Apollo was also bidden to heal their
wounds and compose their forms. So he gave a turn to the face and pulled
the skin from the sides all over that which in our language is called the
belly, like the purses which draw in, and he made one mouth at the centre,
which he fastened in a knot (the same which is called the navel); he also
moulded the breast and took out most of the wrinkles, much as a shoemaker
might smooth leather upon a last; he left a few, however, in the region of
the belly and navel, as a memorial of the primeval state. After the
division the two parts of man, each desiring his other half, came together,
and throwing their arms about one another, entwined in mutual embraces,
longing to grow into one, they were on the point of dying from hunger and
self-neglect, because they did not like to do anything apart; and when one
of the halves died and the other survived, the survivor sought another
mate, man or woman as we call them,--being the sections of entire men or
women,--and clung to that. They were being destroyed, when Zeus in pity of
them invented a new plan: he turned the parts of generation round to the
front, for this had not been always their position, and they sowed the seed
no longer as hitherto like grasshoppers in the ground, but in one another;
and after the transposition the male generated in the female in order that
by the mutual embraces of man and woman they might breed, and the race
might continue; or if man came to man they might be satisfied, and rest,
and go their ways to the business of life: so ancient is the desire of one
another which is implanted in us, reuniting our original nature, making one
of two, and healing the state of man.
Pages:
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111