The Divine Right of Kings

Satan Calling Up his Legions, by William Blake

"and by proof we feel Our power sufficient to disturb His Heav'n, And with perpetual inroads to alarm, Though inaccessible, His fatal throne, Which if not victory is yet revenge"

Regaining Paradise

Milton's political views are particularly correlated with the death of King Charles I of England. Regarded as a poor leader, Charles I insisted on "the divine right of kings" or his birth-right to rule, which is supported by passages of the Old Testament (God's endorsement of Judaean and Israeli kings). He readily believed that a king was answerable only to divine justice, and as such repudiated Parliament's attempt to try him. Milton and Parliament, however, thought differently, in regards to a king's relationship with his people.

Milton's stance is evidenced by Satan's rebellious behavior throughout Paradise Lost. His initial address to the fallen angels in Hell is based largely in Milton's polemical tracts. However, Milton's Satan evidences slight imperfections, which exhibits his "corrupt nature" (Roberts). The relationship Adam and Eve have with the Garden of Eden is correlative with God's relationship with the residents of Heaven. Satan's "Great Debate" in Book 2 may be read as an allegorical record of Milton's feelings toward the shifting government.

Milton's Response

Milton believes an English king should have a catering relationship to his people, to whom he serves, and that a king is "bound" to his country. Milton's argument in The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates contradicts the king's defense: "He [Milton] contends that for the king to make himself answerable only to God is to make himself a god, heretically contradicting the divine ordering of creation" (Roberts). Through this tract he exhibits the tyrannical aspects of Charles' rule, uses classical references to Plutarch, and Tacitus, and unifies biblical and classical references, which would be evidenced in Paradise Lost.

"No man who knows aught can be so stupid to deny that all men naturally were born free, being the image and resemblance of God himself, and were, by privilege above all the creatures, born to command and not to obey." (CPW, III.198)

"It follows that to say kings are accountable to none but God, is the overturning of all law and government [...] for if the king fear not God, [...] we hold then our lives and estates by the tenure of his mere grace and mercy, as from a god, not a mortal magistrate. (CPW, III.204)

The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates, John Milton (1649)

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