Hercules

"Son of Zeus that I was my, torments never ended, forced to slave for a man not half the man I was: he saddled me with the worst heartbreaking labors. Why, he sent me down here once, to retrieve the hound that guards the dead - no harder task for me, he thought - but I dragged the great beast up from the underworld to earth and Hermes and gleaming-eyed Athena blazed the way!"

- Hercules. The Odyssey Book 11 Page 270

In the modern world we still make references to Hercules and his labours in everyday life. From television to movies to magazines to casual conversation, even advertising is riddled with references to the classic hero. The above quote illustrates his take on what he had to do, on how he felt about what he was faced with and I believe it is a good show of morality. It makes him real, no longer this mythical being in a sense because he felt pain. He felt sorrow and heartache, he felt despair and the torment - he was human. As are all of us so if he can face this adversity, despite his god given gifts, and become immortalized then what is to say that one of our generation will not be the next Hercules.