Page - 101 - in The Complete Plato

them, are never at unity with one another or with themselves; for they are passionate and restless, and anything which is at variance and enmity with itself is not likely to be in union or harmony with any other thing. Do you not agree? Yes, I do. Then, my friend, those who say that the like is friendly to the like mean to intimate, if I rightly apprehend them, that the good only is the friend of the good, and of him only; but that the evil never attains to any real friendship, either with good or evil. Do you agree? He nodded assent. Then now we know how to answer the question ‘Who are friends?’ for the argument declares ‘That the good are friends.’ Yes, he said, that is true. Yes, I replied; and yet I am not quite satisfied with this answer. By heaven, and shall I tell you what I suspect? I will. Assuming that like, inasmuch as he is like, is the friend of like, and useful to him—or rather let me try another way of putting the matter: Can like do any good or harm to like which he could not do to himself, or suffer anything from his like which he would not suffer from himself? And if neither can be of any use to the other, how can they be loved by one another? Can they now? They cannot. And can he who is not loved be a friend? Certainly not. But say that the like is not the friend of the like in so far as he is like; still the good may be the friend of the good in so far as he is good? True. But then again, will not the good, in so far as he is good, be sufficient for himself? Certainly he will. And he who is sufficient wants nothing— that is implied in the word sufficient. Of course not. And he who wants nothing will desire nothing? He will not. Neither can he love that which he does not desire? He cannot. 101