The White Horse and the Dark
Read the full text in our reader
Socrates — τῶν δὲ δὴ ἵππων ὁ μέν, φαμέν, ἀγαθός, ὁ δʼ οὔ·… τό τε εἶδος ὀρθὸς, λευκὸς ἰδεῖν, τιμῆς ἐραστὴς μετὰ σωφροσύνης τε καὶ αἰδοῦς, καὶ ἀληθινῆς δόξης ἑταῖρος, κελεύσματι μόνον καὶ λόγῳ ἡνιοχεῖται·
Socrates — ὁ δʼ αὖ σκολιός, σιμοπρόσωπος, γλαυκόμματος, ὕφαιμος, ὕβρεως καὶ ἀλαζονείας ἑταῖρος, κωφός, μάστιγι μετὰ κέντρων μόγις ὑπείκων
Of the two horses, one, we say, is good; the other, not. The good one stands upright, clean-limbed, high-necked, aquiline, white to look upon and dark-eyed: a lover of honor joined with temperance and reverent shame, friend of true opinion; he is driven without a blow, by command and word alone. The other is crooked, a heavy jumble of a beast — thick-necked, short-throated, snub-faced, black-skinned, his grey eyes bloodshot; friend of outrage and imposture, shaggy about the ears, deaf, and scarcely yielding to whip and goads together.
The chariot from 246a finally gets its full portrait. Two horses, described like entries in a breeder's catalogue — except one is virtue's physiognomy and the other is appetite's, down to a suspiciously familiar nose.
The portrait is built on the ears. The white horse — upright (<em>orthós</em>), white (<em>leukós</em>, from the same shine-root as 'light'), lover of honor 'with temperance and <em>aidṓs</em>' — is steered 'by command and <em>word</em> alone': governance by λόγος, no whip required. The dark horse is 'shaggy about the ears — <em>deaf</em>' (<em>kōphós</em>): it cannot be persuaded because it cannot hear, so it yields only to whip and goads (<em>kéntra</em> — the sting that, pointed the other way, gave us 'center'). Plato's whole moral psychology in one anatomical detail: virtue is the part of the soul that responds to speech; appetite is the part reason cannot reach, only rein. Note too who its friends are — <em>hýbris</em> (outrage: in Athenian law a crime against persons, not a character flaw) and <em>alazoneía</em> (the braggart's imposture), keeping company under the warm word <em>hetaîros</em>, the same 'companion' the white horse gets for true opinion.<br><br>And one detail Plato's first readers laughed at: the dark horse is <em>simoprósōpos</em> — snub-faced. <em>Simós</em> was THE word for Socrates's famous nose (<em>Theaetetus</em> 143e; Alcibiades in the <em>Symposium</em> compares him to a satyr, and satyrs are all snub). The appetitive beast of the soul wears its portraitist's face. Even the white horse is not passionless — he is an <em>erastḗs</em>, a lover, of honor. Nothing in this soul is desire-free; the question the reins decide is only what each part loves, and whether it can hear.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Phaedrus 253d in the full reader
Always open passages in the reader
You are reading a page of the Phaedrus — the whole book is free in our interlinear reader.
The Great Library Project presses the classics in their original languages, glossed word by word — free to read, always. Browse the whole library.
Also on our shelves:
Phaedrus 253d — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/phaedrus/253d/