In this article, I aim to identify and explicate stylistic distinctiveness in the use of - ed clauses in parts of Milton's Paradise Lost, in the process testing findings outlined in a 1968 article by Seymour Chatman. I compare the frequency of occurrence of the clause type in the Milton texts with that in a constructed corpus of Early Modern English poetry, and with that in the Helsinki corpus. I measure differences in usage of the clause type by focusing on the use of -ed clauses in stretched chains of control, and on the way adverbially functioning -ed clauses map onto conceptual semantic space. I demonstrate how literary effects are conditioned and enabled by the clause type's properties as outlined in cross-linguistic studies. I prove that in the data analysed Milton's use of -ed clauses is a distinctive feature of his style.