Paradise Lost Fate and Free Will Quotes Page 1

This describes how Satan's associates were allowed to "wander" over the earth because of God's "suff'rance," or forbearance after the Fall. The most important word here is "trial," a word that comes up repeatedly in the poem and in Milton's other writings. It suggests something like a test of man's virtue, which is made manifest when he is tempted and refuses.

God makes it clear that Adam will fall through his own "fault." Even though this sounds like predestination, it's actually foreknowledge. God sees all events – past, present, and future – as simultaneous or present, including Adam's fall, which hasn't happened yet (in the poem). Just because God knows it will happen though doesn't mean he makes it happen; He knows how Adam himself will make it happen.

This passage picks up where the previous left off; things like "fate," "predestination," or "high foreknowledge" don't control one's destiny; in fact, God here places the onus on man's "will," which isn't subject to such external forces as "fate," etc.