words are sincere, an offer to undo his wrong.

5. At this point there is a change in Ulysses, his victory has begotten
insolence, he becomes a kind of Cyclops in his turn. Such is the demon
ever lurking in success. Listen to his response to the confession and
supplication of his wretched victim: "Would that I were as sure of
taking thy life and sending thee down to Hades, as that the
Earth-shaker shall never heal thine eye." The implication is that the
God cannot do it--an act of blasphemy which the God will not be slow to
avenge. But how true to human nature is this new turn in Ulysses, how
profound! No sooner has he escaped and experiences the feeling of
triumph, than his humanity, nay his religion vanishes, he sweeps over
into his opposite and becomes his savage enemy. What follows? The law
must be read to him too, his own law; he will hear it from the mouth of
Polyphemus, and it is essentially this: As thou hast done to me, so
shall it be done to thee.

Accordingly we have next the curse of the Cyclops denounced upon the
head of the transgressor. This curse is to be fulfilled to the letter,
the poet has fully shown the ground of it, Ulysses has really invoked
it upon himself, it lies in his deed. Possibly Polyphemus, when he
offered to give the dues of hospitality and to send the guest home, was
merely using the words of deception, which he had just had the
opportunity of learning, and was trying to get possession of his
enemy's body. Doubtless it was well for Ulysses to keep out of the
giant's hands. But that does not justify his speech, which was both
cruel and blasphemous.

Hear then the curse of the Cyclops, which hints the great obstructing
motive to the return of Ulysses, and marks out the action of the poem;
"Give Ulysses no return to his home; but if he returns, may he arrive
late and in evil plight, upon a foreign ship with loss of all his
companions, and may he find troubles in his house." Of course Neptune
heard the prayer, had to hear it, in the divine order of things. The
curse lay inside of Ulysses, else it could not have been fulfilled; he
himself could drop from his humane and religious mood in adversity and
become a savage in prosperity. His chief misfortunes follow after this
curse. But for the present he escapes to Goat Island, though another
portentous rock is hurled at him by the Cyclops. There he sacrifices to
the Highest God, Zeus, who, however, pays no heed--how is it possible?

Such is