For ten uncertain years, Ulysses and his crew were at the mercy of the winds, which wafted them from plight to plight.
One day, they disembarked upon an island where there lived a sorceress named Circe. She, by way of welcome, offered them a drink—a baneful, if delicious, potion.
First they lost their reason, then their human form, becoming animals of many shapes, from elephants to moles.
Ulysses stood alone unchanged, the only one who had distrusted the concoction. He possessed not wisdom only, but a hero’s looks and orator’s sweet speech. Soon Circe had herself imbibed a potion—namely, love. This she declared with all the confident impetuosity of goddesses.
Ulysses, too quick-witted not to take advantage of the situation, begged that she restore his friends’ humanity.
Said the enchantress, “If they want it back, it’s theirs.”
He hurried with the antidote to his companions, crying, “Here I have the remedy! Renounce your bestial state, and reassume your manhood! Tell me that you will.”
The lion tried to roar, but spoke: “I’d rather not. Renounce these claws and teeth that rend my enemies in pieces? No. I’m now a king; you’d have me abdicate? No, thanks.”
Ulysses next implored the bear. “My brother, look at you! You used to be so handsome. Now . . . !”
“Yes, look at me,” the bear, instead of growling, said. “Am I not what a bear should be? Let’s ask a lady bear if I am handsome, sir. What right have you to judge? If I displease you, go your way, and I’ll go mine. Renounce my liberty and carefree happiness? I’d rather not. No, thanks.”
Ulysses, risking more rebuffs, next pleaded with the wolf. “It pains me, friend, that shepherdesses, whom you formerly protected, now bewail the sheep you eat. Come, lead again a righteous life; come, be again a good and honest man.”
The wolf, half howling, cried, “But is there such a thing? I’ve never seen a good or honest man. And you, who criticize the carnivores, are one. The villagers are hypocrites as well: they mourn not sheep, but mutton lost! Be honest, man: would I, were I a man, love slaughter less? Do men not murder one another over words? because of thoughts? In fact, is man not wolf to man? Renounce, you say, my bestial state. I say: No, thanks. I’d rather be a scoundrel than a villain.”
Ulysses wasn’t able to persuade a single one of his companions. They no longer cared about heroic deeds or praise. They thought that they were free, and that their freedom lay in satisfying each and every yearning, doing only what they liked, pursuing everything they craved.
They were not free, but by themselves enslaved.