Scrutinizing Satan's actions raises many concerns about the nature and intention of his behavior, particularly when he debates with or before an audience. An early example of this is Satan's openly weeping before the throngs of devils as he prepares himself for his turn to speak during the debate among devils about what their course of action should be now that they have been forcefully and convincingly tossed from Heaven.

"He [Satan] now prepared
To speak; whereat their doubled ranks they bend
From wing to wing, and half enclose him round
With all his peers: attention held them mute.
Thrice he assayed, and thrice in spite of scorn,
Tears such as angels weep, burst forth: at last
Words interwove with sighs found out their way." (I.615-621)

It is highly unlikely that these tears are genuinely shed out of love and empathy(Carey 138). Satan is a manipulative personality who has patiently bided his time in the debate so that he could speak last and sweep his audience away by rejecting previous speakers' positions without fear of rebuttal, and by making an emotive appeal to the audience to ally themselves with him. Satan's nature raises doubts about whether or not his physical appearance and actions reflect reality. Such a concern makes this public and persuasive event a prime target for reinvestigation. Given Satan's unsurpassable desire for power, which is what led to the revolt in Heaven and the expulsion of the dissidents in the first place (Frye 26), this scene is most convincingly read as Satan's seizing the moment to advance his claim to power. This public and well-timed weeping seems little more than grandstanding. In fact, Satan's behavior here more closely resembles that of an evangelical preacher than that of a politician, which, of course, complicates the act of performance by actual religious speakers. Satan's effectively performed and impeccably timed theatrics allow him to win the crowd and the debate. He thus secures his total authority in Hell and sets into motion his plan for defiling God's new world and his prized creations Adam and Eve. In this case, performance leads to deception, which leads to condemnation. Any tool of communication this powerful that can be used for evil on this scale most certainly raises concerns about performance of admittedly faulted humans. Puritan ministers claimed to speak the truth and to perform the true theatre in some sense, but how is the observer to know if the minister really does have exclusive and unerring access to the truth? How is the observer to know if the minister is not simply living up to the acting standard set by Satan himself?

Satan is a gifted liar who uses his ability to great success throughout the poem, even managing to put on the appearance of an angel of light and acting the part when speaking with Uriel in Book III. Satan's disguise and speech so completely deceive Uriel that Uriel gives Satan directions to get to Paradise so that Satan can act on his expressed interest "to extol the Creator in the contemplation of this the greatest of His works" (Anstice 28-29). Deceiving Uriel is no small feat, for he is one of only seven archangels, and he possesses the most acute vision of any angel in Heaven. Satan, in effect, becomes an actor by taking on a role and playing it so well that he has little trouble hoodwinking an evaluating observer, an audience, even if this viewer is an opponent as intelligent and sensitive as Uriel. Satan's version of theatre during this exchange has all the trappings of good, godly theatre, but the power of the performance allows Satan to distort the reality of his own appearance, to confuse and to mislead his audience, and to act freely on his evil intentions. Indirectly, it also calls the nature of the sermon performance of Puritan ministers into question.

Perhaps the most spectacular example of deception through theatre and external display is Satan's encounter with Eve in Paradise, during which he appears to her as a beautiful, sliding serpent and convinces her to eat the forbidden fruit. Satan uses every means available to him to mislead Eve-(faulty) logic, emotional appeals, cries for equality, and offerings of empowerment-but he begins his assault on her mind by assuming an enticing physical form in an attempt to break down Eve's discretion by drawing her into his visual display. The description of Satan as he approaches Eve in serpent form reveals the level of external display and implies Satan's knowledge of the influence of the visual object:

". . . the Enemy of mankind, enclosed
In serpent, inmate bad, and toward Eve
Addressed his way, not with indented wave,
Prone on the ground, as since, but on his rear,
Circular base of rising folds, that tow'red
Fold above fold a surging maze, his head
Crested aloft, and carbuncle in his eyes;
With burnished neck of verdant gold, erect
Amidst his circling spires, that on the grass
Floated redundant:" (IX.494-503)

The power of external performance, of the false presentation of the self, is most clearly displayed here. Shimmering and winding, weaving and enticing, Satan somehow manages to approach Eve as an upright snake. His modified presentation of physical appearance is breathtakingly beautiful. It pulls his audience, Eve, out of reality and into the constructed realm of performance created, maintained, and inhabited by Satan. Once Satan lures Eve into his brand of theatre, he is able to mislead and to manipulate her, all of which culminates in her conscious disobedience of God by eating the forbidden fruit.

Clearly, Satan is a character not to be trusted. He is nearly impossible to understand or to describe accurately, and he is a masterful performer with a great sense of audience and timing. He assumes any form and performs any role necessary to achieve his goals by convincing audiences that his drama is, in fact, the real drama. He ultimately succeeds in doing this with two audiences: his supernatural followers and Eve. Satan convinces a considerable portion of the angels in heaven to wage a war that they should know without question that they cannot win, and later stands before these same personalities in Hell after their defeat and convinces them to follow him again in a second strike against God. Eve falls for Satan's charms as well when she rejects the truth and ordering of the world given to her by God in order to follow the claims and advice of a total, but very persuasive, stranger. These moments in "Paradise Lost" describe Satan at his performative and persuasive best, and any attempt to understand how Satan manipulates his audience through performance must discuss these three crucial events in Satan's assault on God.

The first of these three speeches to appear in the chronologically ordered divine history retold by Milton (but not the first to appear in the text; Milton frequently jumps backwards and forwards in time) is Satan's speaking in Book V to the angels under his command in Heaven. Here he urges them to throw off the yoke of God's rule and lay siege to the throne of God. The cause for this rebellion is God's declaring his Son his equal in power and glory and making him an equal object of adulation and worship. Satan, then called Lucifer, feels slighted by this action and, while all of heaven rejoices, he alone schemes to abandon God. Satan realizes that he must enlist the help of his angel contemporaries if he is to succeed, and this speech is designed to secure that help and to initiate the rebellion. This speech actually ends up taking the form of a debate with Abdiel, the only angel in their midst who remains faithful to God, a debate which serves to highlight Satan's rhetorical skill and to push the gathered angels toward his position.

Satan orders his legions to assemble at the mountain under the pretense of its being a meeting to better organize their worshipping and welcome of the newly crowned King, the Son. The angels all gather in their customary position at the bottom of the mountain, but this time, it is Satan who sits atop the mountain and speaks to the angelic throng from a richly decorated throne normally reserved for God himself. Even before he says a word in his address to the angels, Satan has made a bold statement that makes his audience more receptive to his utterances and manipulations. He places them in their customary positions of passive reception and acceptance, and assumes the physical position of power for himself, highlighting his authority and the worthiness of his words. Satan's first words-"Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers," (V.701)-are the very words used by God in his address to the angels earlier that day (V.601). Satan encourages his audience to identify with his new message by placing them in a familiar position to hear, at least initially, familiar words. Additionally, Milton's human audience would know these words well because they are a reference to Colossians 1:16-Satan's repetition of God's words affects both the angelic and the human witnesses to the events.

Satan begins his speech with a discussion of the praises to be sung to the newly crowned King. Then, subtly and virtually without warning, Satan suddenly launches into a ferocious attack on the Heavenly hierarchy of power, stating that the required worship of God and Son is "prostration vile, / Too much to one, but double how endured, / To one and to his image now proclaimed" (V.782-784). Satan asks his audience if they would submit to God if a better option were available: "But what if counsels might erect / Our minds and teach us to cast off this yoke? / Will ye submit your necks, and choose to bend / The supple knee?" (V.785-788). Satan's framing the introduction of another form of rule in the form of a question if one will submit to God's unworthy burden is subtle and incredibly important. It allows Satan to remove himself and his true purpose-the acquisition of power-from the discussion by directing the audience's attention to its own thoughts and actions as a collective. Satan consistently refers to "we" and very rarely to "I," thereby making Satan the speaker merely a justice-seeking member of the oppressed legion of angels, not an ambitious revolutionary. By removing himself and his individual ambitions from his speech, Satan is able to draw his audience into his dialogue to the point that they become active agents-we do this, we do that-without sacrificing the authority he gains by the physical positioning of the audience to the speaker. This sort of language also allows Satan to scapegoat God time and again as the party responsible for the injustices done against the angels. Not once does Satan even hint that he or any of his audience is the least bit responsible for these crimes. Placing blame on a third party makes the speech a safer environment for both speaker and audience, and as a result, the audience is more likely to approach, to embrace, and to identify with the speaker. The successful identification of the angels with Satan is revealed by the fact that the entire audience, save one, agrees whole-heartedly with Satan and eventually goes to war for a doomed cause under his guidance.

After his initial invectives, Satan argues his case in more rational terms, claiming that all the inhabitants of heaven are free and equal (in a disturbingly "American" sense of equal-equal in freedom and worth, but unequal in characteristics and skills). Satan proclaims that any attempt to rule over them in a monarchic capacity is an unjust compromise of their equality and freedom.

. . . ye know yourselves
Natives and sons of heav'n possessed before
By none, and if not equal all, yet free,
Equally free; for orders and degrees
Jar not with liberty, but well consist.
Who can in reason then or right assume
Monarchy over such as live by right
His equals, if in power and splendor less,
In freedom equal?" (V.789-797)

This focus of Satan's speech is clearly targeted at the hierarchy in heaven and the perceived injustices associated with it. Heaven's hierarchy is that of an army. God is the king, the archangels the generals, the archangels have angels below them who are next in command, and so on. This hierarchy may exist and operate in Heaven, but the angels who occupy every position but the top often display rather human personality characteristics and emotions, such as happiness, anger, and pride (see Satan's and Gabriel's machismo posing during their confrontation near the end of Book IV. It is reasonable to think that creatures with very human natures would react to hierarchies in very human ways. This discussion is what makes Satan's speech so appealing. He presents the heavenly hierarchy and he delicately introduces subversion of this hierarchy through idealistic speech. This method makes Satan's speech virtually irresistible to a reader steeped in democracy and civil equality. I imagine that Satan's cry for personal freedom would be even more attractive to an audience that occupied the lower levels of a hierarchy that offered no opportunity for advancement. Even if the hierarchy is in heaven, it still goads those within it to aspire to greater heights.

Although heaven's hierarchy is powerful and rigid, Satan offers his audience a means of transcending it. The language is littered with words like "equal," "free," and "justice." Satan offers his listeners hope for higher achievement by appealing to abstract principles that in some way supersede any formal organization of power. But, as the reader soon discovers, Satan is not content merely to provide emotional consolation by dangling hope before his audience. He has far greater aspirations. Satan begins to lure the audience into his way of thinking about the hierarchy in Heaven by appealing to their sensibilities about abstract notions as means of transcending the hierarchy. Once he has his audience's full attention-and once he is sure that his audience shares his opinion of the hierarchy-Satan successfully prompts his listeners to exceed even abstract transcendence by destroying the hierarchy altogether through violent revolt.

One member of the audience, however, does not accept Satan's construction of Heaven. Abdiel, presumably an unremarkable angel of a lower order, calls back to Satan from the crowd. He decries Satan's pride and foolishness, and argues against Satan's interpretation of the heavenly hierarchy. Abdiel's response begins with an extended assault on Satan himself, in which Abdiel chastises Satan for his unfaithfulness and for his tempting others. Abdiel then attempts to refute Satan's argument that the hierarchy is unjust by reinforcing the hierarchy. Unfortunately for Abdiel, his argument is less rational defense than reactionary flailing. Abdiel speaks to Satan as if he were a child or some kind of idiot.

"Shalt thou give law to God, shalt thou dispute
With him the points of liberty, who made
Thee what thou art, and formed the pow'rs of heav'n
Such as he pleased, and circumscribed their being?" (V.822-825)

This response by Abdiel calls up images of a parent telling their two year-old child that the child must behave in a certain way because his or her parent said so, and for no other reason than that. Between Abdiel's scapegoating Satan-and, implicitly, those who listen to and find value in Satan's speech-and his insulting reprimand, it is no wonder that neither Satan nor the angels gathered there find Abdiel's response very attractive.

After destroying audience identification with his speech, Abdiel's argument falls apart altogether when he claims that experience has shown that the angels are better off in the existing hierarchy. Curiously, no one in heaven has ever experienced anything other than the current hierarchy. Abdiel's failure is secured by his inarticulate and confusing attempt to reaffirm the hierarchy through an unconvincing bit of logic.

"But to grant it thee unjust,
That equal over equals monarch reign:
Thyself though great and glorious dost thou count,
Or all angelic nature joined in one,
Equal to him begotten Son, by whom
As by his Word the mighty Father made
All things, ev'n thee, and all the Spirits of heav'n
By him created in their glory, and to their glory named
Thrones, Dominations, Princedoms, Virtues, Powers,
Essential Powers, nor by his reign obscured,
But more illustrious made, since he the head
One of our number thus reduced becomes,
His laws our laws, all honor to him done
Returns our own." (V.831-845)

Even when this confusing passage is unpacked and then stripped down to its main point, it is still a little bewildering: If all are equal and one of the equals is placed at the head, the glory of all is increased because the one's laws become the all's laws, and all honor done to the one is honor done to the all. It would be surprising if the angelic crowd actually understood Abdiel's blabbering, and it would be truly remarkable if the angels accepted Abdiel's position as a result of sound reasoning. Even if the angels were able to sort through this jumble of ideas and phrases, the resulting position of the all in relationship to the one is less than attractive.