 Section 1 of the Symposium. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Jeffrey Edwards. The Symposium by Plato. Translated by Benjamin Joett. Section 1. Persons of the Dialogue. Apollodorus, who repeats to his companion the dialogue which he had heard from Aristodemus and had already once narrated to Glaucon. Phaedrus, Pausanius, Eriximachus, Aristophanes, Agathon, Socrates, Alcibiades, a Troop of Revelers. Scene. The House of Agathon. Concerning the things about which you ask to be informed, I believe that I am not ill-prepared with an answer. For the day before yesterday I was coming from my own home at Philarum to the city, and one of my acquaintances, who had caught a sight of me from behind, calling out playfully in the distance said, Apollodorus! Oh, Thalphilarion, man! Halt! So I did, as I was bid, and then he said, I was looking for you, Apollodorus, only just now, that I might ask you about the speeches in Praise of Love which were delivered by Socrates, Alcibiades, and others at Agathon supper. Phoenix, the son of Philip, told another person who told me of them. His narrative was very distinct, but he said that you knew, and I wish that you would give me an account of them. Who, if not you, should be the reporter of the words of your friend, and first tell me, he said, were you present at the meeting? Your informant, Glaucon, I said, must have been very indistinct indeed, if you imagined that the occasion was recent, or that I could have been of the party. Why, yes, he replied. I thought so. Impossible, I said. Are you ignorant that for many years Agathon has not resided at Athens, and not three have elapsed since I became acquainted with Socrates, and have made it my daily business to know all that he says and does? There was a time when I was running about the world, fancying myself to be well employed, but I was really a most wretched being, no better than you are now. I thought that I ought to do anything rather than be a philosopher. Well, he said, justing apart, tell me when the meeting occurred. In our boyhood, I replied, when Agathon won the prize with his first tragedy, on the day after that on which he and his chorus offered the sacrifice of victory. Then it must have been a long while ago, he said, and who told you, did Socrates? No indeed, I replied, but the same person who told Phoenix. He was a little fellow who never wore any shoes, Aristodemus, of the Deme of Sedathinaeum. He had been at Agathon's feast, and I think that in those days there was no one who was a more devout admirer of Socrates. Moreover, I have asked Socrates about the truth of some parts of his narrative, and he confirmed them. Then, said Glaucon, let us have the tale over again. Is not the road to Athens just made for conversation? And so we walked, and talked of the discourses on love, and therefore, as I said at first, I am not ill-prepared to comply with your request, and will have another rehearsal of them if you like. Forward to speak, or to hear others speak of philosophy, always gives me the greatest pleasure to say nothing of the prophet. But when I hear another strain, especially that of you rich men and traders, such conversation displeases me, and I pity you, who are my companions, because you think that you are doing something when in reality you are doing nothing. And I dare say that you pity me in return, whom you regard as an unhappy creature, and very probably you are right, but I certainly know of you what you only think of me. There is the difference. Companion, I see, Apollodorus, that you are just the same, always speaking evil of yourself, and of others, and I do believe that you pity all mankind, with the exception of Socrates, yourself first of all. True in this to your old name, which, however deserved, I know not how you acquired, of Apollodorus the madman, for you are always raging against yourself and everybody but Socrates. Apollodorus. Yes, friend, and the reason why I am said to be mad, and out of my wits, is just because I have these notions of myself and you. No other evidence is required. Companion, no more of that, Apollodorus, but let me renew my request that you would repeat the conversation. Apollodorus. Well, the tale of love was on this wise, but perhaps I had better begin at the beginning, and endeavour to give you the exact words of Aristodemus. He said that he met Socrates fresh from the bath and sandaled, and as the sight of the sandals was unusual, he asked him whether he was going, that he had been converted into such a bow. To a banquet at Agathons, he replied, whose invitation to his sacrifice of victory I refused yesterday, fearing a crowd, but promising that I would come today instead, and so I have put on my finery, because he is such a fine man. What say you to going with me unasked? I will do as you bid me, I replied. Follow then, he said, and let us demolish the proverb, to the feasts of inferior men the good unbidden go, instead of which our proverb will run, to the feasts of the good the good unbidden go. And this alteration may be supported by the authority of Homer himself, who not only demolishes, but literally outrages the proverb. For, after picturing Agamemnon as the most valiant of men, he makes Menelaus, who is but a faint-hearted warrior, come unbidden, to the banquet of Agamemnon, who is feasting and offering sacrifices, not the better to the worse, but the worse to the better. I rather fear, Socrates said Aristodemus, lest this may still be my case, and that, like Menelaus in Homer, I shall be the inferior person, who, to the feasts of the wise unbidden goes. But I shall say that I was bitten of you, and then you will have to make an excuse. Two going together, he replied in Homeric fashion, one or other of them may invent an excuse by the way. This was the style of their conversation as they went along. Socrates dropped behind in a fit of abstraction, and desired Aristodemus, who was waiting, to go on before him. When he reached the house of Agathon, he found the doors wide open, and a comical thing happened. A servant coming out met him, and led him at once into the banqueting hall, in which the guests were reclining, for the banquet was about to begin. Welcome, Aristodemus, said Agathon, as soon as he appeared. You are just in time to sup with us, if you come on any other matter, put it off, and make one of us. As I was looking for you yesterday, and meant to have asked you if I could have found you. But what have you done with Socrates? I turned round, but Socrates was nowhere to be seen, and I had to explain that he had been with me a moment before, and that I came by his invitation to the supper. You were quite right in coming, said Agathon, but where is he himself? He was behind me just now, as I entered, he said, and I cannot think what has become of him. Go and look for him, boy, said Agathon, and bring him in, and do you, Aristodemus, meanwhile take the place of Eriximachus. The servant then assisted him to wash, and he laid down, and presently another servant came in, and reported that our friend Socrates had retired into the portico of the neighboring house. There he is fixed, said he, and when I call to him, he will not stir. How strange, said Agathon, then you must call him again, and keep calling him. Let him alone, said my informant, he has a way of stopping anywhere, and losing himself without any reason. I believe that he will soon appear. Do not therefore disturb him. Well, if you think so, I will leave him, said Agathon, and then, turning to the servants, he added, Let us have supper, without waiting for him. Serve up whatever you please, for there is no one to give you orders. Hither, too, I have never left you to yourselves, but on this occasion imagine that you are our hosts, and that I and the company are your guests. Treat us well, and then we shall commend you. After this supper was served, but still no Socrates, and during the meal, Agathon several times expressed a wish to send for him, but Aristodemus objected, and at last, when the feast was about half over, for the fit, as usual, was not of long duration. Socrates entered. Agathon, who was reclining alone at the end of the table, begged that he would take the place next to him, that I may touch you, he said, and have the benefit of the wise thought which came into your mind in the portico, and is now in your possession, for I am certain that you would not have come away until you had found what you sought. I wish, said Socrates, taking his place as he was desired, that wisdom could be infused by touch, out of the fuller into the emptier man, as water runs through the wool out of a fuller cup into an emptier one. If that were so, how greatly should I value the privilege of reclining at your side? For you would have filled me full with a stream of wisdom, plenteous and fair, whereas my own is of a very mean and questionable sort, no better than a dream, but yours is bright and full of promise, and was manifested forth in all the splendor of youth, the day before yesterday, in the presence of more than 30,000 Hellenes. You are mocking, Socrates, said Agathon, and ere long you and I will have to determine who bears off the palm of wisdom. Of this, Danesus shall be the judge, but at present you are better occupied with supper. Socrates took his place on the couch, and supped with the rest, and then libations were offered, and after him had been sung to the god, and there had been the usual ceremonies, there were about to commence drinking, when Pausanias said, and now my friends, how can we drink with least injury to ourselves? I can assure you that I feel severely the effect of yesterday's potations, and must have time to recover, and I suspect that most of you are in the same predicament, for you were of the party yesterday. Consider then, how can the drinking be made easiest? I entirely agree, said Aristophanes, that we should, by all means, avoid hard drinking, for I was myself one of those who were yesterday drowned in drink. I think that you are right, said Eriximachus, the son of Acumenus, but I should still like to hear one other person speak. Is Agathon able to drink hard? I am not equal to it, said Agathon. Then, said Eriximachus, the weak heads like myself, Aristodemus, Fadris, and others who never can drink are fortunate in finding that the stronger ones are not in a drinking mood. Bracket, I do not include Socrates, who is able either to drink or to abstain, and will not mind whichever we do, close bracket. Well, as none of the company seemed disposed to drink much, I may be forgiven for saying, as a physician, that drinking deep is a bad practice, which I never follow, if I can help, and certainly do not recommend to another, least of all to anyone who still feels the effects of yesterday's corrals. I always do what you advise, and especially what you prescribe as a physician. Rejoin Fadris the Miranusian, and the rest of the company, if there are wise, will do the same. It was agreed that drinking was not to be the order of the day, but that they were all to drink only so much as they pleased. Then, said Eriximachus, as you are all agreed that drinking is to be voluntary, and that there is to be no compulsion, I move, in the next place, that the flute girl, who has just made her appearance, be told to go away and play to herself, or, if she likes, to the women who are within. Today, let us have conversation instead, and, if you will allow me, I will tell you what sort of conversation. This proposal, having been accepted, Eriximachus proceeded as follows. I will begin, he said, after the manner of melanope in Euripides, quote, not mine the word, end quote, which I am about to speak, but that of Fadris, for often he says to me, in an indignant tone, what a strange thing it is, Eriximachus, that, whereas other gods have poems and hymns made in their honor, the great and glorious God, Love, has no encomiasse among all the poets who are so many. There are the worthy Sophists, too. The excellent Prodacus, for example, who has discounted in prose on the virtues of Heracles and other heroes, and, what is still more extraordinary, I have met with a philosophical work in which the utility of salt has been made the theme of an eloquent discourse, and many other like things have had a like on or bestowed upon them, and only to think that there should have been an eager interest created about them, and yet that to this day no one has ever dared worthily to him loves praises, so entirely has this great deity been neglected. Now, in this Fadris seems to me to be quite right, and therefore I want to offer him a contribution. Also, I think that at the present moment, we who are here assembled cannot do better than honor the God of love. If you agree with me, there will be no lack of conversation, for I mean to propose that each of us, in turn, going from left to right shall make a speech in honor of love. Let him give us the best which he can, and Fadris, because he is sitting first on the left hand and because he is the father of the thought, shall begin. No one will vote against you, Eriximachus said Socrates. How can I oppose your motion, who profess to understand nothing but matters of love, nor I presume will Agathon and Pausanias, and there can be no doubt of Aristophanes whose whole concern is with Dionysus and Aphrodite. Nor will anyone disagree of those whom I see around me. The proposal, as I am aware, may seem rather hard upon us whose place is last, but we shall be contented if we hear some good speeches first. Let Fadris begin the praise of love and good luck to him. All the company expressed their assent and desired him to do as Socrates bade him. Aristodemus did not recollect all that was said, nor do I recollect all that he related to me, but I will tell you what I thought most worthy of remembrance and what the chief speaker said. Fadris began by affirming that love is a mighty God and wonderful among gods and men, but especially wonderful in his birth. For he is the eldest of the gods, which is an honor to him, and a proof of his claim to this honor is that of his parents there is no memorial. Neither poet nor prose writer has ever affirmed that he had any. As Hesiod says, quote, first chaos came and then broad bosomed earth, the everlasting seat of all that is, and love, close quote. In other words, after chaos, the earth and love, these two came into being. Also, Parmenides sings of generation, quote, first in the train of gods, he fashioned love, close quote. And Acusa Leus agreed with Hesiod. Thus numerous are the witnesses who acknowledge love to be the eldest of the gods, and not only is he the eldest, he is also the source of the greatest benefits to us. For I know not any greater blessing to a young man who is beginning life than a virtuous lover, or to the lover than a beloved youth. For the principle which ought to be the guide of men who would nobly live, that principle, I say, neither kindred nor honor nor wealth, nor any other motive is able to implant as well as love. Of what am I speaking? Of the sense of honor and dishonor, without which neither states nor individuals ever do any good or great works. And I say that a lover who is detected in doing any dishonorable act, or submitting through cowardice when any dishonor is done to him by another, will be more pained at being detected by his beloved than at being seen by his father, or by his companions, or by anyone else. The beloved too, when he is found in any disgraceful situation, has the same feeling about his lover. And if there were only some way of contriving that a state or an army should be made up of lovers and their loves, they would be the very best governors of their own city, abstaining from all dishonor, and emulating one another in honor. And when fighting at each other's side, although a mere handful, they would overcome the world. For what lover would not choose rather to be seen by all mankind than by his beloved, either when abandoning his post, or throwing away his arms? He would be ready to die a thousand deaths, rather than endure this. Or who would desert his beloved, or fail him in the hour of danger? The various coward would become an inspired hero, equal to the bravest at such a time. Love would inspire him, that courage which, as Homer says, the God breathes into the souls of some heroes. Love of his own nature infuses into the lover. Love will make men dare to die for their beloved. Love alone, and women as well as men. Of this Alcestus, the daughter of Peleus, is a monument to all Hellas, for she was willing to lay down her life on behalf of her husband when no one else would, although he had a father and mother. But the tenderness of her love so far exceeded theirs that she made them seem to be strangers in blood to their own son. And in name only, related to him. And so Noble did this action of hers appear to the gods, as well as to men, that among the many who have done virtuously, she is one of the very few to whom, in admiration of her Noble action, they have granted the privilege of returning alive to earth. Such exceeding honor is paid by the gods to the devotion and virtue of love. But Orpheus, the son of Ogrus, the Harper, they sent empty away, and presented to him an apparition only, of whom he sought. But herself they would not give up, because he showed no spirit. He was only a harp player, and did not dare, like Alcestus, to die for love, but was contriving how he might enter Hades alive. Moreover, they afterwards caused him to suffer death at the hands of women, as the punishment of his cowardliness. Very different was the reward of the true love of Achilles towards his lover Petroclus, his lover and not his love, Bracket. The notion that Petroclus was the beloved one is a foolish error, into which Ascalus has fallen, for Achilles was surely the fairer of the two, fairer also than all the other heroes, and as Homer informs us, he was still beardless and younger far, close Bracket. And greatly as the gods honor the virtue of love, still the return of love on the part of the beloved to the lover is more admired and valued and rewarded by them, for the lover is more divine because he inspired by God. Achilles was quite aware, for he had been told by his mother that he might avoid death and return home and live to a good old age if he abstained from slaying Hector. Nevertheless, he gave his life to revenge his friend and dared to die, not only in his defense, but after he was dead. Wherefore, the gods honored him even above Alcestus and sent him to the islands of the blessed. These are my reasons for affirming that love is the eldest and noblest and mightiest of the gods and the chiefest author and giver of virtue in life and of happiness after death. This, or something like this, was the speech of Vadris and some other speeches followed which Aristodemus did not remember. The next which he repeated was that of Pausanias. Vadris, he said, the argument has not been set before us, I think, quite in the right form. We should not be called upon to praise love in such an indiscriminate manner. If there were only one love, then what you said would be well enough. But since there are more loves than one, you should have begun by determining which of them was to be the theme of our praises. I will amend this defect First of all, I will tell you which love is deserving of praise and then try to him the praiseworthy one in a manner worthy of him. For we all know that love is inseparable from Aphrodite and if there were only one Aphrodite, there would be only one love. But as there are two goddesses, there must be two loves and am I not right in asserting that there are two goddesses? The elder one, having no mother, who is called the heavenly Aphrodite. She is the daughter of Uranus, the younger who is the daughter of Zeus and Dion. Her we call common and the love which is her fellow worker is rightly named common as the other love is called heavenly. All the gods ought to have praises given to them, but not without distinction of their natures and therefore I must try to distinguish the characters of the two loves. Now actions vary according to the manner of their performance. Take for example, that which we are now doing, drinking, singing and talking. These actions are not in themselves either good or evil, but they turn out in this or that way according to the mode of performing them. And when well done, they are good, and when wrongly done, they are evil. And in like manner, not every love, but only that which is a noble purpose is noble and worthy of praise. The love who is the offspring of the common Aphrodite is essentially common and has no discrimination being such as the meaner sort of men feel and is apt to be of women as well as of youth and is of the body rather than of the soul. The most foolish beings are the objects of this love which desires only to gain an end, but never thinks of accomplishing the end nobly and therefore does good and evil quite indiscriminately. The goddess who is his mother is far younger than the other and she was born of the union of the male and female and partakes of both. But the offspring of the heavenly Aphrodite is derived from a mother in whose birth the female has no part. She is from the male only. This is that love which is of the youth and the goddess being older there is nothing of wantonness in her. Those who are inspired by this love turn to the male and delight in him who is the more valiant and intelligent nature. Anyone may recognize the pure enthusiasts in the very character of their attachments. For they love not boys but intelligent beings whose reason is beginning to be developed much about the time at which their beards begin to grow. And in choosing young men to be their companions they mean to be faithful to them and pass their whole life in company with them. Not to take them in their inexperience and deceive them and play the fool with them or run away from one to another of them. But the love of young boys should be forbidden by law because their future is uncertain. They may turn out good or bad either in body or soul and much noble enthusiasm may be thrown away upon them. In this matter the good are a law to themselves and the coarser sort of lovers ought to be restrained by force as we restrain or attempt to restrain them from fixing their affections on women of free birth. These are the persons who bring a reproach on love and some have been led to deny the lawfulness of such attachments because they see the impropriety and evil of them. For surely nothing that is decorously and lawfully done can justly be censured. Now here and in Lassa Demon the rules about love are perplexing, but in most cities they are simple and easily intelligible. In Ellis and Boetia and in the countries having no gifts of eloquence, they are very straightforward. The law is simply in favor of these connections and no one, whether young or old has anything to say to their discredit. And the reason being as I suppose that they are men of few words in those parts and therefore the lovers do not like the trouble of pleading their suit. In Ionia and other places and generally in countries which are subject to the barbarians the custom is held to be dishonorable. Loves of youth share the evil repute in which philosophy and gymnastics are held because they are inimical to tyranny. For the interests of rulers require that their subjects should be poor in spirit and that there should be no strong bond of friendship or society among them. Which love above all other motives is likely to inspire as Arathenian tyrants learned by experience. For the love of Aristogaitan and the constancy of Hermodius had a strength which undid their power and therefore the ill repute into which these attachments have fallen is to be ascribed to the evil condition of those who make them to be ill reputed. That is to say to the self-seeking of the governors and the cowardice of the governed. On the other hand, the indiscriminate honor which is given to them in some countries is attributable to the laziness of those who hold this opinion of them. In our own country a far better principle prevails, but as I was saying the explanation of it is rather perplexing. For observe that open loves are held to be more honorable than secret ones and that the love of the noblest and highest even in their persons are less beautiful than others is especially honorable. Consider to how great is the encouragement which all the world gives to the lover. Neither is he supposed to be doing anything dishonorable but if he succeeds he is praised and if he fails he is blamed. And in the pursuit of his love the custom of mankind allows him to do many strange things which philosophy would bitterly censure if they were done from any motive of interest or wish for office or power. He may pray and entreat and supplicate and swear and lie on a mat at the door and endure a slavery worse than that of any slave. In any other case friends and enemies would be equally ready to prevent him but now there is no friend who will be ashamed of him and admonish him and no enemy will charge him with meanness or flattery. The actions of a lover have a grace which ennobles them and custom has decided that they are highly commendable and that there is no loss of character in them and what is strangest of all he only may swear and foreswear himself. Bracket so men say close bracket and the gods will forgive his transgression for there is no such thing as a lover's oath such is the entire liberty which gods and men have allowed the lover according to the custom which prevails in our part of the world. From this point of view a man fairly argues that an Athens to love and to be loved is held to be a very honorable thing but when parents forbid their sons to talk with their lovers and place them under tutors care who is appointed to see to these things and their companions and equals cast in their teeth anything of the sort which they may observe and their elders refuse to silence the reprovers and do not rebuke them. Anyone who reflects on all this will on the contrary think that we hold these practices to be most disgraceful but as I was saying at first the truth as I imagine is that whether such practices are honorable or whether they are dishonorable is not a simple question. They are honorable to him who follows them honorably dishonorable to him who follows them dishonorably. There is dishonor in yielding to the evil or in an evil manner but there is honor in yielding to the good or in an honorable manner. Evil is the vulgar lover who loves the body rather than the soul in as much as he is not even stable because he loves a thing which is in itself unstable and therefore when the bloom of youth which he was desiring is over he takes swing and flies away in spite of all his words and promises whereas the love of the noble disposition is lifelong for it becomes one with the everlasting. The custom of our country would have both of them proven well and truly and would have us yield to the one sort of lover and avoid the other and therefore encourages some to pursue and others to fly testing both the lover and beloved in contests and trials until they show to which of the two classes they respectively belong and this is the reason why in the first place a hasty attachment is held to be dishonorable because time is the true test of this as of most other things and secondly there is a dishonor in being overcome by the love of money or of wealth or of political power whether a man is frightened into surrender by the loss of them or having experienced the benefits of money and political corruption is unable to rise above the seductions of them for none of these things are of a permanent or lasting nature not to mention that no generous friendship ever sprang from them there remains then only one way of honorable attachment which custom allows in the beloved and this is the way of virtue for as we admitted that any service which the lover does to him is not to be accounted for his flattery or dishonor to himself so the beloved has one way only a voluntary service which is not dishonorable and this is virtuous service for we have a custom and according to our custom anyone who does service to another under the idea that he will be improved by him either in wisdom or in some other particular of virtue such a voluntary service I say is not to be regarded as a dishonor is not open to the charge of flattery and these two customs one the love of youth and the other the practice of philosophy and virtue in general ought to meet in one and then the beloved may honorably indulge the lover for when the lover and beloved come together having each of them a law and the lover thinks that he is right in doing any service which he can to his gracious loving one and the other that he is right in doing service which he can to him who is making him wise and good the one capable of communicating wisdom and virtue the other seeking to acquire them with a view of education and wisdom when the two laws of love are fulfilled and meet in one then and only then may the beloved yield with honor to the lover nor when love is of the disinterested sort is there any disgrace in being deceived but in every other case in being or not being deceived for he who is gracious to his lover under the impression that he is rich and is disappointed of his gains because he turns out to be poor is disgraced all the same for he has done his best to show that he would give himself up to anyone's use his base for the sake of money but this is not honorable and on the same principle he who gives himself to a lover because he is a good man who will be improved by his company shows himself to be virtuous even though the object of his affection turn out to be a villain and to have no virtue and if he is deceived he has committed a noble error for he has proved that for his part he will do anything for anybody with a view to virtue and improvement then which there can be nothing nobler thus noble in every case is the acceptance of another for the sake of virtue this is that love which is the love of the heavenly goddess and is heavenly and of great price to individuals and cities making the lover and the beloved alike eager in the work of their own improvement but all other loves are the offspring of the other who is the common goddess to you fadress I offer this my contribution in praise of love which is as good as I can make extempore end of section 1 recording by Jeffrey Edwards section 2 of the symposium this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Jeffrey Edwards the symposium by Plato translated by Benjamin Joett Pausanias came to a pause this is the balanced way in which I have been taught by the wise to speak and Aristodemus said that the turn of Aristophanes was next but either he had eaten too much or from some other cause he had the hiccough and was obliged to change turns with Eriksi Makus the physician who was reclining on the couch below him Eriksi Makus he said you want either to stop my hiccough or to speak in my turn until I have left off I will do both said Eriksi Makus I will speak in your turn and do you speak in mine and while I am speaking let me recommend you to hold your breath and if after you have done so for some time the hiccough is no better then gargle with a little water and if it still continues tickle your nose with something and sneeze and if you sneeze once or twice even the most violent hiccough is sure to go I will do as you prescribe said Aristophanes and now get on Eriksi Makus spoke as follows seeing that Pausanias made a fair beginning and but a lame ending I must endeavor to supply his deficiency I think that he has rightly distinguished two kinds of love but my art further informs me that the double love is not merely an affection of the soul of man that is anything but is to be found in the bodies of all animals and in productions of the earth and I may say in all that is such is the conclusion which I seem to have gathered for my own arts of medicine whence I learn how great and wonderful and universal is the deity of love whose empire extends over all things divine as well as human and for medicine I will begin that I may do honor to my art there are in the human body these two kinds of love which are confessedly different and unlike and being unlike they have loves and desires which are unlike and the desire of the healthy is one and the desire of the diseased is another and as Pausanias was just now saying that to indulge good men is honorable and bad men dishonorable so too in the body the good and healthy elements are to be indulged and the bad elements and the elements of disease are not to be indulged but discouraged and this is what the physician has to do and in this the art of medicine consists for medicine may be regarded generally as the knowledge of the loves and desires of the body and how to satisfy them or not and the best physician is he who is able to separate fair love from foul or to convert one into the other and he who knows how to eradicate and how to implant love whichever is required and can reconcile the most hostile elements in the constitution and make them loving friends is a skillful practitioner now the most hostile are the most opposite such as hot and cold, bitter and sweet moist and dry and the like and my ancestor Asclepus knowing how to implant friendship and accord in these elements was the creator of our art as our friends and poets here tell us and I believe them and not only medicine in every branch but the arts of gymnastics and husbandry are under his dominion anyone who pays the least attention to the subject will also perceive that in music there is the same reconciliation of opposites and I suppose that this must have been the meaning of Heraclitus although his words are not accurate for he says that the one is united by disunion like the harmony of the bow and the liar now there is an absurdity saying that harmony is discord or is composed of elements which are still in a state of discord but what he probably meant was that harmony is composed of different notes of higher and lower pitch which disagreed once but are now reconciled by the art of music for if the higher and lower notes still disagreed there could be no harmony clearly not for harmony is a symphony and symphony is an agreement but an agreement of disagreements while they disagree there cannot be you cannot harmonize that which disagrees in like manner rhythm is compounded of elements short and long once differing and now in accord which accordance as in the former instance medicine so in all these other cases music implants making love and unison to grow up among them and thus music too is concerned with the principles of love in their application to harmony and rhythm again in the essential nature of harmony and rhythm there is no difficulty in discerning love which has not yet become double but when you want to use them in actual life either in the composition of songs or in the correct performance of airs or meters composed already which latter is called education then the difficulty begins and the good artist is needed then the old tale has to be repeated of fair and heavenly love the love of Urania the fair and heavenly muse and of the duty of accepting the temperate and those who are as yet intemperate only that they may become temperate and of preserving their love and again of the vulgar polyhemia who must be used with circumspection that the pleasure be enjoyed but may not generate licentiousness just as in my own art it is a great matter how to regulate the desires of the epicure that he may gratify his tastes without the attendant evil of disease whence I infer that in music in medicine in all other things human as well as divine both loves ought to be noted as far as may be for they are both present the course of the seasons is also full of both these principles and when as I was saying the elements of hot and cold moist and dry attain the harmonious love of one another and blend in temperance and harmony they bring to men animals and plants health and plenty and do them no harm whereas the wanton love getting the upper hand and affecting the seasons of the year is very destructive and injurious being the source of pestilence and bringing many other kinds of diseases on animals and plants for whorefrost and hail and blight spring from the excesses and disorders of these elements of love which to know in relation to the revolutions of the heavenly bodies and the seasons of the year is termed astronomy furthermore all sacrifices and the whole province of divination which is the art of communion between gods and men these I say are concerned only with the preservation of the good and the cure of the evil love for all manner of impiety is likely to ensue if instead of accepting and honoring and reverencing the harmonious love in all his actions a man honors the other love whether in his feelings towards gods or parents, towards the living or the dead wherefore the business of divination is to see to these loves and to heal them and divination is the peacemaker of gods and men working by knowledge of the religious or irreligious tendencies which exist in human loves such is the great and mighty or rather omnipotent force of love in general and the love more especially which is concerned with the good and which is perfected in company with temperance and justice whether among gods or men has the greatest power and is the source of all our happiness and harmony and makes us friends with the gods who are above us and with one another I dare say that I too have admitted an embrace of love but this is not intentional and you, Aristophanes, may now supply the emissions or take some other line of commendation for I perceive that you are rid of the hiccup yes, said Aristophanes who followed, the hiccup is gone not however until I applied the sneezing and I wonder whether the harmony of the body has a love of such noises and ticklings for I know sooner applied the sneezing than I was cured Eriksi Makas said beware, friend Aristophanes although you are going to speak you are making fun of me and I shall have to watch and see whether I cannot have a laugh at your expense when you might speak in peace you are right, said Aristophanes laughing, I will unsay my words but do you please not to watch me as I fear that in the speech which I am about to make instead of others laughing with me I am more than one of our muse and would be all the better I shall only be laughed at by them do you expect to shoot your bolt and escape Aristophanes well perhaps if you are careful and bear in mind that you will be called to account I may be induced to let you off Aristophanes professed to open another vein of discourse he had a mind to praise love in another way unlike that either of Pausanias mankind, he said judging by their neglect of him have never, as I think at all understood the power of love for if they had understood him they would surely have built noble temples and altars and offered solemn sacrifices in his honor but this is not done and most certainly ought to be done since of all the gods he is the best friend of men the helper and the healer of the ills which are the great impediment to the happiness of the race I will try to describe his power to you and you shall teach the rest of the world what I am teaching you in the first place, let me treat of the nature of man and what has happened to it for the original human nature was not like the present, but different the sexes were not two as they are now, but originally three in number there was man, woman, and the union of the two having a name corresponding to this double nature once real existence, but is now lost and the word androgynous is only preserved as a term of reproach in the second place the primeval man was round his back and sides forming a circle and he had four hands and four feet one head with two faces looking opposite ways set on a round neck and precisely alike also four ears the remainder to correspond he could walk upright as men now do backwards or forwards as he pleased and he could also roll over and over at a great pace turning on his four hands and four feet eight in all like tumblers going all over and over with their legs in the air this was when he wanted to run fast now the sexes were three and such as I have described them because the sun, moon, and earth are three and the man was originally the child of the sun the woman of the earth and the man woman of the moon which is made up of sun and earth and they were all round and moved round and round like their parents terrible was their might and strength and the thoughts of their hearts were great and they made an attack upon the gods of them is told the tale of Otis and affiliates who as Homer says, dared to scale heaven and would have laid hands upon the gods doubt reigned in the celestial councils should they kill them and annihilate the race with thunderbolts as they had done the giants then there would be an end of the sacrifices and worship which men offered to them but on the other hand the gods could not suffer their insolence to be unrestrained at last after a good deal of reflection Zeus discovered a way he thinks I have a plan which will humble their pride and improve their manners men shall continue to exist but I will cut them in two and then they will be diminished in strength and increased in numbers this will have the advantage of making them more profitable to us they shall walk upright on two legs and if they continue insolent and will not be quiet I will split them again and they shall hop about on a single leg he spoke and cut men in two he saw a baffle which is halved for pickling or as you might divide an egg with a hair and as he cut them one after another he bade Apollo give the face and the half of the neck a turn in order that the man might contemplate the section of himself he would thus learn a lesson of humility Apollo was also bitten to heal their wounds and compose their forms so he gave a turn to the face and pulled the skin from the sides all over that which in our language is called the belly like the purses which draw in and he made one mouth at the center which he fastened in a knot bracket the same which is called the navel he also molded the breast and took out most of the wrinkles much as a shoemaker might smooth leather upon a last he left a few however in the region of the belly and navel as a memorial of the primeval state after the division one of the two parts of man each desiring his other half came together and throwing their arms about one another and twined in mutual embraces longing to grow into one they were on the point of dying from hunger and self-neglect because they did not like to do anything apart and when one of the halves died and the other survived the survivor sought another mate man or woman as we call them being the sections of entire man and clung to that they were being destroyed when Zeus in pity of them invented a new plan he turned the parts of generation round to the front for this had not always been their position and they sowed the seed no longer as hitherto like grasshoppers in the ground but in one another and after the transposition the male generated in the female in order that by the mutual embraces of man and woman they might breed and the race might continue or if man came to man they might be satisfied and rest and go their way to the business of life so ancient is the desire of one another which is implanted in us reuniting our original nature making one of two and healing the state of man each of us when separated having one side only like a flat fish is but the indenture of a man and he is always looking for his other half men who are a section of that double nature which was once called androgynous are lovers of women adulterers are generally of this breed and also adulterous women who lust after men the women who are a section of the woman do not care for men but have female attachments the female companions are of this sort but they who are a section of the male follow the male and while they are young because of the original man they hang about men and embrace them and they are themselves the best of boys and youths because they have the most manly nature some indeed assert that they are shameless but this is not true for they did not act thus from any want of shame but because they are valiant and manly and have a manly countenance and they embrace that which is like them and these when they grow up become our statesmen which is a great proof of the truth of what I am saying when they reach manhood they are lovers of youth and are not naturally inclined to marry or beget children if at all they do so only in obedience to the law but they are satisfied if they may be allowed to live with one another unwedded and such a nature is prone to love and ready to return love always embracing that which is akin to him and when one of them meets with his other half the actual half of himself whether he be a lover of youth or a lover of another sort the pair are lost in an amazement of love and friendship and intimacy and one will not be out of the other's sight as I may say even for a moment these are the people who pass their whole lives together yet they could not explain what they desire of one another for the intense yearning which each of them has towards the other does not appear to be the desire of lovers intercourse but of something else which the soul of either evidently desires and cannot tell and of which she has only a dark and doubtful pre-sentiment suppose he faced us with his instruments to come to the pair who are lying side by side and to say to them what do you people want of one another they would be unable to explain and suppose further that when he saw their perplexity he said do you desire to be holy one always day and night to be in one another's company for if this is what you desire I am ready to melt you into one and let you grow together so that being two you shall become one and while you live live a common life as if you were a single man and after your death in the world below still be one departed soul instead of two I ask whether this is what you lovingly desire and whether you are satisfied to attain this there is not a man of them who when he heard the proposal would deny or would not acknowledge that this meeting and melting into one another this becoming one instead of two was the very expression of his ancient need and the reason is that human nature was originally one and we were a whole and the desire and pursuit of the whole is called love there was a time I say when we were one but now because of the wickedness of mankind God has dispersed us as the Arcadians were dispersed into villages by the Lacedemonians and if we are not obedient to the gods there is a danger that we shall be split up again and go about in basso reliefio like the profile figures having only one half a nose which are sculpted on monuments and that we shall be like tallies therefore let us exhort all men to piety that we may avoid evil and obtain the good of which love is to us the lord and minister and let no one oppose him he is the enemy of the gods who opposes him for if we are friends of the god and at peace with him we shall find our own true loves which rarely happens in this world at present I am serious and therefore I must beg Eriximachus not to make fun or to find any illusion that I may be able to describe to Pausanias and Agathon who as I suspect are both of the manly nature and belong to the class which I have been describing but my words have a wider application they include men and women everywhere and I believe that if our loves were perfectly accomplished and each one returning to his primeval nature had his original true love then our race would be happy and if this would be best of all the best in the next degree and under present circumstances must be the nearest approach to such a union and that will be the attainment of a congenial love wherefore if we would praise him who has given to us the benefit we must praise the god love who is our greatest benefactor both leading us in this life back to our own nature and giving us high hopes for the future for he promises that if we are Paus he will restore us to our original state and heal us and make us happy and blessed this Eriximachus is my discourse of love which although different to yours I must beg you to leave unassailed by the shafts of your ridicule in order that each may have his turn each or rather either for Agathon and Socrates are the only ones left indeed I am not going to attack you said Eriximachus for I thought your speech charming and did I not know that Agathon and Socrates are masters in the art of love I should be really afraid that they would have nothing to say after the world of things which have been said already but for all that I am not without hopes Socrates said you played your part well Eriximachus but if you were as I am now or rather as I shall be when Agathon has spoken you would indeed be in a great straight you want to cast a spell over me Socrates said Agathon in the hope that I may be disconcerted at the expectation raised among the audience that I shall speak well I should be strangely forgetful Agathon replied Socrates of the courage and magnanimity which you showed when your own compositions were about to be exhibited and you came upon the stage with the actors and faced the vast theater all together undismayed if I thought that your nerves could be fluttered by a small party of friends do you think Socrates said Agathon that my head is so full of the theater as not to know how much more formidable to a man of sense a few good judges are than many fools nay replied Socrates I should be very wrong in attributing to you Agathon that or any other want of refinement and I am quite aware that if you happen to meet with any you thought wise you would care for their opinion much more than for that of the many but then we having been a part of the foolish many in the theaters cannot be regarded as a select wise though I know that if you chance to be in the presence not of one of ourselves but of some really wise man you would be ashamed of disgracing yourself before him would you not yes said Agathon but before the many you would not be ashamed if you thought that you were doing something disgraceful in their presence here interrupted them saying don't answer him my dear Agathon for if he can only get a partner with whom he can talk especially good looking one he will no longer care about the completion of our plan now I love to hear him talk but just at present I must not forget the incomium of love which I ought to receive from him and from everyone if you and he have paid your tribute to the god then you may talk very good said Agathon I see no reason why I should not proceed with my speech as I shall have many other opportunities of conversing with Socrates let me say first how I ought to speak and then speak the previous speakers instead of praising the god love or unfolding his nature appear to have congratulated mankind on the benefits which he confers upon them but I would rather praise the god first and then speak of his gifts this is always the right way of praising everything may I say without impiety or offense that of all the blessed gods he is the most blessed because he is the fairest and best and he is the fairest for in the first place he is the youngest and of his youth he is himself the witness fleeing out of the way of age who is swift enough to consider truly the most of us like love hates him and will not come near him but youth and love live and move together like to like as the proverb says many things were said by Phaedrus about love in which I agreed with him but I cannot agree that he is older than Iapetus and Cronus not so I maintain him to be the youngest of the gods and youthful ever the ancient doings among the gods if the tradition of them be true were done of necessity and not of love had love been in those days there would have been no chaining or mutilation of the gods or other violence but peace and sweetness as there is now in heaven since the rule of love began love is young and also tender he ought to have a poet like Homer to describe his tenderness as Homer says of Ate quote her feet are tender for she sets her steps not on the ground but on the heads of men close quote here is an excellent proof of her tenderness that she walks not upon the hard but upon the soft let us adduce a similar proof of the tenderness of love for he walks not upon the earth nor yet upon the skulls of men which are not so very soft but in the hearts and souls of both gods and men which are of all things the softest in them he walks and dwells and makes his home not in every soul without exception for where there is hardness he departs where there is softness there he dwells and nestling always with his feet and in all manner of ways in the softest of soft places how can he be other than the softest of all things of a truth he is the tenderest as well as the youngest flexible form for if he were hard and without flexure he could not unfold all things or wind his way into and out of every soul of man undiscovered and a proof of his flexibility and symmetry of form is his grace which is universally admitted to be in a special manner the attribute of love ungrace and love are always at war with one another the fairness of his complexion is revealed by his habitation among the flowers for he dwells not amid bloomless or fading beauties whether of body or soul or odd else but in the place of flowers and scents there he sits and abides concerning the beauty of the God I have said enough and yet there remains much more which I might say of his virtue I have now to speak his greatest glory is that he can neither do nor suffer wrong to or from any God or any man for he suffers not by force if he suffers force comes not near him neither when he acts does he act by force for all men in all things serve him of their own free will and where there is voluntary agreement there as the laws which are the lords of the city say is justice and not only is he just but exceedingly temperate for temperance is the acknowledged drooler of the pleasures and desires and no pleasure ever masters love he is their master and they are his servants and if he conquers them he must be tempered indeed as the courage even the God of war is no match for him he is the captive and love is the lord for love the love of Aphrodite masters him as the tale runs and the master is stronger than the servant and if he conquers the bravest of all others he must be himself the bravest of his courage and justice and temperance I have spoken but I have yet to speak of his wisdom and according to the measure of my ability I must try to do my best in the first place he is a poet bracket and here like Eriximachus I magnify my art close bracket and he is also the source of Posey and others which he could not be if he were not himself a poet and at the touch of him everyone becomes a poet even though he had no music in him before this also is a proof that love is a good poet and accomplished in all the fine arts for no one can give to another that which he has not himself or teach that of which he has no knowledge who will deny that the creation of the animals is his doing are they not all the works of his wisdom born and begotten of him and as to the artists do we not know that he only of them who love inspires of fame he whom love touches not walks in darkness the arts of medicine and archery and divination were discovered by Apollo under the guidance of love and desire so that he too is a disciple of love also the melody of the muses the metallurgy of Hephaestus the weaving of Athene the empire of Zeus over gods and men are all due to love who was the inventor of them and so love set in order the empire of the gods the love of beauty as is evident for with deformity love has no concern in the days of old as I began by saying dreadful deeds were done among the gods for they were ruled by necessity but now since the birth of love and from the love of the beautiful has sprung every good in heaven and earth therefore Phadrus I say of love is the fairest and best in himself and the cause of what is fairest and best in all other things and there comes into my mind a line of poetry in which he is said to be the god who quote gives peace on earth and calms the stormy deep who stills the winds and bids the sufferer sleep close quote this is he who empties men of disaffection and fills them with affection who makes them to meet together at banquets such as these sacrifices, feasts, dances he is our lord who sends courtesy and sends away discourtesy who gives kindness ever and never gives unkindness the friend of the good the wonder of the wise the amazement of the gods desired by those who have no part in him and precious to those who have the better part in him parent of delicacy luxury desire fondness softness grace regardful of the good regardless of the evil in every word work wish fear saviour pilot comrade helper glory of the gods and men leader best and brightest in whose footsteps let every man follow sweetly singing in his honor and joining in that sweet strain with which love charms the souls of gods and men such is the speech half playful yet having a certain measure of seriousness which according to my ability I dedicate to the god when Agathon had done speaking Aristodemus said that there was a general cheer the young man was thought to have spoken in a manner worthy of himself and of the god and Socrates looking at Ericsimacus said tell me son of Acumenus was there not reason in my fears and was I not a true prophet and I said that Agathon would make a wonderful aeration and that I should be in a straight the part of the prophecy which concerns Agathon replied Ericsimacus appears to me to be true but not the other part that you will be in a straight why my dear friend Sidsocrates must not I or anyone be in a straight who has to speak after he has heard such a rich and varied discourse I am especially struck with the beauty of the concluding words I could listen to them without amazement when I reflected on the immeasurable inferiority of my own powers I was ready to run away for shame if there had been a possibility of escape for I was reminded of Gorgias and at the end of his speech I fancied that Agathon was shaking at me the Gorginian or Gorgonian head of the great master of rhetoric which was simply to turn me and my speech into stone as Homer says and strike me dumb and then I perceived how foolish I had been in consenting to take my turn with you in praising love and saying that I too was a master of the art when I really had no conception how anything ought to be praised for in my simplicity I imagined that the topics of praise should be true and that this being presupposed out of the true the speaker was to choose the best and set them forth in the best manner I felt quite proud thinking that I knew the nature of true praise and should speak very well whereas I now see that the intention was to attribute to love every species of greatness and glory whether really belonging to him or not without regard to truth or falsehood that was no matter for the original proposal seems to have been not that each of you should really praise love but only that you should appear to praise him and so you attribute love every imaginable form of praise which can be gathered anywhere and you say that quote he is all this close quote and quote the cause of all that close quote making him appear the fairest and best of all to those who know him not for you cannot impose on those who know him and a noble and solemn hymn of praise have you rehearsed but as I misunderstood the nature of the praise when I said I would take my turn I must beg to be absolved from the promise which I made in ignorance and which bracket as Euripides would say close bracket was a promise of the lips and not of the mind farewell then to such a strain for I do not praise in that way no indeed I cannot but if you like to hear the truth about love I am ready to speak in my own manner though I will not make myself ridiculous by entering into any rivalry with you say then Phaedrus whether you would like to have the truth about love spoken in any words and in any order which may happen to come into my mind at the time will that be agreeable to you Aristodema said that Phaedrus and the company bid him speak in any manner which he thought best then he added let me have your permission first to ask Agathon a few more questions in order that I may take his admissions as the premises of my discourse I grant the permission said Phaedrus put your questions Socrates then proceeded as follows in the magnificent oration which you just uttered I think that you are right my dear Agathon in proposing to speak of the nature of love first and afterwards of his works that is a way of beginning which I very much approve and as you have spoken so eloquently of his nature may I ask you further that love is the love of something or of nothing and here I must explain myself I do not want you to say that love is the love of a father or the love of a mother that would be ridiculous but to answer as you would if I asked is a father a father of something to which you would have no difficulty in replying of a son or daughter and the answer would be right very true said Agathon and you would say the same of a mother he assented yet let me ask you one more question in order to illustrate my meaning is not a brother to be regarded essentially as a brother of something certainly he replied that is of a brother or sister yes he said and now said Socrates I will ask about love is love of something or of nothing of something surely he replied keep in mind what this is and tell me what I want to know whether love desires that of which love is yes surely and does he possess or does he not possess that which he loves and desires probably not I should say nay replied Socrates I would have you consider whether necessarily is not rather the word the inference that he who desires something is in want of something and that he who desires nothing is in want of nothing is in mind judgment Agathon absolutely and necessarily true what do you think I agree with you said Agathon very good would he who is great desire to be great or he who is strong desire to be strong that would be inconsistent with our previous admissions true for he who is anything cannot want to be that which he is very true and yet added Socrates if a man being strong desired to be strong or being swift desired to be swift or being healthy desired to be healthy in that case he might be thought to desire something which he already has or is I give the example in order that we may avoid misconception for the possessors of these qualities Agathon must be supposed to have their respective advantages at the time whether they choose or not and who can desire that which he has therefore when a person says I am well and wish to be well or I am rich and wish to be rich and I desire simply to have what I have to him we shall reply you my friend having wealth and health and strength want to have the continuance of them for at this moment whether you choose or know you have them and when you say I desire that which I have and nothing else is it not your meaning that you want to have what you now have in the future he must agree with us must he not he must replied Agathon then said Socrates he desires that which he has at present may be preserved to him in the future which is equivalent to saying that he desires something which is nonexistent to him and which as yet he has not got very true he said then he and everyone who desires desires that which he has not already and which is future and not present and which he has not and is not and of which he is in want these are the sort of things which love and desire seek very true he said then now socrates let us recapitulate the argument first is not love of something and of something to which is wanting to a man yes he replied remember further what you said in your speech or if you do not remember I will remind you you said that the love of the beautiful set in order the empire of the gods for that of deformed things there is no love did you not say something of that kind yes said Agathon yes my friend and the remark was a just one and if this is true love is a love of beauty and not of deformity he assented and the admission has been already made that love is of something which a man wants and has not true he said then love wants and has not beauty certainly he replied and would you call that beautiful which wants and does not possess beauty certainly not and would you still say that love is beautiful Agathon replied I fear that I did not understand what I was saying you made a very good speech Agathon replied Socrates but there is yet one small question which I would vain ask is not the good also the beautiful yes then in wanting the beautiful love wants also the good I cannot refute you Socrates said Agathon assume that what you say is true say rather beloved Agathon that you cannot refute the truth for Socrates is easily refuted end of section 2 recording by Jeffrey Edwards