Author: KIET PHONG

The Essays is a collection of philosophic arguments by the French Renaissance writer Michel Eyquem de Montaigne. As such, Montaigne makes a number of critical observations concerning sixteenth-century French society and proposes a number of suggestions by which individuals can improve themselves and avoid succumbing to certain corrupting influences. Montaigne touches on a large number of different topics from emotions to rationality, to good and bad governance and it would be impossible to go through them all at length here, but The Essays does have some recurring themes which pepper his work. One of the most prevalent themes in The Essays, to which Montaigne attaches a significant amount of emphasis, concerns the nature of knowledge. Montaigne is very critical of those members of elite French society who he believes have developed a mastery over words and flattery but for whom true knowledge is only a pipe dream.

The Book of The City of ladies published in 1405. It was published in medieval times. She wrote it as a response to several popular texts that she was reading at the time. She characterized women with a lot of negative traits. Popular fiction at the time was generalizing women as being naturally immoral, promiscuous, unable to be completely committed, week in terms of their fortitude. A lot of generalization we see today or a lot of fictional works today. But it was strong back then in medieval times. This bothered Christine De Pizan. And she wants to write a book to demonstrate that women aren’t naturally promiscuous, they do have strong fortitude, and they can commit to things. Basically, crushing a lot at of the negative stereotype generalization that was portrayed about women in popular text. She goes about providing a myriad of women, all different types of women both real and legendary, ones in myths, that basically crush a lot of those native generalizations that were popular at the time.

Socrates and Phaedrus describe various kinds of lovers’ behaviors by they both agreed with Lysias that there are two kinds of lovers: non-lover and lover. Lysias makes an irrefutable argument in praising the non-lover for remaining more rational than the lover. The lover will regret giving favors after his desire subsides, while the non-lover will view favors like business transactions. The non-lover will be able to indulge in pleasures without having to worry about their negative impact on his business or personal life. Lovers are jealous and jealousy often leads to enmity; relations with a non-lover, who has attracted a boy with his personal merits, will always lead to friendship. Lovers are usually first attracted to a boy’s body rather than his character, so they may not want to remain friends afterwards. They believes the relationship between non-lovers is better than a relationship with lovers.

Some of us agreed our modern ideas of love align with Platonic ideas of it but some of us don’t agreed. According to Plato second big idea : Let your lover change you. We always say”Finding someone who love you just the way you are.” and we think that’s love. Plato says: “True love is admiration.” In other words, the person you need to get together with should have very good qualities which you yourself lack. Let’s say, they should be really brave or organised or warm and sincere. By getting close to this person , you can become a little like they are. The right person for us helps us grow to our full potential. For Plato, in a good relationship , a couple shouldn’t love each other exactly as they are right now. They should be committed to educating each other and to enduring the stormy passages this inevitably involves. Each person should want to seduce the other into becoming a better version of themselves. Plato’s conception of love influenced ours by we shouldn’t let love confuse us. We should understand what is love and be rational.