Phaedrus — Plato

PH/EDRUS 149 Phadr, Yes, but I will ; and my word shall be an oath. ** I say, or rather swear " — but what god will be the witness of my oath? — *' I swear by this plane-tree, that unless you repeat the discourse here, in the face of the plane-tree, I will never tell you another; never let you have word of an other ! '' Soc, Villain ! I am conquered ; the poor lover of discourse has no more to say. Phadr, Then why are you still at your tricks?

Soc, I am not going to play tricks now that you have taken the oath, for I cannot allow myself to be starved. Phcedr, Proceed. Soc, Shall I tell you what I will do ? PhcRdr, What? ^J^ Soc, I will veil my face and gallop through the discourse as fast as I can, for if I see you, I shall feel ashamed and not know what to say.

Phcedr, Only go on and you may do as you please. [After an invocation to the Muses, Socrates begins his speech, which he addresses to an imaginary youth, by inquiring into the nature and power of love. He says that in every person there are two principles, a better and a worse, which are in conflict with each other. The better one, reason, if allowed to rule, leads to temperance. The worse, desire, when victorious, leads to excess.

Excess has many forms and many names, and among them is found love.] And now, dear Phaedrus, I shall pause for an instant to ask whether you do not think me, as I appear to myself, inspired ? Phcedr, Yes, Socrates, you seem to have a very unusual flow of words.

Soc, Listen to me, then, in silence ; for surely the place is holy ; so that you must not wonder, if, as I proceed, I appear to be in a divine fury, for already I am getting into dithyrambics,» Phcedr. That is quite true. ^ The dithyramb was a kind of poetry of a lofty but often inflated style. The term was used metaphorically, as here, of any bombastic language. (L. andS.)

ISO PLATO THE TEACHER Soc, And that I attribute to you. But hear what follows, and perhaps the fit may be averted ; all is in their hands above. And now I will go on talking to my youth. Listen : — [Socrates proceeds in much the same strain as Lysias, to set forth all the disadvantages and harm that result to a youth from his association with a lover. His speech is a parody on that of Lysias. He shows that he can surpass the rhetoricians in their own art. At the same time he develops still further the germ of truth presented by Lysias, that there is an unworthy and spurious form of love which should be rejected. He concludes his censure of the lover thus :] Consider this, fair youth, and know that in the friendship of the lover there is no real kindness : he has an appetite and wants to feed upon you.

" As wolves love lambs so lovers love their loves.

But, as I said before, I am speaking in vdrse, and therefore I had better make an end ; that is enough. Phcedr, I thought that you were only half-way and were going to make a similar speech about all the advantages of accepting the non-lover. Why don't you go on? Soc, Does not your simplicity observe that I have got out of dithyrambics into epics ; and if my censure was in verse, what will my praise be?

Don't you see that I am already overtaken by the Nymphs to whom you have mischievously exposed me? And therefore I will only add that the non-lover has all the advantages in which the lover is charged with being deficient. And now I will say no more; there has been enough said of both of them. Leaving the tale to its fate, I will cross the river and make the best of my way home, lest a worse thing be inflicted upon me by you.

Phcedr, Not yet, Socrates ; not until the heat of the day has passed ; don't you see that the hour is noon, and the sun is standing over our heads ? Let us rather stay and talk over what has been said, and then return in the cool. Soc, Your love of discourse, Phaedrus, is superhuman, simply marvelous, and I do not believe that there is any one of your contemporaries who in one way or another has either made or