Art thou the world’s wisest of women?
Tell to me now
How a god may conquer his care.
Erda:
Thou art not
What thou hast said.
It is the same primitive motive which we meet Wagner: the mother has robbed her son, the sun-god, of the joy of life, through a poisonous thorn, and deprives him of his power, which is connected with the name. Isis demands the name of the god; Erda says, “Thou art not what thou hast said.” But the “Wanderer” has found the way to conquer the fatal charm of the mother, the fear of death:
“The eternals’ downfall
No more dismays me,
Since their doom I willed.