This inward breaking up of anger into a divided self, this constraint, for it is in opposition to the anger, and Achilles appears at first to be wholly filled with wrath, the epic poet has a perfect right to represent at the same time as an external event. In a similar case in the "Odyssey" we find Minerva acting the part of escort for Telemachus. This attendance is rather more difficult to grasp as a personal experience of the emotional life of Telemachus, although we can readily fix on certain points of contact between the external image and the emotion experienced. And this it is we may generally say which constitutes the cheerful buoyancy of the Homeric gods, and the irony implied in the honour paid to them. Their self-consistency and seriousness are characteristics which tend to dissolve like a cloud, precisely to the extent that they unfold themselves as the very powers which are native to man's emotional life, and thereby, in their manifestation, leave humanity alone with its own possessions. However, it is not necessary to look so far abroad for a complete example of the conversion of a purely mechanical conception of Divine activity into the atmosphere of the subjective consciousness, the sphere, that is, of freedom and ethical beauty. In his Iphigenia in Tauris Goethe has in this connection carried the process through with a beauty that we cannot sufficiently admire. In the drama of Euripides Orestes in complicity with Iphigenia carries off the statue of Diana. This is simply an act of stealing. Then Thoas comes on the scene, and orders their pursuit, and the recovery of the bust of the goddess. Finally, in very prosaic fashion, Athene appears and orders Thoas to stay his hand on the ground that she has independently commended Orestes to the charge of Poseidon, and he, in deference to her wishes, has already carried Orestes far over seas. Thoas submits to her advice and replies to it in the following terms (v, 1442, 43): "Lady Athene, whoever, on hearing the words of the gods, does not obey them is but a fool. For how could it be right and fit to contend with the mighty gods." In this relation we can only see the bare external command of Athene on the one side, and an equally futile submission of Thoas on the other. In Goethe's treatment of the subject, on the contrary, Iphigenia becomes herself exalted to the rank of a goddess, in reliance upon the truth she feels within herself, the truth of a human heart. In this sense she turns to Thoas and exclaims: Is it then man alone who has the right To accomplish things none ever heard before! Shall he alone impress upon the strength Of hearts heroic the impossible? That which in the drama of Euripides the command of Athene effects, the change in the attitude of Thoas, Goethe's Iphigenia endeavours to bring about, and in fact does bring about, through the depth of the feelings and ideas with which she confronts him.