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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Phaedrus by Plato: according to this model he fashioned and framed the remainder of his
discourse. Suppose we read his beginning over again:
PHAEDRUS: If you please; but you will not find what you want.
SOCRATES: Read, that I may have his exact words.
PHAEDRUS: 'You know how matters stand with me, and how, as I conceive,
they might be arranged for our common interest; and I maintain I ought not
to fail in my suit because I am not your lover, for lovers repent of the
kindnesses which they have shown, when their love is over.'
SOCRATES: Here he appears to have done just the reverse of what he ought;
for he has begun at the end, and is swimming on his back through the flood
to the place of starting. His address to the fair youth begins where the
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