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THE RESOLUTION of DUALITIES in MILTON's ENGLISH POETRY By

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THE RESOLUTION of DUALITIES in MILTON's ENGLISH POETRY By THE RESOLUTION OF DUALITIES IN MILTON'S ENGLISH POETRY by MARGARET V. NELSON B.A., The University of British Columbia, 1963 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in the Department of English We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA August, 1965 In presenting this thesis m partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study, I "further agree that per• mission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the Head of my Department or by his representatives,. It is understood that copying, or publi• cation of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department of £ N Cr \~ I S H The University of British Columbia, Vancouver 8, Canada, Date f\U&-UST i <? Q b~ Table of Contents Page Introduction .Chapter One: Early Minor Poems 5 Chapter Two: Comus 17 Chapter Three: Lycidas 37 Chapter Four: Paradise Lost 4-7 Chapter Five: Paradise Regained . 73 Chapter Six: Samson Agomstes 86 Bibliography 100 Abstract Milton's poetic thought especially as expressed in Paradise Lost consists of three basic elements, God, man, and the Evil One. For Milton as a Seventeenth-century Christian the first and last of these two elements are absolutes while Milton's adherence to Renaissance humanism means that man also has a place of prominence in the poet's view of the totality of things. Each of the three elements in Milton's intellectual framework is in polar tension with each of the other two. From the tension between man and God arises the conflict of human concerns with divine imperatives resulting in such dualities as: body and soul, matter and spirit, the 1 pleasures of the flesh and the demands of the spirit, secular human cul• ture and the will of God, reason and revelation, salvation by human effort and salvation by divine grace. The tension between good and evil involves conflicts between human sin and divine righteousness and between human suffering and the ultimate beneficence and justice of God. These duali• ties occur in Milton's poetry with a frequency which suggests that they constitute a continuing problem m the poet's life and thought. This thesis attempts to show that in his poetry Milton consistently sought to unify and resolve these dualities but that the means by which he tried to do so and the extent to which he was successful differ from one poem to another. In the first group of poems, which includes all the early minor poems written before Comus and Lycidas, dualities tend not to be very deeply felt or very firmly pressed. Where resolution is necessary between two opposites, this resolution is, as a rule, complete and is achieved without strenuous effort. In the second group of poems, which includes Comus and Lycidas, there are deeply felt oppositions which clash strongly throughout the poems. These dualities are, on the whole, not completely resolved in the course of the individual poems; much tension remains at the end of each work and oppositions are often simply juxtaposed without resolution. Such resolu• tion as does result is achieved by oblique and unexpected means. The final group of poems includes Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes. These three poems are as full of dichotomies as the two works which immediately precede them. The oppositions are also as deeply felt as m the earlier two poems but by vast expenditures of energy are triumphantly resolved and held in dynamic balance. The reso• lutions achieved in these three poems are complete and are attained in direct ways. Introduction Much of Milton's poetry (especially such major works as Comus, Lycidas, Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes) ap• pears to be full of dualities or pairs of opposites of one kind or another: spirit and flesh (Comus, Paradise Lost), religion and culture (Paradise Regained), faith and knowledge (Paradise Lost, Paradise Re• gained) , the natural and the supernatural (Comus, Paradise Lost, Para• dise Regained), grace and good works (Paradise Lost, Comus), predestina• tion and free will (Paradise Lost), good and evil (almost all the poems), and many others. These dualities are not so various or unrelated as they might seem, nor is their occurrence in Milton's poetry in any sense accidental or haphazard. Rather they arise inevitably from the basic structure of the poet's thought. Milton's poetic thought appears in its clearest and most amplified form in Paradise Lost. Whatever justification there may be in the various attacks which accuse Milton of assorted heresies, the basic framework of his theology as it appears m Paradise Lost and other works is central to the Christian tradition. This framework assumes three basic elements: God, Man, and the Evil One. For the Christian (and especially for the Christian of Milton's time) the first and last of these primal elements are unquestionable absolutes. Although Christians have differed as to the importance of the human race in the divine scheme of things, Milton, as a Christian humanist, and m spite of his essentially orthodox belief in the seriousness of the Fall, clearly gives man a place of special prominence. Each of these three elements in the poet's intellectual -2- framework is thus m polar tension with each of the other two. This basic structure of three absolutes in conflict with each other underlies not only Milton's greatest poem, Paradise Lost, but also most of his i' other major poems, and indeed is the basis of his whole philosophical outlook. Thus in both his thought and his poetry numerous dualities are inescapably present. An important group of them arises from the tension between the poles of Man and God. The source of the conflict can no doubt be found in Milton's adherence to both Renaissance humanism, which sometimes tended to place man at the centre of the universe and to Puritan Christianity, which, like medieval Roman Catholicism, uncompromisingly set God at the centre of the world. While always insisting upon the absoluteness of God and his claim upon man, Milton nevertheless asserts the dignity and freedom of man, refusing to reduce him to a state of utter depravity and helplessness. From this tension arises unavoidably the conflict between the concerns of man and the concerns of God. Participation in the arts is thus confronted by the claims of religion, traditionally often anta• gonistic to man's creative endeavour. The achievements of the human intellect in culture and learning stand opposed to the demands of faith which supposedly transcends or even denies reason. Lure of worldly fame conflicts with promise of heavenly reward. The Christian concept of Satan, on the one hand, and the Renaissance awareness of man's imper• fection and limitations, on the other hand, raise further problems. Two opposite ways of salvation arise: salvation primarily by man him• self through his own reason and will, and salvation solely through the -3- grace of God. Another related duality which occurs m Milton's poetry is the opposition between body and soul or between matter and spirit. This opposition is again traditional and has roots in both Christian and Greek thought. Milton insists on the reality and value of both elements. The other two important poles between which there is much tension in Milton's thought and poetry are of course good and evil, into which conflict man is also drawn, attracted and repelled by both. Again the poet refuses to reject either element m the conflict. Moral evil is, for Milton, always powerful and often attractive, human suffering is always real and terrible; yet Milton's God is always ultimately supreme. In Milton's poetry (and even m some of his prose) the dualities just discussed are of course represented, not abstractly and theoretically, but concretely and dramatically. They are often associated specifically with individual characters and with certain space areas--such as heaven, earth, hell--withm the total setting of each of the poems. Yet despite the varying forms in which they are expressed, the three basic elements of Milton's cosmos and the dualities arising from them occur in succeed• ing poems with a frequency which suggests that these dichotomies repre• sented a continuing problem in the poet's life and thought. It will be the purpose of this thesis to explore in Milton's English poetry the forms m which these opposites occur and the poet's attempts to reconcile them. All Milton's major works and some of his minor ones will be considered and the poems will be examined in chronological order. In the discussion of each poem I shall be concerned to discover which dualities are evident and which of these are most prominent, how these -4- dualities are represented through characterization and setting, and to what extent and in what way they are resolved. Chapter One: Early Minor Poems The first poem of interest in respect to Milton's attempt to resolve dichotomies in his thought is "At a Vacation Exercise...." Its interest lies not so much in itself but in what it anticipates in Milton's later poetry. In this early short poem we find suggested the basic cosmology of Paradise Lost, expressed, it is true, in classical terms: Addressing his "native Language"''" Milton first rejects superficial facility of ex• pression and prays for language suitable for his high thoughts. ...I had rather, if I were to choose, Thy service in some graver subject use.
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