The emphasis that has been here laid on the theme of Paradise Lost and the place of our books is in its structure may well prompt the questions: Is the story true?, and, Did Milton believe it?. Neither question admits a simple answer. Few people today, and fewer still among qualified theologians, take the story of the Fall in Genesis as any more literally true than the account of Creation in seven days that precedes, or that of Noah´s ark that follows it. Those who accept the Bible as the supreme authority in spiritual matters regard the first chapter of Genesis as an affirmation that God is the Creator of all things, and the third as an affirmation that man has grievously failed to fulfil the Divine intention for him, or his own highest possibilities, but that on the contrary he has brought upon himself many of the evils from wich he suffers.

Such people would regard the Fall story as a “myth” enshiring a profound truth. The word does not by its origin (Greek mythos = “word” or “speech”) suggest that the story is either true or false; so that it could conveniently be used by Plato for the stories concluding some of his dialogues to convey his beliefs and those of his master, Socrates, about the ultimate things. The word is also used for the traditional tales of all nations wich cannot be traced to historical foundations; but the importance of the Platonic use is that, although the tale may have no historical basis, it is being employed to express an unshakeable conviction abou things not capable of proof or disproof by the methods of natural science, such as the inmortality of the soul. Similarly for the statement that Satan spoke to Eve in the form of a Serpent no one can produce the kind of evidence that can be used to substantiate the Norman Conquest, or the execution of Charles I; and few Christians any longer hold that this sort of truth is to be looked for in Genesis, any more than in the myths of Plato. Yet Plato´s myths were not related for amusement, like fairy stories, but, like the parables of Jesus, in order to convey spiritual truth.
 

It has been pointed out that Milton made considerable use of the most famous Plato´s myths-that of Er at the end of The Republic-is describing limbo and Satan´s journey to Earth in Book III. It is not, however, being suggested here that the poet himself would have applied the word “myth” to the story of Paradise Lost but he may well have regarded it in the same light as myths were regarded by the only secular author whose volumes Milton ever called “divine”, that Plato whom Coleridge could dub “Milton´s darling”.

©York Notes . Paradise Lost .Books I-II and IV-IX. John Milton by Richard James Beck . Paradise Lost . Books I-II and IX-X  By R.E.C. Oxford University Press.