2) The Cyclopes are far older than the gods and are born of the first generation of Titans: Uranus, god of the sky, and Gaia, goddess of the earth. (In Homer’s Odyssey we encounter another Cyclops, Polyphemus, who is the son of Poseidon, god of the sea, and the sea nymph Thoosa.)

What can we learn about the Cyclopes from the story of their birth?

We can ask why the growth of the seed of heaven in the womb of earth, or the growth of the seed of the god of the seas in a sea nymph, could result in the birth of such a demonic creature. The point is that in both stories a very great truth is poured into a small vessel. In these myths, not all the children of heaven and earth, and not all the children of gods and human beings, become Cyclopes. Indeed, many gods and heroes are born from such unions. Yet the emergence of a Cyclops remains an entirely possible outcome. This story is not only understandable; it is deeply familiar to people across cultures.

We can see this in the way a heavenly idea descending upon an earthly prophet can give birth to Cyclopes such as the believing torturers of the medieval Church or ISIS, and in the way the entry of any great philosophy into small minds can generate dangerous and insane ideologies, of which history offers no shortage of examples.

3) Cyclopes are cannibals. They live in the darkness of caves and, in Hesiod’s account, after they are born to the god of earth and the god of sky, Cronus—the god of time, the firstborn of sky and earth and father of Zeus—imprisons them in a dungeon in Tartarus. In these stories, Cyclopes always close the mouth of their cave with a great stone so that no light can enter.

The cannibalism of the Cyclops, in light of what has already been said, seems understandable and entirely consonant with the being of this one-eyed monster. The Cyclops is one of the most ancient Titans, fallen from the greatness of a Titan into a destructive creature of limited intelligence. The Cyclops has killed its own divinity and reduced the vast consciousness of being a god to the narrow vision of a one-eyed monster.

The cannibalism of the Cyclopes is not merely a sign of the monster’s violence. It is a symbol of how Cyclopes can destroy human beings and how nakedly their hostility and violence against human beings resemble the cannibalism of one-eyed giants. Fascist Cyclopes, communist Cyclopes, atheist Cyclopes, religious Cyclopes, liberal Cyclopes... If you look carefully, you will see them everywhere, and you will see the bloody trail of their cannibalism across human history.

To realise the Cyclops within yourself fully, it is enough to feel that you know so much that your one eye is sufficient for seeing the truth, and to become angry enough that you can find within yourself a justification for destroying other human beings.

In Homer’s story, Polyphemus, a Cyclops, has an unrequited love for Galatea, the beautiful goddess of the sea, without understanding not only that she does not love him but that the two of them belong to different worlds: he to the caverns of the earth, Galatea to the sea. In the madness of this love, the Cyclops kills the young Acis, son of the god of the forest and a river nymph, and Galatea’s beloved. This tragedy once again points to an important feature of the Cyclops within us: this one-eyed giant, who neither sees nor understands anything beyond what his single eye perceives, can commit crimes in the name of anything—even love—because one of the constant characteristics of being a Cyclops is always believing oneself to be right and seeing nothing beyond oneself.

The Cyclopes’ life in darkness signifies their aversion to light, because seeing and vision are not, in principle, desirable to one-eyed giants. Cronus’s sending of the Cyclopes to Tartarus, into the deepest darkness, expresses the truth that if we become Cyclopes, the hand of time will ultimately carry us into the darkest darkness. This is not punishment but the destiny of a being that prefers darkness to light and limited consciousness to the expansion of its vision.