The Odyssey is a tale of the sea. Ulysses is the type of sagacity, as well as of bravery, his mind teems with inventions. In the boy Telemachus we behold a son struggling to cut loose from his mother's leading-strings, and laudably ambitious to be of use to his parents. In the Odyssey we gain a distinct advance upon the moral results obtained from the study of the biblical stories. In the Bible it is chiefly the love of parents for their children which is dwelt upon, in the Odyssey the devotion of children to their parents; and this, of course, marks a later stage. In the Odyssey, too, the conjugal relation comes into the foreground. In the Bible, the love of the husband for his wife is repeatedly touched upon. But the love of the wife for the husband is not equally emphasized, and the relations between the two do not receive particular attention. The joint authority of both parents over their children is the predominant fact, the delicate bonds of feeling which subsist between the parents themselves are not in view. And this again corresponds to the earlier stage of childhood. The young child perceives the joint love which father and mother bear toward it, and feels the joint authority which they exercise over it. But as the child grows up, its eyes are opened to perceive more clearly the love which the parents bear to one another, and its affection for both is fed and the desire to serve them is strengthened by this new insight. Thus it is in the Odyssey. The yearning of Ulysses for his wife, the fidelity of Penelope during twenty years of separation, are the leading theme of the narrative, and the effect of this love upon their son is apparent throughout the poem. Let us now consider the ethical elements of the Odyssey in some detail, arranging them under separate heads. 1. _Conjugal affection._ Ulysses has been for seven years a prisoner in the cave of Calypso. The nymph of the golden hair offers him the gift of immortality if he will consent to be her husband, but he is proof against her blandishments, and asks for nothing but to be dismissed, so that he may see his dear home and hold his own true wife once more in his arms. "Apart upon the shore He sat and sorrowed. And oft in tears And sighs and vain repinings passed the hours, Gazing with wet eyes on the barren deep."[14]