mainstream, but also contains what are easily some of the most iconic and memorable lines from the poem. "The mind is its own place" is Satan's greatest piece of advice and ironically what separates him from God. Because he sees himself as his own person, detached from the kingdoms of Heaven and Hell, he is made likely to rebel. Interesting also how it relates to to ideas of individualism and ambition in American society.

What interests me the most about this tactic is the fact that Milton does not necessarily give his longest, most complex sentences to pivotal plot moments. We've had multiple instances where Milton lends syntactically nuanced sentences to seemingly unimportant similies.

This explanation seems like a stretch. While I'm aware Milton probably paid a lot of attention to stressed and unstressed syllables in his writing, it feels like the pairing of Darkness and Visible just made Milton make an exception to the rule.

“Deviation heightens tension” This is a great point, and is done throughout Paradise Lost with great effect. A good example from book 6 is when Abdiel is scolding Satan and says:

Against his worthier, as thine now serve thee, Thyself not free,but to thyself enthralled;

“As thine now serve thee,” in itself sounds condemnatory but is vague enough that is leaves readers in need of more elaboration. This is given in the second line, which implies that Satan is at the mercy of his own compulsions. When split like this - at first in vague terms and then more specific - this revelation feels more dramatic, like a one-two punch.

I agree with the author here that verse distances readers from the reality of events in fiction and invites contemplation, but would disagree with the implication that verse and theater do this more than other forms of art. Every fictional device, even editing in documentary, causes some srot of reflection.

This last line throws me off a bit. From what I can gather, I think it has to do with the conception of faith we discussed last class. It seems to be saying that God only asks of us to be committed, consistent, and patient in following his command.

This line is interesting to me because it seems to have the same combination of time signatures we've seen in other Milton pieces. In one sense he is looking at how he spent all his waking hours during his life. On the other hand, this line evokes the rhythm of a day, when the sun sets in the west and darkness falls.