[Milton-L] (no subject)

[Nigel Smith (nsmith at Princeton.EDU)]

Dear Joad,

As ever, far too long.  Are you there?  How are things?

Are you still going to put something in the JMEMS volume I'm editing with David Aers?

All the best,

Nigel.  

----- Original Message -----
From: Joad Raymond <joadraymond at googlemail.com>
Date: Saturday, November 8, 2008 10:43 am
Subject: Re: [Milton-L] (no subject)
To: John Milton Discussion List <milton-l at lists.richmond.edu>

> Milton's unfallen angels also learn through experience -- for 
> example, about
> pain in the war in heaven. Commentators adopt various positions on 
> thistopic, emphasising intuition or experience or continuing 
> revelation. For
> example, Milton's friend Henry Lawrence says there are four grounds of
> angelic knowledge: i) natural; ii) revelation; iii) experience; iv)
> supernatural. Having no senses angels know by species infused into 
> them, but
> they also know by reasoning, which they perform with speed and 
> accuracybeyond human comprehension. Thus their modes of knowing are 
> much more like
> ours than Aquinas suggests. John Salkeld adopts a more Thomistic 
> position.But it's worth noting that there are a range of positions 
> on this topic
> expressed in C17th Europe, and Milton probably writes expecting us 
> to be
> familiar with these debates.
> 
> There's even more on the varieties of knowledge possessed by fallen 
> angels.Wollebius writes: "There remained also in them no small 
> knowledge, and a
> sagacity also of searching out future things, having these helps. 
> 1. Their
> natural knowledge. 2. Their long experimental knowledge. 3. 
> Astrologie. 4.
> The knowledge of Scripture, chiefly of the Prophets. 5. Extraordinary
> revelation, so often as God makes use of the service of these 
> torturers."Milton's Satan also knows things in several ways.
> 
> Joad Raymond
> 
> On Fri, Nov 7, 2008 at 8:54 PM, Horace Jeffery Hodges <
> jefferyhodges at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> > John Rumrich wrote:
> >
> > "Angels are very intelligent, Milton believes, and they tend to 
> understand> phenomena intuitively, by sudden apprehension. But one 
> might reply that
> > Satan sits on top of the tree of life and doesn't understand it 
> at all. Go
> > figure."
> >
> > Jeffery Hodges suggests:
> >
> > But Satan is fallen and as God's adversary can now think only in
> > purely adversarial, instrumental ways. He *might* still be 
> capable of
> > reasoning intuitively, as an angel, but we see him reasoning 
> *discursively> *, asking himself questions and seeking answers. 
> Perhaps he is clever --
> > a high IQ sort of guy -- but Milton portrays him as lacking 
> genuine insight.
> >
> > Jeffery Hodges
> >
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> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
> But I have promises to keep,
> And miles to go before I sleep,
> And miles to go before I sleep.
> ~~~~ Robert Frost
>