w can they be saved from those passions which
reason forbids them to indulge, and which are the ruin of so many?
The prohibition of wealth, and the influence of education, and the
all-seeing eye of the ruler, will alike help to promote temperance; but
they will not wholly extirpate the unnatural loves which have been the
destruction of states; and against this evil what remedy can be devised?
Lacedaemon and Crete give no assistance here; on the subject of love, as
I may whisper in your ear, they are against us. Suppose a person were to
urge that you ought to restore the natural use which existed before the
days of Laius; he would be quite right, but he would not be supported by
public opinion in either of your states. Or try the matter by the test
which we apply to all laws,--who will say that the permission of such
things tends to virtue? Will he who is seduced learn the habit of
courage; or will the seducer acquire temperance? And will any legislator
be found to make such actions legal?

But to judge of this matter truly, we must understand the nature of love
and friendship, which may take very different forms. For we speak of
friendship, first, when there is some similarity or equality of virtue;
secondly, when there is some want; and either of these, when in excess,
is termed love. The first kind is gentle and sociable; the second is
fierce and unmanageable; and there is also a third kind, which is akin
to both, and is under the dominion of opposite principles. The one is of
the body, and has no regard for the character of the beloved; but he who
is under the influence of the other disregards the body, and is a looker
rather than a lover, and desires only with his soul to be knit to the
soul of his friend; while the intermediate sort is both of the body
and of the soul. Here are three kinds of love: ought the legislator to
prohibit all of them equally, or to allow the virtuous love to remain?
'The latter, clearly.' I expected to gain your approval; but I will
reserve the task of convincing our friend Cleinias for another occasion.
'Very good.' To make right laws on this subject is in one point of view
easy, and in another most difficult; for we know that in some cases most
men abstain willingly from intercourse with the fair. The unwritten
law which prohibits members of the same family from such intercourse is
strictly obeyed, and no thought of anything else ever enters into the
minds of men in general. A little word