II. Conditionalism Even Woven into Paradise Lost

Milton’s Conditionalist convictions are even woven into Paradise Lost, as seen in the following excerpt. Milton portrayed man as formed of the dust of the ground; God then “infused” into him the “breath of life” (Psalm 104:29, 30). Thus man received “animation from one and the same source of life and breath” (Job 12:10). As a consequence “man became a living soul“: ^{1616) Ibid., p. 188.}CFF2 156.1

“.. He formed thee, Adam, thee, O man,
Dust of the ground, and in thy nostrils breathed
The breath of life; in his own image he
Created thee, in the image of God
Express, and thou becamest a living soul.” ^{1717) Milton, Paradise Lost, book 7, 11. 524-529, in Complete Poetical Works.}CFF2 156.2

And “when God takes back to himself that spirit or breath of life,” then man ceases “to exist.” ^{1818) Milton, Prose Works, vol. 4 p 188.} Man was indeed mortal from the day of the Fall, as forewarned, though he did not die bodily on that same day. Rather, death followed as a consequence:CFF2 156.3

“... My sole command
Transgressed, inevitably thou shalt die,
From that day mortal; and this happy state
Shalt lose, expelled from hence into a world
Of woe and sorrow.” ^{1919) Milton, Paradise Lost, book 8, 11. 329-333, in Complete Poetical Works.}CFF2 156.4

Death, he continues, encompasses the “whole of man,” each part, “the body, the spirit, the soul”—the spirit “principally offending”—all suffering “privation of life.” So he wrote impressively:CFF2 156.5

“... It was but breath
Of life that sinned; what dies but what had life
And sin? The body properly had neither.
All of me then shall die: let this appease
The doubt, since human reach no further knows.” ^{2020) Ibid., book 10, 11. 789-793.}CFF2 156.6