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| Fitzwilliam Museum Paradise Regained Satan tempts Christ with the Kingdoms of the Earth |
"To this high mountain top the Tempter brought [ 265 ]
Our Saviour, and new train of words began.
Well have we speeded, and o're hill and dale,
Forest and field, and flood, Temples and Towers
Cut shorter many a league; here thou behold'st
Assyria and her Empires antient bounds, [ 270 ]
...
To what end I have brought thee hither and shewn [ 350 ]
All this fair sight; thy Kingdom though foretold
By Prophet or by Angel, unless thou
Endeavour, as thy Father David did,
Thou never shalt obtain
...
To whom our Saviour answer'd thus unmov'd.
Much ostentation vain of fleshly arm,
And fragile arms, much instrument of war
Long in preparing, soon to nothing brought,
Before mine eyes thou hast set; and in my ear [ 390 ]
Vented much policy, and projects deep
Of enemies, of aids, battels and leagues,
Plausible to the world, to me worth naught.
Means I must use thou say'st, prediction else
Will unpredict and fail me of the Throne: [ 395 ]
My time I told thee (and that time for thee
Were better farthest off) is not yet come;
...
No, let them serve
Thir enemies, who serve Idols with God.
Yet he at length, time to himself best known,
Remembring Abraham, by some wond'rous call
May bring them back repentant and sincere, [ 435 ]
And at their passing cleave the Assyrian flood,
While to their native land with joy they hast,
As the Red Sea and Jordan once he cleft,
When to the promis'd land thir Fathers pass'd;
To his due time and providence I leave them. [ 440 ]
So spake Israel's true King, and to the Fiend
Made answer meet, that made void all his wiles.
So fares it when with truth falshood contends."
In Paradise Regained, after Jesus refused the temptation to wealth in the world, Satan offered Jesus all the kingdoms of the world which would be placed under the dominion of Israel, God's chosen people. The power to rule the world would be secured through military might which was an attractive option to Satan.
At the time of Jesus the ruling empire was Rome under whose dominion was Palestine where Jesus lived. When Milton wrote Paradise Regained England had returned to government under a monarch after struggling unsuccessfully for ten years to establish a republic. Milton who attempted to influence the system of governance through publishing pamphlets on issues such as marriage laws, freedom of religion and a free press, had been employed by the government which attempted to replace the monarchical form of government with a government of the people. When Milton wrote Paradise Regained he was addressing the authoritarian style of government which ruled in the day of Jesus and in his own day. A hundred years later when Blake wrote he took every opportunity to express his opposition to government in the hands of a corrupt ruling class.
Milton used the response of Jesus in Paradise Regained to any attempt to use force to establish the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth, to indicate that God in his time will bring his children, ' repentant and sincere' to the 'promis'd land.'
If in Milton's writings we often find the statements made by Satan and Christ to be cryptic, we should remind ourselves that although Milton desired to be understood, he was under the stricture of making his work not altogether clear enough that the censors would reject it for its political ideas. If we read Paradise Regained in the light of history and politics we learn that Milton was using his own experience to expand the meaning to be found in scripture and visa versa.
Luke 4
[5] And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
[6] And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it.
[7] If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine.
[8] And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
1 Samuel 15
[26] And Samuel said unto Saul, I will not return with thee: for thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, and the LORD hath rejected thee from being king over Israel.
[27] And as Samuel turned about to go away, he laid hold upon the skirt of his mantle, and it rent.
[28] And Samuel said unto him, The LORD hath rent the kingdom of Israel from thee this day, and hath given it to a neighbour of thine, that is better than thou.
[29] And also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for he is not a man, that he should repent.
[30] Then he said, I have sinned: yet honour me now, I pray thee, before the elders of my people, and before Israel, and turn again with me, that I may worship the LORD thy God.
[31] So Samuel turned again after Saul; and Saul worshipped the LORD.
Romans 8
[22] For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.
[23] And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.
Vision of Last Judgment, (E 564)
"The Whole Creation Groans to be
deliverd there will always be as many Hypocrites born as Honest
Men & they will always have superior Power in Mortal Things You
cannot have Liberty in this World without <what you call> Moral
Virtue & you cannot have Moral Virtue without the Slavery of that
half of the Human Race who hate <what you call> Moral Virtue"
Annotations to Watson, (E 617)
"True I cannot do a miracle thro experiment & to
domineer over & prove to others my superior power as neither
could Christ But I can & do work such as both astonish &
comfort me & mine"
Milton never gave up the desire to inform and inspire the people of England, but as Anna Beer wrote in Milton: Poet, Pamphleteer, and Patriot, he lost hope that they could make the necessary changes unless their minds could become capable of assimilating the liberty that Christ offered. Beer wrote:
"The Son makes absolutely clear that the Roman people had brought their political degradation upon themselves through their own moral degeneracy: 'Degenerate, by themselves enslaved, / Or could of inward slaves made outward free'. (IV: 144-5) There is nothing, for the Son of Man to do, nothing he should do, until and unless the Roman people shake off their inner slavery. If applied to John Milton's England, these passages confirm the views so often expressed by him that the revolution had failed because the English people were 'inward slaves', unwilling and unable to sustain their own liberty. What is left unclear is whether it will ever be possible to sustain political and religious freedom. Would the English people always slide back into being 'vassals', or were they capable of throwing off their slavery?" (Page 371)
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