Explanation: "A dungeon horrible, on all sides round...With ever burning sulphur unconsumed." (Lines 61-69)

Explanation:

"A dungeon horrible, on all sides round
As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames
No light, but rather darkness visible
Served only to discover sights of woe,
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
That comes to all, but torture without end
Still urges, and a fiery deluge, fed
With ever burning sulphur unconsumed."
(Lines 61-69)

Answer: These lines occur in 'Paradise Lost' Book I, the famous epic by John Milton, the great poet of England in the seventeenth century. In these lines, the poet describes Hell, where Satan finds himself along with the rebel angels, after his fall from Heaven.

The place called Hell is a horrible dungeon surrounded by fire on all sides but there is no light. According to medieval notions, the flames of Hell give no light because the damned are deprived of the sight of God who symbolises light. Milton uses the oxymoron 'darkness visible' to create a powerful image of darkness. Satan and his followers are guilty of high treason against God. They have waged an impious war and have thus incurred God's wrath to be imprisoned in Hell which comprises "regions of sorrow" and "doleful shadows". Hell for Satan and his companions is a mental state, as Milton would like us to believe that it is also a physical reality. It is a fiery deluge, fed with ever-burning sulphur unconsummated. It is a place of endless torture for its denizens. Peace and rest are unknown here. Hope which comes to all human beings is also a stranger in this place.

Milton's description of Hell echoes that of Dante in his "Inferno, III, 9". Geologically it refers to a volcanic region. Perhaps Milton has drawn upon visual memory as well as upon imagination and combined actual sense impressions with literary reminiscence. In his blindness, Milton possibly went back to an occasion during his Italian journey when he visited the Phlegraean Fields lying close to Naples. The Sofatara called the "Forum Volcani" is the crater of a half-extinct volcano, destitute of vegetation. On the right, there is still a pool of hot water, other pools have formed and disappeared. It is also likely that Milton compares his hell with the burning Aetna, the great volcano in the centre of Sicily.