Chapter II: Second Twelve Books (5)

It is the virgin land, the virgin world, which now has a young virgin as its central character and representative, to mediate Ulysses with itself, the universal man who must also have the new experience. Still she is not all of Phaeacia, but its prelude, its introductory form; moreover, she is just the person to conduct Ulysses out of his present forlorn condition of mind and body into a young fresh hope, into a new world. The Calypso life is to be obliterated by the vision of the true woman and her instinctive devotion to the Family. We are aware that Ulysses has not been contented with the Dark Island and its nymph, he has had the longing to get away and has at last gotten away; but to what has he come? Lost the one and not attained the other, till he beholds Nausicaa, who grasps him by the hand, as it were, and delivers him wholly from Calypso, leading him forth to her home, where he is to witness the central phase of domestic life, the mother.

The organism of the Book easily falls into two parts, one of which portrays Nausicaa at home, the other gives the meeting between her and Ulysses. Yet over this human movement hovers always the divine, Pallas is the active supernal power which brings these events to pass, introducing both the parts mentioned. She is the providence which the poet never permits to drop out. Most deeply does the old singer's sincerity herein move the reader, who must rise to the same elevation; Homer's loyalty is to faith, faith in the Divine Order of the World, for this is not suffered to go its way without a master spirit; the individual, especially in his pivotal action, is never left alone, but he fits in somewhere; the Whole takes him up and directs him, and adjusts him into the providential plan; not simply from without but through himself. Such is this poet's loyalty to his Idea; he has faith, deep, genuine faith, yet unostentatious, quite unconventional at times; a most refreshing, yes, edifying appearance to-day, even for religious people, though he be "an old heathen."

Such continual recurrence of the God's interference with the course of events--what does it mean? This is unquestionably the fundamental problem with the earnest student of Homer. Let us observe, then, first, that the poet's principle is not to allow a divine intervention to degenerate into a merely external mechanical act; himself full of the spirit of the God, he puts the divine influence inside the individual as well as outside, and thus preserves the latter's freedom in the providential order. The faithful reader will never let these movements of the deity drop into mere machinery; when he does, he has lost the essence of Homer. Doubtless it requires an alert activity of mind to hold the Gods always before the vision in their truth; they must be re-thought, or indeed re-created every time they appear. The somnolescent reader is only too ready to spare himself the poetic exaltation in which the old bard must be read, if we would really see the divinities, and grasp the spirit of their dealings with man. Speak not, then, of epical machinery in Homer, the word is misleading to the last degree, is indeed libellous, belieing the poet in the very soul of his art.

In the present Book there is not by any means as much divine intervention as in the preceding one; we pass from the lower realm of the water-gods to that of Pallas, the goddess of intelligence, who is the sole active divinity in this Book. She appears to Nausicaa at the beginning in the form of a dream, and bids the maiden look after some washing. Our first question is, why call in a goddess for such a purpose? The procedure seems trivial and unnecessary, and so it would be under ordinary circumstances. But through this humble and common-place duty Nausicaa is made a link in the grand chain of the Return of Ulysses, which is the divine plan underlying the whole poem, and is specially the work of Pallas. To be sure this had no place in Nausicaa's intention, but it does have a place in the providential scheme, which has, therefore, to be voiced by the Goddess. Yet that scheme does not conflict with the free-will of the maiden, which finds its fullest scope just in this household duty, and brings out her character. She reveals to Ulysses her nature, this is the occasion; she had to be free to represent what she truly was to the much-experienced man. An ordinary wash-day has little divinity in it, but this one is filled with the divine plan. Thus small events, otherwise immediately forgotten, may by a mighty co-incidence he elevated into the sphere of the World's History, and become ever memorable. That French soldier who threw a camp-kettle over the head of Mirabeau's ancestor and thus saved him from being trampled to death by a passing troop of cavalry, made himself a factor in the French Revolution, and was inspired by whom, demon or angel?

As already hinted, the structure of the Book is determined by the two interventions of Pallas, which divide it into two portions; these are shown in the following outline:--

I. (1.) Pallas appears to Nausicaa in a dream, and gives the
suggestion.

(2.) Nausicaa, when she awakes, obeys the suggestion and
proceeds to the place of the washing.

II. (1.) Ulysses also asleep, lies in his cover not far from the
same spot, when Pallas starts the plan for his waking.

(2.) Meeting of Ulysses and Nausicaa, and the going to the city.

In both parts we observe the same general method; the divine influence, beginning above, moves below and weaves the mortal into its scheme through his own action.

I.

First is a short introduction giving a bit of the history of the Phaeacians, in which we catch a glimpse of their development. They once dwelt near the Cyclops, the wild men of nature, from whom they moved away on account of injuries received; they could live no longer in such a neighborhood. Here we note an important separation, probably a change of life which leaves the ruder stage behind. The colony is led forth to a new land by its hero, who lays the foundation of a social order by building houses, temples to the Gods, and a wall round the city, and who divides the territory. Thus a civil polity begins by getting away from "the insolent Cyclops" or savages. On the other hand, civilized enemies who might bring war, seem not to dwell near the Phaeacians, beloved of the Gods. Beyond all conflict, inner and outer, lies the fortunate realm; it touches the happy mean between barbarism and civilization, though perchance on the road from former to latter; at present, however, it is without the evils which go before it and come after it. As already stated, it is an idyllic world, life appears to be one continued festival, with song and dance of youth. It is not real Greece, not Ithaca, which just now is a land of discord and conflict. What the poet says of Olympus in a famous passage a little further on in this book, seems applicable, in spirit at least, to Phaeacia:

The storm-wind shakes it not, nor is it wet
By showers, and there the snow doth never fall;
The calm clear ether is without a cloud,
And over all is spread a soft white sheen.

1. Now comes the appearance of Pallas, who "like a breath of wind" approaches the couch of the maiden in slumber, and admonishes her about the washing. Some such care the Goddess does impose upon the housekeeper to this day, and if report be true, at times troubles her dreams. It is indeed an important duty, this necessity of keeping the household and its members clean, specially the men, too often indifferent. Young Nausicaa, just entering upon womanhood, is ready for the divine suggestion; plainly she has come to that age at which the Goddess must speak to her on such matters. So much for Pallas at present.

2. Therewith we touch another fact; the maiden has reached the time when she must think, of marriage, which she instinctively regards as her true destiny in life. Still it does not appear that she is betrothed though "the noblest Phaeacians are wooing thee." In simple innocence there hovers in her mind the thought of Family, yet she shows a shy reserve even before her father. With that sweet thought is joined the primary household care, which naturally enough comes to her in a dream. Cleanliness is next to godliness is our modern saying; it is certainly the outward visible token of purity, which Nausicaa is going to bring into her domestic surroundings. We may reasonably think that in the present scene the external deed and the internal character mirror each other.

It must be confessed, however, that to the modern woman wash-day, "blue Monday," is usually a day bringing an unpleasant mood, if not positive terror. She will often declare that she cannot enjoy this Phaeacian idyl on account of its associations; she refuses to accept in image what in real life is so disagreeable. As a symbol of purification the thing may pass, but no human being wishes to be purified too often. Nausicaa's occupation is not popular with her sex, and she herself has not altogether escaped from a tinge of disrelish.

It is curious to note how customs endure. What Homer saw, the traveler in Greece will see to-day wherever a stream runs near a village. The Nausicaas of the place, daughters and mothers too, will be found at the water's side, going through this same Phaeacian process, themselves in white garments even at their labor, pounding, rubbing, rinsing the white garments of their husbands, brothers, sons. Not without sympathy will the by-stander look on, thinking that those efforts are to make clean themselves and their household, life being in truth a continual cleansing for every human soul. So Hellas has still the appearance of an eternal wash-day. (See author's _Walk in Hellas, passim_.)

Nausicaa obtains without difficulty wagon and mules and help of servants. After all, the affair is something of a frolic or outing; when the task is done, there is the bath, the song, and a game of ball. It is worthy of notice that the word (_amaxa_) here used by old Homer for _wagon_, may still be heard throughout Greece for the same or a similar thing. In the harbor of Piraeus the hackman will ask the traveler: "Do you want my _amaxa_?" The dance (_choros_), is still the chief amusement of the Greek villagers, and, as in Nausicaa's time, the young man wishes to enter the dance with new-washed garments, white as snow, whose folds ripple around his body in harmony with his graceful movements. Many an echo of Phaeacia, in language, custom and costume, can be found in Greece at present, indicating, like the Cyclopean masonry, the solid and permanent substructure of Homer's poetry, still in place after more than 2500 years of wear and tear.

II.

The washing is done now, the sport is over, and the party is getting ready to go home; but the main object is not yet accomplished. Ulysses and Nausicaa are here to be brought together--the much-experienced man and the innocent maiden with her pure ethical instinct of Family. In many ways the two stand far asunder, yet in one thing they are alike: each is seeking the domestic relation, each will consummate the bond of love which has two phases, the one being after marriage and the other before marriage. Both are moving in their deepest nature toward the unity of the Family, though on different lines; Ulysses and Nausicaa have a common trait of character, which will be sympathetically found by each and will bring them together.

I. At this fresh turn of affairs there is an intervention of Pallas, not prolonged, but sufficient: "Thereupon Athena (Pallas) planned other things, that Ulysses should wake, and see the fair-faced maiden who would conduct him to the city of the Phaeacians." The Goddess does not appear in person, as the deities so often do in the Iliad, nor does she take a mortal shape, or move Ulysses through a dream; she simply brings about an incident, natural enough, to wake the sleeping hero. Why then introduce the Goddess at all? Because the poet wishes to emphasize the fact that this simple incident is a link in the providential chain; otherwise it would have no mention. The ball is thrown at one of the servants, it falls into the stream, whereat there is an outcry--and Ulysses wakes.

Of course, the latter had at first his usual fit of doubt and complaint, just when the Gods are helping him: "Ah me! to what land have I come! What men are here--wild, insolent, unjust, or are they hospitable, reverencing the Gods? I shall go forth and test the matter"--and so by an act of will he rescues himself from inner brooding and finds out the truth.

2. Now we are to witness the gradual outer approach between Ulysses and Nausicaa, till it becomes internal, and ends in a strong feeling of friendship if not in a warmer emotion. The wanderer, almost naked, with only "a branch of thick leaves bound about his loins," comes forth from his hiding place, a frightful object to anybody, a wild man apparently.

All the servants run, but Nausicaa stands her ground before the nude monster; being a Princess she shows her noble blood, and, being innocent herself, what can she he afraid of? Thus does the poet distinguish her spiritually among her attendants, as a few lines before in the famous comparison with Diana he distinguished her physically: "Over all the rest are seen her head and brow, easily is she known among them, though all are fair: such was the spotless virgin mid her maids." Thus is hinted the outer and also the inner superiority which has now revealed itself in the Phaeacian Princess.

Henceforth a subtle interplay takes place between her and Ulysses, in which we observe three main stages: First, the wild man in appearance he steps forth, yet he succeeds in touching her sympathy, wherein her charity is shown; Second, the transformed man, now a God in appearance he becomes, at whose view the maiden begins to show deep admiration, if not love; Third, the passing of Ulysses to the city to which he is conducted by the maiden, who also tells him how to reach the heart of the family, namely, the mother Arete. Thus she seeks to mediate him with her country and her hearth.

(1) Ulysses, issuing from his lair, addresses her in a speech which shows superb skill on account of its gradual penetration to the soul of the fair hearer. He praises first her external beauty with many a happy touch, yet with an excess which seems to border on adulation. This reaches her outer ear and bespeaks his good-will and gentleness at least. Then he strikes a deeper chord: he mentions his sufferings, those which are past, and forebodes those which are yet to be, perchance upon this shore. "Therefore, O Princess, have compassion, since I have come to thee first; none besides thee do I know in this land. Give me some old rag to throw around me, some useless wrappage which you may have brought hither." Pathetic indeed is the appeal; therewith comes sympathy, the man is no wild Cyclops, whom all Phaeacians still remembered with terror, but a victim of misfortune.

Now comes the culmination of his speech, which shows his keen insight into human nature, as well as his own deepest longing: "May the Gods grant thy heart's desire---husband, home, and wedded harmony." With this praise of domestic life upon his lips he has touched the profoundest chord of her heart; he has divined her secretest yet strongest instinct, and has appealed to it in deep emotion. Yet mark! in the same general direction lies his own dearest hope: he also will return home, to wife and family. Thus he has found the common meeting-place of their souls; the two strike the absolutely concordant note and are one in feeling--he the husband, she the maiden.

In her answer she expresses her strong sympathy, her words indeed rise into the realm of charity. It is no mark of baseness to be unfortunate; "but these must endure," what Zeus lays upon them. Such is the exhortation of the young maiden to the much-enduring man; she has divined too the ground-work of his character. "But now, since thou hast come to our land, thou shalt not want for garment or anything else proper for the needy suppliant." Then she recalls her attendants, reproving them for their flight, and orders them to give to Ulysses food and drink, oil to be used after bathing, and ample raiment. Nor should we pass by that other expression of hers: "all strangers and the poor are Jove's own," under the special protection of the Supreme God, who will avenge their disregard. Such is this ideal world of Phaeacia, still ideal to-day; for where is it realized? The old poet has cast the imago of a society which we are still trying to embody. Well can she say that the Phaeacians dwell far apart from the rest of the nations, "nor does any mortal hold intercourse with us." Thus, too, she marks unconsciously the limit of her people.

(2) The reader, along with Nausicaa, is to see the transformation of the beggarly wanderer, who, having taken his bath and put on his raiment, comes forth like a God. This is said to be the work of Pallas, "who caused him to appear taller and more powerful, with flowing locks, like the hyacinth." He becomes plastic in form, beautiful as a statue, into which the divine soul has been transfused by the artist. Such a transforming power lies within him, yet is granted also by a deity; the godlike in the man now takes on a bodily, or rather a sculpturesque appearance, and prophesies Greek plastic art.

The echo of this change is heard in the words of the maiden: "Hear me attendants; not without the will of the Olympians does this man come to us; lately I thought him unseemly, now he is like the Gods who hold the broad Heavens." Such is her lively admiration now, but what means this? "Would that such a man might be called my husband, dwelling here in Phaeacia!" That note is indeed deeper than admiration.

(3) The third phase of this little play is the bringing of Ulysses to the city and home of Nausicaa. He, having satisfied his hunger, and being ready to start, receives some advice from the maiden, who seeks to conduct him at once to the center of the home. They will pass first through the outlying country, which shows cultivation; then they will go up into the city, with its lofty tower and double harbor; the seafaring character of the people is especially set forth by Nausicaa, whose name is derived from the Greek word for a ship. Particularly we must notice her fear of gossip, which also existed in Phaeacia, ideal though the land was. She must not be seen with Ulysses; men with evil tongues would say: "What stranger is this following Nausicaa? Now she will have a husband." The sharp eye of Goethe detected in this passage the true motive; it is love, always having the tendency to deny itself, which dictates so carefully this avoidance of public report; the thing must not be said just because there is good reason for saying it. Her solicitude betrays her feeling. In pure simplicity of heart she pays the supreme compliment to Ulysses, likening him indirectly to "a God called down from Heaven by her prayers, to live with her all her days." Still further she intimates in the same passage, that "many noble suitors woo her, but she treats them with disdain, they are Phaeacians." To be sure she puts these words into the mouth of a gossipy and somewhat disgruntled countryman, but they come round to their mark like a boomerang. Does she not thus announce to the much-enduring man that she is free, though under a good deal of pressure? All this is done in such an artless way, that it becomes the highest art--something which she does not intend but cannot help. Surely such a speech from such a source ought to repay him for suffering shipwreck and for ten years' wandering.

We cannot, therefore, think of calling this passage spurious, with some critics both ancient and modern. The complaint against it is that the young Phaeacian lady shows here too much reflection, in conjunction with a tendency to sarcasm foreign to her life. But we find it eminently unreflective and naive; the very point of the passage is that she unconsciously reveals the deepest hidden thought and purpose of her heart to Ulysses. With all her being she must move toward the Family, she would not be herself unless she did; yet how completely she preserves modesty and simple-heartedness! Nor is the sarcastic tinge foreign to young girls. So we shall have to set aside the objections of Aristarchus the old Greek, and Faesi the modern German, commentator.

But the final instruction of Nausicaa is the most interesting; the suppliant is not to go to the father but to the mother. Nay, he is to "pass by my father's throne and clasp my mother's knees," in token of supplication; then he may see the day of return. Herein we may behold in general, the honored place of the mother as the center of the Family, its heart, as it were, full of the tender feelings of compassion and mercy. In the father and king, on the other hand, is the man of the State with its inflexible justice, often putting aside sympathy and commiseration with misfortune. The woman's heart may indeed be called the heart of the world, recognized here by the old poet and his Phaeacians.

This mother, however, is in herself a great character; she is next to have a Book of her own, which will more fully set forth her position.

The character of Nausicaa, as here unfolded in the ancient poet, has captivated many generations of readers since Homer began to be read. The story has lived and renewed itself in manifold forms; it has that highest power of a genuine mythus, it produces itself through all ages, taking on a fresh vesture in Time. In old Hellas the tale of Nausicaa was wrought over into various shapes after Homer; it was transformed into a drama, love-story, as well as idyl. The myth-making spirit did not let it drop, but kept unfolding it; later legend, for instance, brought about a marriage between Telemachus and Nausicaa. Our recent greatest poet, Goethe, also responded mightily to the story of Nausicaa; he planned a drama on the subject, of which the outline is to be found in his published works. He did not find time to finish his poem, but there is evidence that he thought much about it and carried it around with him, for a long period. One regrets that the German poet was not able to give this new transformation of his ancient Greek brother, with whom he has manifested on so many lines an intimate connection and poetical kinship. In portions of the _Italian Journey_ specially we see how deeply the Odyssey was moving him and how he was almost on the point of reproducing the whole poem with its marine scenery. But Nausicaa in particular fascinated him, and it would have been the best commentary on the present Book to have seen her in a now grand poetic epiphany in the modern drama of Goethe.

_BOOK SEVENTH._

If the last Book was Nausicaa's, this one is Arete's; there is the transition from the daughter to the mother, from the maiden to the wife. Still it is not quite so emphatically a woman's Book, since the wife has to include the husband in her world. Ulysses now goes to the center of the Family, to its heart, that he may meet with compassion. Still she withholds her sympathy at first for a good reason; Arete is not wholly impulse and feeling, she has thought, reflection. So, after all, it is left to the men to take up the suppliant.

Very surprising to us moderns is the picture drawn by the old Greek poet of this woman, and of her position: "the people look upon her as a God when she goes through the city;" her mind is especially praised; she has a judicial character, supposed usually to be alien to women: "she decides controversies among men," or perchance harmonizes them. To be sure her position is stated as exceptional: "her husband honors her, as no other woman on earth is honored;" she is evidently his counselor as well as wife. Thus the poet would have us regard Arete not merely as a person of kind feelings and of sweet womanly instincts, but she has also the highest order of intelligence; she is united with her husband in head as well as in heart, perchance overtopping him in ability. Not domestic simply is the picture, it rises into the political sphere, even into the administration of justice.

Is the character of the woman, as thus set forth, possibly a thousand years before Christ, by a heathen poet in an uncivilized age comparatively, to be a prophecy unto us still at this late date? Certainly the most advanced woman of to-day in the most advanced part of the world as regards her opportunities, has hardly reached the height of Arete. Unquestionably a glorious ideal is set up before the Sisterhood of all time for emulation; or is it unattainable? At any rate the woman in Homer stands far in advance of her later historical position in Greece.

We may now turn to the husband for a moment, Alcinous the King, the man of civil authority who represents the State, whose function is to be the protector of the Family and of whomever the family receives into its bosom rightfully. He is the element surrounding and guarding the warm domestic center; still he seems to have stronger impulses, or probably less governed, than his wife. Distinctly is the superiority accorded to the woman in this discourse of Pallas to Ulysses; possibly the Goddess may have overdrawn the picture a little in favor of her sex, as really Alcinous becomes the more prominent figure later one.

So we catch a very fascinating glimpse of the Phaeacian world. Two prominent characters representing the two great institutions of man, Family and State, we witness; thus is the spirit of the whole poem ethical. Here is no longer the realm of Calypso, the nymph of wild untrained nature, but the clear sunlit prospect of home and country, the anticipation of sunny Ithaca and prudent Penelope to the hapless sufferer. Ulysses sees his own land in the image of Phaeacia, sees what he is to make out of his own island. Verily it is a great and epoch-making experience for him just before his return; he finds the ideal here which he is to realize.

Accordingly we have in line three women, Calypso, Nausicaa, Arete, through whose spheres Ulysses has passed on his way to his own female counterpart, Penelope. We may see in them phases of man's development out of a sensuous into an institutional life. Nor is the suggestion too remote that we may trace in this movement certain outlines in the progress of mankind toward civilization.

In the mythical history of Phaeacia which is also here given, we can observe the same development suggested with greater distinctness. Already in the previous Book it was stated that the Phaeacians at first "dwelt near the insolent Cyclops," from whom they had to make the removal to their present island on account of violence done them by their neighbors. But now we hear that both Alcinous and Arete are descended on one side from the daughter of King Eurymedon, "who ruled over the arrogant race of Giants," all of whom, both king and "wicked people," had perished. On the other side the royal pair had the sea-god Neptune as their progenitor who was also the father of the Cyclops Polyphemus. It is impossible to mistake the meaning of this genealogy and the reason of its introduction at the present conjuncture. The Phaeacians likewise were sprung of the wild men of nature, and had been at one time savages; but they had changed, had separated from their primitive kindred and begun the march of civilization. The poet has manifestly before his mind this question: why does one branch of the same people develop, and another branch lag behind; why, of two brothers, does one become civilized and the other remain savage? Of this dualism Greece would furnish many striking illustrations, whereof the difference between Athena and Sparta is the best known. Here the change from the locality of the Cyclops, implying also the change in spirit, is made by a hero-king, "the large-souled Nausithous," evidently a very important man to the Phaeacians. Then this respect given to the woman has often been noted as both the sign and the cause of a higher development of a people. At any rate the Phaeacians have made the great transition from savagery to civilization, and thus reveal the inherent possibilities of the race.

We now begin to catch a hint of the sweep of the poem in these portions. Ulysses who has lapsed or at least has become separated from his institutional life, must travel back to the same through the whole rise of society; he has to see its becoming in his own experience, and to a degree create it over again in his own soul, having lost it. Hence the evolution of the social organism passes before his eyes, embodied in a series of persons and places.

In this Seventh Book, therefore, Ulysses is to make the transition to Family and State as shown in Phaeacia, and as represented by Arete and Alcinous. We shall mark three leading divisions:--

I. Ulysses enters the city in the dark, when he is met by Pallas and receives her instructions. The divine principle again comes down and directs.

II. The external side of this Phaeacian world is shown in the city, garden, and palace of the king; nature is transformed and made beautiful for man. All this Ulysses now beholds.

III. The internal side of this Phaeacian world, its spiritual essence, is shown in the domestic and civil life of the rulers and nobles; of this also Ulysses is the spectator, recognizing and appropriating.

Thus we see in the Book the movement from the divine to the human, which we have so often before noticed in Homer. The three parts we may well put together into a whole: the Goddess of Intelligence informs the mind of man, which then transforms nature and builds institutions. Here Pallas simply directs Ulysses, who, however, is now to witness the works of mind done in Phaeacia, to recognize them and to take them up into his spirit.

I.

Ulysses follows the direction of Nausicaa and passes to the city stealthily in a kind of concealment; "Pallas threw a divine mist over him," the Goddess now having the matter in hand. Moreover she appeared to him in the shape of a young girl with a pitcher, who points out the house of Alcinous and gives him many a precious bit of history in her prattle. Again we must see what this divine intervention means; Pallas is in him as well as outside of him. These are suggestions of his own ingenuity on the one hand, yet also the voice of the situation; indeed he knew them essentially already from the instructions of Nausicaa. Still further, they are now a part of the grand scheme, which is in the Olympian order, and hence is voiced by the Gods.

The poet introduces his mythical forms; we hear also the fabulous genealogy of the Phaeacian rulers, the meaning of which has been above set forth. They, too, Arete and Alcinous, have come from the Cyclops, and have made the same journey as Ulysses, though in a different manner. It must be remembered that he has had his struggle with the giant Polyphemus, one of the Cyclops, whereof he will hereafter give the account. But the chief matter of the communication of Pallas is to define to Ulysses the position and character of Arete, evidently a woman after her own heart. In this way the Goddess, taking the part of a prattling maid, gives the royal pedigree, and especially dwells on the importance of the queen. Also she throws side glances into the peculiar disposition of the Phaeacians, needful to be known to the new-comer. They are a people by themselves, distrustful of other peoples; they too must be transcended.

It is well at this point to observe Homer's procedure in regard to Pallas. We can distinguish two different ways of employing the Goddess. The poet says that Pallas gives to the Phaeacian women surpassing skill in the art of weaving. This is almost allegorical, if not quite; the Goddess stands for a quality of mind, is subjective. Again, when she endows Ulysses with forecast in an emergency, it is only another statement for his mental prevision. Many such expressions we can find in the Odyssey; Pallas is becoming a formula, indicating simply some activity of mind in the individual. But in the important places the Goddess is kept mythical; that is, she voices the Divine Order, she utters the grand ethical purpose of the poem, or makes herself a vital part thereof. Thus she is objective, truly mythical; in the other case she is subjective and is getting to be an allegorical figure. The Odyssey, with its greater internality compared with the Iliad, is losing the mythus.

There is a third way of using Pallas and the Gods which is hardly found in Homer, indeed could not be found to any extent without destroying him. This is the external way of employing the deities, who appear wholly on the outside and give their command to mortals, or influence them by divine authority alone. Thus the Gods become mechanical, and are not a spiritual element of the human soul. Virgil leaves such an impression, and the Roman poets generally. Even the Greek tragic poets are not free from it; especially Euripides is chargeable with this sin, which is called in dramatic language _Deus ex machina_.

Though the Homeric poems as wholes are not allegories, yet they have allegory playing into them. Indeed the mythus has an inherent tendency to pitch over into allegory through culture. Then there is a reaction, the mythical spirit must assert itself even among civilized peoples, since allegorized Gods are felt to be hollow abstractions, having nothing divine about them.

There can hardly be a doubt that a proper conception of the relation of the deities to men is the most important matter for the student of Homer. But it requires an incessant alertness of mind to see the Homeric Gods when they appear to the mortal, and to observe that they are not always the same, that they too are in the process of evolution. For instance, in the present Book as well as elsewhere, Pallas must be noted as having two characters, a mythical and allegorical, as above unfolded. Nitzsch, whose commentary on the Odyssey, though getting a little antiquated, is still the best probably, because it grapples with so many real problems of the poem, says: "It is wholly in Homer's manner to represent, in the form of a conversation with Pallas, what the wise man turns over in his own mind and resolves all to himself" (_Anmerkungen zu Homer's Odyssee, Band II, S. 137_). Very true, yet on the next page Nitzsch says that it is "entirely wrong to suppose that Pallas represents the wisdom of Ulysses _allegorically_." But what else is allegory but this embodiment of subjective wisdom? Now Nitzsch truly feels that Pallas is something altogether more than an allegory, but he has failed to grasp distinctly her mythical character, the objective side of the Goddess, and so gets confused and self-contradictory.

One of the best books ever written on Homer is Naegelsbach's _Homerische Theologie_, which also wrestles with the most vital questions of the poem. But Naegelsbach's stress is almost wholly on the side of the Gods, he seems to have the smallest vision for beholding the free, self-acting man in Homer. In his first chapter (_die Gottheit, the Godhead_) he recognizes the Gods as the upholders and directors of the Supreme Order (sec. 28); also they determine, or rather create (_schaffen_) man's thought and will (sec. 42). What, then, is left for the poor mortal? Of course, such a view is at variance with Homer in hundreds of passages (see especially the speech of Zeus with which the action of the Odyssey starts, and in which the highest God asserts the free-will and hence the responsibility of the man). Naegelsbach himself suspects at times that something is wrong with his view and hedges here and there by means of some limiting clauses; note in particular what he says about Ulysses (sec. 31), who is an exception, being "thrown upon his own resources in cases of extreme need," without the customary intervention of the Gods. But the man in his freedom, who co-operates with the God in the providential order, is often brought before the reader in the Iliad as well as in the Odyssey (see author's _Com. on the Iliad_, pp. 129, 157, 216, etc.).

II.

We now come to one of the most famous passages in Homer, describing the palace and garden of Alcinous. First of all, we must deem it the outer setting of this Phaeacian world with its spirit and institutions, the framework of nature transformed which takes its character from within. Civilized life assumes an external appearance corresponding to itself; it remodels the physical world after its own pattern. The result is, this garden is in striking contrast with the bower of Calypso, which is almost a wild product of nature. The two localities are mirrored surrounding each home respectively. Again we observe how Homer employs the description of scenery: he makes it reflect the soul as its center.

In a certain sense we may connect these Phaeacian works with Pallas, who has directed Ulysses hither; they are the works of intelligence. The arts and the industries spring up through the transformation of nature. Here is first noted the palace of the king with certain hints of its materials and construction; especially have the metals been wrought and applied to human uses. Gold, silver, steel, brass or bronze are mentioned in connection with the palace and its marvelous contents. Thus an ideal sense of architecture we note; still more strongly indicated is the feeling for sculpture, the supreme Greek art. Those gold and silver watch-dogs at the entrance, "which Vulcan made by his skill, deathless and ageless for all time;" those golden boys "upon their well-built pedestals holding lighted torches in their hands" are verily indications that the plastic artist has already appeared. The naive expression of life which the old poet gives to the sculpturesque shapes in the palace of Alcinous, is fresh as the first look upon a new world, which is indeed now rising.

But not only the Fine Arts, the Industries also are touched upon. Weaving is specially emphasized along with navigation, one being the Phaeacian woman's and the other being the Phaeacian man's most skillful work. Other occupations are involved in these two. Thus is marked the beginning of an industrial society.

After the palace the garden is described with its cultivated fruit-trees--pear, pomegranate, apples--a good orchard for to-day. Of course the vineyard could not be left out, being so important to the Greek; three forms of its products are mentioned--the grape, the raisin, and wine. Finally the last part is set off for kitchen vegetables, though some translators think that it was for flowers. Nor must we omit the two fountains, such as often spout up and run through the Greek village of the present time.

Undoubtedly fabulous threads are spun through this description. Quite too lavish a use is made of the precious metals in the house of Alcinous, as in some fairy tale or romantic ballad; so much gold is found nowhere outside of wonderland. In the garden fruit is never wanting, some of it just ripe, some still green, some in flower. No change of season, yet the effect of all seasons; surely a marvelous country it appears; still we learn that in Campania are some sorts of grapes which produce thrice a year. A mythical garden is indeed the delight of human fancy. Eden has its counterparts everywhere. Indeed a significant parallel might be drawn between Greek Phaeacia and the Hebrew Paradise; in the one, man unfolds out of savagery, in the other he is created at once by a divine act. Can we not see Orient and Occident imaging themselves in their respective ideal products? The one from below upwards, the other from above downwards; both movements, the Greek and the Hebrew, belong to man, and have entered into his civilization. The next world-poet, Dante, will unite the two streams.

III.

Ulysses now comes to the internal element of Phaeacia, to its soul as it were, manifested in the institutional life of Family and State. From this indeed is derived the beautiful world which we have just witnessed; Art builds up a dwelling-place, which images the spirit of the people to themselves and to others.

In accord with his instructions from both. Pallas and Nausicaa, he first goes to Arete and clasps her knees in supplication, begging for an escort to his country. But behold! She hesitates, notwithstanding his strong appeal to her domestic feeling and her sympathy with suffering. What can be the matter? Another Phaeacian, not of the royal house apparently, but of the nobles, is the first to speak and command the stranger to be raised up and to be hospitably received. An old religious man who sees the neglect of Zeus in the neglect of the suppliant, a man of long experience, "knowing things many and ancient," is this Echeneus; him at once the king obeys, the queen still remaining silent.

Soon, however, we catch the reason of her conduct in the question: "Stranger, where did you get those garments?" She noticed Ulysses wearing the mantle and tunic "which she herself had made with her servants," and which Nausicaa had given him. Surely this is a matter which must be accounted for before proceeding further. Herein the woman comes out in her own peculiar province; no man would ever have noticed the dress so closely; Alcinous did not, and wise Ulysses in this case did not forecast so far out of his masculine domain. But the poet had made the subtle observation and uses it as a turning-point in his little drama. Now we see the queen before us: imagine a pair of dark eyes shooting indignation upon the man clothed with garments intrusted this very morning to the daughter.

Nor should we fail to scan her second question: "Do you not say that you have come hither a wanderer over the deep?" Verily the case is suspicious. Ulysses sees his plight, and at once offers the most elaborate explanation, going back and giving a history of himself for the last seven or eight years. Now we know why the poet specially praised the mind of Arete, and why her husband so honored her, and why she could be judge of disputes among men. She shows the keenest observation united with reasoning power; she stands out in contrast with the Phaeacian men, who follow impulse more readily than she, as she keeps the judicial balance, though a woman, and demands evidence of truth from the uncertain stranger.

We may draw from this scene certain traits of the Phaeacians, as we see here a man, a typical man probably who is outside of the royal family. An ideal humanity seems to live in them; they will receive the unfortunate wanderer and succor him to the fullest extent. More impressive still is their religious faith; they live in intimate communion with the Gods, who appear in person at the feast "sitting among us;" nor do the deities conceal themselves from the solitary wayfarer; "since we are as near to them as are the Cyclops and the wild tribes of Giants." So speaks Alcinous, hinting that kinship, which has been previously set forth; both himself and Arete are the descendants of savages, who were children of the Gods of nature. But they have risen into fellowship with the higher Gods of Olympus. The words of the king seemed to be tinged with sarcasm at those inferior deities, parents of savagery, from whom, however, they themselves are sprung. He cannot forget the Cyclops, the men of violence who once did his people wrong.

In these mythical allusions, obscure enough just here, we have already traced the rise of Phaeacia into an ethical existence. The worship of the higher Gods is the emotional side of such a condition, and the treatment of the suppliant marks an advance toward the conception of an universal humanity. Still Phaeacia, has its spiritual limits, genuine Greek limits, of which hereafter something will be said.

It is sufficient to state that the speech of Ulysses has its effect, it contains a great deal which appeals to the character of Arete; his leaving Calypso and his desire to return to his home-life must be powerful motives towards winning her sympathy. Then she cannot help recognizing and admiring his skill; there is an intellectual bond between them, as well as an ethical one. Not much does she say hereafter, her part being finished; her husband takes the lead henceforth. She has tested the wanderer, Alcinous can now preform the ceremonies.

We soon see that the king needs a counterpart in such a wife, he being impulsively generous; he blames his daughter for her backwardness in not coming to town with Ulysses, whereat the latter frames one of his smallest fibs in excuse of the maiden. Still further, the king in a surprising burst of admiration, wishes that Ulysses, or "such an one as thou art," might stay and be called his son-in-law. Altogether too sudden; Arete would not have said that, though the woman be the natural match-maker. Still Alcinous, in a counter-outpouring of his generosity, promises to send Ulysses to his own land, though "this should be further off than Euboea, the most distant country." Thus overflows the noble heart of the king, but he clearly needs his other half, in the thorny journey of life.

Thus has Ulysses reached the heart of Phaeacia and found its secret beat; he has felt its saving power, not simply externally but also internally; it rescues him from dangers of the sea and of himself too. The truly positive side of life begins to dawn upon him again, after his long career of struggle with dark fabulous shapes. Well may he pray Zeus for Alcinous: "May his fame be immortal over the fertile earth"--a prayer which has been fulfilled, and is still in the process of fulfillment. Arete gives the order to the servants to spread his couch for the night's repose, she has received him.

In the sweep of the present Book, many origins are suggested. The genealogy of the king and queen and people is significant, it might be called the genealogy of civilization. The woman is placed at the center; out of her springs the family, and with it come society, state, the institutional world.

Of such a world the external environment is seen in the garden, palace, and city of the Phaeacians, which are built by the spirit for its dwelling-place and reflect the spirit. The Greek world of Beauty is born, and its course is foreshadowed; this ideal Homeric realm is prophetic of what Greece is to become. The plastic arts and the industrial arts are suggested, and to a degree are realized.

The artistic soul of Hellas is fully felt in Homer's Phaeacia. The formative impulse is everywhere alive and at work; the instinctive need of shaping and transforming nature and life is here in its first budding, and will bloom into the greatest art-people of all time. Those two supreme Fine Arts of mature Greece, Architecture and Sculpture, are present in examples which foretell plainly Phidias and the Parthenon.

King Alcinous; thy fair palace has had fairer offspring,
Thou art ruling the world still by the beautiful form;
Out of thy mansion majestic was born in a song the Greek Temple,
Sentineled round with a choir--Titans columnar of stone,
Bearing forever their burden to hymns of a Parian measure,
Wearing out heaviest Fate to a Pindaric high strain.
Look! those boys of thy garden with tapers are moving to statues,
Seeming to walk into stone while they are bringing the light;
Hellas springs out of thy palace all sculptured with actions
heroic,
Even the God we discern turning to marble by faith.

Such is the originative, prophetic character of Phaeacia, which the reader must take profoundly into his soul, if he would understand the genetic history of Greek spirit. Verily the poet is the maker of archetypes and reveals in his shapes all that his people are to become.

Thou, old Homer, wert the first builder in Greece, the first
carver,
Afterward she could but turn fancies of thine into stone;
Architects followed thee, building thy poem aloft into temples,
Sculptors followed thee too, thinking in marble thy line.

Nor must we forget the Industrial Arts here suggested--weaving, ship-building, the working of metals; in general, there is hinted the varied transformation of nature, which begets a civilized life. Agriculture is present, also horticulture, which the garden of Alcinous presupposes. Such, then, is the grand frame-work for the social order as here portrayed.

But the chief art of the Homeric world has not yet been given, though it is at work now, and is just that which has reproduced Phaeacia with all its beauty. This is the poet's own art, which having set forth the other arts, is next to set forth itself. Accordingly we are to see the poet showing the poet in the following Book, which may, therefore, be named the Book of the Bard. Thus we pass out of the industrial and plastic arts of Phaeacia, into the supreme art, the poetic, as it manifests itself in the Phaeacian singer.

_BOOK EIGHTH._

We observe a decided change in the present Book; it has a character of its own quite distinct from the preceding Books. Yet it is on a line of development with them, we note a further spiritual evolution which must be looked into with some attention. In general, Phaeacia is now seen as an art-world, in true correspondence with Hellas, of which it is a kind of ideal prototype. In the two previous Books we saw portrayed chiefly institutional life in Family and in State. But in this Book institutional life, though present and active, is withdrawn into the background, and becomes the setting for the picture, yet also is the spirit which secretly calls forth the picture. A poetic art-world now passes before us in entrancing outlines, a world filled with song, dance, games, with all the poetry of existence.

Such an artistic development follows from what has gone before. Man, having attained culture, civilization, and a certain freedom from the necessity of working for his daily bread, begins to turn back and look at his career; he observes the past and measures how far he has come. The image of himself in his unfolding he beholds in art, specially in the poetic art, whose essence must at last be just this institutional life which has been described in Phaeacia. He attains it and then steps back and portrays his attaining of it; having done the heroic deed, he must see himself doing it forever, in the strains of the bard. Art is thus the mirror of life and of institutions; it reflects the grand conflict of the times and the people; it seizes upon the supreme national event, and holds it up in living portraiture along with its heroes.