Season 3 Podcast 238, Milton's Paradise Lost, Bk IX, Pt XXV, "Temptation of Adam Pt A"

Milton’s Paradise Lost Bk IX, Pt XXV, “Temptation of Adam Pt A” In the preface to Book IX, Milton presents the following abstract[Eve], pleased with the taste, deliberates awhile whether to impart thereof to Adam or not; at last brings him of the fruit; relates what persuaded her to eat thereof.  Adam at first amazed, but perceiving her lost, resolves, through vehemence of love, to perish with her; and, extenuating the trespass, eats also of the fruit: the effects thereof in them both; they seek to cover their nakedness; then fall to variance and accusation of one another. Feeling the effects of the fruit, Eve praises the tree of knowledge of good and evil.O Sovran, virtuous, precious of all TreesIn Paradise, of operation blestTo Sapience, hitherto obscured, unfamed,And thy fair Fruit let hang, as to no endCreated; The first effect on Eve is a desire to know everything. Eve vows to dedicate her life to caring for the tree until she has all knowledge.but henceforth my early care,Not without Song, each Morning, and due praiseShall tend thee, and the fertile burden easeOf thy full branches offered free to all;Till dieted by thee I grow matureIn knowledge, as the Gods who all things know;Milton shows that Eve understands the power of the forbidden fruit. She wants to be as the Gods knowing good and evil. Milton also portrays Eve as fully understanding that the Gods are omniscient. Milton, unlike others, portrays Eve as equal to Adam in her search for knowledge. She understands that without eating of the forbidden fruit, she would have remained in ignorance, and the only way of wisdom is by eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.Though others envy what they cannot give;For had the gift been theirs, it had not hereThus grown. Experience, next to thee I owe,Best guide; not following thee, I had remainedIn ignorance, thou op’nst Wisdom’s way,And giv’st access, though secret she retire.Already Eve perceives that she must keep her secret hidden. And I perhaps am secret; Heav’n is high,High and remote to see from thence distinctEach thing on Earth; and other care perhapsMay have diverted from continual watchOur great Forbidder, safe with all his SpiesAbout him. However, she deceives herself into thinking she can hide from God. She turns her thoughts to Adam and contemplates how she can approach him.  It is a huge dilemma for Eve because she knows that she is now different from Adam and cannot remain in the Garden of Eden. She ponders if she should hide her secret from him. She realizes that she is now far superior to Adam and wonders if she should let Adam continue in blissful ignorance while she grows in knowledge, or should she tell him her secret. She understands that knowledge gives one power over another. She wrestles with the idea that perhaps she should remain superior to Adam.But to Adam in what sortShall I appear? shall I to him make knownAs yet my change, and give him to partakeFull happiness with me, or rather not,But keep the odds of Knowledge in my powerWithout Copartner? so to add what wantsIn Female Sex, the more to draw his Love,And render me more equal, and perhapsA thing not undesirable, sometimeSuperior; for inferior who is free?