I read Plato’s Dialogues in high school, and in it I was introduced to the concept of Forms. Instantly I was transfixed. In the book, Socrates suggests that for everything we can think of, tangible or not — dogs, grace, friendship — there is a true ideal form of that thing. (View Highlight)
Yet the true ideal form is not something we mere mortals can behold. We are like prisoners tied down in a cave, a fire burning behind us as we stare straight ahead at the smooth grey walls. There, shadows dance — the outline of a dog wagging his tale, the dancing body of a ballerina, the swaying silhouettes of friends in song. (View Highlight)
If this were all that the prisoners saw, would they not think the shadows were everything? That the dark shapes moving across the wall represented dogs, grace, and friendship in all their essence and beauty? (View Highlight)
I could understand the allegory perfectly. It described my life: always in search of the brilliance of these Forms that I could never truly attain.
A worthy goal, surely? A foot, an inch, a nudge closer out of the cave and toward the true light. (View Highlight)
