Daily Advice 11.20.20

Today, a note from Plato on the nature of the soul:

Of the nature of the soul, though her true form be ever a theme of large and more than mortal discourse, let me speak briefly, and in a figure. And let the figure be composite-a pair of winged horses and a charioteer. Now the winged horses and the charioteers of the gods are all of them noble and of noble descent, but those of other races are mixed; the human charioteer drives his in a pair; and one of them is noble and of noble breed, and the other is ignoble and of ignoble breed; and the driving of them of necessity gives a great deal of trouble to him.
 

Later, in the same dialog, he elaborates:

 

As I said at the beginning of this tale, I divided each soul into three-two horses and a charioteer; and one of the horses was good and the other bad: the division may remain, but I have not yet explained in what the goodness or badness of either consists, and to that I will proceed. The right-hand horse is upright and cleanly made; he has a lofty neck and an aquiline nose; his colour is white, and his eyes dark; he is a lover of honour and modesty and temperance, and the follower of true glory; he needs no touch of the whip, but is guided by word and admonition only. The other is a crooked lumbering animal, put together anyhow; he has a short thick neck; he is flat-faced and of a dark colour, with grey eyes and blood-red complexion; the mate of insolence and pride, shag-eared and deaf, hardly yielding to whip and spur. Now when the charioteer beholds the vision of love, and has his whole soul warmed through sense, and is full of the prickings and ticklings of desire, the obedient steed, then as always under the government of shame, refrains from leaping on the beloved; but the other, heedless of the pricks and of the blows of the whip, plunges and runs away, giving all manner of trouble to his companion and the charioteer, whom he forces to approach the beloved and to remember the joys of love. They at first indignantly oppose him and will not be urged on to do terrible and unlawful deeds; but at last, when he persists in plaguing them, they yield and agree to do as he bids them.

Now, Plato is talking about sex here-- and not the kind of sex that would please Jerry Falwell, either. But his words apply to every circumstance in which the two steeds within us are aroused. A modern Plato might have written:
 

Now, when the charioteer sees a friend's Facebook post, the obedient steed thinks "Good for her!" or "I hope he's happy" or at least "After all, everyone tries to look as good as possible on social media. But the other, heedless of the whip, goes right to envy, or judgment, or regret, or lust. 

Or,
 

Now, when the charioteer beholds an advertisement, the obedient steed is unmoved, seeing in it only a cynical attempt to manipulate his desires; but the other, heedless of the whip, allows himself to be led by lust or fear or insecurity towards a product that he does not need.

Or,
 

Now, when the charioteer hears of some news item, the obedient steed, always under the government of patience and prudence, refrains from responding emotionally; but the other, heedless of the whip, plunges down into whatever rabbit-hole of fear or hatred the media have prepared for him. 
 

All of us who are not immortal beings come equipped with both of these horses, and learning, through meditation and spiritual practice, to guide the chariot of our soul is the work of a lifetime. And it is slow, difficult, work, requiring immense patience and a will to persist in the face of a thousand setbacks and obstacles. But the work is worth it. As Plato tells us, the soul which comes under the rule of its charioteer is able to return to the gods, where it can ascend with them to the highest heaven. 
 

But of the heaven which is above the heavens, what earthly poet ever did or ever will sing worthily? It is such as I will describe; for I must dare to speak the truth, when truth is my theme. There abides the very being with which true knowledge is concerned; the colourless, formless, intangible essence, visible only to mind, the pilot of the soul. The divine intelligence, being nurtured upon mind and pure knowledge, and the intelligence of every soul which is capable of receiving the food proper to it, rejoices at beholding reality, and once more gazing upon truth, is replenished and made glad, until the revolution of the worlds brings her round again to the same place. In the revolution she beholds justice, and temperance, and knowledge absolute, not in the form of generation or of relation, which men call existence, but knowledge absolute in existence absolute; and beholding the other true existences in like manner, and feasting upon them, she passes down into the interior of the heavens and returns home; and there the charioteer putting up his horses at the stall, gives them ambrosia to eat and nectar to drink.