‘Thousands at his bidding speed … They also serve who only stand and wait.’ There is no doubt that Milton is a master of scale His ‘Paradise Lost’ starts before man’s disobedience. His starting-point is the fall of the angels. We forget the angels. Milton does not. Whether we see them as agents or agencies, they give effect to their master’s orders. An empty heaven is full of God’s messengers. ‘His state is kingly,’ as Milton says. He has a retinue. He has limitless resources. He is almighty.
This establishes the cosmic setting as Milton sees it. This new venture of the Almighty is pivotal. Planet earth is where a clash of wills takes place. It is the scene of a contest between good and evil.
This view is of course at odds with a secular understanding of mankind’s inexorable progress. It is an old-fashioned view. Nowadays we do not in general see planet earth as a contest of this kind. An ancient formula, the world, the flesh and the devil loses its pungency; the evanescent, the ephemeral win out in a battle for men’s minds.
Equally, we lose interest in that other trio – faith, hope and love. Such categories of thought avail little in an understanding of planet earth as a repository of prosperity with everything angled to serve that end.
We cannot have it both ways. Planet earth can be regarded as a contest or as progress. Either it has a Maker who gives it meaning or it is a neutral region where man’s views are all that matter. As far as the Christian faith is concerned, our planet (and others like it) is here because the mind of the Maker would have it so. Planet earth has a meaning, a value. Its inhabitants can achieve an understanding of that meaning. The New Testament is a good place to start an inquiry.
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