Satiation in John Milton’s Paradise Lost and Margaret Cavendish’s Blazing World
Hell is huge but it isn’t big enough. Within the text of Paradise Lost by John Milton, it is, 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, inutterable, and worse… (II.622-6)There is no satiety in Hell. Eden, by comparison, is a relatively small place in Milton’s epic poem, but it seems to be an environment replete with satisfaction. Or is it? We students of experiential literature owe Milton a debt of gratitude for helping us to experience our forebears’, that is Adam and Eve’s, lack of satiation within a paradisiacal environment. This paper will explore the topic of satiety within that environment; and, along the way, discuss the concept of singularity found in Cavendish’s Blazing World for comment upon that satiation.
Milton begins at the middle of his epic with an appeal to music, a universal and fulfilling language, “Restore us, and regain the blissful seat, Sing Heavenly Muse” (I.5-6).He immediately places us after the fall and takes us beyond sentience with an invocation to a muse, only this muse is beyond all muses and this epic is above all epics:
I thence Invoke thy aid to my advent’rous song,That with no middle flight intends to soar
Above th’ Aonian mount, while it pursues Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme. (I.12-16)
Milton establishes himself as the legitimate teller of the tale – and this tale will take us beyond the mythology of the Greeks’Aonian Mount and inoculate us against Hell’s prodigiousness. He is taking us beyond mythological or explanatory pictures of ourselves, to an area where we may bask in a greater comfort:
Taught by the Heav’nly Muse to venture down The dark descent, and up to reascend,
Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,And feel thy sovran vital lamp… (III.19-22)
In her note to the reader in The Description of A New World, Called The Blazing World, it is evident that Margaret Cavendish seeks to take us beyond mere studious thoughts, to a place sated with fancy:
And this is the reason, why I added this piece of fancy to my philosophical observations, and joined them as two worlds at the ends of their poles;
both for my own sake, to divert my studious thoughts, which I employed in the contemplation thereof, and to delight the reader with variety, which is always pleasing.
The use of labor came in two forms; indenture servitude and Slavery used on plantations in the south particularly in Virginia. The southern colonies such as Virginia were based on a plantation economy due to factors such as fertile soil and arable land that can be used to grow important crops, the plantations in the south demanded rigorous amounts of labor and required large amounts of time, the plantation owners had to employ laborers in order to grow crops and sell them to make a profit. Labor had become needed on the plantation system and in order to extract cheap labor slaves were brought to the south in order to work on the plantations. The shift from indentured servitude to slavery was an important time as well as the factors that contributed to that shift, this shift affected the future generations of African American descent. The history of colonial settlements involved altercations and many compromises, such as Bacons Rebellion, and slavery one of the most debated topics in the history of the United States of America. The different problems that occurred in the past has molded into what is the United States of America, the reflection in the past provides the vast amount of effort made by the settlers to make a place that was worth living on and worth exploring.
Receiving steady business and making sure customer’s wants and needs are met in the restaurant world is the only way to ensure a successful business. The environments you experience can affect everything. Panera Bread’s comfortable relaxed environment encourages a happy mood which will lead to people continuing to dine with them. Panera Bread is an excellent restaurant and my overall experience was amazing. I will recommend the restaurant to other with no discretion.
The slaves could not get all the necessary nutrients from the food supplied. If approved by the master, a small piece of land could be worked by the male slaves to create a garden to help better their diet slightly.
Slavery was the main resource used in the Chesapeake tobacco plantations. The conditions in the Chesapeake region were difficult, which lead to malnutrition, disease, and even death. Slaves were a cheap and an abundant resource, which could be easily replaced at any time. The Chesapeake region’s tobacco industries grew and flourished on the intolerable and inhumane acts of slavery.
The wretched living conditions were not acceptable. The plantation workers had to live in very small houses with many people. Often two families had to share a ten square foot houses. These plantation workers had to pay these small houses. They had to keep the house clean at all times even though they were barely in the room or the other family made the mess. Lastly if the plantation workers got
Plantations did not always start out with the availability to produce crops. It took a lot of manpower and time to get the land into shape. Slaves were brought into the plantations when it was just deserted land, and forced to chop down trees, cultivate the land, and build manmade water canals. The best example we can see of this is the "Carolina Rice Plantation." Hiring the slaves to do these jobs made the land more valuable in the long run.
Slave trade grew gradually when it began in 1600's. As the demand for labor in the colonies increased, a number of plantation owners resorted to slave labor. These plantation owners used s...
The controversies surrounding slavery have been established in many societies worldwide for centuries. In past generations, although slavery did exists and was tolerated, it was certainly very questionable,” ethically“. Today, the morality of such an act would not only be unimaginable, but would also be morally wrong. As things change over the course of history we seek to not only explain why things happen, but as well to understand why they do. For this reason, we will look further into how slavery has evolved throughout History in American society, as well as the impacts that it has had.
For these landowners, slave labor was an ideal way of labor for their crops. These owners wanted slave labor for many reasons some being the fact that the enslaved laborers had a better idea of how to work and grow the crops. Along with that the biggest incentive for hiring slave labor was receiving 150 acres of land for every imported slave that they obtained (Alan
Tobacco plantation formed an essential component of Pre-Civil War African-American slavery. During the early colonial period in the United States, plantation constituted as the highest percentage of economic activity. The economic growth of American colonies relied on the export of cash crops such as rice, indigo etc. However, out of all cash crops, tobacco became the most popular one due to its use for pipes, cigars, and snuff. Due to this growing demand for tobacco in Europe, Early American settlers discontinued all other economic activities and started tobacco cultivation. As a result, tobacco became the principal and dominant cash crop of Southern colonies such as Virginia, Chesapeake, and Maryland. Now growing tobacco was very labor- intensive, as it required a large amount of work force. For the plantation and processing of tobacco, thousands of indentured servants and slaves worked at farms. An example of American tobacco plantation is shown in document seven, “Illustration of Slaves Cultivating Tobacco, 1738.” As tobacco plantation grew in importance in the southern economy, the demand for more workers grew as well. This increase in labor demand, and the desire of money making urged early American settlers to seek free labor. In short, tobacco plantation became the key step to promote the need of free permanent labor, and to raise the Question of slavery.
This epic simile portrays shockingly disgusting imagery of war and death, which are both consequences of eating the fruit of knowledge. Sin and Death, Satan’s daughter and son (who is also his Grandson) take full advantage of the Fall of Man and construct a bridge between Hell and Earth through Chaos, constructed of anything ‘Solid or slimy’. This allowed death, sin and disease to enter the world, similar to the great Greek Myth of Pandora’s box, where a woman named Pandora unleashed all the negative emotions from their captivity inside a box. Thus, showing both Milton’s classical influences and education at Christs College, Cambridge and how attitudes to women have remained constant through many centuries, from the period of the Ancient Greeks to the 1600s. Man’s disobedience would be the sole point of blame for all the wrongs in the world to Milton’s audience, not only was this a story but the events transpired. This was an easy way for the Church to explain the mass destruction caused by the Great Plague from 1665
Steadman, John M. Milton's Epic Characters: Image and Idol. Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press. 1968
Although the epic poem centers around the story of the fall of man, it is interesting that Milton intertwines in this story the fall of Satan from heaven and the consequences it has not only for Satan himself, but for Adam, Eve, and the world as a whole. Milton allows the reader to see the fall from the point of view of Satan, God, as well as Adam and Eve. Because Milton gives insight into these characters feelings regarding the fall, it is no surprise that he uses “eternal providence” in conjunction with the stories of Satan, Adam, and Eve. The providence being described here is the knowledge of good and evil. However, ev...
MacCaffrey, Isabel. "Satan’s Voyage". Modern Critical Views: John Milton . Bloom, Harold, ed. Chelsea House Publishers: New York, 1986.
Throughout Paradise Lost, Milton uses various tools of the epic to convey a traditional and very popular Biblical story. He adds his own touches to make it more of an epic and to set forth new insights into God's ways and the temptations we all face. Through his uses of love, war, heroism, and allusion, Milton crafted an epic; through his references to the Bible and his selection of Christ as the hero, he set forth a beautifully religious Renaissance work. He masterfully combined these two techniques to create a beautiful story capable of withstanding the test of time and touching its readers for centuries.