John Milton

Freely we serveBecause we freely love, as in our willTo love or not; in this we stand or fall.

Of four infernal rivers that disgorge/ Into the burning Lake their baleful streams;/Abhorred Styx the flood of deadly hate,/Sad Acheron of sorrow, black and deep;/Cocytus, nam'd of lamentation loud/ Heard on the rueful stream; fierce Phlegethon/ Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage./ Far off from these a slow and silent stream,/ Lethe the River of Oblivion rolls/ Her wat'ry Labyrinth whereof who drinks,/ Forthwith his former state and being forgets,/ Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain.

How charming is divine Philosophy! Not harsh, and crabbed as dull fools suppose, But musical as is Apollo's lute, And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets, Where no crude surfet raigns.

But now at last the sacred influenceOf light appears, and rom the walls of Heav'nShoots far into the bosom of dim NightA glimmering dawn; here Nature first begins her farthest verge, and Chaos to retireAs from her outmost works a broken foeWith tumult less and with less hostile din,

Whose but his own? ingrate, he had of meeAll he could have; I made him just and right,Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.Such I created all th_ Ethereal PowersAnd Spirits, both them who stood and them who fail__;Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell.Not free, what proof could they have giv__ sincereOf true allegiance, constant Faith or Love,Where only what they needs must do, appear__,Not what they would? what praise could they receive?What pleasure I from such obedience paid,When Will and Reason (Reason also is choice)Useless and vain, of freedom both despoil__,Made passive both, had served necessity,Not mee. They therefore as to right belong__,So were created, nor can justly accuseThir maker, or thir making, or thir Fate;As if Predestination over-rul__Thir will, dispos__ by absolute DecreeOr high foreknowledge; they themselves decreedThir own revolt, not I; if I foreknewForeknowledge had no influence on their fault,Which had no less prov__ certain unforeknown.So without least impulse or shadow of Fate,Or aught by me immutable foreseen,They trespass, Authors to themselves in allBoth what they judge and what they choose; for soI form__ them free, and free they must remain,Till they enthrall themselves: I else must changeThir nature, and revoke the high DecreeUnchangeable, Eternal, which ordain__Thir freedom: they themselves ordain__ thir fall.

Father, I do acknowledge and confessThat I this honor, I this pomp have broughtTo Dagon, and advanc__ his praises highamong the Heathen round; to God have broughtDishonor, obloquy, and op__ the mouthsOf Idolists, and Atheists[_]The anguish of my Soul, that suffers notMine eye to harbor sleep, or thoughts to rest.This only hope relieves me, that the strifeWith mee hath end.

And looks commercing with the skies,Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes.

For so I created them free and free they must remain.

Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.

Thou canst not touch the freedom of my mind.

Celestial light, shine inward...that I may see and tell of things invisible to mortal sight

For books are not absolutely dead things, but... do preserve as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. I know they are as lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous Dragon's teeth; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armed men. And yet on the other hand unless warriors be used, as good almost kill a Man a good Book; who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image; but he who destroys a good book, kills Reason itself, kills the Image of God, as it were in the eye. Many a man lives a burden to the Earth; but a good Book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.John MiltonAreopagitica

Many a man lives a burden to the Earth, but a good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, imbalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.

A good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.

For books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are; nay, they do preserve as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them.

Awake, arise or be for ever fall__.

How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth,Stol'n on his wing my three-and-twentieth year!

The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven..