[439d]
but the impulses which draw and drag
come through affections1 and
diseases?” “Apparently.” “Not
unreasonably,” said I, “shall we claim that they are two
and different from one another, naming that in the soul whereby it reckons
and reasons the rational2 and that with which it loves, hungers,
thirsts, and feels the flutter3 and titillation of other desires, the irrational and
appetitive—companion4 of various
repletions and pleasures.” “It would not be unreasonable
but quite natural,”
1 The “pulls” are distinguished verbally from the passions that are their instruments.νοσημάτων suggests the Stoic doctrine that passions are diseases. Cf. Cicero Tusc. iii. 4perturbationes, and passim, and Philebus 45 C.
2 λογιστικόν is one of Plato's many synonyms for the intellectual principle. Cf. 441 C, 571 C, 587 D, 605 B. It emphasizes the moral calculation of consequences, as opposed to blind passion. Cf. Crito 46 B (one of the passages which the Christian apologists used to prove that Socrates knew the λόγος), Theaetetus 186 Cἀναλογίσματα πρός τε οὐσίαν καὶ ὠφέλειαν, and Laws 644 D. Aristotle Eth. 1139 a 12 somewhat differently.
3 ἐπτόηται: almost technical, as in Sappho's ode, for the flutter of desire.ἀλόγιστον, though applied here to the ἐπιθυμητικόν only, suggests the bipartite division of Aristotle, Eth. Nic. 1102 a 28.
4 So the bad steed which symbolizes the ἐπιθυμητικόν in Phaedrus 253 E is ἀλαζονείας ἑταῖρος.
Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 5 & 6 translated by Paul Shorey. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1969.
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