Did anyone else notice that Milton puts himself on par with Homer and a bunch of other super famous people? In one passage he writes, "I equaled with them in renown, / Blind Thamyris and blind Maeonides, / And Tiresias and Phineus prophets old" (3. 34-36). He includes himself among these famous writers, poets, and prophets. When he wrote Paradise Lost, he was blind, just as all these other poets were. He saw this similarity and decided to attribute their other qualities of fame, respect, and renown to himself. While this is a prideful claim, Milton is also showing truth through this.
It is a literary trope that the blind can see truth even though they cannot see the world. This is seen very clearly in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex. In this play, the blind prophet Teiresias attempts to convince King Oedipus of his sins. Oedipus refuses to believe him and says that Teiresias is a “sightless, witless, senseless, mad old man” (20). In response, Tiresias cries out, “You mock my blindness, do you? / But I say that you, with both your eyes, are blind” (22). Tiresias is blind and sees the truth; Oedipus can see perfectly well and yet is blind to his own sins.
Milton uses this idea of the blind seeing truth in Paradise Lost. Soon after claiming his place among the blind prophets, he shows how lack of sight can lead to truth. He invokes the Spirit with the following words:
...thou celestial Light
Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers
Irradiate, there plant eyes, and mist from thence
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight. (3. 51-55).
The light of God shows far more truth than anything that man could see on his own. Milton says that it is better to see through God than to rely on one’s own sight. The only way that one can really know the truth is to acknowledge that man is blind unless God reveals His truth by His light. It doesn't matter if you have 20-20 vision. If you can't see God's truth, you are blind.
P.S. I commeneted on Madison's and AnnaKate's posts.
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