Milton was blind when he wrote Paradise Lost and left us a beautiful description at the start of Book 3: Hail holy light, offspring of Heaven first-born, Or o

Milton was blind when he wrote Paradise Lost and left us a beautiful description at the start of Book 3: Hail holy light, offspring of Heaven first-born, Or of the Eternal Coeternal beam May I express thee unblamed? ...but thou Revisitest not these eyes, that roll in vain To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn; So thick a drop serene hath quenched their Orbs, Or dim suffusion veiled. ...as the wakeful Bird Sings darkling, and in shadiest Covert hid Tunes her nocturnal Note. Thus with the Year Seasons return, but not to me returns Day, or the sweet approach of Even or Morn, Or sight of vernal bloom, or Summer's Rose, Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine; But cloud instead, and ever-during dark Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Cut off, and for the Book of knowledge fair Presented with a Universal blank Of Nature's works to me expunged and razed, And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out. So much the rather thou Celestial light Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell Of things invisible to mortal sight.