The Symposium - Plato

          The general argument/point made by Plato in his work The Symposium is that love is immortal and eternal. More specifically, Plato argues/suggests that love is nothing like it is thought to be. It is carried on through one, people’s and animal’s desire to procreate and two because of man’s curiosity and infatuation with finding true beauty. He writes, “The contemplation of beauty absolute; a beauty which if you once beheld, you would see not to be after the measure of gold, and garments, and fair boys and youths, whose presence now entrances you.” (pg. 289) In this passage, Plato is suggesting that love is really man’s desire to find true beauty; it is where it stems from. It’s not love in the sense that we think of it as two people loving each other for unselfish reasons, it that desire to find the absolute beauty. In conclusion, it is Plato’s belief that love has many secret meanings and stems from many different people but from main desire of finding true beauty which may never actually be able to be understood or obtained.

            In my view, Plato is wrong because love might start out as a desire to possess something of beauty, but it turns into something more when soul is involved. For example, arranged marriages sometimes start out as only physical attraction for what a person has; their material possessions, physical attributes, or what that person/marriage could bring. But arranged marriages usually turn into a deeper kind of love/appreciation when the two souls of those people meet and become familiar. It strays away from possessing something beautiful, and turns into possessing something that makes you happy. Although, Plato might object that love is not all about obtaining, I maintain that love is a deep connection among two souls. Therefore, I conclude that although Plato brought about many thoughts and possible truths, love is much deeper and selfless than the possession of true beauty.