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The heroic song in Paradise lost and Paradise regained

University of British Columbia

In the following study, I propose to pursue the subject of heroism in Milton's "Paradise Lost" and "Paradise Regained". The Miltonic delineation of heroic virtue in these two works emerges from the tension between seventeenth-century English Puritanism and the strong influence of sixteenth-century Renaissance humanism—-between the religious view that human virtue is contingent upon the active power of divine beneficence and the more secular belief in the capacity of natural man to assert his essential dignity. Conscious of this ostensible dichotomy between the temporal and the eternal maintained by secular humanism and strict Puritanism respectively, Milton transcends the impasse in a religious vision of human grandeur. In a Baroque fusion of apparent opposites, Milton synthesizes divine grace and free will: God's will dovetails with man's, and the two are, for all intents and purposes, interdependent, inseparable. And this synthesis is founded on the crucial distinction between theocentric and egocentric humanism—the first recognizing that the centre for man is God, and the second, asserting that the individual is the centre and measure of all things. Man manifests the heroic song in direct proportion to his theocentricity; his magnanimity is contingent upon his moral orientation, and it is this religious humanism which inspires Milton's works. Thus, the theocentric heroic vision is a conscious transcendence of the heroic norm inherited from Western tradition. In general terms, an epic poem is a narrative of considerable length in which the main character or characters demonstrate in deeds, usually of a violent nature and directly related to war, their capacity to realize a level of human achievement that is "larger than life." But Milton, in his choice to write classical epic on a Christian theme, consciously alludes to the Graeco-Roman precedent in order to establish a new, revolutionary heroic ethos. The classical heroic norm, specifically illustrated in the "Iliad" and the "Aeneid", celebrating deeds motivated largely by personal ambition and resulting in a recognizable secular glory, is wholly inadequate to Milton's vision. Milton thus rejects the Western heroic tradition, describing mythic, "superhuman" feats only to transcend them. He demonstrates the inferiority of the "long and tedious havoc [caused by] fable'd Knights./ In Battles feign'd" ("Paradise Lost", IX, 30-31) in contradistinction to "the better fortitude/ Of Patience and Heroic Martyrdom [hitherto] Unsung" (11. 31-33). While the more primitive classical epic isolates only the value of worldly success, Milton, the product of a Christian age, identifies and embraces a heroic ethos celebrating the sacredness of the human spirit. In "Paradise Lost" and in "Paradise Regained", Milton orchestrates his epic vision through Satan, the Son, and Adam and Eve. Satan he creates as the embodiment of the classical ideal, underscoring the parallel portrait in direct allusion to "the wrath/ Of stern Achilles" (PL, IX,. 14-15), the "rage/ Of Turnus" (11. 16-17), and "Neptune1s ire or Juno's" (1. 18). In Satan's futile heroism, Milton deflates the validity of "might" not subject" to the character and will of divine beneficence. The Son, later the incarnate Christ in Paradise Regained, is the one true hero who fully embodies Milton's new and "better fortitude," the initiator of the heroic song. While the classical spirit hails human achievement for its own sake,. Milton eulogizes: in the Son the paradox that what is. most often considered weak exemplifies greater spiritual strength—"By Humiliation and strong Sufferance:/ His weakness shall o'ercome Satanic strength" (Paradise Regained, I, 160-161). And in man Milton consolidates his view that genuine heroism is the exercise of moral magnanimity in the cosmic battle between good and evil. Edenic man knows that bliss is contingent upon his obedience, and fallen man, raising himself from the depths of despair, realizes that the pursuit of spiritual heroism coincides with his possession of "A paradise within... happier far" (PL, XII, 587).

Text

2010-04-19

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/23890

English

University of British Columbia

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