Symposium

After this, it seems, when Socrates had taken his place and had dined with the rest, they made libation and sang a chant to the god and so forth, as custom bids, till they betook them to drinking. Then Pausanias opened a conversation after this manner: Well, gentlemen, what mode of drinking will suit us best? For my part, to tell the truth, I am in very poor form as a result of yesterday’s bout, and I claim a little relief; it is so, I believe, with most of you, for you were at yesterday’s party: so consider what method of drinking would suit us best.On this Aristophanes observed: Now that, Pausanias, is a good suggestion of yours, that we make a point of consulting our comfort in our cups: for I myself am one of those who got such a soaking yesterday.When Eryximachus, son of Acumenus, heard this; You are quite right, sirs, he said; and there is yet one other question on which I request your opinion, as to what sort of condition Agathon finds himself in for drinking.No, no, said Agathon, I am not in good condition for it either. It would be a piece of luck for us, I take it, the other went on, that is, for me, Aristodemus, Phaedrus, and our friends here, if you who are the stoutest drinkers are now feeling exhausted. We, of course, are known weaklings. Socrates I do not count in the matter: he is fit either way, and will be content with whichever choice we make. Now as it appears that nobody here present is eager for copious draughts, perhaps it will be the less irksome to you if I speak of intoxication, and tell you truly what it is. The practice of medicine, I find, has made this clear to me—that drunkenness is harmful to mankind; and neither would I myself agree, if I could help it, to an excess of drinking, nor would I recommend it to another, especially when his head is still heavy from a bout of the day before. Here Phaedrus of Myrrhinus interrupted him, saying: Why, you know I always obey you, above all in medical matters; and so now will the rest of us, if they are well advised. Then all of them, on hearing this, consented not to make their present meeting a tipsy affair, but to drink just as it might serve their pleasure. Since it has been resolved, then, said Eryximachus, that we are to drink only so much as each desires, with no constraint on any, I next propose that the flute-girl who came in just now be dismissed: let her pipe to herself or, if she likes, to the women-folk within, but let us seek our entertainment today in conversation. I am ready, if you so desire, to suggest what sort of discussion it should be.

They all said they did so desire, and bade him make his proposal. So Eryximachus proceeded: The beginning of what I have to say is in the words of Euripides’ Melanippe, for

not mine the tale

First then, as I said, he told me that the speech of Phaedrus began with points of this sort—that Love was a great god, among men and gods a marvel; and this appeared in many ways, but notably in his birth. Of the most venerable are the honors of this god, and the proof of it is this: parents of Love there are none, nor are any recorded in either prose or verse. Hesiod says that Chaos came first into being—

1. and thereafter rose
2. Broad-breasted Earth, sure seat of all for aye,
3. And Love.

1. invented Love before all other gods.

For a man in love would surely choose to have all the rest of the host rather than his favorite see him forsaking his station or flinging away his arms; sooner than this, he would prefer to die many deaths: while, as for leaving his favorite in the lurch, or not succoring him in his peril, no man is such a craven that Love’s own influence cannot inspire him with a valor that makes him equal to the bravest born; and without doubt what Homer calls a

fury inspired

And Aeschylus [*](Aesch. Myrm. fr. 135-136.) talks nonsense when he says that it was Achilles who was in love with Patroclus; for he excelled in beauty not Patroclus alone but assuredly all the other heroes, being still beardless and, moreover, much the younger, by Homer’s account. [*](Hom. Il. 11.786.) For in truth there is no sort of valor more respected by the gods than this which comes of love; yet they are even more admiring and delighted and beneficent when the beloved is fond of his lover than when the lover is fond of his favorite; since a lover, filled as he is with a god, surpasses his favorite in divinity. This is the reason why they honored Achilles above Alcestis, giving him his abode in the Isles of the Blest. So there is my description of Love—that he is the most venerable and valuable of the gods, and that he has sovereign power to provide all virtue and happiness for men whether living or departed.The Speech of PausaniasSuch in the main was Phaedrus’ speech as reported to me. It was followed by several others, which my friend could not recollect at all clearly; so he passed them over and related that of Pausanias, which ran as follows: I do not consider, Phaedrus, our plan of speaking a good one, if the rule is simply that we are to make eulogies of Love. If Love were only one, it would be right; but, you see, he is not one, and this being the case, it would be more correct to have it previously announced what sort we ought to praise. Now this defect I will endeavor to amend, and will first decide on a Love who deserves our praise, and then will praise him in terms worthy of his godhead. We are all aware that there is no Aphrodite or Love-passion without a Love. True, if that goddess were one, then Love would be one: but since there are two of her, there must needs be two Loves also. Does anyone doubt that she is double? Surely there is the elder, of no mother born, but daughter of Heaven, whence we name her Heavenly; [*](Hdt. 1.105, Hdt. 1.131; Paus. 1.14.7.) while the younger was the child of Zeus and Dione, and her we call Popular. [*](Paus. 1.22.3.) It follows then that of the two Loves also the one ought to be called Popular, as fellow-worker with the one of those goddesses, and the other Heavenly. All gods, of course, ought to be praised: but none the less I must try to describe the faculties of each of these two. For of every action it may be observed that as acted by itself it is neither noble nor base.

For instance, in our conduct at this moment, whether we drink or sing or converse, none of these things is noble in itself; each only turns out to be such in the doing, as the manner of doing it may be. For when the doing of it is noble and right, the thing itself becomes noble; when wrong, it becomes base. So also it is with loving, and Love is not in every case noble or worthy of celebration, but only when he impels us to love in a noble manner. Now the Love that belongs to the Popular Aphrodite is in very truth popular and does his work at haphazard: this is the Love we see in the meaner sort of men; who, in the first place, love women as well as boys; secondly, where they love, they are set on the body more than the soul; and thirdly, they choose the most witless people they can find, since they look merely to the accomplishment and care not if the manner be noble or no. Hence they find themselves doing everything at haphazard, good or its opposite, without distinction: for this Love proceeds from the goddess who is far the younger of the two, and who in her origin partakes of both female and male. But the other Love springs from the Heavenly goddess who, firstly, partakes not of the female but only of the male; and secondly, is the elder, untinged with wantonness: wherefore those who are inspired by this Love betake them to the male, in fondness for what has the robuster nature and a larger share of mind. Even in the passion for boys you may note the way of those who are under the single incitement of this Love: they love boys only when they begin to acquire some mind—a growth associated with that of down on their chins. For I conceive that those who begin to love them at this age are prepared to be always with them and share all with them as long as life shall last: they will not take advantage of a boy’s green thoughtlessness to deceive him and make a mock of him by running straight off to another. Against this love of boys a law should have been enacted, to prevent the sad waste of attentions paid to an object so uncertain: for who can tell where a boy will end at last, vicious or virtuous in body and soul? Good men, however, voluntarily make this law for themselves, and it is a rule which those popular lovers ought to be forced to obey, just as we force them, so far as we can, to refrain from loving our freeborn women.

These are the persons responsible for the scandal which prompts some to say it is a shame to gratify one’s lover: such are the cases they have in view, for they observe all their reckless and wrongful doings; and surely, whatsoever is done in an orderly and lawful manner can never justly bring reproach. Further, it is easy to note the rule with regard to love in other cities: there it is laid down in simple terms, while ours here is complicated. For in Elis and Boeotia and where there is no skill in speech they have simply an ordinance that it is seemly to gratify lovers, and no one whether young or old will call it shameful, in order, I suppose, to save themselves the trouble of trying what speech can do to persuade the youths; for they have no ability for speaking. But in Ionia and many other regions where they live under foreign sway, it is counted a disgrace. Foreigners hold this thing, and all training in philosophy and sports, to be disgraceful, because of their despotic government; since, I presume, it is not to the interest of their princes to have lofty notions engendered in their subjects, or any strong friendships and communions; all of which Love is pre-eminently apt to create. It is a lesson that our despots learnt by experience; for Aristogeiton’s love and Harmodius’s friendship grew to be so steadfast that it wrecked their power. Thus where it was held a disgrace to gratify one’s lover, the tradition is due to the evil ways of those who made such a law— that is, to the encroachments of the rulers and to the cowardice of the ruled. But where it was accepted as honorable without any reserve, this was due to a sluggishness of mind in the law-makers. In our city we have far better regulations, which, as I said, are not so easily grasped.

Consider, for instance, our saying that it is more honorable to love openly than in secret, especially when the beloved excels not so much in beauty as in nobility and virtue; and again, what a wonderful encouragement a lover gets from us all: we have no thought of his doing anything unseemly, and success in his pursuit is counted honorable and failure disgraceful; and how in his endeavors for success our law leaves him a free hand for performing such admirable acts as may win him praise; while the same acts, if attempted for any other purpose or effect to which one might be inclined, would bring one nothing in return but the sharpest reproach. For suppose that with the view of gaining money from another, or some office, or any sort of influence, a man should allow himself to behave as lovers commonly do to their favorites—pressing their suit with supplications and entreaties, binding themselves with vows, sleeping on doorsteps, and submitting to such slavery as no slave would ever endure—both the friends and the enemies of such a man would hinder his behaving in such fashion; for while the latter would reproach him with adulation and ill-breeding, the former would admonish him and feel ashamed of his conduct. But in a lover all such doings only win him favor: by free grant of our law he may behave thus without reproach, as compassing a most honorable end. Strangest of all, he alone in the vulgar opinion has indulgence from the gods when he forsakes the vow he has sworn; for the vow of love-passion, they say, is no vow.[*](Cf. Sophocles, fr. 694 ὅρκους δὲ μοιχῶν εἰς τέφραν ἐγὼ γράφω, the lecher’s vows in ashes I record.) So true it is that both gods and men have given absolute licence to the lover, as our Athenian law provides. Thus far, then, we have ground for supposing that here in our city both loving some one and showing affection to one’s lover are held in highest honor. But it happens that fathers put tutors in charge of their boys when they are beloved, to prevent them from conversing with their lovers: the tutor has strict injunctions on the matter, and when they observe a boy to be guilty of such a thing his playmates and fellows reproach him, while his reproachers are not in their turn withheld or upbraided by their elders as speaking amiss; and from this it might rather be inferred that his behavior is held to be a great disgrace in Athens. Yet the truth of it, I think, is this: the affair is no simple thing; you remember we said that by itself it was neither noble nor base, but that it was noble if nobly conducted, and base if basely. To do the thing basely is to gratify a wicked man in a wicked manner: nobly means having to do with a good man in a noble manner. By wicked we mean that popular lover, who craves the body rather than the soul: as he is not in love with what abides, he himself is not abiding. As soon as the bloom of the body he so loved begins to fade he

flutters off and is gone,

Now our law has a sure and excellent test for the trial of these persons, showing which are to be favored and which to be shunned. In the one case, accordingly, it encourages pursuit, but flight in the other, applying ordeals and tests in each case, whereby we are able to rank the lover and the beloved on this side or on that. And so it is for this reason that our convention regards a quick capitulation as a disgrace: for there ought, first, to be a certain interval—the generally approved touchstone—of time; and, second, it is disgraceful if the surrender is due to gold or public preferment, or is a mere cowering away from the endurance of ill-treatment, or shows the youth not properly contemptuous of such benefits as he may receive in pelf or political success. For in these there appears nothing steadfast or abiding, unless it be the impossibility of their producing a noble friendship. One way remains in our custom whereby a favorite may rightly gratify his lover: it is our rule that, just as in the case of the lovers it was counted no flattery or scandal for them to be willingly and utterly enslaved to their favorites, so there is left one sort of voluntary thraldom which is not scandalous; I mean, in the cause of virtue. It is our settled tradition that when a man freely devotes his service to another in the belief that his friend will make him better in point of wisdom, it may be, or in any of the other parts of virtue, this willing bondage also is no sort of baseness or flattery. Let us compare the two rules—one dealing with the passion for boys, and the other with the love of wisdom and all virtuous ways: by this we shall see if we are to conclude it a good thing that a favorite should gratify his lover. For when lover and favorite come together, each guided by his own rule—on the one side, of being justified in doing any service to the favorite who has obliged him, and on the other, of being justified in showing any attentions to the friend who makes him wise and good; the elder of his plenty contributing to intellectual and all other excellence, the younger in his paucity acquiring education and all learned arts: only then, at the meeting of these two principles in one place, only then and there, and in no other case, can it befall that a favorite may honorably indulge his lover. To have such hopes deceived is no disgrace; while those of any other sort must be disgraceful, whether deceived or not.

For suppose that a youth had a lover he deemed to be wealthy and, after obliging him for the sake of his wealth, were to find himself deceived and no money to be got, since the lover proved to be poor; this would be disgraceful all the same; since the youth may be said to have revealed his character, and shown himself ready to do anyone any service for pelf, and this is not honorable. By the same token, when a youth gratifies a friend, supposing him to be a good man and expecting to be made better himself as a result of his lover’s affection, and then finds he is deceived, since his friend proves to be vile and destitute of virtue; even so the deception is honorable. For this youth is also held to have discovered his nature, by showing that he would make anyone the object of his utmost ardor for the sake of virtuous improvement; and this by contrast is supremely honorable. Thus by all means it is right to bestow this favor for the sake of virtue. This is the Love that belongs to the Heavenly Goddess, heavenly itself and precious to both public and private life: for this compels lover and beloved alike to feel a zealous concern for their own virtue. But lovers of the other sort belong all to the other Goddess, the Popular. Such, Phaedrus, is the contribution I am able to offer you, on the spur of the moment, towards the discussion of Love.Pausanias’ praise made a pause with this phrase—you see what jingles the schoolmen are teaching me The next speaker, so Aristodemus told me, was to have been Aristophanes: but a surfeit or some other cause had chanced to afflict him with a hiccough, which prevented him from speaking; and he could only just say to Eryximachus the doctor, whose place was next below him, I look to you Eryximachus, either to stop my hiccough, or to speak in my stead until I can stop it. Why, I will do both, replied Eryximachus for I will take your turn for speaking, and when you have stopped it, you shall take mine. But during my speech, if on your holding your breath a good while the hiccough chooses to stop, well and good; otherwise, you must gargle with some water. If, however, it is a very stubborn one, take something that will tickle your nostrils, and sneeze: do this once or twice, and though it be of the stubbornest, it will stop. Start away with your speech, said Aristophanes, and I will do as you advise.

Then Eryximachus spoke as follows: Well then, since Pausanias did not properly finish off the speech he began so well, I must do my best to append a conclusion thereto. His division of Love into two sorts appears to me a good one: but medicine, our great mystery, has taught me to observe that Love is not merely an impulse of human souls towards beautiful men but the attraction of all creatures to a great variety of things, which works in the bodies of all animals and all growths upon the earth, and practically in everything that is; and I have learnt how mighty and wonderful and universal is the sway of this god over all affairs both human and divine. [*](This cosmic theory was derived from Empedocles, who spoke of Love as the combining, and Strife as the disruptive, force pervading the universe.) Reverence for my profession prompts me to begin with the witness of medicine. This double Love belongs to the nature of all bodies: for between bodily health and sickness there is an admitted difference or dissimilarity, and what is dissimilar craves and loves dissimilar things. Hence the desire felt by a sound body is quite other than that of a sickly one. Now I agree with what Pausanias was just saying, that it is right to gratify good men, base to gratify the dissolute: similarly, in treating actual bodies it is right and necessary to gratify the good and healthy elements of each, and this is what we term the physician’s skill; but it is a disgrace to do aught but disappoint the bad and sickly parts, if one aims at being an adept. For the art of medicine may be summarily described as a knowledge of the love-matters of the body in regard to repletion and evacuation; and the master-physician is he who can distinguish there between the nobler and baser Loves, and can effect such alteration that the one passion is replaced by the other; and he will be deemed a good practitioner who is expert in producing Love where it ought to flourish but exists not, and in removing it from where it should not be. Indeed he must be able to make friends and happy lovers of the keenest opponents in the body. Now the most contrary qualities are most hostile to each other—cold and hot, bitter and sweet, dry and moist, and the rest of them. It was by knowing how to foster love and unanimity in these that, as our two poets[*](Aristophanes and Agathon.) here relate, and as I myself believe, our forefather Asclepius composed this science of ours.

And so not merely is all medicine governed, as I propound it, through the influence of this god, but likewise athletics and agriculture. Music also, as is plain to any the least curious observer, is in the same sort of case: perhaps Heracleitus intends as much by those perplexing words,

The One at variance with itself is drawn together, like harmony of bow or lyre.