Plato quote about love from Symposium - Evil is the vulgar lover who loves the body rather than the soul
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Evil is the vulgar lover who loves the body rather than the soul
 Plato, Symposium. copy citation

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Author Plato
Source Symposium
Topic love soul body
Date
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by Benjamin Jowett
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1600/1600-h/1600-h.htm

Context

“But, as I was saying at first, the truth as I imagine is, that whether such practices are honourable or whether they are dishonourable is not a simple question; they are honourable to him who follows them honourably, dishonourable to him who follows them dishonourably. There is dishonour in yielding to the evil, or in an evil manner; but there is honour in yielding to the good, or in an honourable manner. Evil is the vulgar lover who loves the body rather than the soul, inasmuch 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 wing and flies away, in spite of all his words and promises; whereas the love of the noble disposition is life-long, 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.” source

Meaning and analysis

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