Paradise Lost Sin Quotes Page 2

Naïve readers often suggest that Eve was tainted from the get go, but Adam reminds us, yet again, that she is "entire[ly]" free "from sin and blame." Just because Eve goes off to garden by herself does not automatically make her a sinner. This passage is important alongside God's remarks about predestination, etc. as it emphasizes the ideas of innocence and purity, which seem to be related to all that stuff about freewill.

Milton goes to great lengths to display the intemperance associated with Eve's sin. Notice how ravenously she eats: "greedily," "engorged without restraint," and "heightened as with wine." The irony, of course, is that Eve is "eating death" (how does one do that?), but she doesn't know it, and continues to eat voraciously.

After the Fall, Sin and Death build a bridge to earth; Adam and Eve have left the earth "open wide" for Sin and Death. In other words, while the characters Sin and Death can now make their way towards earth, the point is sin and death more generally have now become a part of the (fallen) world.