PLATO – THE SYMPOSIUM (DIOTIMA SECTION)
201E-212A; TEXT PAGES: 483-494 (PLATO: COMPLETE WORKS, COOPER & HUTCHISON, 1997)
• Love is between the mortal and immortal, ignorance and wisdom; its lineage is poverty (Penia, mother) and plenty (Poros, father) • Love’s goal is desiring beautiful things and realizing happiness (eudaimonia) by “giv[ing] birth” to beauty, either physically or spiritually. Children represent the former, while wisdom, virtue, moderation and justice, the latter. Both seek immortality though Diotima’s preference is the latter • Love’s path is stair-like, ascending from the physical to the spiritual: (1) from the love of one beautiful body to beautiful bodies; (2) creating beautiful ideas; (3) realizing the beauty of the soul and (4) that of activities and laws -- finally, apprehending the perfect, eternal, unchanging Form of Beauty itself • The Form of Beauty imparts virtue which is greatly favored by the gods -- its practice could make one immortal