Page:The Dialogues of Plato v. 1.djvu/558

 

 

be gratified without inflicting upon liim the attendant penalty of Sym- . . poHum. disease. 188 There is a similar harmony or disagreement in the course of nalvsis. the seasons and in the relations of moist and dry, hot and cold, hoar frost and blight ; and diseases of all sorts spring from the excesses or disorders of the element of love. The knowledge of these elements of love and discord in the heavenly bodies is termed astronomy, in the relations of men towards gods and parents is called divination. For divination is the peacemaker of gods and men, and works by a knowledge of the tendencies of merely human loves to piety and impiety. Such is the power of love ; and that love which is just and temperate has the greatest power, and is the source of all our happiness and friendship with the gods and with one another. I dare say that I have omitted to 189 mention many things which you, Aristophanes, may supply, as I perceive that you are cured of the hiccough. Aristophanes is the next speaker ; — He professes to open a new vein of discourse, in which he begins by treating of the origin of human nature. The sexes were originally three, men, women, and the union of the two ; and they were made round — having four hands, four feet, two 190 faces on a round neck, and the rest to correspond. Terrible was their strength and swiftness ; and they were essaying to scale heaven and attack the gods. Doubt reigned in the celestial councils; the gods were divided between the desire of quelling the pride of man and the fear of losing the sacrifices. At last Zeus hit upon an expedient. Let us cut them in two, he said ; then they will only have half their strength, and we shall have twice as many sacrifices. He spake, and split them as you might split an egg with an hair ; and when this was done, he told Apollo to give their faces a twist and re-arrange their persons, taking out 191 the wrinkles and tying the skin in a knot about the navel. The two halves went about looking for one another, and were ready to die of hunger in one another's arms. Then Zeus invented an adjustment of the sexes, which enabled them to marry and go their way to the business of life. Now the characters of men differ accordingly as they are derived from the original man or the original woman, or the original man-woman. Those who come from the man-woman arc lascivious and adulterous ; those