John Milton

...So little knowsAny but God alone to value rightThe good before him but perverts best thingsTo worst abuse or to their meanest use.

Oh goodness infinite, goodness immense!That all this good of evil shall produce,And evil turn to good; more wonderfulThan that which by creation first brought forthLight out of darkness! Full of doubt I stand,Whether I should repent me now of sinBy me done, and occasioned; or rejoiceMuch more, that much more good thereof shall spring;To God more glory, more good-will to menFrom God, and over wrath grace shall abound.

A dungeon horrible, on all sides round, As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames No light; but rather darkness visible Served only to discover sights of woe

Our torments also may in length of timeBecome our Elements.

Gratitude bestows reverence.....changing forever how we experience life and the world.

And now without redemption all mankindMust have been lost, adjudged to death and hellBy doom severe, had not the Son of God,In whom the fullness dwells of love divine,His dearest mediation thus renewed.'Father, Thy word is passed, man shall find grace;And shall grace not find means, that finds her way,The speediest of Thy winged messengers,To visit all Thy creatures, and to allComes unprevented, unimplored, unsought,Happy for man, so coming; he her aidCan never seek, once dead in sins and lost;Atonement for himself or offering meet,Indebted and undone, hath none to bring:Behold Me then, Me for him, life for lifeI offer, on Me let Thine anger fall;Account Me man; I for his sake will leaveThy bosom, and this glory next to TheeFreely put off, and for him lastly dieWell pleased, on Me let death wreak all his rage;Under his gloomy power I shall not longLie vanquished; Thou hast given Me to possessLife in Myself forever, by Thee I live,Though now to death I yield, and am his dueAll that of Me can die, yet that debt paid,Thou wilt not leave Me in the loathsome graveHis prey, nor suffer My unspotted soulForever with corruption there to dwell;But I shall rise victorious, and subdueMy vanquisher, spoiled of his vaunted spoil;Death his death's wound shall then receive, and stoopInglorious, of his mortal sting disarmed.

Yet some there be that by due steps aspireTo lay their just hands on that golden keyThat opes the palace of Eternity.To such my errand is

A grateful mind by owing owes not, but still pays, at once indebted and discharged; what burden then?

Where glowing embers through the roomTeach light to counterfeit a gloom...

Chaos and ancient Night, I come no spy,With purpose to explore or to disturbThe secrets of your realm, but by constraint Wand'Ring this darksome desert, as my wayLies through your spacious empire up to light,Alone, and without guide, half lost, I seekWhat readiest path leads where your gloomy bounds Confine with Heav'n; or if som other place From your Dominion won, th' Ethereal King Possesses lately, thither to arriveI travel this profound, direct my course; Directed no mean recompence it brings To your behoof, if I that Region lost, All usurpation then expelled, reduce To her original darkness and your sway (Which is my present journey) and once moreErect the Standard there of ancient Night; Yours be th' advantage all, mine the revenge.970-987

Long is the way and hard, that out of Hell leads up to light.

Even the demons are encouraged when their chief is "not lost in loss itself.

I will not deny but that the best apology against false accusers is silence and sufferance, and honest deeds set against dishonest words.

All is best, though we oft doubt, what the unsearchable dispose, of highest wisdom brings about.

And of the sixth day yet remainedThere wanted yet the master work, the endOf all yet done: a creature who not prone And brute as other creatures but enduedWith sanctity of reason might erect His stature and, upright with front serene,Govern the rest, self-knowing, and from thenceMagnanimous to correspond with Heaven, But grateful to acknowledge whence his good Descends, thither with heart and voice and eyesDirected in devotion to adore And worship God supreme who made him chiefOf all His works.

Be strong, live happy and love, but first of allHim whom to love is to obey, and keepHis great command!

The end then of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love him, to imitate him, to be like him, as we may the nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue, which being united to the heavenly grace of faith makes up the highest perfection.

He who thinks we are to pitch our tent here, and have attained the utmost prospect of reformation that the mortal glass wherein we contemplate can show us, till we come to beatific vision, that man by this very opinion declares that he is yet far short of truth.