Ulysses
shuddered at the proposition; truly he has the choice between the devil
and the deep sea, and he manfully chooses the latter. First, however,
the Goddess has to take the great oath "by Earth, by Heaven above and
Styx below," the sum total of the physical universe, from whose
presence the perjurer cannot escape, though a God, that she is not
practicing any hidden guile against her much-desired guest. Always the
doubter, the skeptic Ulysses will show himself, even toward a divinity.
He must test the Gods also, as well as man. Very beautiful and humane
is the answer of the Goddess: "Such things I plan and deliberate for
thee as I would devise for myself, were I in so great straits. For I
too have a righteous mind, and the heart within my breast is not of
iron, but compassionate."

Has a change come over the Goddess through this visit from Olympus?
Hardly could she have felt this before, else she would have sent away
Ulysses of her own accord. Her adjustment to the divine decree seems
now to be internal, and not simply a yielding to an external power.
Still the separation costs her deep pangs, and she wonders how Ulysses,
a mortal, can give her up, who is immortal, with all her beauty and the
pleasures of her paradise.

The answer of Ulysses reveals the man in his present stale of mind. He
recognizes Calypso as beautiful, deathless, ever young; still he must
have something more than sensuous life and beauty; though it last
forever, it can never satisfy. Not to be compared with the Goddess in
grace and stature, is his wife Penelope, still he longs for his home;
"yea, though some God wreck me on the wine-dark deep, I shall endure."
But there is no doubt the other side is also present in Ulysses; he has
within himself a strong sensuous nature with which is the battle, and
the poem does not disguise the matter, for he is again ready to enjoy
all the pleasures of Calypso's bower, after this paroxysm of
home-sickness.

Such is the deep struggle of the man; such is also the divine obstacle,
which has to be removed by an Olympian interference before he can
return. We see that Ulysses in spite of all blandishments of the
Goddess and momentary weakness of himself, was ready for its removal;
in his heart he has overcome Calypso, and wishes to get back to his
institutional life in Family and State. Such a man must return, the
Gods must be on his side, else they are not Gods. According to the
Greek conception, Calypso is a s