'Love-in-idleness' is actually another name for the common pansy. Oberon the fairy king uses it as a means to take revenge on Titania the fairy queen.
It symbolises man's search for the ultimate magic pill which will enable a person to make the object of his love fall effortlessly,instantaneously and passionately in love with him.
The irony,ofcourse, is that the juice of this same flower when applied to the eyes of a person who is asleep and which is reputed to magically make that person fall madly in love with the very next living thing which that person sees as soon as he or she awakes is deliberately misused and abused by Oberon as a means to take revenge on his beloved queen Titania.
Oberon orders Puck to use the same flower to make Demetrius fall in love with Helena but total confusion prevails because of Puck's 'mistakes'. The play almost becomes a 'tragi-comedy of errors.'
But 'all's well that ends well' and the play ends happily.
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