Page:Plato (IA platocollins00colliala).pdf/171

 whence she came, and renew her wings of immortality. And at the end of each life is a day of judgment, followed by a period of retribution, either for good or for evil, lasting a thousand years; and after that each soul is free to cast lots and choose another life. Then the soul of the man may pass into the life of a beast, or from a beast again into that of a man. But the soul of him who has never seen the truth will not pass again into the human form.

But from the souls of those who have once gazed on celestial truth or beauty the remembrance can never be effaced. Like some divine inspiration, the glories of this other world possess and haunt them; and it is because their souls are ever struggling upwards, and fluttering like a bird that longs to soar heavenwards, and because they are rapt in contemplation and careless of earthly matters, that the world calls the philosopher, the lover, and the poet "mad." For the earthly copies of justice or temperance, or any of the higher qualities, are seen but through a glass dimly, and few are they who can discern the reality by looking at the shadow.

And thus the sight of any earthly beauty in face or form, thrills the genuine lover with unutterable awe and amazement, because it recalls the memory of the celestial beauty seen by him once in the sphere of eternal being. The divine wings of his soul are warmed and glow with desire, and he lives in a sort of ecstasy, and shudders "with the misgiving of a former world." Often, indeed, a furious struggle takes place between the charioteer and the dark and vicious horse