The Greeks had a bleak outlook on life. Was Oedipus doomed from the start? Or did he bring about his own destruction? His parents tried to avoid the prophesy by trying to have him killed. Yet through odd circumstances he was spared. Then he tried to avoid the prophesy by leaving who he thought were his parents. Despite good intended decisions the gods did not favor Oedipus. He could not change what was prophesied. What he could change was how he reacted. He was very brash in calling down such an extreme curse upon the man who killed Laius. This was completely unnecessary. He made that curse of his own free will. So in part his fate was up to him.
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“Which creature in the morning goes on four legs, at mid-day on two, and in the evening upon three, and the more legs it has, the weaker it be?” Man—who crawls on all fours as a baby, then walks on two feet as an adult, and then walks with a cane in old age.
Why is this significant for Oedipus? Oedipus more than most babies had to crawl on all fours because his feet were swollen as a child. He learns to overcome this and "walks on his own two feet." In the end he blinds himself by gouging out his eyes, so the cane makes sense for two reasons. One is that he needs it to walk on his lame legs and two he needs the "blind man's" cane to see.
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