ds, and his
consort Fricka lie sleeping. Wotan, you will observe, has lost one eye;
and you will presently learn that he plucked it out voluntarily as the
price to be paid for his alliance with Fricka, who in return has brought
to him as her dowry all the powers of Law. The meadow is on the brink of
a ravine, beyond which, towering on distant heights, stands Godhome, a
mighty castle, newly built as a house of state for the one-eyed god and
his all-ruling wife. Wotan has not yet seen this castle except in his
dreams: two giants have just built it for him whilst he slept; and the
reality is before him for the first time when Fricka wakes him. In that
majestic burg he is to rule with her and through her over the humble
giants, who have eyes to gape at the glorious castles their own
hands have built from his design, but no brains to design castles for
themselves, or to comprehend divinity. As a god, he is to be great,
secure, and mighty; but he is also to be passionless, affectionless,
wholly impartial; for Godhead, if it is to live with Law, must have no
weaknesses, no respect for persons. All such sweet littlenesses must be
left to the humble stupid giants to make their toil sweet to them; and
the god must, after all, pay for Olympian power the same price the dwarf
has paid for Plutonic power.

Wotan has forgotten this in his dreams of greatness. Not so Fricka. What
she is thinking of is this price that Wotan has consented to pay,
in token whereof he has promised this day to hand over to the giants
Fricka's sister, the goddess Freia, with her golden love-apples. When
Fricka reproaches Wotan with having selfishly forgotten this, she finds
that he, like herself, is not prepared to go through with his bargain,
and that he is trusting to another great worldforce, the Lie (a European
Power, as Lassalle said), to help him to trick the giants out of their
reward. But this force does not dwell in Wotan himself, but in another,
a god over whom he has triumphed, one Loki, the god of Intellect,
Argument, Imagination, Illusion, and Reason. Loki has promised to
deliver him from his contract, and to cheat the giants for him; but he
has not arrived to keep his word: indeed, as Fricka bitterly points
out, why should not the Lie fail Wotan, since such failure is the very
essence of him?

The giants come soon enough; and Freia flies to Wotan for protection
against them. Their purposes are quite honest; and they have no doubt
of the god's