By Anthony Esolen.

I have been committing Paradise Lost to memory - in emulation of a farmer who lived one big field over from a professor of mine, the medievalist George Kane, when George was a boy in Saskatchewan. Yes, I know what Milton thought of the Catholic Church. But Paradise Lost is still the greatest single poem in English, and I find Milton quite shrewd in his psychological analysis of good and evil, and what moves a presumably intelligent being to do wrong.

I write this because some of the prelates in our Church seem to me to have a childish and simplistic, if not guileful, view of the relationship between what we know or think we know, and what it is right for us to do.

Below, from memory, is Adam speaking to Eve in Book 9, on the fateful morning of the temptation and fall. Eve wants to work aside from Adam till noon, to get more done that way, because while they are near each other, they smile, they chat, and "the hour of supper comes unearned." Adam does not think it is a good idea, because, as he and Eve both know very well, they have an enemy somewhere in wait, malicious and devoured with hatred, but subtle and full of guile. Eve says, rightly enough, that God has made them proof against temptation, whether they are together or alone.

Adam will yield, as we know, but in his last warning to Eve he sets forth how an innocent and intelligent soul can yet err in reasoning. God has made man "perfect," that is, finished, fully wrought, what man in his kind should be, and left him secure from outward force. But. . .

within himself

The danger lies, yet lies within his power:

Against his will he can receive no harm.

But God left free the will, for what obeys

Reason is free, and reason he made right,

But bid her well beware, and still erect,

Lest by some fair appearing good surprised

She dictate false, and misinform the will

To do what God expressly hath forbid.

Then not mistrust, but tender love enjoins

That I should mind thee oft, and mind thou me.

Firm we subsist, yet possible to swerve,

For reason not impossibly may meet

Some specious object by the foe suborned,

And fall into deception unawares,

Not keeping strictest watch, as she was warned.

Notice that Adam and Eve, before the Fall, can reason incorrectly, at least for a time. How so? They may view only one aspect of a question. They may draw a hasty conclusion. They may not possess all the pertinent facts. A mistake is not a sin.

Presumably (and Milton has already shown us the process in action, several times), if they let the question rest awhile, if they ask an answer from someone wiser than they are, if they talk the matter over, they will eventually find their mistake in reasoning.

Such mistakes, or unsettled doubts, are of no decisive consequence, if we are talking about why the stars shine when all creatures are asleep, or why the infinitesimally tiny earth should receive influences from all the heavenly bodies, or whether angels can enjoy earthly food.

They are urgent, in the case of Adam and Eve, only when they touch upon the "sole command, sole pledge of their obedience." Suppose then that your reason is "surprised," that is, ambushed, so that some evil action looks good.

This is a common thing: everyone who chooses the wrong chooses it under some aspect of good. Such good is "specious," as Adam puts it. Milton intends the word literally: it is speciosum; it looks flashy on the outside.

Hence we must obey, regardless of what we think we see at the moment. This is not blind obedience. It is a humble acknowledgment of our intellectual limitations, even if we are not confused by sinful desires. When those desires are in force, we can be pretty sure that "reason" will be rationalization, excuse-making, arguing oneself into the position that most pleases.

The stronger the passions, or the more ingrained the habits, the more inevitable the rationalization will be. Sexual sins are not the worst - though that is no more than to say that pneumonia is not as b...