Tuesday, September 17, 2019
Love is a logical Fallacy Essay
           Love is a logical fallacy. In Metamorphoses, even the god of pure reason, Apollo is ridiculed and behaves irrationally while the Phaedra of Seneca violated all norms of proper female behavior for the sake of her love. Truly, love makes people do the most illogical and impractical acts. Love is a logical fallacy because had reason intervened, the ill-fate of the characters in both works would be largely abated.            In book twelve of the Metamorphoses, Priam laments Paris’ incontinence. By his rape of Helen and his rejection of Hera as the fairest goddess, Paris had effectively doomed Priam’s city of Troy. Priam, Hector and all others of Priam’s sons wept for the tragedy that would soon befall the city. Not so for Paris because he felt that his love for Helen, and the love she felt for him in return was just compensation. Such is the hubris that Paris’ love brought upon the house of Priam.            Hubris too drove Phaedra, who was married to Thesus to attempt to seduce her foster son Hippolytus. Many artifices and guiles will she employ through out the play but Hippolytus refuses to dishonor his father’s memory by committing incest on the queen. Phaedra will become increasingly desperate even co-opting her wet nurse to help her win over the young Hippolytus but to no avail. In the end Phaedra will even accuse Hippolytus of indeed having relations with her to his father Thesus. Hippolytus will die because of her slander. Indeed when they said â€Å"love conquers all†they had the love-crazed Phaedra in mind. Her insane love conquered all reason from her mind and led her to an untimely and unfortunate end.            Still another story of hubris from the Metamorphoses is the ill-fate of Midas. Already wealthy and a reasonably powerful king Midas desired gold above all other treasures. So Bacchus grants him the power to turn all that he touches into gold. He soon embarks upon a tragic quest to gain as much gold as his can until he soon turns even his daughter into gold. The lust for gold ruined all that was good around him. The tragedy of Midas was that he was so blinded by his love for gold that he did not realize how much that he truly loved could be lost. No less tragic was the life of Thesus in Phaedra. After returning from the dead Thesus is greeted by his wife with the accusation that Hippolytus had had his way with her. Blinded with rage over the mishandling of his ‘beloved’ wife Thesus says a prayer to Neptune for the redress of his wrongs. Sure as a sunrise, Neptune strikes down Hippolytus by having him ripped apart by his horses. Never mind that he was entirely innocent to begin with.            However, even if Amor, the Roman Cupid, can drive all reason from those he assails not all of his conquests have turned to evil. One example is the love story of Thetis and Peleus, the soon to be famous parents of Achilles. Evil was still done to the two but eventually their escapade resulted in some good being accomplished. In the story of the two lovers in book            Thetis was a sea nymph whose beauty so drew Peleus that the poor king would soon be driven to desperate measures to gain her. Just like Phaedra he begins a campaign of seduction that is initially rebuffed by the coy nymph mirroring the failed seduction efforts of Phaedra upon Hippolytus. However, while Phaedra is ultimately unsuccessful Peleus has some measure of success.            After a whole day of trying to conquer Thetis, and Thetis trying to break free eventually Thetis tires of their struggles and consents to have relations with Peleus. As will later be seen, this union will result in Achilles perhaps the most famous Greek in story and in Song.            Hippolytus tried to stay loyal to his father by refusing to acquiesce to his step-mother’s incestuous desires. His deep love for his father does not allow him to dishonor him especially not so soon. Eventually, Phaedra accuses him wrongly and Thesus prayers leads to his death. However, in his death some good is achieved since Phaedra confesses her incestuous desires and the innocence of Hippolytus. As this sampling of the two works suggests love is not places in very high regard by these two authors. By allowing reason to be overwhelmed by love, or lust, the heroes and gods are led down ill paths. Phaedra embarks of a sickening path of incestuous seduction, Midas loses everything to worthless gold, Troy will burn for the indiscretion of the boy Paris. Thesus will slay his own son out of blind love for Phaedra. They are a just a few examples, how love conquered the rational thought of the characters and brought them ill fate. If any good is achieved it is accidental and to be realized later on. Tragedy still befalls those who imbibe in love regardless of what good will occur later because of it. Just ask Hippolytus who was torn apart by his horses before Phaedra would realize the error of her ways. Trully, love is a logical fallacy. Both Greek and Roman prized reason and common sense over love. It is by allowing ourselves to be buffeted by the winds of love that tragedy befalls. Therefore, we must ever be vigilant lest our reason be mastered by this logical fallacy.
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