Virtue
Comus is a multilayered text, but its primary focus is on the concept of virtue that the Lady espouses through her unwavering commitment to chastity. Throughout the masque, the Lady's chastity transforms from a private state of being to an active and powerful form of protection. Even Comus, who is enticed by the Lady precisely because of her virginal manner, recognizes that "something holy lodges in that breast" (246) and that the Lady's speech is "set off by some superior power" (801). Furthermore, the conversation between the two brothers underscores the idea that chastity is an outward and effective power. The Elder Brother compares chastity to a soldier's armor and recalls the virginal warrior-goddess Diana from antiquity to demonstrate the force chastity holds. Lastly, it is the Lady's commitment to preserving her virtue that saves her from being corrupted by Comus. And, as the masque concludes, the Attendant Spirit encourages the audience to "Love Virtue" above all else in order to gain eternal life in heaven (1019). Milton's celebration of virtue marks a major departure from the masque tradition, which conventionally depicted the revelry and whims of courtly life. Many have argued that Comus represents Milton's attempt to claim the masque for a distinctly Christian tradition.
Feminine Agency
In making the Lady the protagonist of Comus, Milton reinforces the value of virtue and righteousness over violence and force. Both Comus and the Second Brother, though for markedly different reasons, assume the Lady is weak and vulnerable as she travels alone through the woods. Milton attempts to overturn this paradigm of female vulnerability by transforming the Lady's chastity into an element of strength rather than weakness, thereby challenging the notion of an effective defense against corruption. Indeed, the two brothers, despite their zeal, fail to actually free the Lady from Comus's charms when they burst into the palace with their swords. It is in fact Sabrina, a virginal river nymph, who returns the Lady to her family. Thus, Milton endows his protagonist with markedly feminine virtues that are deployable in the same way as masculine force, but are ultimately much more effective as they are guided by the word of God.
Alternative Structures of Government
Beyond his poetry, John Milton is known for the role he played in the fraught political climate of seventeenth-century England. A staunch critic of the English monarchy, the Anglican church, and the divine right of kings, Milton frequently used his poetry to comment on what he saw as a corrupt and ungodly political system. Comus is no exception, as Milton uses the landscape of the masque to indicate alternative structures of government that depart from absolute power. The first indication of these alternative structures comes at the very beginning of the masque, when the Attendant Spirit notes that the Neptune "to grace his tributary gods / By course commits to several government, / And gives them leave to wear their sapphire crowns, / Ad wield their little tridents" (24-27). Here, the Spirit informs the audience of Neptune's decision to delegate power to numerous local gods. At the end of the masque, it is the river nymph Sabrina—another local deity—who ultimately frees the Lady from Comus's charms. In representing these smaller authority figures, Milton subtly advocates for the importance of local governments within a commonwealth, rather than an absolute monarchy prone to corruption and inequity.
Hypocrisy
Just as Milton uses Comus as a means of political critique, he also uses the masque to highlight hypocrisy in how people think about combatting corruption and sin. Early on in the masque, he uses the Lady as a mouthpiece for a scathing review of courtly life, when she notes that courtesy stems more frequently from the impoverished commoner than from princes and kings. Here, Milton suggests that the court has been overrun by self-indulgence and no longer lives up to its reputation for benevolent rule. In addition, Milton stages an extensive conversation between the two brothers in which the Elder Brother reminds the Second Brother of the efficacy of chastity. While this conversation highlights Milton's interest in the primacy of virtue, it also humorously depicts the brothers' own hypocrisy as they philosophize about the utility of chastity while failing to follow the Attendant Spirit's directions to reject violence.
Temptation
Comus as a character represents debauchery, sin, and excess. However, he also represents temptation to the virtuous to join him in his revels by drinking from his magic cup. In this way, Comus again mirrors the character of Satan in Paradise Lost, who determines that it is preferable to rule in hell than to serve God in heaven. This determination is what eventually leads him to Eden to tempt Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge. Comus's role in the masque is remarkably similar, as he attempts to convince the Lady to drink from his cup that will, unbeknownst to her, transform her into the grotesque half-beasts that follow Comus around. That the Lady is able to resists Comus's temptations—defined, just like Satan, by his rhetorical prowess—is a testament to the power of virtue and godliness in the face of sin.
Rhetorical Skill
Comus is known for his debauchery and temptation, but along with these qualities comes his skill as a rhetorician. Just like Satan in Paradise Lost, Comus's ability to tempt the virtuous stems from his talent at manipulating language. Milton uses variations in rhyme and meter throughout the text to indicate Comus's rhetorical adaptability. When he first appears in the masque, for example, he speaks in rhymed couplets of trochaic tetrameter, a notably lighthearted and mirthful rhythm that underscores his penchant for food, drink, and carnality. Once he engages the Lady in conversation, however, he quickly switches to blank verse, or unrhymed iambic pentameter, indicating his attempts to seduce her through more serious and thoughtful means. The Lady responds in kind, mirroring his own speech patterns and often completing lines of verse that Comus begins. As such, Milton uses poetic elements to indicate that though Comus is a skilled rhetorician and thus a particularly dangerous tempter, the Lady is an equally skilled adversary armed with virtue and a free mind.
Social Welfare
The theme of social welfare appears in tandem with that of virtue, as the Lady and Comus argue about how individual belief affects societal structure. The Lady, armed with her chastity, argues that virtuous behavior demands modesty, moderation, and "unsuperfluous even proportion" of resources (773). Comus, unsurprisingly, advocates for indulgence and excess, saying that if moderation reigned supreme, humanity would serve God "as a grudging master, / As a penurious niggard of his wealth" (725-726). Comus attempts to convince the Lady that temperance makes men slaves to God, a perspective remarkably similar to that of Satan in Milton's epic Paradise Lost. As such, Milton uses the Lady's virtue as a means by which she can both defeat Comus and reinforce God's message about equity in society—something about which Milton felt strongly, having often accused members of the English clergy of overindulgence and corruption.