![]() ![]() ![]() Finally, he goes forth on his own to cross Chaos and find Earth. Satan also calls for and leads the grand council. Satan tells the other rebels that they can make "a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n" (I, 255) and adds, "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heav'n" (I, 263). In those books, Satan rises off the lake of fire and delivers his heroic speech still challenging God. Most of these writers based their ideas on the picture of Satan in the first two books of Paradise Lost. Writers and critics of the Romantic era advanced the notion that Satan was a Promethean hero, pitting himself against an unjust God. ![]() ![]() However, the progression, or, more precisely, regression, of Satan's character from Book I through Book X gives a much different and much clearer picture of Milton's attitude toward Satan. Probably the most famous quote about Paradise Lost is William Blake's statement that Milton was "of the Devil's party without knowing it." While Blake may have meant something other than what is generally understood from this quotation (see "Milton's Style" in the Critical Essays), the idea that Satan is the hero, or at least a type of hero, in Paradise Lost is widespread. ![]()
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