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The Writings of Transcendence...

Paradise Lost

This contains my selected quotations from John Milton's
Paradise Lost, which I read while at university.
Svenski Yatskutskaya, Hom-UHT Publishing

Paradise Lost - John Milton

Book I
As one great Furnace flam’d, yet from those flames
No light, but rather darkness visible
Serv’d onely to discover sights of woe,
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
And rest can never dwell, (62-66)

All is not lost; the unconquerable Will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate,
And courage never to submit or yield;
And what is else not to be overcome? (106-109)

Whom reason hath equald, force hath made supream
Above his equals. (248-249)

The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n. (254-255)

Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n. (263)

At length from us may find, who overcomes
By force, hath overcome but half his foe. (648-649)

Anon out of the earth a Fabrick huge
Rose like an exhalation, with the sound
Of Dulcet Symphonies and voices sweet. (710-712)

Book II
In temper and in nature, will receive
Familiar the fierce heat, and void of pain;
This horror will grow milde, this darkness light (218-220)

How wearisome
Eternity so spent in worship paid
To whom we hate. (247-249)

As he our darkness, cannot we his Light
Imitate when we please? (269-270)

For what peace will be giv’n
To us enslaved, but custody severe,
And strips, and arbitrary punishment
Inflicted? And what peace can we return,
But to our power hostility and hate,
Untam’d reluctance, and revenge (332-337)

For neither do the Spirits damn’d
Loose all their virtue; least bad men should boast
Thir specious deels on earth, which glory excites,
Or clos ambition varnisht o’re with zeal. (482-485)

And God proclaiming peace,
Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strife
Among themselves, and levie cruel warres,
Wasting the Earth, each other to destroy: (499-502)

A Universe of death, which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, and Nature breeds,
Perverse, all monstrous, all prodigious things,
Abominable, unutterable, and worse
Than Fables yet have feign’d, or fear conceiv’d (622-627)

Fierce as ten Furies, terrible as Hell (671)

Chaos Umpire sits,
And by decision more imbroiles the fray
By which he Reigns: next him high Arbiter
Chance governs all. (907-910)

Into this wild Abyss the warie fiend
Stood on the brink of Hell and look’d a while,
Pondering his Voyage; for no narrow faith
He had to cross. (917-920)

Havock and spoil and ruin are my gain. (1009)

But now at least the sacred influence
Of light appears, and from the walls of Heav’n
Shoots farr into the bosom of dim Night
A glimmering dawn; (1034-1037)

Book III
As my Eternal purpose has decreed:
Man shall not quite be lost, but sav’d who will,
Yet not of will in him, but grace in me (172-174)

They who neglect and scorn, shall never taste;
But hard be hard’nd, blind be blinded more,
That they may stumble on, and deeper fall; (199-201)

Say Heav’nly powers, where shall we find such love,
Which of ye shall be mortal to redeem
Mans mortal crime, and just th’unjust to save,
Dwels in all Heaven charitie so deare? (213-216)
On me let death wreck all his rage;
Under his gloomie powere I shall no long
Lie vanquisht; (241-243)

Far more then Great or High, because in thee
Love hath abounded more than Glory abounds, (311-312)

For neither Man nor Angel can discern
Hypocrisie, the only evil that walks
Invisible, except to God alone, (682-684)

Book IV
Be then his Love accurst, since love or hate,
To me alike, it deals eternal woe. (69-70)

While they adore me on the Throne of Hell,
With Diadem and Scepter high advanc’d
The lower still I fall, onely Supream
In miserie; such joy Ambition findes. (89-92)

For never can true reconcilement grow
Where wounds of deadly hate have pierc’d so deep: (98-99)

So little knows
Any, but God alone, to value right
The good before him, but perverts best things
To worst abuse, or to thir meanest use. (201-204)

For contemplation hee and valour formd,
For softness shee and sweet attractive Grace. (297-298)

So spake the Fiend, and with necessitie,
The Tyrants plea, excus’d his devilish deeds. (393-394)

Knowledge forbidd’n?
Suspicious, reasonless. Why should thir Lord
Envie them that? Can it be sin to know,
Can it be death? And do they onely stand
By Ignorance, is that thir happy state,
The proof of thie obedience and thir faith? (515-520)

Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet,
With charm of earliest Birds; pleasant the sun
When first on this delightful Land he spreads
His orient Beams, (641-644)

Yet happiest if ye seek
No happier state, and know to know no more. (774-775)

And with them comes a third of Regal part,
But faded splendour wan; who by his gate
And fierce demeanour seems the Prince of Hell, (869-871)

Book V
Now Morn her rosie steps in th’ Eastern Clime
Advancing, sow’d the earth with Orient Pearle, (1-2)

Thou Sun, of this great World both Eye and Soule, (171)

A Wilderness of sweets; for Nature here
Wantond as in her prime, and plaid at will
Her Virgin Fancies, pouring forth more sweet,
Wilde above Rule or Art; enormous bliss. (294-297)

Your bodies may at last turn all to Spirit,
Improv’d by tract of time, and wingd ascend
Ethereal, as wee, or may at choice
Here or in Heav’nly Paradises dwell; (497-500)

Flatly unjust, to binde with Laws the free,
And equal over equals to let Reigne,
One over all with unsucceeded power. (819-821)

Among the faithless, faithful only hee;
Among innumerable false, unmoved,
Unshak’n, unreduced, unverified
His Loyaltie he kept, his Love, his Zeale; (897-900)

Book VI
Though strange to us it seemd
At first, that Angel should with Angel warr, (91-92)

When Reason hath to deal with force, yet so
Must reason is that Reason overcome. (125-126)

Nor in thir liquid texture mortal wound
Receive, no more then can the fluid Aire; (348-349)

Vain glorious, and through infamie seeks fame:
Therfore Eternal silence be thir doome. (384-385)

In fight they stood
Unwearied, unobnoxious to be pain’d.
By wound, though from thir place by violence mov’d. (403-405)

As one he stood escape’s from cruel fight,
Sore toil’d, his riv’n Armes to havoc hewn, (448-449)

Warr seem’d a civil Game
To this uproar; horrid confusion heapt
Upon confusion rose: (667-669)

In heav’nly Spirits could such perverseness dwell?
But to convince the proud what Signs availe,
Or Wonders more th’obdurate to relent? (788-790)

One Spirit in them rul’d, and every eye
Glar’d lightning, and shot forth pernicious fire
Among th’accurst, that withered all thir strength,
And of thir wanted vigour left them drain’d,
Exhausted, spiritless, afflicted, fall’n. (848-852)

Headlong themselves they threw
Down from the verge of Heav’n, Eternal wrauth
Burnt after them to the bottomless pit. (864-866)

Hell thir fit habitation fraught with fire
Unquenchable, the house of woe and paine. (876-877)

Let it profit thee to have heard
By terrible Example the reward
Of disobedience; firm they might have stood,
Yet fell; remember, and fear to transgress. (909-912)

Books I - VI
Books VII - XII

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