Do you agree Better to reign in Hell than serve in hall?

Answer 1

"Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven" comes from John Milton's Paradise Lost. Specifically, from Book I, the passage reads:…] Here at least
we shall be free; the Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choice
to reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.

• Lines 258-63.

According to Samuel Johnson, in Lives of the English Poets (1781), "The Life of Milton", Johnson says of reading Paradise Lost: "The want of human interest is always felt. Paradise Lost is one of the books which the reader admires and lays down, and forgets to take up again. None ever wished it longer than it is. Its perusal is a duty rather than a pleasure. We read Milton for instruction, retire harassed and overburdened, and look elsewhere for recreation; we desert our master, and seek for companions."

Paradise lost is a detailed accounting of humanity's inner torment and struggle between Good and Evil, Right and Wrong, and the difficulties we experience in choosing what IS truly "right" when an issue seems to have neither a right or wrong answer, only "grey". We all have light and dark sides, the Yin and Yang, the potential to do good or evil.

We can easily hear ourselves, arguing with ourselves, using the quote you gave! Sometimes doing the right thing seems too hard, not as advantageous, and less remarkable---doing what's wrong seems more to our benefit. You can almost hear an angry or bitter person strongly proposing, "Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven!" Or, one might imagine someone today saying this in a joking way when about to do something foolish or wrong, such as over-indulging in alcohol.

Whether any other person agrees with the quote is immaterial--what we think about it makes it personal, belonging directly to our own choosing.

However, I would challenge the idea that doing wrong would make the person "reign" over anything. Doing wrong creates fear and hiding from authorities. When caught, the person goes to jail. With an active conscience, the person will face his / her guilt. Often guilt is harder to get over than just doing right in the first place!

I challenge the idea that doing good means we "serve", as if "service to others" is somehow beneath us. Waitresses serve, but are not beneath the person being served. Nurses and doctors serve in giving physical care, but their service does not reduce them. To serve means seeing ourselves in another person, to do for them as we want done to and for us. Service does not always imply "Heaven"; serving is hard work sometimes. Yet, it is rewarding to serve, to be in service to others. Humans must always serve (e.g. help) each other, or none of us would survive.

Answer 2

I am afraid you have the quote wrong. It is " better to reign in Hell than to serve in heaven " No, I don't agree. The idea of Hell is meant to be a punishment for the person who has lived a life of sin. This stems from the idea that Man is born from sin and must repent through life to correct the sin.