...Egypt with Assyria strove In wealth and luxury. The ascending pile Stood fixed her stately height; and straight the doors Opening their brazen folds,...the smooth And level pavement: from the arched roof, Of starry lamps and blazing cressets, fed With naphtha and asphaltus, yielded light As from a sky....

...enshrine Belus or Scrapis their gods . . . . . . Th' ascending pile Stood fixed her stately height, and straight the doors Opening their brazen folds...the smooth And level pavement; from the arched roof Pendant by subtle magic many a row Of starry lamps and blazing cressets fed With naphtha and asphaltus...

...and theological systems and suggestions Milton imagines a splendid Pandemonium, illuminated with •" a row Of starry lamps, and blazing cressets, fed With naphtha and asphaltus,"— where resides the majestic Prince, or " Chief of many throned powers That led the embattled seraphim...

...with Pandaemonium. Both are enveloped in a dense, smoky atmosphere. From the roof of Pandaemonium, Pendent by subtle magic many a row Of starry lamps...and blazing cressets fed With naphtha and asphaltus yielded light As from a sky. (PL. 1.727-3o) The irony in "light / As from a sky" has to do not only...

...a fabric huge Rose like an exhalation, with the sound Of dulcet symphonies and voices sweet, . . . and straight the doors, Opening their brazen folds,...blazing cressets, fed With Naphtha and Asphaltus, yielded light As from a sky. (1:23; PL 1:710-30) Keats comments, "What creates the intense pleasure...

...pile Soon fixed her stately height, and straight the doors Opening their bra2en folds discover wide0 Within her ample spaces, o'er the smooth And level...Pendent by subtle magic many a row Of starry lamps and bla2ing cressets fed0 With naphtha and asphaltus yielded light0 As from a sky. The hasty multitude...

...wide Within, her ample spaces, o'er the smooth 725 And level pavement: from the arched roof Pendant by subtle Magic many a row Of Starry Lamps and blazing Cressets fed With Naphtha and Asphaltus yielded light As from a sky. The hasty multitude 7W) Admiring enter'd, and the work some praise And...

...description of the palace of Pandemonium right down to book and line number: from the arched roof Pendant by subtle Magic many a row Of Starry Lamps and blazing Cressets fed With Naphtha and Asphaltus yielded light As from a sky. (PL 1.726-30) 120 (dependent lychni laquearibus aureis incensi et noctem...

...Egypt with Assyria strove In wealth and luxury. The ascending pile Stood fixed her stately highth, and straight the doors Opening their brazen folds...the smooth And level pavement: from the arched roof Pendant by subtle Magic many a row Of Starry Lamps and blazing Cressets fed With naphtha and asphaltus5...

...3.358-64) with the eminently concrete descriptions of Pandaemonium: "and straight the doors / Op'ning thir brazen folds discover wide/ Within, her ample spaces, o'er the smooth / And level pavement" (1.723-6). 27 On Milton's doctrine of the middle way. see Richard Halpem. "Puritanism and Maenadism...