Plato in a symposium setting with a student compares the behavior of men in poor health who seek a panacea to restore themselves to health when they won't stop drinking, gorging themselves and wenching to poorly administered governments saying, "... the way of such invalids is precisely that of those cities which being badly governed forewarn their citizens not to meddle with the general constitution of the state, denouncing death to whosoever attempts that—while whoever most agreeably serves them governed as they are and who curries favor with them by fawning upon them and anticipating their desires and by his cleverness in gratifying them, him they will account the good man, the man wise in worthwhile things, the man they will delight to honor? Plato. The Republic. Book 4. Section 426b to 426c.
Image: Aquamanile depicting Airstotle's girlfriend Phyllis riding him around the garden after Aristotle warned Alexander the Great about women Copper Alloy South Lowlands 14th century CE photographed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. I wonder what Plato would have thought of this depiction of his most famous student?
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