Thesis on "Human Behavior Explored"

Thesis 10 pages (3087 words) Sources: 10 Style: MLA

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Human Behavior Explored in the Works of John Milton

The English poet John Milton was born on December 9, 1608 in London, near St. Paul's Cathedral. This remarkable birthplace serves to be prophetic as Milton becomes one of the most outspoken voices f his time regarding human behavior and one's relationship with God. Milton was one of three children born to John and Sara Milton. Their family parish, All Hallows, was famous for reforming Puritan ministers. Milton's father was a professional scrivener as well as a musician and composer. (Skerpan-Wheeler) in 1620, Milton attended St. Paul's school and in 1625, he entered Christ's College of the University of Cambridge. Here Milton studied logic, rhetoric, and ethics and became bishop of Cork in 1638. He wrote two books about preaching during this time and within a few years, he was "composing strong, if humorous critiques of strict old-fashioned Aristotelian philosophy" (Skerpan-Wheeler). Milton left Cambridge and became a private student in 1632 in hopes to "serve his country by becoming a 'relater of the best and sagest things among mine own Citizens'" (Skerpan-Wheeler). Milton concluded his education by touring Italy and other countries. When he returned to Britain because of news of the civil unrest in Britain, Milton was a tutor but he also began to publish pamphlets known as "antiprelatical tracts" (Skerpan-Wheeler). Many of Milton's works exploited conventions and traditions and some expose his reasons for not becoming a clergyman. Albert C. Labriola asserts, "Milton's chief polemical prose was written . . . during the strife between the Church of England and various reformist groups such as the Puritans and between the monarch and Parliament" (Labriola). Labriola also asserts that these works, "advocate a freedom of conscience and a high degree of civil liberty for humankind against the various forms of tyranny and oppression, both ecclesiastical and governmental" (Albert C. Labriola). His works were not without controversy and fame.

He married Mary Powell in 1642 and Skerpan-Wheeler asserts that this was probably an arranged marriage because Milton's father owed Powell's father money. Mary returned to her family within months of becoming married but after external pressure, she returned to Milton and they had a daughter, Anne. His marriage endured troubles, however, and this prompted him to write many tracts about divorce. He takes on conventional thought by using the government as an analogy for his argument that if a nation can divorce itself from a failing monarch, then a husband or wife should be able to divorce him or herself from a husband or wife that is incompatible. Milton continued to write about concerns of his day, including education, art, logic, and religious doctrine. Milton's eyesight began going and by 1652, he was totally blind. His wife died in childbirth to their third daughter. In 1656, Milton married again to Katherine, who died in 1658. In 1663, Milton married Elizabeth Minshull and is noted to have lived a peaceful life with her.

There is no doubt that Milton's political beliefs affected his writing. This was an organic process, as it tends to be with all thinker and writers, and Milton seemed to appreciate the unfolding nature of history. The things he experienced allowed him to write what he did with a unique perspective and we can know that he was writing from his own experience and his own passion. Nothing illustrates this more than "Paradise Lost" when we see the elements of the Western world infused with the destiny of one of the oldest stories known to man. Roy Flannagan asserts that Milton was a "child of the Protestant Reformation" (Flannagan 9), contending that that there are very few individuals that have read as much as Milton read. He wrote dictionaries in Latin and Greek that were so "precise and complete" (Flannagan 10), that they were used as models for later dictionaries. When the new government struggled and returned to kingship, was "jailed for his role in the now disgraced regicidal (king killing) government" (Moss). While there is much logic in Milton's work, it should also be noted that his work is recognized for its quality as well. Thomas Macaulay claims that Milton's poetry "produces an illusion on the eye of the mind, as a magic lantern acts best in a dark room" (Macaulay 6), acting like an "incantation" (8). Even though Paradise Lost was written at a time when "images of beauty and tenderness are in general beginning to fade" (19), Milton "adorned it with all that is most lovely and delightful in the physical and moral world" (19). This type of adornment is what allows Milton's poetry to b studied today.

While Milton is notorious for his poetry, it is worth noting that his prose became significant, especially during the English civil War. He was convinced that the political disturbance in England deserved his attention. Alexander Witherspoon notes that even before the break between the Protestants and loyalists, Milton had "allied himself firmly with the Puritan party by a series of pamphlets" (Witherspoon 260). Perhaps one of his most compelling pieces during this time is the Tenure of Kings and Magistrates, where Milton justifies the execution of Charles. Shortly after the execution o the king, Milton was appointed as Latin Secretary to the Commonwealth Council of State, where he served for eleven years and gave to that cause "Most of his energy, his talents, and his eyesight" (Witherspoon 378). This length of time Milton committed to the cause demonstrates his passion for not only the war but also its outcome. His sentiments are reflected in his art.

Lewalski writes that Milton's final years were "busy and productive" (489). He wrote "two remarkable poems" and Paradise Regained as well as Samson Agonistes. She notes that Paradise Regained "offers Jesus in a model of unflinching resistance to and forthright denunciation of all versions of the sinful or distorted life" (493). In Samson Agonistes, Milton presents us with a "warrior hero" (493). Both of these works, she maintains, "dramatize, in different ways, Milton's characteristic stance in the prose tracts: the atonement of liberty, the exercise of governance, and indeed any worthy action in the service of God and country are predicated on virtue, sound moral and political understanding, and openness to divine illumination" (493).

Thoughts, beliefs, and passions meet in what is arguable Milton's greatest work, "Paradise Lost." J. Martin Evans contends that echoes of Milton's political thought can be seen in "Paradise Lost." Evans states, "The motives which impel Satan on his voyage replicate, in turn, virtually all the social and political arguments advanced in favor of England's colonial expansion in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries" (Evans). He observes, "During the course of the poem, then, Satan rehearses virtually all the major roles in the repertoire of English colonial discourse. By turns buccaneer, pilgrim, and empire-builder, he embodies not only the destructive potential of imperial conquest but its glamour and energy as well. It may well be no accident that the critical glorification of Milton's devil took place during the heyday of England's imperial power while his descent from hero to fool coincided with its decline" (Evans). In addition, "God's emissaries, too, function as agents of imperial authority. Indeed, Raphael has in some ways even more in common with the explorers than his diabolical antagonist" (Evans). Even Adam and Eve represent English settlers in Evans' opinion. While this idea might appear to be far-fetched, it is important in that it allows us to see the importance of the war in Milton's opinion.

Joyce Moss aggress that political struggles can be seen in the epic. She states:

Paradise Lost is rife with insurrection. Lucifer's, Adam's, and Eve's. By the poem's conclusion, it is clear that obedience to God ought to provide a system of ordering man's behavior in the world. But it is equally clear, according to the poem, that political struggle is a sad fact of fallen humanity, one that perhaps may never be satisfactorily resolved, and that this struggle is rooted in the original battle in the Garden of Eden, in which desire was allowed to overpower reason . . . In this dark philosophy, upon which the poem ends, one perhaps sees Milton's own hard-learned political lessons. (Moss)

Barbara Lewalski asserts that in "Paradise Lost," Milton "poured all that he had learned, experienced, desired, and imagined about life, love, artistic creativity, theology, work, history, and politics" (Lewalski). She claims that the poem is a "more daring political gesture than we often realize" (Lewalski 442) because it "undertakes a strenuous project of educating readers in the virtues, values, and attitudes that make a people worthy of liberty" (Lewalski 442). While on the surface, the epic seems to be a tale of Adam and Eve and the fall, it is certainly much more.

"Paradise Lost" is laced with several underlying themes that relate to human behavior. The overarching story discloses Milton's ideal society through the revelation of man, woman, and their mistakes in the garden. There is no doubt… READ MORE

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