But Diotima, the prophetess of Mantineia, whose sacred and superhuman
character raises her above the ordinary proprieties of women, has taught
Socrates far more than this about the art and mystery of love. She has
taught him that love is another aspect of philosophy. The same want in the
human soul which is satisfied in the vulgar by the procreation of children,
may become the highest aspiration of intellectual desire. As the Christian
might speak of hungering and thirsting after righteousness; or of divine
loves under the figure of human (compare Eph. 'This is a great mystery, but
I speak concerning Christ and the church'); as the mediaeval saint might
speak of the 'fruitio Dei;' as Dante saw all things contained in his love
of Beatrice, so Plato would have us absorb all other loves and desires in
the love of knowledge. Here is the beginning of Neoplatonism, or rather,
perhaps, a proof (of which there are many) that the so-called mysticism of
the East was not strange to the Greek of the fifth century before Christ.
Pages:
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58