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Paradise Lost, Book 4
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
136 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1667
2 people are currently reading
20 people want to read
About the author
John Milton
3,789 books2,257 followersPeople best know John Milton, English scholar, for
Paradise Lost
, the epic poem of 1667 and an account of fall of humanity from grace.
Beelzebub, one fallen angel in Paradise Lost, of John Milton, lay in power next to Satan.
Belial, one fallen angel, rebelled against God in Paradise Lost of John Milton.
John Milton, polemicist, man of letters, served the civil Commonwealth under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote in blank verse at a time of religious flux and political upheaval.
Prose of John Milton reflects deep personal convictions, a passion for freedom and self-determination, and the urgent issues and political turbulence of his day. He wrote in Latin, Greek, and Italian and achieved international renown within his lifetime, and his celebrated Areopagitica (1644) in condemnation of censorship before publication among most influential and impassioned defenses of free speech and the press of history.
William Hayley in biography of 1796 called and generally regarded John Milton, the "greatest ... author," "as one of the preeminent writers in the ... language," though since his death, critical reception oscillated often on his republicanism in the centuries. Samuel Johnson praised, "with respect to design may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the second, among the productions of the ... mind," though he, a Tory and recipient of royal patronage, described politics of Milton, an "acrimonious and surly republican."
Because of his republicanism, centuries of British partisanship subjected John Milton.
Beelzebub, one fallen angel in Paradise Lost, of John Milton, lay in power next to Satan.
Belial, one fallen angel, rebelled against God in Paradise Lost of John Milton.
John Milton, polemicist, man of letters, served the civil Commonwealth under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote in blank verse at a time of religious flux and political upheaval.
Prose of John Milton reflects deep personal convictions, a passion for freedom and self-determination, and the urgent issues and political turbulence of his day. He wrote in Latin, Greek, and Italian and achieved international renown within his lifetime, and his celebrated Areopagitica (1644) in condemnation of censorship before publication among most influential and impassioned defenses of free speech and the press of history.
William Hayley in biography of 1796 called and generally regarded John Milton, the "greatest ... author," "as one of the preeminent writers in the ... language," though since his death, critical reception oscillated often on his republicanism in the centuries. Samuel Johnson praised, "with respect to design may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the second, among the productions of the ... mind," though he, a Tory and recipient of royal patronage, described politics of Milton, an "acrimonious and surly republican."
Because of his republicanism, centuries of British partisanship subjected John Milton.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
July 28, 2017
Far faster and easier than book 1, though probably not as grand a reading experience.
May 12, 2024
In spite of being way too poetic for me to actually enjoy reading it (because I was too busy trying to figure out the numerous references and understand what was actually being said), even I was reeled in by the plight of Satan and his plan to destroy Adam and Eve's bliss.
Satan's melancholy at being banished to Hell juxtaposes beautifully with Adam and Eve's blissful life in the Garden of Eden and once I really got into it, I was almost tempted to read the next book as well.
Satan's melancholy at being banished to Hell juxtaposes beautifully with Adam and Eve's blissful life in the Garden of Eden and once I really got into it, I was almost tempted to read the next book as well.
October 6, 2025
ap lit kill me
November 29, 2017
As my favourite book in Milton's Epic Poem, I decided to re-read this biased, yet perhaps more accurate, account of Lucifer's entrance into Eden and initial temptation of Eve.
July 3, 2023
Book IV of Paradise Lost has been labelled as the most wide-ranging of all in importance and exquisiteness. It presents, at last, 'Man the central figure of the Epic'. As Satan descends on Earth to entice Adam and Eve the poet is grabbed with a robust sentiment, and expresses the natural wish that some warning voice might be carried to them of the peril with which they are endangered.
Satan is involved in a perilous initiative. He comes to Earth with the malevolent object of beguiling man from his adherence to God, when his mind is troubled with uneasy thoughts. In his mind, the desolation of Hell is agitated from its lowermost depths like the sea being stirred up by the ferocious winds.
Satan has since absconded from Hell and yet Hell is within him. He cannot flee from Hell any more for he cannot esacpe from himself.
'The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven'. Hell is always present with him for his tumbledown soul is Hell.
Change of place does not result an alteration in his position. He realizes the absolute fruitlessness of his position, when he remembers the disastrous story of his former position, the chief of the angels and his present position, the damned spirit. He understands that inferior deeds must follow shoddier penalties. He understands that his evil deed on innocent man would be repaid with a more radical and horrifying chastisement from the Almighty.
The scenes between Adam and Eve in Book IV are some of the most delightful and fragranced in the poem. They talk together against the silhouette of a paradisial evening.
They talk about labour and relaxation, and in doing so demonstrate Milton's quandary in having to accept the biblical view that labour was imposed on man as a blasphemy after the Fall:
"Man hath his daily work of body or mind
Appointed,"
Adam elucidates to Eve, speaking for Milton, for whom the everyday round of labour and the thought of appointed work well done were always representative of all that was most sustaining in human experience.
A life of unadulterated meditation was as difficult for Milton to praise as a fleeting and sequestered virtue: it might be said that the meditative custom of Christian thought was the one European tradition that Milton was powerless to work into his great amalgamation.
Though he had spent so many years in silent groundwork for his own poetic achievement, he never regarded these years, whether at that time or later, as a period dedicated to observation only.
Though Milton succeeds in giving superb manifestation to the state of guiltless poise in which Adam and Eve lived before the Fall, he is incapable to make their daily life conclusive, for the reason that he cannot actually have faith in it. An unwarranted tranquillity.
As Satan watches the "conjugal attraction" between Adam and Eve, both possessiveness and envy are aroused.
The love-scene between Adam and Eve becomes a "sight hateful, sight tormenting.....these two Imparadised in one another's arms", while Satan has been thrust to Hell.
Where neither joy nor love, but fierce desire
Among our other torments not the least-
Still unfulfilled with pain of longing pine….
Lastly, a discussion on the character of Satan, one of the supreme creations in any language. The magnitude lies not only indeed, not chiefly in the representation of the regal character of Books I and II, but in the deliberate and stable disintegration of an angel who once stood next to God himself in Heaven.
As we read Paradise Lost we watch the delicacy of Milton's art as the character progressively reduces from opulence and majesty to immorality and final dilapidation, so that we are unavoidably estranged from our approbation of Satan.
In following the collapse of Satan, we must understand that Milton is, as always in Paradise Lost, lettering on two levels, a literal and a moral. On the literal level, Satan is a character, a person, about whom a story is laced. Milton's rudimentary method is a subtle change in figures of speech, mutation of the images to which Satan is likened.
In Book I, for example, we are awestruck by Satan's physical size, his shield the extent of the moon, his spear reducing the tallest pine tree to a mere wand, himself now like a tower, now like the sun seen through morning mist. So Satan continues for some time, grand, impressive, yet always a little more defective.
In Book IV we have evidence that the figures of speech are changing. When Satan is seeking entrance to the Garden of Eden, he disdains the gate and leaps over the wall.
As in Lycidas, Milton thinks of Satan as "a prowling wolf" leaping over the fence into the sheepfold, as a thief, forcing his way through large doors for plunder. "So clomb this first grand Thief into God's fold."
Satan is involved in a perilous initiative. He comes to Earth with the malevolent object of beguiling man from his adherence to God, when his mind is troubled with uneasy thoughts. In his mind, the desolation of Hell is agitated from its lowermost depths like the sea being stirred up by the ferocious winds.
Satan has since absconded from Hell and yet Hell is within him. He cannot flee from Hell any more for he cannot esacpe from himself.
'The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven'. Hell is always present with him for his tumbledown soul is Hell.
Change of place does not result an alteration in his position. He realizes the absolute fruitlessness of his position, when he remembers the disastrous story of his former position, the chief of the angels and his present position, the damned spirit. He understands that inferior deeds must follow shoddier penalties. He understands that his evil deed on innocent man would be repaid with a more radical and horrifying chastisement from the Almighty.
The scenes between Adam and Eve in Book IV are some of the most delightful and fragranced in the poem. They talk together against the silhouette of a paradisial evening.
They talk about labour and relaxation, and in doing so demonstrate Milton's quandary in having to accept the biblical view that labour was imposed on man as a blasphemy after the Fall:
"Man hath his daily work of body or mind
Appointed,"
Adam elucidates to Eve, speaking for Milton, for whom the everyday round of labour and the thought of appointed work well done were always representative of all that was most sustaining in human experience.
A life of unadulterated meditation was as difficult for Milton to praise as a fleeting and sequestered virtue: it might be said that the meditative custom of Christian thought was the one European tradition that Milton was powerless to work into his great amalgamation.
Though he had spent so many years in silent groundwork for his own poetic achievement, he never regarded these years, whether at that time or later, as a period dedicated to observation only.
Though Milton succeeds in giving superb manifestation to the state of guiltless poise in which Adam and Eve lived before the Fall, he is incapable to make their daily life conclusive, for the reason that he cannot actually have faith in it. An unwarranted tranquillity.
As Satan watches the "conjugal attraction" between Adam and Eve, both possessiveness and envy are aroused.
The love-scene between Adam and Eve becomes a "sight hateful, sight tormenting.....these two Imparadised in one another's arms", while Satan has been thrust to Hell.
Where neither joy nor love, but fierce desire
Among our other torments not the least-
Still unfulfilled with pain of longing pine….
Lastly, a discussion on the character of Satan, one of the supreme creations in any language. The magnitude lies not only indeed, not chiefly in the representation of the regal character of Books I and II, but in the deliberate and stable disintegration of an angel who once stood next to God himself in Heaven.
As we read Paradise Lost we watch the delicacy of Milton's art as the character progressively reduces from opulence and majesty to immorality and final dilapidation, so that we are unavoidably estranged from our approbation of Satan.
In following the collapse of Satan, we must understand that Milton is, as always in Paradise Lost, lettering on two levels, a literal and a moral. On the literal level, Satan is a character, a person, about whom a story is laced. Milton's rudimentary method is a subtle change in figures of speech, mutation of the images to which Satan is likened.
In Book I, for example, we are awestruck by Satan's physical size, his shield the extent of the moon, his spear reducing the tallest pine tree to a mere wand, himself now like a tower, now like the sun seen through morning mist. So Satan continues for some time, grand, impressive, yet always a little more defective.
In Book IV we have evidence that the figures of speech are changing. When Satan is seeking entrance to the Garden of Eden, he disdains the gate and leaps over the wall.
As in Lycidas, Milton thinks of Satan as "a prowling wolf" leaping over the fence into the sheepfold, as a thief, forcing his way through large doors for plunder. "So clomb this first grand Thief into God's fold."
July 14, 2023
But neither breath of Morn when she ascends
With charm of earliest birds, nor rising sun
On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flow'r,
Glist'ring with dew, nor fragrance after showers,
Nor grateful ev'ning mild, nor silent night
With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,
Or glittering starlight without thee is sweet.
With charm of earliest birds, nor rising sun
On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flow'r,
Glist'ring with dew, nor fragrance after showers,
Nor grateful ev'ning mild, nor silent night
With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,
Or glittering starlight without thee is sweet.
November 12, 2018
i wanna die
February 5, 2022
3.5 stars.
Read
July 21, 2023Misogyny! Eden! Satan!
September 22, 2023
"Is it sin to know?"
October 26, 2023
poetic genius
December 13, 2025
Maybe the only good thing to come from AP Lit so far.
Ok not true, some of the short stories have been fun.
4.5 rounded up to a 5 since I was REALLY into it while we were reading it.
Ok not true, some of the short stories have been fun.
4.5 rounded up to a 5 since I was REALLY into it while we were reading it.
April 6, 2016
This book was much easier to understand than Book 1, which is the only other part of this poem our class has covered so far. Fantastic imagery. The theology is questionable in some cases, mostly tainted by Milton's apparent misogyny, but in others quite beautifully expressed. With this book I found myself interested and wanting to keep reading, whereas with Book 1 I kept counting how many lines there were left. I'm eager to read the rest.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews