Chariot Metaphor

In Phaedrus, Socrates uses a metaphor about a chariot. This metaphor included a charioteer and two horses. The charioteer symbolized us while the two horses symbolized different ways to handle situations. The white horse was clean and beautiful, basically the good horse; it symbolized doing the right thing and it explicitly followed the charioteer’s commands. The black horse was crooked and ugly and didn’t follow the charioteer’s lead; it put up a struggle and would try to push forward when the charioteer didn’t want them to. In the book, the metaphor was talking about love and temptation; the white horse tried to hold back from temptation while the dark horse pushed towards temptations and would make the charioteer fall into his desires. On a deeper level, it was talking about how one who is speaking can both rise up and help his audience understand his level of thinking (white horse), or it can go down the audience’s level and not aid them to understand.