After much deliberation Socrates concludes that, “...virtue comes to be present, in those in whom it is present, by divine allotment.” (100b) In class I purposed that the pursuit of virtue could be likened to love, and I believe this parallel could be means to understanding the process by which divine allotment enables such virtue to become.
I will define love as an efficacious emotion that reveals a beauty to the lover. When the human soul sees something beautiful it is drawn to it in hopes of either attaining it or merely knowing it or understanding it. So, a lover, if the love is earnest, asks this question in earnestness: how do I love (or better love) my beloved? When this thought occupies a mind, behaviors will naturally evidence it. Time is spent with the beloved so that the lover can better come to know her better (which will hopefully reveal greater beauty, reciprocating greater love), and various forms of altruism will manifest themselves until, if a third party was asked to judge if the lover loved the beloved, he would doubtlessly answer yes.
Likewise, we can consider the aforementioned divine allotment to be an opening of the eyes to the beauty of virtue. Man, seeing such beauty and how much he lacks it, will ask this question: how do I become virtuous? By putting forth effort to know virtue, virtue will eventually manifest itself in a person’s lifestyle to such a degree that if an observer was asked if the person was virtuous, the answer would be yes.
Though we may not be able to define virtue, divine allotment can reveal to us that it is beautiful, and, being drawn to this beauty, we begin to take it on as part of ourselves.
Mr. Pounds, this is an excellent analogy. The only thing I could think to 'pick at' it with, like Socrates before us, is this question; What if someone never saw someone else being virtuous? I know it's a stretch, as most people are usually surrounded by at least a couple virtuous people, but what if they weren't? With love, someone could find a beauty in anything, whether it be a person or even a book, but being that virtue is a kind of action, if someone were isolated and never saw virtue, it would be tough to become virtuous for them.
ReplyDeleteAgain, I know, it's a really big, and unlikely, stretch, but it is something to think about at least.
I don't think that people have to be exposed to virtue in order to be virtuous themselves. Virtue can begin on its own and doesn't necessarily have to be picked up through seeing others who possess it. If Socrates concludes that those who have virtue get it from divine allotment, then I don't think people have to know what virtue is, they just are that way naturally. I understand why Socrates was not able to define virtue because virtue appears to be something more of instinct than of practice, kind of like love.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Mr. Fritz. If a person were, as Benjamin said, isolated and never saw virtue but were perhaps "allotted" virtue by a divine power then he or she would simply act that way. The only difference, I feel, is that the person in isolation would not know to label him or her self as virtuous. They just simply would be acting how they saw fit. In relation to love, we don't set out saying I'm going to love X, and in order to show my love for X, I'm going to do this, this, and this. We simply just do it. In the same regards, being virtuous would be of the same. If a person is virtuous then he or she does not say I must do this, this, and this to stay virtuous. They simply are because that is how they know to act and behave. It is instilled into their being.
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