Socrates Diner Party Speech

In Plato's Symposium, a dinner party was held with the discussion of love as the focus. Everyone who attended the party gave a speech, an ode to Love. Socrates spoke last, alleging his speech was a reiteration of what Diotima had once told him. Diotima, a priestess, whom Socrates allegedly met in the past, told him of the secrets of love. Another attendee of the party, Alcibiades, was asked to make a eulogy for love as well, but instead, talked about the nature of Socrates. The nature of love, from what Alcibiades said, and the nature of Socrates turned out to be almost identical. In Plato's Symposium, Socrates represents the quintessence of love itself.

Love, the spirit, was said to be the son of Plenty and Poverty. One parent a complete opposite of the other, came together to form the middle, Love. Love took after his mother, Poverty, with the characteristic of a constant need. However, he also had characteristics from his father, Plenty. Love was said to enjoy chasing things of beauty and value, and was filled with courage, spontaneity, and energy. He had a desire for knowledge, and was resourceful.

Socrates saw love and beauty in constant pursuit of the other, which is the greatest of all knowledge. Love is a driving force toward a desired want. Like humans are drawn to food, for energy and strength, we are also attracted to beauty by love. Love is an emotion, and like all emotions, humans are bound to an action by it. Anger might take us to violence; Love leads us to admire that which is beautiful. Love has many forms as well. There is physical love, the attraction and appreciation of something for its physical characteristics. This is both love for another person's physical beauty and to other physical forms, such as a beautiful sunset or some sort of picture-perfect scenery. All these things represent a part of beauty, they are beautiful, and as a result provoke love in the minds of those who observe them. Emotions add to another form of love. This is love for a person's inner beauty, the beauty of the person on an emotional level, regardless of the physical aspect. This form is more limited; one wouldn't form an emotional attachment to a work of art or to their favorite food. The emotional phase can be rare and hard to obtain, and is also not as common as physical love in that it cannot be developed in an instant. Emotional beauty requires complete contact and awareness for another. Because of this, emotional love is usually followed by physical love; physical attraction to a person would allow for the time and experience required to develop a beginning of emotional love.

We don't yearn for the half or the whole unless it is good, is what Socrates says while he's speaking at the diner party. By this he means that the purpose in love is a longing for goodness, not just satisfaction. Love is always bound for what is good, that goodness itself is the only objective of love. When we love something we really are just seeking to hold the goodness which is in it. We want to hold this not only temporarily, but permanently. Plato, in giving his definition of love, says, "Love is desire for the perpetual possession of the good."

Ð''Love is desire' expresses a belief that human beings are always searching. Our life is a continuous search for things that will satisfy and fulfill our needs, needs that will provide happiness. Desiring is having a want to have what is good. We desire something because we think that it will help us out and do us some good. Plato believes everything, not just human beings, strive for what is good, the entire universe seems to be continuously in love. All things love, but all things may not know what their love means. Some might not know why, or what, they are striving for or desiring their love for. Really, few recognize the object of their love, that which stimulates their need, that which inspires their every wish, that which will guarantee Ð''perpetual possession'. This Plato says is, the Good.

As the main purpose of desire, the Good must be present in all phases of human life. Everyone seeks it, but not everyone sees what is good. In the busyness of life, we don't stop to think thoroughly about our desires; therefore we don't know what will satisfy them. When we're hungry, we eat, thinking that food is the aim of our desire. But once we have eaten, we may desire other things, and the process will continue on until our death. Some may never understand that all we are really striving for is beauty and goodness. At that point, you are susceptible to not being able to love properly.

Socrates later changes his earlier definition and says, "To love beauty is to wish to bring forth in beauty." To have it perpetually is to re-create it endlessly. As a result, love must be the love of immortality. Socrates believed that love's goal is to imitate itself in beauty. A form of beauty, in either a cerebral form or a physical form, should be carried on, because things that are beautiful are things that are good. Through reproduction these things of beauty are given immortality. We cherish our children because through them we share the future. This is why love is related with the birth of new beings. Love's desire is to procreate because procreation is our closest way to perpetuity.

The ladder of love is a model of how love should progress from the most general form of love to the purest form of love. The lover begins at the most obvious form of love, obsession. This starts by loving one beautiful body leading to beautiful ideas. The lover will naturally think of the physical beauty. The lover will eventually