Alcestis, Achilles, Codrus
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Diotima — παίδων, καὶ χρήματα ἀναλίσκειν καὶ πόνους πονεῖν οὑστινασοῦν καὶ ὑπεραποθνῄσκειν. ἐπεὶ οἴει σύ, ἔφη, Ἄλκηστιν ὑπὲρ Ἀδμήτου ἀποθανεῖν ἄν, ἢ Ἀχιλλέα Πατρόκλῳ ἐπαποθανεῖν, ἢ προαποθανεῖν τὸν ὑμέτερον Κόδρον ὑπὲρ τῆς βασιλείας τῶν παίδων, μὴ οἰομένους ἀθάνατον μνήμην ἀρετῆς πέρι ἑαυτῶν ἔσεσθαι, ἣν νῦν ἡμεῖς ἔχομεν; πολλοῦ γε δεῖ, ἔφη, ἀλλʼ οἶμαι ὑπὲρ ἀρετῆς ἀθανάτου καὶ τοιαύτης δόξης εὐκλεοῦς πάντες πάντα ποιοῦσιν, ὅσῳ ἂν ἀμείνους
children, and to spend money and endure toils of any kind and to die for it. For do you think, she said, Alcestis would have died for Admetus, or Achilles died after Patroclus, or your Codrus died beforehand for the kingship of his sons, not thinking there would be a deathless memory of their virtue, which we now hold? Far from it, she said, but I think for deathless virtue and such glorious repute all do everything, the better they are,
Diotima names the proof. People spend money, endure any toil, and die for the sake of glory. Do you think Alcestis would have died for Admetus, or Achilles chosen death after Patroclus, or your Codrus died to secure his sons' kingship, if they had not believed there would be a deathless memory of their virtue — the very memory we now keep? Far from it: for immortal virtue and glorious fame all people do everything, the better they are, the more. Continued in 208e.
Diotima's reading is bold and reductive at once: none of these acted from love of the person or from calculation, but for the deathless memory of their virtue — the kleos that we, generations later, still keep. She turns even Alcestis' wifely devotion and Achilles' grief for his beloved into instances of the love of immortality through fame. It is a striking move in a dialogue that has just praised erotic love: the highest human deeds are recast as the soul's bid to outlast death by leaving an undying name. And the closing measure — 'the better they are, the more' — makes the love of glory the mark of the noblest natures, not a vice. This prepares the ranking to come (209a ff.): those pregnant in body beget children, but those pregnant in soul bring forth something greater and more immortal — wisdom, virtue, poems, and laws — the offspring for which Homer, Hesiod, and the great lawgivers are honoured as with shrines.
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