Heart, to put it vulgarly); yet in the drama Wotan is a
religiously moral man, and Loki a witty, ingenious, imaginative
and cynical one. As to Fricka, who stands for State Law, she does
not assume her allegorical character in The Rhine Gold at all,
but is simply Wotan's wife and Freia's sister: nay, she
contradicts her allegorical self by conniving at all Wotan's
rogueries. That, of course, is just what State Law would do; but
we must not save the credit of the allegory by a quip. Not until
she reappears in the next play (The Valkyries) does her function
in the allegorical scheme become plain.

One preconception will bewilder the spectator hopelessly unless
he has been warned against it or is naturally free from it. In
the old-fashioned orders of creation, the supernatural personages
are invariably conceived as greater than man, for good or evil.
In the modern humanitarian order as adopted by Wagner, Man is the
highest. In The Rhine Gold, it is pretended that there are as yet
no men on the earth. There are dwarfs, giants, and gods. The
danger is that you will jump to the conclusion that the gods, at
least, are a higher order than the human order. On the contrary,
the world is waiting for Man to redeem it from the lame and
cramped government of the gods. Once grasp that; and the allegory
becomes simple enough. Really, of course, the dwarfs, giants, and
gods are dramatizations of the three main orders of men: to wit,
the instinctive, predatory, lustful, greedy people; the patient,
toiling, stupid, respectful, money-worshipping people; and the
intellectual, moral, talented people who devise and administer
States and Churches. History shows us only one order higher than
the highest of these: namely, the order of Heroes.