ABSTRACT
Plato's narrator, Socrates, continues with his symbolic narrative to describe the actions of the soul in love. The wing is the corporeal element that is most akin to the divine and by nature tends to soar aloft and carry that which gravitates downwards into the upper region, which is the habitation of the gods. The divine is Beauty, Wisdom, Goodness, and the like; and by these the wing of the soul is nourished and grows apace; but when fed upon evil and foulness and the opposite of good, it wastes and falls away. The chariots of the gods in even poise, obeying the rein, glide rapidly; but the others labor, for the vicious steed goes heavily, weighing down the charioteer to the earth when his steed has not been thoroughly trained-and this is the hour of agony and extremest conflict for the soul.
