The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Paradise Lost by John Milton: Therefore so abject is their punishment,
Disfiguring not God's likeness, but their own;
Or if his likeness, by themselves defaced;
While they pervert pure Nature's healthful rules
To loathsome sickness; worthily, since they
God's image did not reverence in themselves.
I yield it just, said Adam, and submit.
But is there yet no other way, besides
These painful passages, how we may come
To death, and mix with our connatural dust?
There is, said Michael, if thou well observe
![](http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0451524748.01.MZZZZZZZ.gif) Paradise Lost |