1

Paradise Lost: A Classical Epic

Homer and Virgil were the two great masters of the Classical epic. Homer’s Iliad and
Virgil’s Aeneid have invariably served as models for all writers of the classical epic.
Milton was a great classical scholar and he sought to write an epic. He dreamt of
immortality and he aspired to be one with Homer and Virgil as the author of a classical
epic. Milton turned his great classical and Biblical learning to a poem to “assert eternal
providence, and justify the ways of God to men”.

“I may assert Eternal Providence,

And justify the ways of God to men.”

Milton achieved eminent success in making Paradise Lost as classical epic. In spite of
certain drawbacks and defects, Milton’s epic is entitled to take its rightful place among
half a dozen classical epics in the world. The first essential feature of the epic is its
theme. The theme of an epic must have a national importance or significance; that is, the
epic must be a true and faithful mirror of the life and of a nation. Homer represented the
national life, thought and culture of ht Greeks in the Iliad, and Virgil gave expression to
the hopes and aspirations of the Romans in the Aeneid. The Fall of Man is the theme of
the epic.

“Of Man’s first disobedience, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world, and all our woe,”

The epic action has three qualifications. First, it should be one action, secondly, it should
be an entire action, and thirdly, it should be a great action. In short, the action of an epic
should be one, entire and great. All these three qualities of epic action are followed by
Milton.

The action of Paradise Lost is one and there is a unity of action. The central action is the
Fall of Man, and everything in the epic as, the battle of angels, the creation of the world,
is subordinated to this central action. There are digressions at the beginning of the third
and seventh books, but they do not affect the unity and central action of the poem. The
whole action of Paradise Lost is single and compact. In the second place, its action is
entire which means that it has a beginning, middle and an end. The action in Paradise
Lost is contrived in hell, executed upon earth, and punished by heaven. In the third place
the action ought to be great, by greatness of the action, Aristotle means that it should not
only be great in its nature but also in its duration. The entire action of Paradise Lost has a
stamp of grandeur and greatness about it. Milton’s subject is greater than Homer’s Iliad
and Virgil’s Aeneid. It does not determine the fate of one single person or nation; but of
the whole human race.

Milton plunges into the middle of the action. Milton, in imitation of the great poets, opens
his Paradise Lost, with an infernal council plotting the fall of man.

The characters of the epic must have dignity and variety. In Paradise Lost, we have a
wide variety of characters marked with qualities. In Paradise Lost, we have human as
 2

well as superhuman characters. Adams and Eve are human characters, whereas God,
Christ and Satan are superhuman characters.

An epic must have a hero with great qualities. Identification of the hero is different in
Paradise Lost. Adam can be called the hero of the epic. He is not a warrior or a conqueror
but a noble figure.

An epic is a serious poem embodying sublime and nobler thoughts. Milton’s Paradise
Lost is a sublime and noble poem characterized by loftiness of thought and sentiment.

An epic is not without a moral. Moral forms an integral and intrinsic part in Milton’s
poem. It seeks to “vindicate the ways of God to man, to show the reasonableness of
religion and the necessity of obedience to the Divine Law”.

Milton, in conformity with the epic practice, begins Paradise Lost by invoking the Muse
to help him in his great task. But since Milton seeks the aid of the Heavenly Muse, the
Holy spirit,

“And chiefly thou, O Spirit, that dost prefer

Before all temples the upright heart and pure,
Instruct me, for thou know’st:”

He requests:

“- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -: what in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support,”

In and epic poem the poet narrates very little in his person. The characters themselves
carry forward the mission of the poet.

Lastly the language of an epic must be sublime and rose above the language of common
parlance.

“- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - What though the fields be lost?

All is not lost”

Aristotle observes that a sublime style can be formed by three methods --- by the use of
metaphors, by making use of the idioms and by lengthening of the phrase by the addition
of words. Milton employs all these three methods to give the air of grandeur to his epic.
His similes and metaphors are epical. Latin words are frequently introduced. The style of
Paradise Lost is the truest example of grand style. On one place, Satan says:
“The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n”

On the other place:

“Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.”
Milton’s Paradise Lost is a successful classical epic. Paradise lost has thus many
excellences as an epic but the defects in it also not be forgotten. The introduction of
allegorical persons like sin and death, the frequent allusions to heathen mythological
fables, the intervention of grotesque incidents, the frequent indulgence in puns and
 3

useless display of learning and the unnecessary use of technical terms as in the
description of Pandemonium are some blemishes in the style of the poem.

One other point must also be noted. An epic is an objective poem, and personal
reflections are out of place in it. But the most sublime parts of Paradise Lost reflect the
individuality of the poet. How ever this has added to the interest of the work as a poem
though it is not, strictly speaking, permissible in an epic.
______________________________

Character of "Satan"
Satan occupies the most prominent position in the action of Paradise Lost. Though the
main theme of the poem is the “Man’s first disobedience” yet it is the character of Satan
which gives a touch of greatness to this epic. Al the poetic powers of Milton are shown
on the delineation of the majestic personality of the enemy of God and Man, i.e. Satan.

As it is shown in Paradise Lost Book-I that the character of Satan is a blend of the noble
and the ignoble, the exalted and the mean, the great and the low, therefore, it becomes
difficult to declare him either a hero or a wholly villain.

In Paradise Lost Book-I we can hardly doubt his heroic qualities because this book fully
exhibits his exemplary will-power, unsurpassable determination, unshakable confidence
and unbelievable courage. However, the encyclopedia of religion removes some of the
confusion from our minds regarding Satan’s character in the following words:

“Satan means the arch-enemy of men, the adversary of God and of

Christianity, a rebel against God, a lost arch-angle.”

Milton also confirms the remarks and tells us that Satan is an archangel. When God
declares the Holy Christ his viceroy, Satan refuses to accept God’s order because he
himself is a confident for it, his false strength and pride leads him to revolt against God
for the fulfillment of his lust for power but he and his army suffers a heavy defeat and
throw headlong into the pit of hell.

Milton’s description of Satan’s huge physical dimension, the heavy arms he carries, his
tower like personality and his gesture make him every inch a hero. In his first speech,
Satan tells Beelzebub that he does not repent of what he did and that defeat has brought
no change in him at all. He utters memorable lines:
“What though the field be lost?
All is not lost – the unconquerable will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate,
And courage never to submit or yield.”
Actually he is not ready to bow before the will of God and is determined to wade and
eternal war by force and will never compromise. He proudly calls himself the new
possessor of the profoundest hell and foolishly claims to have a mind never to be changed
by force or time. As he says:

“The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.”
 4

Although Satan undergoes perpetual mental and physical torture in hell yet he is fully
satisfied because he is at liberty to do whatever he likes, without any restriction. The
following line clearly indicates his concept of freedom.

“Better to reign in Hell, the Serve in Heaven.”

It can be said without any doubt that Satan gives an evidence of great leadership qualities
which are certainly worthy of an epic hero and Beelzebub appreciates him for his
undaunted virtues as the commander of undaunted virtue as the commander of fallen
angels. His speech to the fallen angels is a sole roof of his great leadership because it
infuses a new spirit in the defeated angels who come out of the pit of hill with their
swords and are ready to face any danger regardless of their crushing and humiliating
defeat at the hands of God. We fully laud Satan’s views on the themes of honour, revenge
and freedom, but we cannot help sympathizing him because he embodies evil. He is the
embodiment of disobedience to God.

As the poem proceeds, the character of Satan degenerates and he fails to produce any
impression to true heroism because he is morally a degraded figure. When we closely
examine his addressed to his followers, we find that it is full of contradictions and
absurdities, because he tries to throw dust into the eyes of his comrades. In fact, on the
one hand, he says that they will provoke war against God and on the other hand, he wants
peace which is only possible through submission. Then, on reaching the earth, he enters
into a serpent and is completely degrades. Pride is the cause of his fall from Heaven –
Pride that has ‘raised’ him to contend with the mightiest. But where is that pride when the
Archangel enters into the mouth of a sleeping serpent and hides himself in its “Mazy
folds”. Here from the grand figure that he is in the beginning, he degenerates into a man
and cunning fellow, and then he tries to tempt Eve by guile. So, Satan degenerates from
the role of a brave hero to that of a cunning villain as C. S. Lewis remarks:

“From hero to general, from general to politician, from politician to

secret service agent, and thence to a thing that peers in at bed-room or
bath-room window and thence toad, and finally to a snake – such is the
progress of Satan.”

So, it can easily be said in the light of above mentioned facts that Satan is out and pouter
hero in Book-I of Paradise Lost, but in Book-IX he appears before us every inch a villain
because of his evil design and he himself says that his chief pleasure lies in the
destruction of mankind which lowers him in our estimation as a hero.
____________________________

The Hero of "Paradise Lost" Book-I

Introduction
Much controversy has clustered round the question as to who is the hero of Paradise
Lost. There are very sensible persons, who advocate the claim of Satan, and others, that
of Adam. One critic suggests God, and another the Messiah (Christ). A French critic
(Denis Saurat) puts forward the strange thesis that Milton himself is he hero of Paradise
Lost.
 5

(A) SATAN: THE HERO OF "PARADISE LOST"

Satan as A most Powerfully Drawn Character

Let us see some of the points of his character which are definitely indicated. In the
beginning, it is Satan who, first of all the angels, arouses himself up from the lake of fire.
He has the power of recovery in the face of defeat. Not one word, which he utters,
expresses despair, when he discovers the terrible nature of the place to which God has
banished them. Immediately his active mind begins to scheme, and he proceeds to
reassemble his shattered forces. We are often told that adversity reveals the best qualities
in a man; adversity certainly reveals the vigorous intellect and driving personality of
Satan. He shows the highest degree of fortitude and "courage never to submit or yield."
His personal example soon communicates itself to the other angels, and they gather round
their great leader. In the plays of Shakespeare, we have often seen that the great dramatist
contrives to create his finest characters by letting us hear what other people think of them,
and say about them, so it is with Milton. All the angels welcome with joy their mighty
leader. It matters not that they have been defeated and expelled from Heaven, because of
their share in his rebellion. They gather round him with absolute confidence such as
earthly men feel instinctively at times when they realize the worth of a great leader. The
mighty qualities of Satan's mind, and the indomitable resolution which animates him, are
displayed when he exclaims:
... and thou, profoundest Hell
Receive thy new possessor, one who brings
A mind not to be changed by place or time
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.
There are sentiments which might well be uttered by the most spiritual of characters.
The spirit of self-reliance, of mental courage, which rises independent of environment, is
a quality possessed only by the greatest characters. This might well have been spoken by
some saint in exile, or languishing in dungeons of a cruel tyrant. A few lines later, there
blazes a burst of strong, over-mastering ambition, the expression of a nature the must, be
first in all things:
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell;
Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.
It is no ordinary ambition which we see here; there is something colossal in this bold
challenge to the Almighty for supreme power. We have seen instances in the history of
the human race where two great natures clashed, and neither would give way: Caesar
and Hannibal, Wellington and Napoleon, and we have been impressed by the greatness
on either side. It may be a wicked thing to defy God, but, in this case, God is far-removed
and unreal, and it is the greatness of the challenge, rather than the wickedness, which is
the prominent impression.

Beelzebub bears witness to the great worth of Satan as a leader:

If once they hear that voice, their liveliest pledge
Of hope in fears and dangers, heard so oft
.... they will soon resume
New courage and revive, though now they lie
Grovelling and prostrate on yon lake of fire.

If this was said of the noblest general who ever led mortal armies, he would be
acclaimed by all as a leader of men. The effect here is similar; we must judge Satan
 6

according to earthly and human standards since we have no other. We respect him
because of the confidence with which he inspire the forces. When the downfallen angels
reach the shore, their dejected spirits are cheered, and their look show:

Obscure some glimpse of joy,

to have found their chief
Not in despair...
Million then makes Satan console them, raise their sinking courage, and dispel their
fears. The poet seems to feel here that he is ennobling the Archfiend unduly, for he
reminds the reader that Satan achieves this by:
high words that bore
Semblance of worth, not substance.

A Great Figure of Epic Dimension

But Milton has endowed Satan with all those qualities which make a hero. In fact, it
is the grandeur of Satan's character that makes Paradise Lost an epic. Milton has
imparted something of himself to Satan, and so Satan arouses our admiration by the
strength of his character and individuality. He assets himself against the autocracy of
God, and is able to win over to his side the third part of the angelic host in Heaven. He is
no doubt defeated by the Messaih (Christ) but his defeat and his expulsion from Heaven
cannot curb his indomitable spirit. He would urge eternal war against God; he remains as
bold in spirit and as defiant as he was before his defeat; and the change of his
surroundings cannot in any way dampen his unconquerable spirit. He will make Heaven
of Hell, and undertakes all kind of risks and dangers in order to take revenge on God.
This figure is heroic in every way. He is a perfect leader, and all the fallen angels submit
unquestioningly to his authority. "It is surely the simple fact" says Abercrombie, "that
Paradise Lost exists for one figure that is Satan, just as the Iliad exists for Achilles and
the Odyssey for Odysseus. It is in the figure of Satan that the imperishable significance
ofParadise Lost is centered; his vast unyielding agony symbolizes the profound antimony
of modern consciousness." Satan is indeed a great figure of epic dimension. He is a true
hero, but he is so only in Books I and II of Paradise Lost.
Robert Burns strongly upheld Satan as the hero of Paradise Lost, in these words:
"give me a spirit like my favourite hero, Milton's Satan", W. Hazlitt was of the same
view, "the interest of the poem arises from the daring ambition and fierce passions of
Satan, and from the account of the paradisiacal happiness and the loss of it by our first
parents, Satan is the indubitable hero - in fact, the most heroic subject that ever was
chosen for a poem".

Arguments against Satan being the Hero of the Poem

As the poem proceeds, this heroic figure gradually loses its splendour, though he
retains his original greatness even when he comes to the earth and sees the joy; but pride
prevails over him, for he must have his revenge on God who is his eternal enemy.

Ah gentle pair, ye little think how nigh

Your change approaches, when all these delights
Will vanish, and deliver ye to woe-
****
Yet no purposed foe
 7

to you, whom I could pity thus forlorn,

Though I unpitied

From now onward, the deterioration of Satan starts. In fact when he enters into a
serpent to tempt Eve, he has turned from a great hero into a despicable spy and cunning
trickster. So when we take the whole of Paradise Lost into consideration, we cannot
agree with the view that Satan is the hero of Paradise Lost.

Admiration and Sympathy of Satan Misunderstood

According to some critics, Satan is the hero of the poem. In the preceding chapter,
we have expressed the view of these critics of the Romantic age and the twentieth
century. Now let us interpret the views of these critics. In fact, Satan is not the hero of the
poem. Even Dryden was misled by the epic current in his day. The Romantics
misunderstood Blake. It is a pity that even a great critic like Tillyard misunderstood him.
As Rudrum Alan remarks in his book Milton: Modern judgements: "It is only in the
context of his own highly complex system of thought that Blake's remarks on Milton's
Satan can be properly understood. But of course they have been abstracted from that
context..." Blake never means that Milton identifies himself with Satan. According to
him, poetry is emotional rather than rational. In other words, evil inspires a poet more
than the good; a poet finds it easier to depict evil than good, as stated by Blake. It is in
this sense that Milton is of the Devil's party. So, the Romantics misunderstood Blake. A
poet has 'as much delight in depicting an Iago as an Imogen' (an evil and good character).
Milton took pleasure in the exercise of his power.
Secondly, those who think that Satan is the hero of the poem, confine their criticism
to the first two books. As A. Stopford Brooke remarks: "The interest of the story collect
at first round the character of Satan, but he grows meaner as the poem develops, and his
second degradation after he has destroyed innocence is one of the finest and most
consistent motives in the poem. This at once disposes the view that Milton meant Satan to
be the hero of his epic." Thus in the first two books he is made a heroic figure.
Subsequently, his character degenerates.
Thirdly, Milton's identification with Satan is misunderstood. Tillyard says that the
character of Satan expresses something in which Milton believed very strongly. But
Tillyard forgets that the identification of Milton with Satan, is only partial. Milton is also
Adam. Milton thought himself a sincere Christian. Milton has Satan in him and wants to
drive him out. "He was of the devil's party without knowing it; but he was also of God's
party, and what is more important, he knew it." (Denis Saurat Milton: Man, and Thinker).
Further Denis Saurat remarks: "And yet Satan is not the hero of the poem: he is
intellectually condemned, in spite of all the poet's and the reader's sympathy."
We should not be taken in by Satan's impressive speeches. For what indeed does his
fine sounding phrase sense of "injured merit" mean but simply "not fair" which is far
from being a heroic cry. Stylistic reasons enforce superficially the heroism of Satan-his
utterances are always couched in language of unrivalled poetic splendour. But this should
not mislead us, for in the end Satan himself realized his impotence and inner
helplessness.
Finally, the splendour of Satan is misunderstood. The magnificence and splendour of
Satan must be exalted in order to indicate the epic greatness of the coming conflict. In
other words, in order to rouse the reader's fears for himself, human sympathy with his
first parents and gratitude for his redemption, Milton has shown the magnificence of
Satan's character. George Sampson remarks: "Those who maintain that Satan the rebel is
the real hero of the poem fail to understand that the adversary of God and Man must be
 8

presented in majesty and magnitude if he is to be worthy of his place in the story that he
must have, in fact all the fascination of evil. "We should not be swept away by the sheer
grandeur of Satan's speeches, or by the splendour of his personality. Heroism exerted in
the bad cause, ceases to be virtue. And, therefore, it is not enough to say that Satan is the
hero of the poem because he is brave and bold.
Many of the twentieth century critics do not hold the view of the Romantics i.e.
Satan is the hero of Paradise Lost. John Peter is of the opinion that "the loss of poetic
energy or resonance in the heroic similes applied to Satan shows an important aspect of
the deterioration in Milton's treatment of the Devil". According to David Daiches, the
whole poem is the story of Satan's inevitable degeneration.

(B) MILTON: THE HERO OF "PARADISE LOST"

This theory has been formulated by Denis Saurat, a French critic. He says in his book
Milton: Man and Thinker that Adam is not the fitting counterpart for Satan. According to
him, the hero of the poem is Milton himself. As stated by him: "Though Satan is Milton's
own creation, and he has displayed a greater force of poetry in him than in any other
character in Paradise Lost as he represents a part of his own mind and character, yet it
seems that Milton throws himself personally into the struggle against Satan". Further
Saurat feels that Milton has exalted Satan because he himself wanted to drive out
malignant and militant Satan from his own heart. In this connection, he says: "Milton had
Satan in him and wanted to drive him out. He had felt passion, pride and sensuality. The
displeasure he takes in the creation of Satan is the joy of liberating, purging himself of
the evil in himself by concentrating it outside himself into a work of art. A joy peculiar to
the artist……a joy that, perhaps was God's ultimate aim in creating the world, as we have
seen.
The argument is not plausible that Milton himself is the hero. No doubt, Milton's
personality is revealed in Paradise Lost: and he never conceals where his sympathy lies.
There is again some similarity between the position of Satan and that of Milton. Satan
had defied the authority of God the autocrat, just as Milton had defied the autocracy of
the King. Hence, Satan is endowed with all the force and fire of Milton's own spirit. But
Milton's object was to justify the ways of God to man. He therefore, expresses himself
here and there to execute his avowed aim. The epic, it must be remembered, is a piece of
objective art. He calls Satan's "infernal serpent" 'Arch-fiend' and uses abusive epithets to
expose Satan's real character. But Milton himself cannot and does not take part in the
action of the poem. The lyrical qualities of Milton's genius inevitably enter into Paradise
Lost. But to say that he is the hero of Paradise Lost, is nothing short of preposterous.

(C) ADAM: THE HERO OF "PARADISE LOST"

To put forward the claim either of God or of the Messiah (Christ) is absurd, for they
do not take part in the central action of Paradise Lost. However, the whole epic, turns
rounds what Milton indicates even in the first line of the poem 'Man's first disobedience.'
Adam disobeyed God, and by this act of disobedience, he not only lost Paradise but
brought about the fall of the whole human race. No action can be more tremendous in its
import and significance than that which brought the fall of the whole of humanity. And
Adam, being responsible for it, is obviously meant by the poet to fill the role of the hero
of the great poem.
Difficulty arises because Adam does not act. He is merely a passive figure, who is
acted upon by others. But it is his fate that engages the attention of God and the Angels in
Heaven, and of Satan and the devils in Hell. His fate again causes a terrible upheaval on
the Earth. When Eve plucks the fruit, "Nature sighs that all is lost." Adam may not be a
 9

heroic figure in the same sense as Achilles is. But Paradise Lost is a different kind of
epic from Homer's Iliad. Milton himself says,
... Yet argument
Not less but more heroic than the wrath of stern Achilles.
In creating Adam, Milton attempted a very peculiar task. Adam, the father of
mankind is almost without human experience and so cannot have much personality.
Milton has to present a figure who appeals imaginatively and poetically and this he does.
Adam has a natural magnificence that fits him to be the hero of an epic. However, Adam
is not a hero like Achilles and Ullyses, etc. capable of incredibly heroic deeds. Adam is a
hero of a nobler kind.
Adam's role is not that of a warrior but that of a God-fearing man, faced with a
temptation and defeated in the conflict between himself and Satan. In studying the
question of the hero of Paradise Lost, we need not be obsessed with the classical
conception of the epic here. Adam is defeated no doubt but through the Messiah (Christ)
he regains the Paradise 'happier far'. Thus the ultimate victory which is of a spiritual
nature goes to Adam. Adam is the real hero of Paradise Lost.
Conclusion
"One supposed defect in the story of Paradise Lost has been frequently dwelt on, and
the fact is that Satan, and not Adam, is the hero of the epic. We think that only those, who
reading of Milton has been confined to the first two books, can be misled by this
nonsensical paradox. In the first two books Satan is naturally made a heroic
figure; he is still an Arch-angel (though fallen) one of the chief Arch-
angels and king over his fellows. "His character has power. His capacity for evil
must be exalted in order to show the epic greatness of the coming conflict and in order to
arouse the reader's fears for himself, human sympathy with his first parents and gratitude
for his redemption. But we have not to wait for Paradise Regained to see the steady
deterioration in Satan's character. Surely, to take one instance alone there is little of the
heroic in Satan when he takes the form of a toad to whisper in Eve's ear and is stirred up
by the spear of Ethereal. At the close of the poem Satan's degradation is complete."
(Wyatt and Low).
“Satan is, of course, a character in an epic, but he is in no
sense the hero of the epic as a whole; he is only a figure of heroic
magnitude and heroic energy, and he is developed by Milton with
dramatic emphasis and dramatic intensity" Helen Grander.

Although Adam is a passive and not an active agent in the poem and although he
suffers more than he acts, his claim to the title of the hero seems to be better than
anybody else's. As Landor points out, and as everybody at once notices, Adam is the
central figure in the poem, round whom the others act. It is his fall that is the
subject matter of the poem. Our interest centres round him; our
sympathy goes to him. He may reasonably be called the hero of
'Paradise Lost'. Adam does not have a romantic character and obvious bravery of a
noble; he is every man as he recognizes his own weakness: accepts his responsibility, and
faces life with true courage. His battles are within him, as is fitting for the hero of a great
religious epic.
___________________________________
 10

Grand Style of Milton in "Paradise Lost" Book-I

Introduction
"The name of Milton", says Raleigh, "is become the mark, not of a biography nor of
a theme, but of a style - the most distinguished in our poetry." In all that he has written he
has impressed his indomitable personality and irrepressible originality. John Milton is not
only in every line of Paradise Lost but in every line of poetry that he has written. As
Macaulay has said: "There is not a square inch of his poetry from first to last of which
one could not confidently say." "This is Milton and no one else." His accent and speech
alike in Ode to Nativity and in Paradise Lost are his own and in marked contrast to any
other English poet.

Essentials of Miltonic Style

Since style is the expression of personality, we have to find the peculiar quality of
Milton's style in his personality and character. In the first place, Milton's mind was
"nourished upon the best thoughts and finest words of all ages", and that is the language,
says Pattison, of one "who lives in the companionship of the great and the wise of the
past." Secondly, Milton was a man of lofty character, whose "soul was like a star that
dwelt apart, and who in all that is known about him, his life, his character, and his power
of poetry, shows something for which the only fit words is Sublime." Thirdly, Milton was
a supreme artist. "Poetry", says Bailey, "has been by far our greatest artistic achievement,
and he (Milton) is by far our greatest poetic artist. Tennyson truly called him "God gifted
organ-voice of England." "To live with Milton," says Bailey, "is necessarily to learn that
the art of poetry is no triviality, no mere amusement, but a high and grave thing, a thing
of the choicest discipline of phrase, the finest craftsmanship of structure, the most nobly
ordered music of sound. So, in Milton's poetic style we inevitably find the imprint of a
cultured mind, a lofty soul and an artistic conscience. "In the sure and flawless perfection
of his rhythm and diction, he (Milton) is as admirable as Virgil or Dante, and in this
respect, he is unique amongst us. No one else in English literature possess the like
distinction.... Shakespeare is divinely strong, rich and attractive; but sureness, of perfect
style Shakespeare himself does not possess. Milton from one end of Paradise Lost to the
other is in his diction and rhythm constantly a great artist in the great style." (Mathew
Arnold). "The study of his verse is one that never exhausts itself, so that the appreciation
of it has been called the last reward of consummate scholarship." Above all, there is a
certain loftiness about the style of Milton, which is found alike in his Ode to Nativity and
in Paradise Lost, and so Bailey says that it is precisely 'majesty' which is the unique and
essential Miltonic quality." Milton achieves this loftiness as much by words as by the
sonority, dignity and weight of the words themselves.
Artistic Perfection
In reply to the observation that Shakespeare never blotted a line, Ben Johnson said,
'would he have blotted a thousand': No one has ever uttered such a wish with regard to
Milton's poetry? Milton as a poetic artist is never careless or slipshod. There is hardly a
line in his poetic work which is unpoetical - hardly a word which is superfluous. All the
words used by him are deliberately chosen for fulfilling these functions: the exact
expression of thought, their power for suggestion, and the musical effects for the verse.
And this artistic perfection characterizes his poetry from his first important poem Ode to
Nativity to his last one, Samson Agonistes. Milton has written all types of poetry - lyric,
epic and dramatic - and his style in each reaches the high water-mark of poetic art.
 11

According to Dr. Pearce, Milton's grand style originates from the formalities of
classical prose. "Prosaic virtues of clarity, order, strict definition, working from line to
line, adjusting clause to clause, word to word, are the real source of that classic "finish" a
clear hardness of texture which everywhere distinguishes the Miltonic line from any
other.”
Grand style of "Paradise Lost"
The greatest work of Milton is Paradise Lost, and when we speak of the style of
Milton, we usually think of the majestic style of this great epic. When Wordsworth wrote:
"Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea, "he had in his mind the grand style
of Paradise Lost. When Tennyson spoke of Milton as being the "God-gifted organ-voice
of England," he was no doubt referring to the majestic blank verse of Paradise Lost.

Miltonic style of "Paradise Lost"

The style of the epic is always great. On the whole, it is greatest in the whole range
of English poetry. Fullness of sound, weight of march, compactness of finish, fitness of
words to things, fitness of pauses to thought, a strong grasp of the main idea while other
ideas play around it, equality of power over vast spaces of imagination, sustained
splendour when he soars.
With plume so strong, so equal and so soft, majesty in the conduct of thought, and a
music in the majesty which fills it with solemn beauty belong one and all to the style; and
it gains its highest influence on us, and fulfills the ultimate need of a grand style in being
the easy and necessary expression of the very character and nature of man. It reveals
Milton, as much, sometimes more than his thought." (Stopford A. Brooke).

Milton's style Paradise Lost is rich and full of splendour; it is replete with numerous
deliberate devices that heighten dignity and govern imaginative and emotional response.
Milton's style is not totally artificial. Inspite of the numerous passages that are thickly
inlaid with allusions and references, inspite of the elevated and heightened character of its
style, the basic structure has an element of plainness. "Plain familiar words, in their
natural order, form the bedrock of his style."

Style in Conformity with Theme

The theme of Paradise Lost is stupendous, "The horizon of Paradise Lost is not
narrower than all space; its chronology not shorter than eternity; the globe of our earth
becomes a mere spot in the physical universe, and that universe itself a drop suspended in
the infinite empyrean" (Pattison). Its characters are God and His creatures, and it
concerns itself with the fortunes of the whole human race. Such a great theme required a
great style for adequate presentation.

The style of Paradise Lost fully sees to the height of the theme. It is the solitary
instance of sustained grandeur in English poetry (though Professor Saintsbury has
instances of grand style in Shakespeare). It rises to a lofty place by virtue of the poet's
imaginative power, passionate emotion and moral earnestness. Everything in Paradise
Lost is conceived in a mighty way. When the poet describes Satan, he calls up the picture
of the huge Leviathan, whom, "the pilot of some night-foundered skiff" deemed "some
island".

The solemn and sonorous quality of the verse-music brings out in an abundant
measure the grandeur of the style in Paradise Lost. There is a cunning variety in the
 12

rhythm of his verses, secured by a skilful variation of his pauses, a freedom of movement
and an apt use of allusion with the right type of long and short syllables.

Suggestive and Compact

"Of all English styles," says Raleigh, "Milton's is best entitled to the name of
classic." In Milton's style we have the compactness, force and reserve and the unity of
emotional impression, which are the distinctive characteristics of the true classical style.
Milton was a conscientious artist; he weighed every word he used for its meaning, weight
and sound. "He taxes every line to its fullest capacity, and wring the last drop of value
from each word. " "His poetry," says Macaulay, "acts like an incantation". Its merit lies
less in its obvious meaning than in its occult power. There would seem at first sight to be
no more in his words than in other words. But they are words of enchantment. No sooner
are they pronounced than the past is present and the distant near. Change the structure of
the sentence, substitute a synonym for another and the whole effect is destroyed. "Milton
is often not satisfied with one meaning from a word, but will make it do double duty.
Words derived from Latin served this double purpose. To the ordinary reader they convey
one meaning and to the scholar they suggest another. This gives a suggestive power to
Milton's language. "The most striking characteristic of the poetry of Milton is the extreme
remoteness of the associations by which it acts on the reader. It effect is produced, not so
much by what it expresses, as by what it suggests, not so much by the ideas which it
directly conveys by other ideas which are connected with them. He electrifies the mind
through conductors... The works of Milton cannot be comprehend or enjoyed unless the
mind of the reader cooperates with that of the writer. He does not paint a finished picture,
or play for a mere passive listener. He sketches and leaves other to fill up the outline. He
strikes the key-note and expects his hearers to make out the melody." (Macaulay).

Allusiveness
An essential quality of Milton's poetic style is its allusiveness. He, no doubt pressed
to the service of his poetry all that he observed in life and nature; but his vision was often
coloured by his knowledge. The whole treasury of poetry, ancient and modern, and the
whole storehouse of learning were at his command; and he seemed to assume that they
were also at the command of his readers and so he loaded every rift of his verse with
myth and legend, historical, literary, and scientific fact. Classical and Biblical allusions
are most abundant, and are woven into the very texture of his language. Hence Pattison
remarks: "The appreciation of Milton is the last reward of consummate scholarship. "His
scholarly habit of mind is illustrated in the comparison of the army of Satan to various
military assemblage mentioned, in legend and history at the close of Book I of Paradise
Lost
………...for never since created man
Met such embodied force, as named with these
Epic Similes
A striking feature of Milton's style in Paradise Lost is his use of epic similes. These
go far beyond the limits of comparison, and are expanded to draw complete pictures.
Satan's huge bulk is compared to the huge Leviathan, who may be mistaken for an island:
Him, haply slumbering on the Norway foam
The pilot of some small night-foundered skiff.
Milton uses these expanded similes to ennoble his narrative rather than merely to
illustrate it.
 13

By all these devices and many more, "he attained to a finished style of perhaps a
more consistent and unflagging elevation than is to be found elsewhere in literature... No
poet, since Milton's day has recaptured the solemnity and beauty of the large utterance of
Gabriel or Belial or Satan" (Raleigh). In the epic similes the use of alliteration produces
strange musical effects.
Did Milton "Corrupt our Language"?
Dr. Johnson called attention to the peculiarity of Miltonic diction saying that it is so
far removed from common use that an unlearned reader when he first opens the book,
finds himself surprised by a new language "Our language". Addison had said before,
"sunk under him." Milton's is a personal style, which T.S. Eliot points out, is "not based
upon common speech or common prose, or direct communication of meaning. It violates
the accepted rules of English grammar and syntax, so much so that Dr. Johnson said that
he "wrote no language". Milton had a preference for the unusual and recondite in
vocabulary and construction, which led him to archaism, on the one hand, and to the
substitution of foreign idiom particularly Latin, for English idiom, on the other. We have
frequent uses of ablative absolute with preposition, irregular pronouns, ellipses,
constructions changed by changes of thought, interchange of parts of speech,
transposition and inventions and unusual compound epithets similar to those in Homer.
We also find sentences with gnarled and involved structure, inversions of the natural
order of words and phrases and grammatical superfluities. These devices impart a
classical tone of Milton's style but at the same time they are out-landish and inconsistent
with the normal use of English language.

In general, Milton's style may be described as almost uniquely literary and

intellectual. But, fraught as it is with learning and bookish phrase, and elaborates as it is
in construction and alien in vocabulary, it achieves uniform effect of dignity and becomes
a means for expressing the elevated and intensely passionate personality of its author.

Modern literary critics like Ezra Pound, Herbert Read, Middleton Murry, F.R. Leavis
and above all T.S. Eliot have condemned Milton's style for the following reasons:
(i) Apart from its intrinsic difficulties, it is harmful in its extrinsic effects.
(ii) Modern critics point out the artificiality of the inflated and Latinized diction, idiom and
syntactical structure of Milton's style.
(iii) The fabrication of heavy, inflexible and unnatural speech rhythms.
(iv) The reliance on pompous and meaningless sound.
(v) The baneful influence of his verse, strangled the metaphysical style.
However, there are many critics who defend Milton against these charges. C.S.
Lewis maintains that the essential requirement of an epic style is continuity. Milton
produces this stylistic continuity and in order to do this the idiom and rhythm of normal
speech have to be altered. Also that a ritualistic and incantatory effect is inevitable in the
best of epic verse. Moreover, Milton chose blank verse as the medium of his expression,
one hitherto unused in the epic field.
According to Prof. Bush, Milton's style is ideally suited to the sustained narrative of
the epic action. An epic style is narrative, didactic, rhetorical and continuously elevated
and directly exemplary. It cannot become colloquial, witty or intimate without ceasing to
be epic. It cannot have flexible rhythms nor can it modulate the tones without causing
disharmony.
All the characteristics of Milton's style may be found in English literature before
Milton, but in Milton they become habitual features of style. Spenser, for instance, uses
archaisms much more persistently than Milton. The use of the Latinisms was common
 14

enough in English prose in the seventeenth century. But no other poet before Milton has
resorted to Latinized diction as a means of removing his speech from the sphere of daily
life, and he, therefore, employed style, corresponding to the dignity of his subject. And
this style, which has been called 'grand style', was something personal to Milton, with his
classical training and vast intellectual equipment. This style was quite suitable for Milton,
dealing with a subject 'unattempted in prose and rhyme', but when the pseudo-classical
poets of the eighteenth century employed the devices of Miltonic style, the result was the
artificial poetic diction, which was vehemently condemned by Wordsworth.
Mathew Arnold remarked: "Milton, of our entire English race, is by his diction and
rhythm the one artist of the highest rank in the great style that we have; this I take as
requiring no discussion this I take as certain."
_________________________________