arvel not then at the love which all men have of their
offspring; for that universal love and interest are for the sake of
immortality."

When I heard this, I was astonished and said, "Is this really true, O
thou wise Diotima?" And she answered with all the authority of a
sophist: "Of that, Socrates, you may be assured; think only of the
ambition of men, and you will marvel at their senselessness unless you
consider how they are stirred by the love of an immortality of fame.
They are ready to run risks greater far than they would have run for
their children, and to spend money and undergo any amount of toil, and
even to die for the sake of leaving behind them a name which shall be
eternal. Do you imagine that Alcestis[62] would have died on behalf of
Admetus, or Achilles after Patroclus, or your own Codrus in order to
preserve the kingdom for his sons, if they had not imagined that the
memory of their virtues, which is still retained among us, would be
immortal? Nay," she said, "for I am persuaded that all men do all
things for the sake of the glorious fame of immortal virtue, and the
better they are the more they desire this; for they are ravished with
the desire of the immortal.

"Men whose bodies only are creative betake themselves to women and
beget children--this is the character of their love; their offspring,
as they hope, will preserve their memory and give them the blessedness
and immortality which they desire in the future. But creative
souls--for there are men who are more creative in their souls than in
their bodies--conceive that which is proper for the soul to conceive
or retain. And what are these conceptions?--wisdom and virtue in
general. And such creators are all poets and other artists who may be
said to have invention. But the greatest and fairest sort of wisdom by
far is that which is concerned with the ordering of states and
families, and which is called temperance and justice. And he who in
youth has the seed of these implanted in him and is himself inspired,
when he comes to maturity desires to beget and generate offspring. And
he wanders about seeking beauty that he may beget offspring--for in
deformity he will beget nothing--and embraces the beautiful rather
than the deformed; and when he finds a fair and noble and
well-nurtured soul, and there is union of the two in one person, he
gladly embraces it, and to such a soul he is full of fair speech about
virtue and the nature and pursuits of a g