WEBVTT 00:01.820 --> 00:05.320 Professor John Rogers: I'm actually going to 00:05.321 --> 00:08.891 continue here one of the discussions that I had begun in 00:08.888 --> 00:12.348 the last lecture, which involved the matter of 00:12.348 --> 00:16.318 the relationship of this poem, Paradise Regained, 00:16.320 --> 00:20.900 to the earlier epic, which we have to acknowledge is 00:20.901 --> 00:24.401 in so many ways the more ambitious poem, 00:24.400 --> 00:25.750 Paradise Lost. 00:25.750 --> 00:29.190 I want to look at the way in which Milton uses this new poem, 00:29.190 --> 00:32.850 Paradise Regained, to explore the larger 00:32.848 --> 00:38.738 problem of identity and in a lot of ways, the identity of Milton 00:38.741 --> 00:43.981 himself: Milton's identity as an obedient son of God, 00:43.980 --> 00:48.590 Milton's identity as a poet. 00:48.590 --> 00:52.760 All of this gets worked out over the course of the poem. 00:52.760 --> 00:55.210 Each of the characters in Paradise Regained, 00:55.214 --> 00:58.104 Satan and the Son -- each of them is involved in an 00:58.096 --> 01:01.776 elaborate process, and it's really a process that 01:01.782 --> 01:06.222 spans the entire poem, of trying to figure out who the 01:06.220 --> 01:08.840 other one is. On top of that, 01:08.837 --> 01:13.607 each of them is trying to figure out who he himself is -- 01:13.606 --> 01:17.776 or who he himself has been, in the Son's case. 01:17.780 --> 01:29.320 01:29.319 --> 01:34.319 I don't know what page this is on, but it's in Book One, 01:34.321 --> 01:36.141 lines 355 and 356. 01:36.140 --> 01:42.670 This is the Son speaking to Satan, and I think it's an 01:42.674 --> 01:47.734 extraordinary thing for the Son to say. 01:47.730 --> 01:56.200 The Son says to Satan: "Why dost thou then suggest to 01:56.195 --> 02:05.795 me distrust, / knowing who I am, as I know who thou art?" 02:05.799 --> 02:09.239 Of course, we are -- how can we not be? 02:09.240 --> 02:13.730 -- inclined to assume, because this is the Son of God 02:13.734 --> 02:18.404 after all, that there's something more meaningful about 02:18.400 --> 02:22.290 this statement than actually is the case. 02:22.290 --> 02:23.420 What does the Son know? 02:23.419 --> 02:29.149 The Son does know that Satan is his enemy and that Satan is to 02:29.148 --> 02:34.688 be identified with that serpent from the Protoevangelium, 02:34.690 --> 02:39.940 the prophecy back in Genesis whom it will be the 02:39.936 --> 02:42.126 Son's job to destroy. 02:42.129 --> 02:47.129 The Son knows that, and Satan knows that the Son is 02:47.127 --> 02:53.117 his enemy and that it will be the Son's job as the Messiah to 02:53.123 --> 02:59.423 destroy him.But this is still just a partial knowledge, 02:59.419 --> 03:02.169 and it's remarkable, the extent to which Milton 03:02.165 --> 03:05.265 doesn't let on just how partial this knowledge is. 03:05.270 --> 03:08.850 We don't know until the end how little the Son and Satan 03:08.847 --> 03:12.747 actually understand about themselves and about each other. 03:12.750 --> 03:17.680 And so I think the Son is actually wrong in some way at 03:17.681 --> 03:23.161 this early point in the poem to claim that he knows who Satan 03:23.160 --> 03:24.380 is, because his is, 03:24.379 --> 03:25.809 of course, just a partial knowledge. 03:25.810 --> 03:30.680 Satan doesn't know fully who the Son is, and the Son doesn't 03:30.682 --> 03:32.832 know fully who Satan is. 03:32.830 --> 03:36.700 Each of them on some level knows who the other is, 03:36.697 --> 03:41.507 but neither of them knows who the other has been -- I'm 03:41.511 --> 03:46.561 hoping that will make more sense by the time we get to the end of 03:46.563 --> 03:49.013 our period here.Okay. 03:49.009 --> 03:52.769 So what little action, what little drama this poem 03:52.768 --> 03:57.298 affords us -- and we have to confess it is relatively little 03:57.295 --> 04:02.135 -- involves just this struggle, this intellectual struggle to 04:02.144 --> 04:04.164 understand one's identity. 04:04.159 --> 04:07.729 I think that the search for identity represented in the poem 04:07.730 --> 04:10.030 in a lot of ways is a reflection of, 04:10.030 --> 04:13.710 or something like a narrative version of, Milton's own 04:13.710 --> 04:17.530 attempts -- and we've been tracking this for a long time 04:17.529 --> 04:21.209 now -- Milton's own attempts to identify himself. 04:21.209 --> 04:27.069 So one of the questions I think at stake here is who is John 04:27.066 --> 04:29.576 Milton? Who is this man? 04:29.579 --> 04:33.389 Who is this man who dared to rewrite scripture in his 04:33.388 --> 04:37.268 twelve-book epic poem Paradise Lost?I think 04:37.269 --> 04:41.589 this poem is everywhere trying to answer that question, 04:41.589 --> 04:43.939 and it begins answering it at the very opening. 04:43.940 --> 04:46.460 Look at the beginning of Paradise Regained. 04:46.459 --> 04:50.319 This is page 483 of the Hughes. 04:50.319 --> 04:54.889 I [and obviously, this is Milton the narrator 04:54.893 --> 04:58.833 talking to us] who erewhile the happy Garden 04:58.826 --> 05:02.496 sung, By one mans disobedience lost, 05:02.496 --> 05:05.526 now sing Recover'd Paradise to all 05:05.533 --> 05:08.993 mankind, By one mans firm obedience 05:08.990 --> 05:13.680 fully tried… Obviously Milton is drawing our 05:13.683 --> 05:17.213 attention to the earlier achievement, the epic that had 05:17.208 --> 05:19.818 begun with that prepositional phrase, 05:19.820 --> 05:23.910 "of man's first disobedience." 05:23.910 --> 05:28.220 So the poet very carefully wrings a variation on that 05:28.216 --> 05:33.426 phrase in the forced line of the new poem, and the new phrase is 05:33.434 --> 05:36.254 "by one's man firm obedience." 05:36.250 --> 05:39.710 This little modulation reflects, of course, 05:39.714 --> 05:43.924 the change of subject matter.But look at the way 05:43.920 --> 05:48.790 in which Milton has -- this is unbelievable to me -- look at 05:48.787 --> 05:53.647 how he has characterized his authorship of the earlier poem: 05:53.653 --> 05:57.533 "I who erewhile the happy Garden sung." 05:57.529 --> 06:03.439 Now just pause for a moment and think about what kind of way 06:03.442 --> 06:08.552 that is to refer to the magnificent epic achievement 06:08.553 --> 06:11.463 that is Paradise Lost. 06:11.459 --> 06:14.439 Milton's alluding -- he hasn't made up this convention 06:14.444 --> 06:17.904 -- he's alluding in these lines to the opening of Virgil's epic, 06:17.899 --> 06:20.209 The Aeneid, and also to the beginning 06:20.214 --> 06:23.124 of Spenser's romance epic, The Faerie Queene; 06:23.120 --> 06:25.600 Spenser, of course, was himself alluding to Virgil. 06:25.600 --> 06:29.110 Virgil and Spenser had begun their vast and ambitious 06:29.110 --> 06:33.160 literary project by identifying themselves to the readers, 06:33.160 --> 06:38.950 and so each of them in his way began their huge poems like 06:38.954 --> 06:43.144 this: "I, the poet, who had sung of happy gardens, 06:43.139 --> 06:47.169 who had been content writing pastoral poems -- diminutive, 06:47.170 --> 06:50.770 little pastoral lyrics -- I'm now embarking on an epic, 06:50.774 --> 06:53.384 and an epic, as you all know from having 06:53.378 --> 06:56.548 read Homer, is a poem that treats of 06:56.545 --> 06:58.345 heroism and of war. 06:58.350 --> 07:02.560 I have graduated to epic ambition." 07:02.560 --> 07:05.840 That's how Spenser began The Faerie Queene and that's how 07:05.839 --> 07:08.129 Virgil before him had begun The Aeneid. 07:08.129 --> 07:11.879 By the time we get to the Renaissance, this is really the 07:11.877 --> 07:15.247 standard way of introducing your epic poem.Okay. 07:15.250 --> 07:19.090 That's fine. But what sense is there to 07:19.092 --> 07:24.542 Milton's beginning Paradise Regained this way? 07:24.540 --> 07:27.130 [laughs] He should have done this before 07:27.129 --> 07:28.589 in Paradise Lost. 07:28.589 --> 07:33.469 What sense does it make for Milton to begin this poem 07:33.474 --> 07:36.424 with that conventional epic opening? 07:36.420 --> 07:40.530 Milton had already written his epic. 07:40.529 --> 07:42.249 Not only had Milton already written his epic, 07:42.251 --> 07:43.661 but he had written his diminutive, 07:43.660 --> 07:47.830 little pastoral lyrics long before that -- I'd say maybe 07:47.829 --> 07:51.539 thirty years before the publication of Paradise 07:51.544 --> 07:54.044 Regained. "Lycidas," Comus, 07:54.038 --> 07:56.788 "L'Allegro," and "Il Penseroso" -- those were 07:56.785 --> 07:58.235 Milton's pastoral poems. 07:58.240 --> 08:02.620 Those were the poems in which he sang the happy garden, 08:02.620 --> 08:07.160 but to identify Paradise Lost as a simple pastoral 08:07.163 --> 08:11.463 about a happy garden is obviously on some level to get 08:11.463 --> 08:15.543 it wrong. I think there's everything 08:15.544 --> 08:22.274 riding on the fact that Milton has misidentified the nature of 08:22.265 --> 08:24.905 his Paradise Lost. 08:24.910 --> 08:29.340 This is going to be the working assumption of the rest 08:29.342 --> 08:32.762 of this lecture: that Milton on some level -- 08:32.763 --> 08:36.733 and I know this sounds far-fetched -- but Milton has 08:36.729 --> 08:41.239 repressed the epic content of his epic poem.Now, 08:41.240 --> 08:44.860 you'll remember that last time we saw how Satan in Paradise 08:44.856 --> 08:47.816 Regained had repressed the fact that it was, 08:47.820 --> 08:50.180 in fact, the Son of God who had brought him to the brink of 08:50.175 --> 08:51.755 destruction during the war in heaven. 08:51.759 --> 08:54.729 He had repressed a crucial fact about that war, 08:54.732 --> 08:57.772 perhaps the most crucial fact about that war. 08:57.769 --> 09:02.839 Well, on some level the speaker of the poem, Milton's narrator 09:02.837 --> 09:07.317 -- we can call him Milton -- joins Satan in this act of 09:07.323 --> 09:10.453 repression, and the speaker of this poem 09:10.450 --> 09:14.010 has repressed the fact of the war in heaven as well. 09:14.009 --> 09:17.309 It's as if he had forgotten that Paradise Lost was an 09:17.308 --> 09:20.828 epic, something more than a poem merely about a happy garden, 09:20.830 --> 09:28.000 because an epic necessarily features the epic subject of 09:27.998 --> 09:30.578 war. Paradise Lost can't be 09:30.581 --> 09:34.061 identified merely with Book Four, our introduction to the 09:34.061 --> 09:37.871 Garden of Eden, needless to say.It's not 09:37.870 --> 09:42.770 just that Paradise Lost featured that lush, 09:42.769 --> 09:45.929 extraordinarily beautiful style of poetry that Milton feels in 09:45.933 --> 09:48.633 some way he has to resist in Paradise Regained. 09:48.629 --> 09:53.089 It's not just the lure of the rich, classical style that 09:53.094 --> 09:54.914 was so tempting there. 09:54.909 --> 09:57.609 It's also the fact that Paradise Lost 09:57.607 --> 10:00.097 represented, gave us an image of, 10:00.097 --> 10:02.857 heroic actions, the heroic actions of its 10:02.864 --> 10:05.524 characters. Its characters actually did 10:05.520 --> 10:08.590 something, a fact that we didn't know we were supposed to 10:08.590 --> 10:11.990 appreciate so much when we were actually reading the thing; 10:11.990 --> 10:15.210 but now that we're reading Paradise Regained, 10:15.208 --> 10:17.478 the fact that the characters [laughs] 10:17.479 --> 10:20.819 actually act and do in Paradise Lost takes on a 10:20.824 --> 10:23.634 new meaning. The very fact of all of that 10:23.633 --> 10:27.163 action that had been represented in Paradise Lost has 10:27.160 --> 10:30.870 become something of a problem by the time we get to Paradise 10:30.865 --> 10:34.575 Regained.Now, we remember that when Milton in 10:34.584 --> 10:37.934 those early poems was considering his problems of 10:37.934 --> 10:42.404 career and of vocation, he was consistently imagining a 10:42.402 --> 10:46.682 tension between those two parables in the Gospel of 10:46.679 --> 10:50.529 Matthew that posed the question of action, 10:50.530 --> 10:52.840 the question of work. 10:52.840 --> 10:56.960 The parable of the talents -- this lecture in some 10:56.960 --> 11:01.080 way will be something like a review session for the whole 11:01.081 --> 11:05.201 semester up to this point -- suggested that hard work and 11:05.202 --> 11:09.032 initiative were absolutely essential for the Father's 11:09.029 --> 11:11.609 approval, while the parable of the 11:11.607 --> 11:14.867 workers in the vineyard gave us a different understanding. 11:14.870 --> 11:18.480 It suggested in some way that the Father approves of the 11:18.484 --> 11:22.694 individual who is willing merely to wait to be called to work. 11:22.690 --> 11:25.090 The conflicting, or what seemed to be the 11:25.092 --> 11:28.582 conflicting, implications of those two parables were worked 11:28.576 --> 11:32.116 over in dozens of earlier poems and in prose treatises, 11:32.120 --> 11:36.370 and they're reworked here in Paradise Regained again, 11:36.373 --> 11:38.683 much later in Milton's career. 11:38.679 --> 11:43.179 They're reworked in the three temptations that the Son of God 11:43.177 --> 11:46.477 undergoes at the hand of Satan in Paradise 11:46.475 --> 11:51.045 Regained.So this for me is one of the most amazing and 11:51.048 --> 11:55.398 most surprising aspects of Satan's temptation of the Son of 11:55.396 --> 11:57.266 God in this poem. 11:57.269 --> 12:01.759 In Paradise Lost, Satan had tempted Eve to be 12:01.761 --> 12:06.721 disobedient, and it was clear to everyone that this was a kind of 12:06.718 --> 12:08.498 temptation to evil. 12:08.500 --> 12:11.620 But the situation in Paradise Regained -- this 12:11.620 --> 12:13.660 is a much more complicated poem. 12:13.659 --> 12:16.769 It's infinitely more complex, the nature of these 12:16.772 --> 12:20.222 temptations. Satan in this poem is tempting 12:20.217 --> 12:24.697 the Son not to act disobediently but, on some level, 12:24.700 --> 12:28.800 actually to act virtuously or to exhibit what strikes us as 12:28.800 --> 12:32.420 virtuous behavior.Now, the cardinal virtues, 12:32.419 --> 12:36.789 you'll remember from an earlier discussion of Comus, 12:36.789 --> 12:40.289 are faith, hope, and charity. 12:40.289 --> 12:44.139 In Milton's account -- and it's ingenious -- Satan tempts the 12:44.135 --> 12:47.595 Son with those virtues, but he does it in precisely the 12:47.596 --> 12:50.836 reverse order. He tempts the Son to an act of 12:50.840 --> 12:55.090 charity and then to an act of hope and then an act of faith. 12:55.090 --> 13:00.190 Now, just think of what Milton does to the original story in 13:00.185 --> 13:02.935 Luke. Okay: so the Son is hungry 13:02.937 --> 13:06.817 after forty days of fasting in the wilderness. 13:06.820 --> 13:10.100 Now in the account from the Gospel of Luke, 13:10.099 --> 13:14.549 Satan responds to the Son's hunger by tempting him to turn 13:14.549 --> 13:16.579 this stone into bread. 13:16.580 --> 13:21.650 He's tempting him to provide himself with something to 13:21.645 --> 13:25.845 eat.Well, Milton goes way beyond that, 13:25.850 --> 13:28.840 and in Paradise Regained Satan doesn't merely tempt 13:28.838 --> 13:31.038 the Son of God to eat something himself. 13:31.039 --> 13:33.839 That would be far too easy for the Son to resist. 13:33.840 --> 13:37.480 He asks the Son to turn the stone into bread so he can 13:37.483 --> 13:39.963 perform the virtuous, the charitable, 13:39.957 --> 13:43.667 act of feeding the hungry and of feeding the poor. 13:43.669 --> 13:48.009 "We are starving here," a disguised Satan tells the Son, 13:48.010 --> 13:52.270 and, in a magnificent line that strikes me as perfectly 13:52.271 --> 13:57.481 prophetic of the vegan movement of the late twentieth century, 13:57.480 --> 14:04.370 Satan says sublimely, "We here / live on tough Roots 14:04.372 --> 14:07.552 and Stubs." This is the kind of -- I don't 14:07.545 --> 14:10.235 know if you get those emails that I get from a woman named 14:10.235 --> 14:13.015 Anastasia Curley from the Yale Sustainable Food Project, 14:13.019 --> 14:17.319 but I think of her [laughter] with those updates from what's 14:17.324 --> 14:20.684 happening at the farm when I read this line, 14:20.679 --> 14:24.439 "We here live on tough roots and stubs, and we're asking for 14:24.441 --> 14:27.021 your help." That's what Satan says, 14:27.021 --> 14:30.911 and it's this temptation, the temptation to virtuous 14:30.905 --> 14:33.795 action, that the Son has to resist. 14:33.799 --> 14:37.349 It's not a simple temptation to gluttony in any way as it seems 14:37.346 --> 14:39.116 to be in the Gospel original. 14:39.120 --> 14:41.520 Satan is tempting the Son -- what? 14:41.519 --> 14:45.809 -- to exhibit a little humanity, to do the right 14:45.811 --> 14:49.281 thing.Milton's father, John Milton, 14:49.281 --> 14:54.391 Sr., had pressed the young Milton to stop reading at home 14:54.394 --> 14:57.594 and to begin doing something. 14:57.590 --> 15:01.710 His father was pressuring Milton to perform the virtuous 15:01.711 --> 15:05.061 action of a clergyman, and it was just this form of 15:05.062 --> 15:08.172 virtuous action that Milton, of course -- and we remember 15:08.168 --> 15:10.218 this -- was continually resisting. 15:10.220 --> 15:12.790 He insisted repeatedly that he wasn't ready yet, 15:12.790 --> 15:14.650 he wasn't ready to start acting. 15:14.649 --> 15:18.419 "It's too soon," we found him continually protesting. 15:18.420 --> 15:20.460 "I'm not ripe yet." 15:20.460 --> 15:25.930 He was constantly explaining to that paternal authority that he 15:25.928 --> 15:31.308 had in some way internalized the fact of his unripeness.Of 15:31.309 --> 15:34.479 course, it seems to be something just 15:34.476 --> 15:38.716 like the voice of Milton's father, which is nothing other 15:38.716 --> 15:43.146 than Milton's own conscience, that constitutes the essence of 15:43.149 --> 15:44.509 the next temptation. 15:44.509 --> 15:49.049 That's the temptation to accept the worldly kingdoms from Satan 15:49.051 --> 15:51.761 as Satan's gift. It's the second temptation 15:51.762 --> 15:54.122 which really takes up the bulk of the poem. 15:54.120 --> 15:58.610 Milton takes this verse from the Gospel of Luke and explodes 15:58.609 --> 16:01.729 it into hundreds and hundreds of lines. 16:01.730 --> 16:05.730 It stretches from the middle of Book Two to the middle of Book 16:05.729 --> 16:09.799 Four, and it's here that Milton really most powerfully distorts 16:09.795 --> 16:11.495 his scriptural source. 16:11.500 --> 16:14.200 He takes what you could think of as a kind of brief, 16:14.200 --> 16:16.690 throwaway temptation from the Gospel of Luke, 16:16.690 --> 16:21.960 and he expands it into a set of several sub temptations. 16:21.960 --> 16:24.970 They're genuine temptations, and in a lot of ways, 16:24.970 --> 16:28.230 he's imported the notion of these temptations from his 16:28.227 --> 16:30.867 favorite canto of The Faerie Queene, 16:30.870 --> 16:34.820 the cave of Mammon canto from Book Two.So Milton 16:34.820 --> 16:38.490 takes his cue from Spenser and transforms this second 16:38.488 --> 16:42.508 temptation into a catalog of all of those activities, 16:42.509 --> 16:48.669 all of those seemingly virtuous activities, that he had himself 16:48.673 --> 16:50.863 devoted his life to. 16:50.860 --> 16:56.970 This massive and seemingly endlessly elaborated second 16:56.974 --> 17:03.554 temptation reads something like Milton's autobiography. 17:03.549 --> 17:06.699 He explores, with what I take to be an 17:06.699 --> 17:11.039 almost painful precision, the central drives and the 17:11.041 --> 17:13.681 impulses of his very being. 17:13.680 --> 17:18.090 Satan tempts the Son of God with wealth. 17:18.089 --> 17:21.129 He tempts the Son of God with revolutionary political 17:21.128 --> 17:24.048 commitment with the promise of military success. 17:24.049 --> 17:27.609 He offers Jesus the entire Parthian army to help him regain 17:27.609 --> 17:30.469 the throne of David, because of course everybody 17:30.469 --> 17:33.599 knows Jesus will eventually regain the throne of David. 17:33.600 --> 17:35.960 He tempts the Son with empire. 17:35.960 --> 17:40.760 He offers to give him the empire of Rome since the current 17:40.756 --> 17:45.326 emperor, Tiberius, is so old and corrupt anyway, 17:45.326 --> 17:51.496 and he tempts him finally with all of the beauty and all of the 17:51.498 --> 17:56.578 wisdom and all of the fame associated with classical 17:56.575 --> 18:01.395 Athens. In short, Satan tempts the Son 18:01.402 --> 18:08.792 with just about everything that was ever important to our John 18:08.789 --> 18:11.879 Milton. It's almost as if Milton had 18:11.878 --> 18:15.698 deliberately structured the second temptation as something 18:15.701 --> 18:18.721 like a review session for the Milton exam. 18:18.720 --> 18:22.490 You have an entire career narrated here.So in the 18:22.487 --> 18:26.977 temptation to wealth -- and I've given you a sense of the dates 18:26.978 --> 18:31.538 but it's also on your handout -- in the temptation to wealth you 18:31.542 --> 18:35.312 have the protestations of action and of merit, 18:35.309 --> 18:39.679 that guilty defensiveness that you saw in the lyrics of the 18:39.676 --> 18:43.526 1630s and in that Latin poem, "Ad Patrem," that Milton had 18:43.525 --> 18:44.765 written to his father. 18:44.769 --> 18:48.879 In the temptation to political commitment or the temptation to 18:48.882 --> 18:51.672 intervene politically, you have Milton's new 18:51.670 --> 18:55.130 commitment, the commitment of in the 1640s -- the decade of his 18:55.125 --> 18:58.295 prose -- to apply his literary energies to the goal of the 18:58.302 --> 19:01.742 Puritan Revolution, the desire to reform the 19:01.740 --> 19:04.540 corruption of church and state. 19:04.539 --> 19:08.129 In the temptation to Parthian military glory, 19:08.131 --> 19:11.971 you can hear Milton's conviction in the regicide 19:11.968 --> 19:15.068 treatises of 1649 and thereabouts, 19:15.069 --> 19:20.219 his conviction in the importance of destroying with 19:20.218 --> 19:26.158 force, by actual military power, the unlawful tyranny of Charles 19:26.163 --> 19:28.893 the First. In the temptation of the Roman 19:28.890 --> 19:32.740 empire, you have reflected the faith that Milton seemed to hold 19:32.735 --> 19:35.675 in the early 1650s, at least, in the almost 19:35.681 --> 19:39.531 unlimited, utopian potential of the Puritan commonwealth: 19:39.531 --> 19:43.381 the hope -- and it turned out to be a crazy and perfectly 19:43.381 --> 19:47.711 irrational hope -that an empire governed by the virtuous Puritan 19:47.713 --> 19:52.323 saints might actually be able to precipitate the millennium, 19:52.319 --> 19:56.019 or the apocalypse, at the end of time. 19:56.019 --> 20:00.989 In the last part of Satan's second temptation, 20:00.989 --> 20:06.619 you have Satan's absolutely delicious and completely 20:06.620 --> 20:13.470 irresistible offer of literary fame and classical wisdom in the 20:13.466 --> 20:16.886 form of classical Athens. 20:16.890 --> 20:22.430 Clearly, this last addition to the second temptation -- that is 20:22.426 --> 20:27.156 the thing that persists throughout Milton's career. 20:27.160 --> 20:31.510 It obviously spans his entire life.So Milton alludes to 20:31.505 --> 20:35.845 and recycles in the elaborated second temptation all of the 20:35.850 --> 20:40.420 virtuous commitments and all of the disciplined decisions that 20:40.420 --> 20:44.840 he had been making himself over the course of the last forty 20:44.841 --> 20:48.301 years. He presents them -- and this is 20:48.296 --> 20:52.716 what's so brilliant -- he presents them in a form that the 20:52.721 --> 20:54.431 hero has to resist. 20:54.430 --> 20:57.440 They're temptations that the hero has to resist. 20:57.440 --> 21:02.160 The voices in his head that had come to him through the 21:02.156 --> 21:06.346 mechanism of conscience -- or God or John Milton, 21:06.348 --> 21:09.368 Sr. or someone authoritative -- all 21:09.374 --> 21:13.664 of those authoritative voices are now crystalized in the 21:13.659 --> 21:16.229 person and the shape of Satan. 21:16.230 --> 21:18.720 Satan is tempting the Son of God with a version of 21:18.720 --> 21:21.770 essentially all of the virtuous behavior that Milton's father 21:21.768 --> 21:23.698 had pressured Milton with.Now, 21:23.700 --> 21:27.780 it's usually clear that the Satanic version -- and this is 21:27.778 --> 21:31.568 almost always clear -- that the Satanic version of the 21:31.569 --> 21:35.019 temptation is an evil, or at least a questionable, 21:35.022 --> 21:38.272 rendition of the virtuous action that Milton himself had 21:38.268 --> 21:41.688 over the course of those years felt obliged to perform, 21:41.690 --> 21:46.630 but it's not always perfectly clear to me as a reader why it 21:46.634 --> 21:50.494 is that all of Satan's arguments are faulty, 21:50.490 --> 21:55.250 or why it is we have to dismiss them necessarily as evil. 21:55.250 --> 22:01.340 It often seems that the Son of God is rejecting modes of action 22:01.339 --> 22:07.229 and types of virtuous commitment that Milton himself actively 22:07.232 --> 22:13.222 embraced -- which is just a way of saying there's nothing that 22:13.224 --> 22:18.434 Milton is not willing to question in this poem. 22:18.430 --> 22:21.670 He's struggling to reinterpret, in some way, 22:21.670 --> 22:25.290 his entire career, as if to purify it of anything 22:25.287 --> 22:27.847 like a self-interested motive. 22:27.849 --> 22:32.229 It's as if he's systematically reviewing and scrutinizing every 22:32.231 --> 22:36.611 move, every type of action that he had been engaged in over the 22:36.613 --> 22:39.523 years, in order to purify his own past 22:39.520 --> 22:43.710 by differentiating it in some way from its Satanic double, 22:43.710 --> 22:48.950 from a dark version of his own virtue.Okay. 22:48.950 --> 22:53.700 Let's turn to page 510 in the Hughes. 22:53.700 --> 22:58.560 This is Book Three, line 224. 22:58.559 --> 23:02.329 This is a good example of the way in which Milton will cast as 23:02.326 --> 23:06.086 a Satanic temptation the voice of virtuous conscience that had 23:06.092 --> 23:08.132 plagued him as a younger man. 23:08.130 --> 23:10.630 So Satan asks, "If you have such hopes to be 23:10.626 --> 23:14.166 the savior of your nation -- and of course you do -- why don't 23:14.168 --> 23:15.618 you hurry up and act? 23:15.620 --> 23:17.240 Come on. Do something." 23:17.240 --> 23:24.720 Look at line 224: Why move thy feet so slow 23:24.719 --> 23:27.319 to what is best? [Now I'll skip a couple of 23:27.321 --> 23:28.091 lines here.] ….. 23:28.089 --> 23:32.099 Perhaps thou linger'st in deep thoughts detain'd 23:32.099 --> 23:34.799 Of the enterprise so hazardous and high; 23:34.800 --> 23:37.650 No wonder; for though in thee be united 23:37.650 --> 23:40.150 What of perfection can in man be found, 23:40.150 --> 23:44.030 Or human nature can receive, consider 23:44.029 --> 23:48.689 Thy life hath yet been private [This is quite a jab: 23:48.689 --> 23:52.979 You're not really fit for public action at all], 23:52.984 --> 23:56.934 most part spent At home, scarce view'd the 23:56.930 --> 24:00.370 Galilean Towns, And once a year 24:00.366 --> 24:04.336 Jerusalem… Satan's saying, 24:04.341 --> 24:06.081 "Oh, I know why you're hesitant to act. 24:06.079 --> 24:09.889 You're too busy lingering in all of your deep thoughts. 24:09.890 --> 24:12.980 You've spent all of your life at home and you've never 24:12.984 --> 24:15.884 ventured out. You've never sallied forth to 24:15.884 --> 24:17.844 do something in the world." 24:17.839 --> 24:22.499 Milton has incorporated into Satan's temptation a piercing 24:22.503 --> 24:26.623 critique of his own tendency, that early tendency, 24:26.621 --> 24:30.181 to wait -- to anticipate rather than to act. 24:30.180 --> 24:34.390 Satan tempts the Son with the wisdom of John Milton, 24:34.389 --> 24:38.929 Sr.: "You've spent most of your life in private at home, 24:38.929 --> 24:42.239 reading. Why in God's name don't you 24:42.235 --> 24:47.205 do something?"Now, let's jump ahead to the final 24:47.208 --> 24:52.358 moment of the second temptation, which is another of Milton's 24:52.359 --> 24:57.199 additions to the story that has absolutely no basis in scripture 24:57.195 --> 24:59.795 whatsoever. Of course, its absence from 24:59.803 --> 25:03.323 Milton's biblical source should only draw our attention all the 25:03.323 --> 25:04.803 more to its importance. 25:04.799 --> 25:09.209 This is the temptation to the intellectual fame represented by 25:09.214 --> 25:11.534 classical Athens in Book Four. 25:11.530 --> 25:19.780 Turn to Book Four, line 240. 25:19.779 --> 25:24.589 Satan displays before the Son all of the cultural wealth of 25:24.594 --> 25:28.004 ancient Athens, and at line 240 he invokes 25:27.997 --> 25:30.797 Athens, "the eye of Greece, 25:30.802 --> 25:34.092 Mother of Arts / and Eloquence." 25:34.089 --> 25:37.339 This Athens, the "Mother of Arts," seems to 25:37.338 --> 25:41.828 possess within it all of the classical learning that Milton 25:41.825 --> 25:46.465 himself had been addicted to as a young man as he spent those 25:46.466 --> 25:50.876 years after college in studious retirement at his family's 25:50.875 --> 25:53.965 house.Look down at line 281. 25:53.970 --> 25:59.310 Satan urges the Son to read all of these great classical texts. 25:59.309 --> 26:02.409 This is just getting so close to home. 26:02.410 --> 26:07.480 Satan says to the Son: "These here revolve, 26:07.478 --> 26:11.218 or, as thou lik'st, at home." 26:11.220 --> 26:14.050 This is amazing. It's as if Satan were imagining 26:14.050 --> 26:16.960 something like a lending library, and nothing could be 26:16.958 --> 26:18.438 more tempting to Milton. 26:18.440 --> 26:22.320 The Son could actually think about, read, and ponder these 26:22.323 --> 26:24.983 works in the privacy of his own home. 26:24.980 --> 26:28.630 This line here [laughs] convinces me that Milton 26:28.629 --> 26:31.889 himself had an enormous book collection. 26:31.890 --> 26:36.600 The books were his -- he read them at home after he was in 26:36.603 --> 26:40.483 college. He wasn't merely reading them 26:40.476 --> 26:46.566 in a nobleman's house or a friend's copy or in some version 26:46.569 --> 26:50.819 of a library. Milton must have read at home, 26:50.815 --> 26:52.805 until: These here revolve, 26:52.814 --> 26:54.344 or, as thou lik'st, at home, 26:54.339 --> 26:57.189 Till time mature thee to a Kingdom's weight; 26:57.190 --> 26:59.910 These rules will render thee a King complete 26:59.910 --> 27:03.570 Within thyself, much more with Empire 27:03.573 --> 27:07.233 join'd. This temptation to immerse 27:07.231 --> 27:11.001 himself in pagan literature at home, of course, 27:11.001 --> 27:15.021 is the temptation in Paradise Regained that 27:15.018 --> 27:20.098 has to be most difficult for Milton to imagine resisting. 27:20.099 --> 27:25.089 Of course, I think it's the most difficult temptation for us 27:25.090 --> 27:27.290 as readers to encounter. 27:27.289 --> 27:30.029 It's impossible, in fact, to read the Son's 27:30.028 --> 27:33.548 response to Satan's temptation here without wincing, 27:33.549 --> 27:37.929 without wincing at the pain that had to have accompanied 27:37.929 --> 27:39.919 Milton's writing of it. 27:39.920 --> 27:45.360 This is the Son who becomes unbelievably puritanical at this 27:45.363 --> 27:50.993 point in a stereotypical sense -- this is the top of page 523, 27:50.991 --> 27:53.391 line 322 of Book Four. 27:53.390 --> 27:55.740 The Son says to Satan: [W]ho reads 27:55.740 --> 27:59.120 Incessantly, and to his reading brings not 27:59.119 --> 28:02.879 A spirit and judgment equal or superior 28:02.880 --> 28:07.670 (And what he brings, what needs he elsewhere seek) 28:07.670 --> 28:09.930 Uncertain and unsettl'd still remains, 28:09.930 --> 28:13.850 Deep verst in books and shallow in himself, 28:13.849 --> 28:17.599 Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys, 28:17.599 --> 28:29.499 And trifles for choice matters, worth a sponge [a sponge is an 28:29.499 --> 28:34.489 eraser]; As Children gathering pebbles 28:34.492 --> 28:39.312 on the shore. The Son dismisses literature -- 28:39.307 --> 28:44.217 he dismisses all of secular learning as mere toys fit for 28:44.217 --> 28:47.087 children. You can hear something like the 28:47.087 --> 28:50.777 voice of Milton's father here accusing Milton of childishness. 28:50.779 --> 28:53.309 You can also see hear the important association of 28:53.314 --> 28:55.284 literature with the domestic sphere, 28:55.279 --> 28:58.929 the space of the home -- the sphere of experience that's 28:58.934 --> 29:02.394 governed not by the child's father but by the child's 29:02.389 --> 29:04.259 mother. It's important, 29:04.261 --> 29:08.681 I think, that Athens is very carefully figured by Milton as 29:08.675 --> 29:11.975 the mother of arts, because this kind of learning 29:11.984 --> 29:15.254 is presented and represented in Milton's poem as a maternal 29:15.254 --> 29:17.454 inheritance. It's just this maternal 29:17.446 --> 29:20.896 inheritance that the Son has to resist -- because what's his 29:20.901 --> 29:22.601 purpose here in this poem? 29:22.599 --> 29:27.429 It's perfect sole obedience to the Father. 29:27.430 --> 29:31.790 The Son's rejection of classical learning really 29:31.791 --> 29:36.711 parallels Milton's own as he writes this very poem. 29:36.710 --> 29:40.360 On some level he's describing for us what he himself is doing. 29:40.359 --> 29:43.419 He's obviously resisting classical literature, 29:43.420 --> 29:46.410 or at least allusion to classical literature, 29:46.412 --> 29:48.862 throughout Paradise Regained. 29:48.859 --> 29:53.979 This poem is almost -- and of course, I can only say 29:53.978 --> 29:59.378 "almost" -- it's almost scoured of any classical references 29:59.376 --> 30:04.076 whatsoever.Well, the exquisitely abstemious Son 30:04.075 --> 30:08.595 of God resists this most tempting of temptations just as 30:08.595 --> 30:11.385 he has resisted all the others. 30:11.390 --> 30:16.180 This is the big gun that Satan has just pulled out, 30:16.180 --> 30:22.120 and Satan understandably is beside himself with frustration. 30:22.119 --> 30:26.359 Look at line 366, top of page 524: 30:26.364 --> 30:32.544 Satan is "quite at a loss, for all his darts were 30:32.537 --> 30:37.767 spent..." Satan has nothing else to ask 30:37.770 --> 30:43.050 but this astonishing question at line 372. 30:43.049 --> 30:50.229 Look at Satan's question at line 372: "What dost thou in 30:50.231 --> 30:52.861 this World?" In other words, 30:52.860 --> 30:56.010 "You have rejected every form of action, and I can't imagine 30:56.010 --> 30:58.520 that you're actually willing to do anything. 30:58.520 --> 30:59.300 This is ridiculous. 30:59.300 --> 31:01.370 Can you do anything but say no?" 31:01.369 --> 31:04.499 Satan asks the Son.What, of course, Satan doesn't 31:04.499 --> 31:07.749 understand yet is that this poem isn't about action. 31:07.750 --> 31:10.710 It's not about doing, but on some important level 31:10.711 --> 31:12.131 it's about knowledge. 31:12.130 --> 31:15.560 Particularly, it's about self-knowledge and 31:15.556 --> 31:20.526 it's the problem of knowledge that really comes to the fore at 31:20.534 --> 31:24.984 the third and final temptation, which goes like this: 31:24.983 --> 31:26.883 "If you are, as you claim, 31:26.880 --> 31:29.840 the real Son of God, then prove it," 31:29.840 --> 31:32.100 Satan challenges the Son. 31:32.099 --> 31:37.069 So the third temptation is essentially a paternity test. 31:37.069 --> 31:40.889 It's a test in his faith in who his father is. 31:40.890 --> 31:44.680 Satan's coming to the point where he has to learn once and 31:44.679 --> 31:48.429 for all exactly who this Son is, and it's here that Satan takes 31:48.429 --> 31:51.309 the Son to the top of the pinnacle -- the Father's house, 31:51.309 --> 31:56.749 the top of the temple -- to prove that he is, 31:56.745 --> 31:59.705 in fact, a Son of God. 31:59.710 --> 32:02.590 Satan is going back, he's returning once again to 32:02.593 --> 32:06.023 that proclamation that the Father had made at the baptism, 32:06.017 --> 32:07.757 "This is my beloved Son." 32:07.759 --> 32:15.539 He has to figure out once and for all what that meant.So 32:15.535 --> 32:18.035 look at page 527. 32:18.039 --> 32:22.889 This is Book Four, line 515, Satan to the Son: 32:22.890 --> 32:27.510 [I want to] learn In what degree or meaning thou 32:27.506 --> 32:29.766 art call'd The Son of God, 32:29.772 --> 32:36.552 which bears no single sense; The Son of God I also am, 32:36.549 --> 32:42.239 or was, And, if I was, I am; 32:42.240 --> 32:53.330 relation stands… The relation of past and 32:53.327 --> 32:56.997 present, the relation of who I was to who I am, 32:57.003 --> 33:00.203 is finally presented here explicitly. 33:00.200 --> 33:04.540 This is the big question, and it's here that the extent 33:04.538 --> 33:09.038 of what we can think of Satan's repression becomes almost 33:09.038 --> 33:11.688 unbearable for me to witness. 33:11.690 --> 33:16.020 Satan insists that the Son of God is a term that can be used 33:16.016 --> 33:20.266 indiscriminately to describe all of God's human and angelic 33:20.269 --> 33:22.469 creatures, and he's right. 33:22.470 --> 33:27.000 It was used pretty much indiscriminately throughout a 33:26.996 --> 33:29.256 lot of Paradise Lost. 33:29.259 --> 33:34.069 Satan is incapable here of acknowledging to himself the 33:34.071 --> 33:37.571 identity of this Son of God, this opponent, 33:37.570 --> 33:41.680 with that Son of God -- the Son of God, the so-called only 33:41.683 --> 33:43.743 begotten, the first begotten, 33:43.739 --> 33:47.119 in heaven way back when: that Son of God whose favor in 33:47.121 --> 33:50.571 the eyes of the Father had, of course, motivated Satan's 33:50.565 --> 33:53.695 fall from heaven in the first place and had motivated the 33:53.695 --> 33:57.155 rebellion.Satan brings the Son to the top of the temple and 33:57.162 --> 33:59.512 he asks the Son to cast himself down. 33:59.509 --> 34:04.239 It's incredible the degree to which this climactic moment in 34:04.240 --> 34:09.370 this poem reworks that climactic moment in the other poem -- from 34:09.372 --> 34:12.742 the war in heaven in Paradise Lost. 34:12.739 --> 34:18.679 It's as if unconsciously, Satan is trying to re-stage 34:18.677 --> 34:24.097 that fall from heaven perhaps, in some sort of fantasy way, 34:24.104 --> 34:28.324 to have it have a different outcome -- that terrible moment 34:28.317 --> 34:31.877 at which the Son had successfully maneuvered Satan 34:31.876 --> 34:36.156 and the other rebel angels into casting themselves down from 34:36.162 --> 34:39.752 heaven. It's as if this were a 34:39.748 --> 34:46.638 desperate attempt to redo a traumatic moment in the familial 34:46.636 --> 34:49.396 past. Satan tempts the Son to call 34:49.396 --> 34:52.846 upon the Father to lift him up, since it is written in 34:52.854 --> 34:57.034 scripture that angels will rush to the aid of the Son of God. 34:57.030 --> 35:00.220 In essence, if you are in fact the Son of God, 35:00.220 --> 35:03.010 prove it! Call upon the Father to help 35:03.008 --> 35:07.168 you.It's at this point in Milton's text that absolutely 35:07.170 --> 35:11.260 everything that we've been discussing comes to a head. 35:11.260 --> 35:12.920 It's a remarkable convergence. 35:12.920 --> 35:23.600 Look at line 560 on page 528: "To whom thus Jesus. 35:23.599 --> 35:28.749 Also it is written, / Tempt not the Lord thy God; 35:28.750 --> 35:31.520 he said, and stood. 35:31.519 --> 35:37.079 / But Satan, smitten with amazement 35:37.084 --> 35:41.254 fell…" The Son of God performs no 35:41.252 --> 35:45.402 action here other than quoting a verse, a verse from the Book of 35:45.402 --> 35:47.632 Deuteronomy, and then stands, 35:47.630 --> 35:50.810 or maybe actually just remains standing. 35:50.809 --> 35:54.739 He refuses to honor Satan's request, and he exhibits his 35:54.741 --> 35:58.741 complete and total obedience to the Father by quoting the 35:58.743 --> 36:01.443 Father's word, by quoting scripture: 36:01.441 --> 36:04.871 "Tempt not the Lord thy God."It's at this point, 36:04.868 --> 36:07.218 and it is not before this point, 36:07.219 --> 36:12.829 that the truth of the Son's identity becomes evident to 36:12.825 --> 36:16.895 Satan, I think. I think this is also the moment 36:16.903 --> 36:21.463 at which the truth of the Son's identity becomes apparent also 36:21.455 --> 36:25.505 to the Son. On one level Jesus merely 36:25.512 --> 36:29.972 means, don't tempt the Lord thy God; 36:29.969 --> 36:32.749 don't tempt the Lord to help you if you don't really need his 36:32.753 --> 36:34.473 help, if you can do it on your own. 36:34.469 --> 36:37.889 But at the very moment that the Son quotes the Father's 36:37.885 --> 36:41.925 scripture, it's almost as if the meaning of this scriptural verse 36:41.932 --> 36:44.022 changes before our very eyes. 36:44.019 --> 36:48.719 "Tempt not the Lord thy God" comes also to mean -- maybe by 36:48.721 --> 36:53.911 the time he's gotten to the God part -- it comes also to mean, 36:53.909 --> 36:58.929 perhaps, "Don't tempt me because I am in some way the 36:58.926 --> 37:02.596 Lord thy God." At this very moment of absolute 37:02.599 --> 37:06.649 obedience, the Son is rewarded with the knowledge that he is 37:06.653 --> 37:10.233 not only the Savior or the Messiah -- he's known that 37:10.225 --> 37:13.605 – but he's rewarded with the 37:13.605 --> 37:19.205 knowledge that in some sense he is God himself.It's an 37:19.206 --> 37:24.086 incredible moment, and it's at this moment that 37:24.086 --> 37:29.616 it's as if this poem's repression of Paradise Lost, 37:29.619 --> 37:32.019 the earlier poem, has been lifted. 37:32.019 --> 37:35.469 The repression that has obscured the identity of this 37:35.466 --> 37:39.466 Son of God with that Son of God, the Son of God who was actually 37:39.474 --> 37:42.704 responsible for driving out Satan from heaven in the first 37:42.699 --> 37:44.849 place -- the repression evaporates. 37:44.849 --> 37:48.969 As soon as the reality of the situation asserts itself once 37:48.967 --> 37:52.297 again, it's amazing: Satan falls headlong to his 37:52.304 --> 37:55.594 destruction. It's as if all of these pieces 37:55.586 --> 37:58.656 of the puzzle are suddenly fitting together, 37:58.663 --> 38:02.893 and finally the identity of this Son of God with that Son of 38:02.885 --> 38:06.315 God in Paradise Lost is established. 38:06.320 --> 38:10.680 It seems to me that everybody in the poem is surprised, 38:10.682 --> 38:14.482 even the heavenly angels.Look at line 605 of 38:14.479 --> 38:17.099 Book Four. This is where the angels are 38:17.096 --> 38:18.686 singing in praise of the Son. 38:18.690 --> 38:25.250 I'm convinced that it's only now that they realize who this 38:25.245 --> 38:31.005 guy is, which means who this guy had been. 38:31.010 --> 38:34.600 So the angels tell the Son in this heavenly hymn, 38:34.604 --> 38:37.454 and they're speaking of Satan here: 38:37.450 --> 38:41.900 [H]im long of old Thou didst debel [debel means 38:41.896 --> 38:46.106 to conquer in war], and down from Heav'n cast 38:46.110 --> 38:49.440 With all his Army; now thou hast aveng'd 38:49.440 --> 38:51.990 Supplanted Adam, and by vanquishing 38:51.989 --> 38:57.339 Temptation, hast regain'd lost Paradise… 38:57.340 --> 39:02.680 This is the first moment that this poem has acknowledged the 39:02.682 --> 39:08.752 Son's agency in the war that was represented in the earlier poem. 39:08.750 --> 39:12.450 Finally, the connection between Paradise Lost and 39:12.447 --> 39:16.137 Paradise Regained is established.Look at that 39:16.144 --> 39:18.904 last line that I just read, line 608. 39:18.900 --> 39:22.040 You have something like the visual indication of the 39:22.040 --> 39:23.950 conjunction of the two poems. 39:23.949 --> 39:27.389 Their titles are compressed into three words. 39:27.389 --> 39:32.369 Both titles are compressed into three words: "regain'd lost 39:32.369 --> 39:35.149 Paradise." I think it's one of the 39:35.145 --> 39:38.935 greatest, most exciting revelation scenes in all of 39:38.940 --> 39:40.610 Western literature. 39:40.610 --> 39:43.330 The entire phenomenon of recovered memory -- the 39:43.334 --> 39:45.194 recovered memory, for example, 39:45.190 --> 39:49.740 of years later of past traumatic abuse -- is obviously 39:49.743 --> 39:54.473 one that only really began to assert itself later in the 39:54.469 --> 39:58.159 twentieth century, or in the early '90s with Oprah 39:58.158 --> 40:00.478 and Roseanne, although you probably don't 40:00.479 --> 40:02.799 remember Roseanne's recovered memory. 40:02.800 --> 40:06.230 But Milton was representing just this phenomenon, 40:06.231 --> 40:09.311 the phenomenon of recovered memory, in 1671, 40:09.306 --> 40:13.306 and he represented it on an unbelievably huge scale. 40:13.309 --> 40:16.639 It's not just the revelation of a character's identity. 40:16.639 --> 40:19.639 It's the identity of an entire text. 40:19.640 --> 40:20.760 What is that text? 40:20.760 --> 40:24.850 The text is only the greatest poem ever written in English 40:24.853 --> 40:27.873 that is brought to light at this moment. 40:27.869 --> 40:32.699 The Son by resisting the Satan's temptation has regained 40:32.696 --> 40:37.346 lost paradise but Milton has regained Paradise Lost 40:37.347 --> 40:40.767 and allowed us to regain Paradise 40:40.769 --> 40:45.769 Lost.Remember at the beginning that it seemed that 40:45.771 --> 40:50.861 Milton had actually forgotten the epic content of his poem: 40:50.861 --> 40:53.441 "Oh, I was just writing some 40:53.438 --> 40:56.718 pastoral and I called it Paradise Lost, but 40:56.723 --> 41:00.943 now -- eureka! " It's like an enormous bolt of 41:00.938 --> 41:04.778 lightning hits him and he remembers. 41:04.780 --> 41:07.510 He remembers that Paradise Lost was, 41:07.505 --> 41:11.395 in fact, an epic and according to Milton it's this revelation 41:11.399 --> 41:14.579 which is the moment at which man is redeemed. 41:14.579 --> 41:18.229 This is the moment at which paradise is regained, 41:18.230 --> 41:22.950 and the Son proves his identity through the simple quotation of 41:22.945 --> 41:25.755 scripture -- nothing imaginative, 41:25.760 --> 41:28.160 nothing fancy. He's quoting the Bible: 41:28.161 --> 41:30.121 "Tempt not the Lord thy God." 41:30.119 --> 41:35.019 Milton proves his own obedience to God by his composition of a 41:35.021 --> 41:39.841 biblical epic that is virtually untainted by the ornaments of 41:39.842 --> 41:44.342 classical literature.So it is at this moment [laughs] 41:44.341 --> 41:48.681 of proof that everything in Paradise Regained is 41:48.680 --> 41:50.930 permitted to change. 41:50.929 --> 41:53.389 As soon as Milton describes Satan's fall, 41:53.393 --> 41:57.153 he allows himself to embrace -- and we're so happy for this -- 41:57.150 --> 42:00.780 to embrace a poetic mode that had been completely suppressed 42:00.783 --> 42:04.553 up to this point, and this is the sublime mode of 42:04.545 --> 42:07.425 epic grandeur. All of a sudden we have not one 42:07.425 --> 42:10.745 epic simile, but we have two, and it's as if we're breathing 42:10.748 --> 42:14.198 oxygen again. Milton compares the Son's 42:14.199 --> 42:19.399 victory over Satan to Hercules' defeat of Antaeus, 42:19.400 --> 42:22.630 Antaeus being the figure who gained his strength from his 42:22.627 --> 42:25.917 mother, the earth, every time he touched the 42:25.923 --> 42:27.933 ground. Milton, of course, 42:27.929 --> 42:32.399 is also figuring the victory of Christianity over the maternal 42:32.400 --> 42:36.250 arts of Greece.Finally, at line 572, 42:36.250 --> 42:42.300 Milton compares Satan to the Theban sphinx. 42:42.300 --> 42:46.120 Look at line 572: And as that Theban 42:46.118 --> 42:51.128 monster that propos'dHer riddle, and him who solv'd it 42:51.125 --> 42:54.015 not, devour'd,That once found 42:54.015 --> 42:57.425 out and solv'd, for grief and spiteCast 42:57.428 --> 43:02.058 herself headlong from th' Ismenian steep… 43:02.059 --> 43:06.179 Now, Milton doesn't mention here who it was who found out 43:06.182 --> 43:08.982 and solved the riddle of the sphinx. 43:08.980 --> 43:12.140 He doesn't mention who it was who impelled the sphinx to cast 43:12.143 --> 43:14.413 herself headlong from the Ismenian steep. 43:14.409 --> 43:19.229 Like Satan who has repressed up to this point the name of who it 43:19.232 --> 43:23.292 was who had caused him to hurl himself from heaven, 43:23.289 --> 43:27.069 Milton -- in a kind of interesting and really related 43:27.069 --> 43:31.289 way -- Milton is repressing the name of that classical hero 43:31.285 --> 43:34.105 here; but of course we know. 43:34.110 --> 43:38.080 We know who solved the riddle of the sphinx and we know that 43:38.078 --> 43:41.438 the Son of God is implicitly being compared to him: 43:41.441 --> 43:44.761 it was Oedipus. It was Oedipus who was able to 43:44.758 --> 43:48.968 answer the riddle posed by the sphinx, and it was Oedipus whose 43:48.970 --> 43:52.640 answer pressed the sphinx to cast herself off that high 43:52.638 --> 43:55.898 precipice.What was the sphinx's riddle? 43:55.900 --> 43:57.090 Some of you will remember. 43:57.090 --> 43:59.960 The riddle was, what creature goes first on 43:59.961 --> 44:04.201 four legs, then on two legs, and then finally on three legs? 44:04.199 --> 44:09.479 And Oedipus' ingenious answer was "man": because man is born 44:09.481 --> 44:13.381 to crawl on all fours, initially, then grows up to 44:13.376 --> 44:16.476 walk on two legs, and ends his life as an old man 44:16.480 --> 44:20.200 with a cane, or what amounts to three legs. 44:20.199 --> 44:23.049 Before this simile, Satan had asked the Son a 44:23.048 --> 44:25.568 riddle, essentially, and the riddle was: 44:25.574 --> 44:28.734 who are you? The Son's answer to that riddle 44:28.728 --> 44:32.008 was -- it was kind of, "I am the Lord thy God." 44:32.010 --> 44:36.350 Oedipus' answer to the riddle of the sphinx was "man," and 44:36.346 --> 44:40.016 it's been one conjecture, and I think it's a very strong 44:40.022 --> 44:43.482 one, that the truth of the Son's identity in Paradise Regained 44:43.484 --> 44:45.124 involves, in some way, 44:45.119 --> 44:47.429 a combination of those two answers. 44:47.429 --> 44:51.279 The Son of God is both God and man, and you could see Milton 44:51.278 --> 44:54.928 using these classical illusions in some way to encode the 44:54.931 --> 44:58.521 mysterious truth of the Son's identity and to encode the 44:58.518 --> 45:01.778 mystery of the incarnation.Now there is, 45:01.780 --> 45:05.790 of course, much more to the story of Oedipus than Milton is 45:05.786 --> 45:07.786 alluding to in this simile. 45:07.789 --> 45:12.019 Oedipus is most famous for having killed his father and 45:12.023 --> 45:14.613 then having married his mother. 45:14.610 --> 45:18.310 Since Paradise Regained is a poem that is everywhere 45:18.305 --> 45:22.025 concerned with repression, with all of those things that 45:22.026 --> 45:25.826 it refuses to acknowledge, it's surely not too far-fetched 45:25.832 --> 45:29.302 to imagine the relation of Milton's poem to that most 45:29.304 --> 45:32.914 obvious aspect of the classical story of Oedipus. 45:32.909 --> 45:37.229 This is, after all, the classical myth that became 45:37.230 --> 45:41.110 for Freud the dominant myth of repression. 45:41.110 --> 45:45.780 Milton, by the way -- this is a conjecture from a brilliant 45:45.781 --> 45:50.861 Freudian reading of Milton by a critic named William Kerrigan -- 45:50.855 --> 45:54.475 Milton was one of Freud's favorite poets, 45:54.480 --> 45:57.630 and it's been argued that Milton in a lot of ways in 45:57.632 --> 46:00.352 Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained 46:00.351 --> 46:04.181 provides Freud with some of the intellectual tools by which 46:04.183 --> 46:07.213 he developed the complicated notion of the Oedipus 46:07.212 --> 46:11.452 complex.In any case, I think you have in Paradise 46:11.447 --> 46:15.597 Regained as powerful a representation of repression as 46:15.597 --> 46:19.527 anything that you could find in the pages of Freud. 46:19.530 --> 46:22.590 So in Sophocles' famous tragedy, Oedipus Rex, 46:22.590 --> 46:26.300 Oedipus kills his father and moves in with his mother, 46:26.301 --> 46:28.451 Jocasta, the Queen of Thebes. 46:28.449 --> 46:31.269 I don't want to suggest -- this is what I'm willing to repress 46:31.274 --> 46:34.054 here -- that Milton's interested in the sexual element of the 46:34.052 --> 46:37.072 Son's relation to his mother, although of course we know that 46:37.072 --> 46:39.772 Milton does have an interest in incest: think of Satan, 46:39.769 --> 46:43.379 Sin, and Death in Paradise Lost. 46:43.380 --> 46:46.290 But Milton's very much interested, I think, 46:46.286 --> 46:49.396 in the fact that Oedipus killed his father. 46:49.400 --> 46:53.460 There's a very real sense in which the Son's defeat of Satan 46:53.461 --> 46:57.391 in Paradise Regained is a literary rewriting of the 46:57.386 --> 46:59.716 hostility, the simmering resentment, 46:59.722 --> 47:00.822 of John Milton, Jr. 47:00.820 --> 47:02.240 to John Milton, Sr. 47:02.239 --> 47:05.529 Above all things, the Son resents the temptation 47:05.530 --> 47:09.730 to act in a way that the public world values as important. 47:09.730 --> 47:13.110 Milton's laying to rest once and for all -- his father is 47:13.105 --> 47:16.355 already dead -- but once and for all the censorious, 47:16.360 --> 47:21.850 judgmental voice of his father.We might even be able 47:21.847 --> 47:27.627 to say that he has hereby in some figurative way killed his 47:27.634 --> 47:31.094 earthly father. His patricide is closely 47:31.085 --> 47:35.165 related to what is happening at the actual narrative of the poem 47:35.167 --> 47:39.117 when the Son of God realizes at that extraordinary moment that 47:39.119 --> 47:40.609 he himself is God. 47:40.610 --> 47:44.500 The Son of God identifies with God, with the Father, 47:44.503 --> 47:48.023 and by means of that identification in some way 47:48.015 --> 47:52.665 displaces or renders unnecessary -- we could say even kills -- 47:52.672 --> 47:55.512 the father. When the Son internalizes the 47:55.508 --> 47:58.528 authority of the Father and actually becomes on some level 47:58.532 --> 48:01.592 the Father himself, it's as if the Father as a 48:01.587 --> 48:04.997 meaningful, external reality were dead.Well, 48:04.999 --> 48:08.849 critics have always been puzzled and astounded by this 48:08.846 --> 48:11.746 ending of Paradise Regained. 48:11.750 --> 48:16.690 After the moment of the Son's victory over Satan on the 48:16.688 --> 48:21.168 pinnacle, the entire poem seems to shift gears. 48:21.170 --> 48:23.970 All of a sudden, this is the Milton we recognize 48:23.965 --> 48:26.545 and love. All of a sudden the quality of 48:26.554 --> 48:29.394 the verse begins to revert back to that rich, 48:29.393 --> 48:32.363 densely textured style of Paradise Lost. 48:32.360 --> 48:35.090 The Son himself, on the level of plot, 48:35.085 --> 48:39.005 is rewarded for his victory with the beautiful assistance of 48:39.008 --> 48:42.198 angels who come to feed him and Milton, too. 48:42.199 --> 48:45.649 On the poetic level, as a poet, Milton is rewarded. 48:45.650 --> 48:48.900 He's successfully resisted the poetic lushness of Paradise 48:48.902 --> 48:52.492 Lost up to this point, and he's permitted for his 48:52.489 --> 48:56.629 pains to return to that lush and extravagant style. 48:56.630 --> 49:00.730 He's acutely aware of the new direction, I think, 49:00.727 --> 49:06.017 that the poem is taking at this point.Look at the last line 49:06.020 --> 49:10.800 of the poem: "hee unobserv'd / Home to his Mother's house 49:10.801 --> 49:12.851 private return'd." 49:12.849 --> 49:17.489 The Son is rewarded for his efforts in good, 49:17.490 --> 49:21.160 Oedipal fashion with the mother. 49:21.159 --> 49:24.159 The Son has proven himself victorious in the Father's 49:24.159 --> 49:26.579 house, the temple, and it's only after that 49:26.582 --> 49:29.872 victory that he can reassume the pleasures of the domestic 49:29.870 --> 49:33.400 sphere, the space of the mother. 49:33.400 --> 49:36.780 I think that Milton's ending is also Milton's best description 49:36.779 --> 49:39.659 of what it is that actually happens in the remarkable 49:39.659 --> 49:41.819 conclusion to this remarkable poem. 49:41.820 --> 49:46.720 He has renounced so much in his composition of Paradise 49:46.715 --> 49:49.805 Regained. He has forsaken his love of 49:49.810 --> 49:52.830 wandering verse. He's forsaken all of that 49:52.826 --> 49:56.126 learned allusiveness for a highly disciplined, 49:56.131 --> 49:58.921 austere, and severely repressive style 49:58.920 --> 50:03.290 and, just as the Son in the poem is rewarded for his obedience to 50:03.289 --> 50:06.839 the Father with the return to his mother's house, 50:06.840 --> 50:12.660 Milton is rewarded for his own literary submission to the 50:12.664 --> 50:19.014 austere style of the Father's gospel.It's almost as if, 50:19.010 --> 50:23.020 retrospectively, Milton can now be said to have 50:23.023 --> 50:27.563 earned the right to have written Paradise Lost. 50:27.559 --> 50:31.319 He can identify himself now as someone who was entitled to 50:31.318 --> 50:33.288 have written Paradise Lost. 50:33.289 --> 50:35.589 Milton was rewarded at the end of the poem with the 50:35.589 --> 50:37.079 triumphant return to the imagery, 50:37.079 --> 50:41.339 the wisdom, and the beauty of his beloved classics, 50:41.344 --> 50:46.554 and he justifies to himself and to his reader how it is he can 50:46.548 --> 50:51.328 be a dutiful Christian poet who can also at the same time 50:51.325 --> 50:55.585 indulge at will in the great pagan classics. 50:55.590 --> 50:58.850 He's proven himself to the heavenly father and he can now 50:58.847 --> 51:02.397 -- it's as if he can read and write as freely as anything that 51:02.395 --> 51:06.055 he was able to imagine way back in 1644 in Areopagitica. 51:06.059 --> 51:08.599 The ending, the last line of this poem, 51:08.604 --> 51:11.214 is so incredibly beautiful -- this quiet, 51:11.210 --> 51:15.510 exquisite ending -- and when we read that the Son of God returns 51:15.510 --> 51:18.780 home to his mother's house, we have an image, 51:18.775 --> 51:22.855 I think, of a similar return on the part of the poet. 51:22.860 --> 51:29.820 Milton is returning -- almost but not entirely unobserved -- 51:29.818 --> 51:35.008 to the paradise of Greece, mother of arts and 51:35.007 --> 51:37.717 eloquence.Okay. 51:37.720 --> 51:41.060 We are in for the home stretch. 51:41.060 --> 51:46.220 We have four more things to do. 51:46.219 --> 51:51.979 Friday we will all be meeting in LC 102 -- is that right? 51:51.980 --> 51:57.050 Yes, in LC 102. Instead of sections, 51:57.051 --> 52:04.101 we will be meeting as a group -- this is the size of the 52:04.095 --> 52:09.725 section actually -- as a group in LC 102. 52:09.730 --> 52:13.070 You have to begin to prepare yourselves for the final poem, 52:13.072 --> 52:14.342 Samson Agonistes. 52:14.340 --> 52:16.700 Make sure that you all have read it all. 52:16.699 --> 52:19.589 It's not very long, but it's pretty friggin' 52:19.588 --> 52:24.158 intense. Read it all by Monday's class. 52:24.160 --> 52:26.000 Okay.