The tone of his speech is pedantic, as is the portrayal of his character throughout the book he takes every opportunity possible to show his knowledge of medicine. Similar to Pausanias, Eryximachus is satirized by Plato for self-importance and high opinion of the significance of medicine. Aristophanes takes a step back, saying he has not tried to joke about Eryximachus’ speech, before beginning his own. He comically applies Eryximachus’ principle, saying the orderly sort of Love must have taken over since Eryximachus’ suggestion to cure the hiccups have worked.Įryximachus warns Aristophanes that he is about to begin his own speech, making him vulnerable to others’ jokes as well. The power of Love is ultimately absolute.īy Eryximachus’ speech’s end, Aristophanes’ hiccups have stopped he used the Sneeze Treatment suggest by Eryximachus to stop them. Divination encourages proper kind of Love, producing affection between gods and men. The diseased Love causes impiety, pulling us away from proper Love, which is necessary to interact with the gods. Love affects all of nature and even interactions between humans and gods. The proper species of Love creates harmony, even amongst opposites. Caution is indicated from vulgar or Common Love (which he says comes from Polyhymnia, rather than Pandemos as indicated by Pausanias), which can easily slip from pleasure into debauchery if not regulated. In other words, guided by Love, medicine seeks to create harmony in the human body, ridding discordant elements, similar to how music creates rhythm and harmony.Įryximachus ultimately agrees with Pausanias, saying that Heavenly Love, love felt by good people or by those who might be improved, must be encouraged. Physicians must be able to distinguish Love that is noble from Love that is disgraceful and their task is to establish mutual love between bodily elements.
Eryximachus states that medicine is the science of the effects of Love on repletion and depletion of the body. Being a doctor himself, he draws on his knowledge from the science of medicine throughout his speech.īodies manifest two species of love: one type in health and the other in disease.
Love directs everything that occurs with humans and gods. Building on Pausanias’ distinction between two types of Love, Eryximachus expands this, claiming that Love not only occurs in humans, but everywhere in the universe, including the animal kingdom and in the world of plants, a lesson he learned from the field of medicine.
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