Passages from Paradise Lost

The logic of a king who would rather rule a wasteland than bend the knee.

What matter where, if I be still the same,And what I should be, all but less than heWhom thunder hath made greater? Here at leastWe shall be free; the Almighty hath not builtHere for his envy, will not drive us hence:Here we may reign secure, and in my choiceTo reign is worth ambition though in Hell:Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.

What remains when the visible world is switched off.

Then feed on thoughts that voluntary moveHarmonious numbers; as the wakeful birdSings darkling, and in shadiest covert hidTunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the yearSeasons return; but not to me returnsDay, or the sweet approach of even or morn,Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer’s rose,Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;But cloud instead and ever-during darkSurrounds me, from the cheerful ways of menCut off, and, for the book of knowledge fair,Presented with a universal blankOf Nature’s works, to me expunged and rased,And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.

The argument that freedom isn't real unless you can ruin yourself with it.

For Man will hearken to his glozing lies,And easily transgress the sole command,Sole pledge of his obedience; so will fallHe and his faithless progeny. Whose fault?Whose but his own? Ingrate, he had of meAll he could have; I made him just and right,Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.Such I created all the ethereal powersAnd Spirits, both them who stood and them who failed:Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell.

Why gratitude can feel like a bill you can never stop paying.

What could be less than to afford him praise,The easiest recompense, and pay him thanks,How due? Yet all his good proved ill in me,And wrought but malice. Lifted up so high,I ’sdeined subjection, and thought one step higherWould set me highest, and in a moment quitThe debt immense of endless gratitude,So burdensome, still paying, still to owe;Forgetful what from him I still received;And understood not that a grateful mindBy owing owes not, but still pays, at onceIndebted and discharged—what burden then?

The blessing over a sleeping couple that quietly warns them not to want more.

Here Love his golden shafts employs, here lightsHis constant lamp, and waves his purple wings,Reigns here and revels: not in the bought smileOf harlots, loveless, joyless, unendeared,Casual fruition; nor in court-amours,Mixed dance, or wanton mask, or midnight ball,Or serenate, which the starved lover singsTo his proud fair, best quitted with disdain.These, lulled by nightingales, embracing slept,And on their naked limbs the flowery roofShowered roses, which the morn repaired. Sleep on,Blest pair! and, O! yet happiest, if ye seekNo happier state, and know to know no more!

What actually makes a marriage is smaller than romance.

To whom thus, half abashed, Adam replied:“Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aughtIn procreation common to all kinds(Though higher of the genial bed by far,And with mysterious reverence, I deem),So much delights me as those graceful acts,Those thousand decencies, that daily flowFrom all her words and actions, mixed with loveAnd sweet compliance, which declare unfeignedUnion of mind, or in us both one soul;Harmony to behold in wedded pairMore grateful than harmonious sound to the ear.

The only relief revenge can actually deliver.

Nor hope to be myself less miserableBy what I seek, but others to make suchAs I, though thereby worse to me redound:For only in destroying I find easeTo my relentless thoughts; and, him destroyed,Or won to what may work his utter loss,For whom all this was made, all this will soonFollow, as to him linked in weal or woe;In woe then, that destruction wide may range!

The first thing to do after blame has used up the room.

But rise; let us no more contend, nor blameEach other, blamed enough elsewhere, but striveIn offices of love, how we may lightenEach other’s burden, in our share of woe;Since this day’s death denounced, if aught I see,Will prove no sudden, but a slow-paced evil,A long day’s dying, to augment our pain,And to our seed (O hapless seed!) derived.”

The devils cooperate; it's the humans who cannot stop killing each other.

O shame to men! Devil with devil damnedFirm concord holds, men only disagreeOf creatures rational, though under hopeOf heavenly grace; and, God proclaiming peace,Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strifeAmong themselves, and levy cruel wars,Wasting the Earth, each other to destroy:As if (which might induce us to accord)Man had not hellish foes enow besides,That day and night for his destruction wait!