In his address to the Sun Satan expresses his hatred of that bright light because it brings to remembrance the more glorious state from which he fell.
“O thou that, with surpassing glory crowned,
Look’st from thy sole dominion like the god
Of this new World—at whose sight all the stars
Hide their diminished heads—to thee I call,
But with no friendly voice, and add thy name,
O Sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams,
That bring to my remembrance from what state
I fell, how glorious once above thy sphere.”
(IV. 32–39.)