexameters en pentameters waarin het epitaphium geschreven is, niet (in regel 5 leze men metri causa ,,dormitat" i.pl.v. dormitat" !), maar bepaald moeilijk blijkt het vertalen indien men de oorspronkelijke interpunctie handhaaft. De editie van de Wereldbibliotheek 5 I. Zie: Ulenspieghek Naar het facsimile van den eersten Nederlandschen druk van MichM Hillen van Hoochstraten te Antwerpen uit I52o, verlucht met illustraties naar de oorspronkelijke houtsneden en ingeleid door D. Th. Enklaar. Utrecht, I943. Wij citeren uit deze editie. 2. Ulenspieghel, p. 8o. Zie verder op p. 5 van ons artikel. 3. Zie: Till Eulenspiegel, Abdruck des Ausgabe vom Jahre 1515, Strassburg, Halle a. S., I884. 4. Zie: Tyel Ulenspiegel in Niedersachsischer Mundart nach dem Aeltesten Druck des Servais Kruffter Photolithographisch nachgebildet, Berlin, I865. 5. Her Volksboek van Ulenspieghel, Ingeleid en van aantekeningen voorzien door L. Debaene en P. Heyns, I948, p. 73.