APOLOGY

By Plato

Translated by Benjamin Jowett

INTRODUCTION. 

In what relation the Apology of Plato stands to the real defence ofSocrates, there are no means of determining. It certainly agrees intone and character with the description of Xenophon, who says in theMemorabilia that Socrates might have been acquitted 'if in any moderatedegree he would have conciliated the favour of the dicasts;' and whoinforms us in another passage, on the testimony of Hermogenes, thefriend of Socrates, that he had no wish to live; and that the divinesign refused to allow him to prepare a defence, and also that Socrateshimself declared this to be unnecessary, on the ground that all his lifelong he had been preparing against that hour. For the speech breathesthroughout a spirit of defiance, (ut non supplex aut reus sed magisteraut dominus videretur esse judicum', Cic. De Orat. ); and the loose anddesultory style is an imitation of the 'accustomed manner' inwhich Socrates spoke in 'the agora and among the tables of themoney-changers. ' The allusion in the Crito may, perhaps, be adduced as afurther evidence of the literal accuracy of some parts. But in themain it must be regarded as the ideal of Socrates, according to Plato'sconception of him, appearing in the greatest and most public scene ofhis life, and in the height of his triumph, when he is weakest, and yethis mastery over mankind is greatest, and his habitual irony acquires anew meaning and a sort of tragic pathos in the face of death. The factsof his life are summed up, and the features of his character are broughtout as if by accident in the course of the defence. The conversationalmanner, the seeming want of arrangement, the ironical simplicity, arefound to result in a perfect work of art, which is the portrait ofSocrates. 

Yet some of the topics may have been actually used by Socrates; andthe recollection of his very words may have rung in the ears of hisdisciple. The Apology of Plato may be compared generally with thosespeeches of Thucydides in which he has embodied his conception of thelofty character and policy of the great Pericles, and which at the sametime furnish a commentary on the situation of affairs from the point ofview of the historian. So in the Apology there is an ideal rather than aliteral truth; much is said which was not said, and is only Plato's viewof the situation. Plato was not, like Xenophon, a chronicler of facts;he does not appear in any of his writings to have aimed at literalaccuracy. He is not therefore to be supplemented from the Memorabiliaand Symposium of Xenophon, who belongs to an entirely different class ofwriters. The Apology of Plato is not the report of what Socrates said, but an elaborate composition, quite as much so in fact as one of theDialogues. And we may perhaps even indulge in the fancy that the actualdefence of Socrates was as much greater than the Platonic defence as themaster was greater than the disciple. But in any case, some of the wordsused by him must have been remembered, and some of the facts recordedmust have actually occurred. It is significant that Plato is said tohave been present at the defence (Apol. ), as he is also said to havebeen absent at the last scene in the Phaedo. Is it fanciful to supposethat he meant to give the stamp of authenticity to the one and not tothe other?--especially when we consider that these two passages are theonly ones in which Plato makes mention of himself. The circumstance thatPlato was to be one of his sureties for the payment of the fine which heproposed has the appearance of truth. More suspicious is the statementthat Socrates received the first impulse to his favourite calling ofcross-examining the world from the Oracle of Delphi; for he must alreadyhave been famous before Chaerephon went to consult the Oracle (Riddell), and the story is of a kind which is very likely to have been invented. On the whole we arrive at the conclusion that the Apology is true to thecharacter of Socrates, but we cannot show that any single sentence in itwas actually spoken by him. It breathes the spirit of Socrates, but hasbeen cast anew in the mould of Plato. 

There is not much in the other Dialogues which can be compared with theApology. The same recollection of his master may have been presentto the mind of Plato when depicting the sufferings of the Just in theRepublic. The Crito may also be regarded as a sort of appendage to theApology, in which Socrates, who has defied the judges, is neverthelessrepresented as scrupulously obedient to the laws. The idealizationof the sufferer is carried still further in the Gorgias, in which thethesis is maintained, that 'to suffer is better than to do evil;' andthe art of rhetoric is described as only useful for the purpose ofself-accusation. The parallelisms which occur in the so-called Apologyof Xenophon are not worth noticing, because the writing in which theyare contained is manifestly spurious. The statements of the Memorabiliarespecting the trial and death of Socrates agree generally with Plato;but they have lost the flavour of Socratic irony in the narrative ofXenophon. 

The Apology or Platonic defence of Socrates is divided into threeparts: 1st. The defence properly so called; 2nd. The shorter address inmitigation of the penalty; 3rd. The last words of prophetic rebuke andexhortation. 

The first part commences with an apology for his colloquial style;he is, as he has always been, the enemy of rhetoric, and knows ofno rhetoric but truth; he will not falsify his character by making aspeech. Then he proceeds to divide his accusers into two classes; first, there is the nameless accuser--public opinion. All the world from theirearliest years had heard that he was a corrupter of youth, and had seenhim caricatured in the Clouds of Aristophanes. Secondly, there arethe professed accusers, who are but the mouth-piece of the others. Theaccusations of both might be summed up in a formula. The first say, 'Socrates is an evil-doer and a curious person, searching into thingsunder the earth and above the heaven; and making the worse appear thebetter cause, and teaching all this to others. ' The second, 'Socrates isan evil-doer and corrupter of the youth, who does not receive the godswhom the state receives, but introduces other new divinities. ' Theselast words appear to have been the actual indictment (compare Xen. Mem. ); and the previous formula, which is a summary of public opinion, assumes the same legal style. 

The answer begins by clearing up a confusion. In the representationsof the Comic poets, and in the opinion of the multitude, he had beenidentified with the teachers of physical science and with the Sophists. But this was an error. For both of them he professes a respect in theopen court, which contrasts with his manner of speaking about them inother places. (Compare for Anaxagoras, Phaedo, Laws; for the Sophists, Meno, Republic, Tim. , Theaet. , Soph. , etc. ) But at the same timehe shows that he is not one of them. Of natural philosophy he knowsnothing; not that he despises such pursuits, but the fact is that he isignorant of them, and never says a word about them. Nor is he paid forgiving instruction--that is another mistaken notion:--he has nothing toteach. But he commends Evenus for teaching virtue at such a 'moderate'rate as five minae. Something of the 'accustomed irony, ' which mayperhaps be expected to sleep in the ear of the multitude, is lurkinghere. 

He then goes on to explain the reason why he is in such an evil name. That had arisen out of a peculiar mission which he had taken uponhimself. The enthusiastic Chaerephon (probably in anticipation of theanswer which he received) had gone to Delphi and asked the oracle ifthere was any man wiser than Socrates; and the answer was, that therewas no man wiser. What could be the meaning of this--that he who knewnothing, and knew that he knew nothing, should be declared by the oracleto be the wisest of men? Reflecting upon the answer, he determined torefute it by finding 'a wiser;' and first he went to the politicians, and then to the poets, and then to the craftsmen, but always with thesame result--he found that they knew nothing, or hardly anything morethan himself; and that the little advantage which in some cases theypossessed was more than counter-balanced by their conceit of knowledge. He knew nothing, and knew that he knew nothing: they knew little ornothing, and imagined that they knew all things. Thus he had passedhis life as a sort of missionary in detecting the pretended wisdom ofmankind; and this occupation had quite absorbed him and taken him awayboth from public and private affairs. Young men of the richer sort hadmade a pastime of the same pursuit, 'which was not unamusing. ' And hencebitter enmities had arisen; the professors of knowledge had revengedthemselves by calling him a villainous corrupter of youth, and byrepeating the commonplaces about atheism and materialism and sophistry, which are the stock-accusations against all philosophers when there isnothing else to be said of them. 

The second accusation he meets by interrogating Meletus, who is presentand can be interrogated. 'If he is the corrupter, who is the improver ofthe citizens?' (Compare Meno. ) 'All men everywhere. ' But how absurd, howcontrary to analogy is this! How inconceivable too, that he should makethe citizens worse when he has to live with them. This surely cannot beintentional; and if unintentional, he ought to have been instructed byMeletus, and not accused in the court. 

But there is another part of the indictment which says that he teachesmen not to receive the gods whom the city receives, and has other newgods. 'Is that the way in which he is supposed to corrupt the youth?''Yes, it is. ' 'Has he only new gods, or none at all?' 'None at all. ''What, not even the sun and moon?' 'No; why, he says that the sun is astone, and the moon earth. ' That, replies Socrates, is the old confusionabout Anaxagoras; the Athenian people are not so ignorant as toattribute to the influence of Socrates notions which have foundtheir way into the drama, and may be learned at the theatre. Socratesundertakes to show that Meletus (rather unjustifiably) has beencompounding a riddle in this part of the indictment: 'There are no gods, but Socrates believes in the existence of the sons of gods, which isabsurd. '

Leaving Meletus, who has had enough words spent upon him, he returns tothe original accusation. The question may be asked, Why will he persistin following a profession which leads him to death? Why?--because hemust remain at his post where the god has placed him, as he remainedat Potidaea, and Amphipolis, and Delium, where the generals placed him. Besides, he is not so overwise as to imagine that he knows whether deathis a good or an evil; and he is certain that desertion of his duty isan evil. Anytus is quite right in saying that they should never haveindicted him if they meant to let him go. For he will certainly obey Godrather than man; and will continue to preach to all men of all ages thenecessity of virtue and improvement; and if they refuse to listen to himhe will still persevere and reprove them. This is his way of corruptingthe youth, which he will not cease to follow in obedience to the god, even if a thousand deaths await him. 

He is desirous that they should let him live--not for his own sake, butfor theirs; because he is their heaven-sent friend (and they will neverhave such another), or, as he may be ludicrously described, he is thegadfly who stirs the generous steed into motion. Why then has he nevertaken part in public affairs? Because the familiar divine voice hashindered him; if he had been a public man, and had fought for the right, as he would certainly have fought against the many, he would not havelived, and could therefore have done no good. Twice in public mattershe has risked his life for the sake of justice--once at the trial ofthe generals; and again in resistance to the tyrannical commands of theThirty. 

But, though not a public man, he has passed his days in instructingthe citizens without fee or reward--this was his mission. Whether hisdisciples have turned out well or ill, he cannot justly be charged withthe result, for he never promised to teach them anything. They mightcome if they liked, and they might stay away if they liked: and theydid come, because they found an amusement in hearing the pretenders towisdom detected. If they have been corrupted, their elder relatives (ifnot themselves) might surely come into court and witness against him, and there is an opportunity still for them to appear. But their fathersand brothers all appear in court (including 'this' Plato), to witnesson his behalf; and if their relatives are corrupted, at least theyare uncorrupted; 'and they are my witnesses. For they know that I amspeaking the truth, and that Meletus is lying. '

This is about all that he has to say. He will not entreat the judges tospare his life; neither will he present a spectacle of weeping children, although he, too, is not made of 'rock or oak. ' Some of the judgesthemselves may have complied with this practice on similar occasions, and he trusts that they will not be angry with him for not followingtheir example. But he feels that such conduct brings discredit on thename of Athens: he feels too, that the judge has sworn not to give awayjustice; and he cannot be guilty of the impiety of asking the judge tobreak his oath, when he is himself being tried for impiety. 

As he expected, and probably intended, he is convicted. And now the toneof the speech, instead of being more conciliatory, becomes morelofty and commanding. Anytus proposes death as the penalty: and whatcounter-proposition shall he make? He, the benefactor of the Athenianpeople, whose whole life has been spent in doing them good, should atleast have the Olympic victor's reward of maintenance in the Prytaneum. Or why should he propose any counter-penalty when he does not knowwhether death, which Anytus proposes, is a good or an evil? And he iscertain that imprisonment is an evil, exile is an evil. Loss of moneymight be an evil, but then he has none to give; perhaps he can make upa mina. Let that be the penalty, or, if his friends wish, thirty minae;for which they will be excellent securities. 

(He is condemned to death. )

He is an old man already, and the Athenians will gain nothing butdisgrace by depriving him of a few years of life. Perhaps he could haveescaped, if he had chosen to throw down his arms and entreat for hislife. But he does not at all repent of the manner of his defence; hewould rather die in his own fashion than live in theirs. For the penaltyof unrighteousness is swifter than death; that penalty has alreadyovertaken his accusers as death will soon overtake him. 

And now, as one who is about to die, he will prophesy to them. They haveput him to death in order to escape the necessity of giving an accountof their lives. But his death 'will be the seed' of many disciples whowill convince them of their evil ways, and will come forth to reprovethem in harsher terms, because they are younger and more inconsiderate. 

He would like to say a few words, while there is time, to those whowould have acquitted him. He wishes them to know that the divine signnever interrupted him in the course of his defence; the reason of which, as he conjectures, is that the death to which he is going is a good andnot an evil. For either death is a long sleep, the best of sleeps, ora journey to another world in which the souls of the dead are gatheredtogether, and in which there may be a hope of seeing the heroes ofold--in which, too, there are just judges; and as all are immortal, there can be no fear of any one suffering death for his opinions. 

Nothing evil can happen to the good man either in life or death, and hisown death has been permitted by the gods, because it was better for himto depart; and therefore he forgives his judges because they have donehim no harm, although they never meant to do him any good. 

He has a last request to make to them--that they will trouble his sonsas he has troubled them, if they appear to prefer riches to virtue, orto think themselves something when they are nothing. 

*****

'Few persons will be found to wish that Socrates should have defendedhimself otherwise, '--if, as we must add, his defence was that with whichPlato has provided him. But leaving this question, which does not admitof a precise solution, we may go on to ask what was the impression whichPlato in the Apology intended to give of the character and conduct ofhis master in the last great scene? Did he intend to represent him (1)as employing sophistries; (2) as designedly irritating the judges? Orare these sophistries to be regarded as belonging to the age in whichhe lived and to his personal character, and this apparent haughtiness asflowing from the natural elevation of his position?

For example, when he says that it is absurd to suppose that one man isthe corrupter and all the rest of the world the improvers of the youth;or, when he argues that he never could have corrupted the men with whomhe had to live; or, when he proves his belief in the gods becausehe believes in the sons of gods, is he serious or jesting? It may beobserved that these sophisms all occur in his cross-examination ofMeletus, who is easily foiled and mastered in the hands of the greatdialectician. Perhaps he regarded these answers as good enough for hisaccuser, of whom he makes very light. Also there is a touch of ironyin them, which takes them out of the category of sophistry. (CompareEuthyph. )

That the manner in which he defends himself about the lives of hisdisciples is not satisfactory, can hardly be denied. Fresh in the memoryof the Athenians, and detestable as they deserved to be to the newlyrestored democracy, were the names of Alcibiades, Critias, Charmides. Itis obviously not a sufficient answer that Socrates had never professedto teach them anything, and is therefore not justly chargeable withtheir crimes. Yet the defence, when taken out of this ironical form, is doubtless sound: that his teaching had nothing to do with their evillives. Here, then, the sophistry is rather in form than in substance, though we might desire that to such a serious charge Socrates had givena more serious answer. 

Truly characteristic of Socrates is another point in his answer, whichmay also be regarded as sophistical. He says that 'if he has corruptedthe youth, he must have corrupted them involuntarily. ' But if, asSocrates argues, all evil is involuntary, then all criminals ought to beadmonished and not punished. In these words the Socratic doctrine of theinvoluntariness of evil is clearly intended to be conveyed. Hereagain, as in the former instance, the defence of Socrates is untruepractically, but may be true in some ideal or transcendental sense. Thecommonplace reply, that if he had been guilty of corrupting the youththeir relations would surely have witnessed against him, with which heconcludes this part of his defence, is more satisfactory. 

Again, when Socrates argues that he must believe in the gods because hebelieves in the sons of gods, we must remember that this is a refutationnot of the original indictment, which is consistent enough--'Socratesdoes not receive the gods whom the city receives, and has other newdivinities'--but of the interpretation put upon the words by Meletus, who has affirmed that he is a downright atheist. To this Socrates fairlyanswers, in accordance with the ideas of the time, that a downrightatheist cannot believe in the sons of gods or in divine things. Thenotion that demons or lesser divinities are the sons of gods is notto be regarded as ironical or sceptical. He is arguing 'ad hominem'according to the notions of mythology current in his age. Yet heabstains from saying that he believed in the gods whom the Stateapproved. He does not defend himself, as Xenophon has defended him, by appealing to his practice of religion. Probably he neither whollybelieved, nor disbelieved, in the existence of the popular gods; hehad no means of knowing about them. According to Plato (compare Phaedo;Symp. ), as well as Xenophon (Memor. ), he was punctual in the performanceof the least religious duties; and he must have believed in his ownoracular sign, of which he seemed to have an internal witness. But theexistence of Apollo or Zeus, or the other gods whom the State approves, would have appeared to him both uncertain and unimportant in comparisonof the duty of self-examination, and of those principles of truthand right which he deemed to be the foundation of religion. (ComparePhaedr. ; Euthyph. ; Republic. )

The second question, whether Plato meant to represent Socrates asbraving or irritating his judges, must also be answered in the negative. His irony, his superiority, his audacity, 'regarding not the person ofman, ' necessarily flow out of the loftiness of his situation. He is notacting a part upon a great occasion, but he is what he has been all hislife long, 'a king of men. ' He would rather not appear insolent, ifhe could avoid it (ouch os authadizomenos touto lego). Neither ishe desirous of hastening his own end, for life and death are simplyindifferent to him. But such a defence as would be acceptable to hisjudges and might procure an acquittal, it is not in his nature to make. He will not say or do anything that might pervert the course of justice;he cannot have his tongue bound even 'in the throat of death. ' Withhis accusers he will only fence and play, as he had fenced with other'improvers of youth, ' answering the Sophist according to his sophistryall his life long. He is serious when he is speaking of his own mission, which seems to distinguish him from all other reformers of mankind, andoriginates in an accident. The dedication of himself to the improvementof his fellow-citizens is not so remarkable as the ironical spirit inwhich he goes about doing good only in vindication of the credit of theoracle, and in the vain hope of finding a wiser man than himself. Yetthis singular and almost accidental character of his mission agrees withthe divine sign which, according to our notions, is equally accidentaland irrational, and is nevertheless accepted by him as the guidingprinciple of his life. Socrates is nowhere represented to us as afreethinker or sceptic. There is no reason to doubt his sincerity whenhe speculates on the possibility of seeing and knowing the heroes of theTrojan war in another world. On the other hand, his hope of immortalityis uncertain;--he also conceives of death as a long sleep (inthis respect differing from the Phaedo), and at last falls back onresignation to the divine will, and the certainty that no evilcan happen to the good man either in life or death. His absolutetruthfulness seems to hinder him from asserting positively more thanthis; and he makes no attempt to veil his ignorance in mythology andfigures of speech. The gentleness of the first part of the speechcontrasts with the aggravated, almost threatening, tone of theconclusion. He characteristically remarks that he will not speak as arhetorician, that is to say, he will not make a regular defence such asLysias or one of the orators might have composed for him, or, accordingto some accounts, did compose for him. But he first procures himself ahearing by conciliatory words. He does not attack the Sophists; for theywere open to the same charges as himself; they were equally ridiculed bythe Comic poets, and almost equally hateful to Anytus and Meletus. Yetincidentally the antagonism between Socrates and the Sophists is allowedto appear. He is poor and they are rich; his profession that he teachesnothing is opposed to their readiness to teach all things; his talkingin the marketplace to their private instructions; his tarry-at-home lifeto their wandering from city to city. The tone which he assumes towardsthem is one of real friendliness, but also of concealed irony. TowardsAnaxagoras, who had disappointed him in his hopes of learning about mindand nature, he shows a less kindly feeling, which is also the feelingof Plato in other passages (Laws). But Anaxagoras had been dead thirtyyears, and was beyond the reach of persecution. 

It has been remarked that the prophecy of a new generation of teacherswho would rebuke and exhort the Athenian people in harsher and moreviolent terms was, as far as we know, never fulfilled. No inferencecan be drawn from this circumstance as to the probability of thewords attributed to him having been actually uttered. They express theaspiration of the first martyr of philosophy, that he would leave behindhim many followers, accompanied by the not unnatural feeling that theywould be fiercer and more inconsiderate in their words when emancipatedfrom his control. 

The above remarks must be understood as applying with any degree ofcertainty to the Platonic Socrates only. For, although these or similarwords may have been spoken by Socrates himself, we cannot exclude thepossibility, that like so much else, e. G. The wisdom of Critias, thepoem of Solon, the virtues of Charmides, they may have been due only tothe imagination of Plato. The arguments of those who maintain that theApology was composed during the process, resting on no evidence, do notrequire a serious refutation. Nor are the reasonings of Schleiermacher, who argues that the Platonic defence is an exact or nearly exactreproduction of the words of Socrates, partly because Plato would nothave been guilty of the impiety of altering them, and also because manypoints of the defence might have been improved and strengthened, at allmore conclusive. (See English Translation. ) What effect the death ofSocrates produced on the mind of Plato, we cannot certainlydetermine; nor can we say how he would or must have written under thecircumstances. We observe that the enmity of Aristophanes to Socratesdoes not prevent Plato from introducing them together in the Symposiumengaged in friendly intercourse. Nor is there any trace in the Dialoguesof an attempt to make Anytus or Meletus personally odious in the eyes ofthe Athenian public. 

APOLOGY

How you, O Athenians, have been affected by my accusers, I cannot tell;but I know that they almost made me forget who I was--so persuasivelydid they speak; and yet they have hardly uttered a word of truth. Butof the many falsehoods told by them, there was one which quite amazedme;--I mean when they said that you should be upon your guard and notallow yourselves to be deceived by the force of my eloquence. To saythis, when they were certain to be detected as soon as I opened my lipsand proved myself to be anything but a great speaker, did indeed appearto me most shameless--unless by the force of eloquence they meanthe force of truth; for is such is their meaning, I admit that I ameloquent. But in how different a way from theirs! Well, as I was saying, they have scarcely spoken the truth at all; but from me you shall hearthe whole truth: not, however, delivered after their manner in a setoration duly ornamented with words and phrases. No, by heaven! but Ishall use the words and arguments which occur to me at the moment; forI am confident in the justice of my cause (Or, I am certain that I amright in taking this course. ): at my time of life I ought not to beappearing before you, O men of Athens, in the character of a juvenileorator--let no one expect it of me. And I must beg of you to grant mea favour:--If I defend myself in my accustomed manner, and you hear meusing the words which I have been in the habit of using in the agora, atthe tables of the money-changers, or anywhere else, I would ask you notto be surprised, and not to interrupt me on this account. For I am morethan seventy years of age, and appearing now for the first time in acourt of law, I am quite a stranger to the language of the place; andtherefore I would have you regard me as if I were really a stranger, whom you would excuse if he spoke in his native tongue, and after thefashion of his country:--Am I making an unfair request of you? Nevermind the manner, which may or may not be good; but think only of thetruth of my words, and give heed to that: let the speaker speak trulyand the judge decide justly. 

And first, I have to reply to the older charges and to my firstaccusers, and then I will go on to the later ones. For of old I have hadmany accusers, who have accused me falsely to you during many years;and I am more afraid of them than of Anytus and his associates, who aredangerous, too, in their own way. But far more dangerous are the others, who began when you were children, and took possession of your minds withtheir falsehoods, telling of one Socrates, a wise man, who speculatedabout the heaven above, and searched into the earth beneath, and madethe worse appear the better cause. The disseminators of this tale arethe accusers whom I dread; for their hearers are apt to fancy that suchenquirers do not believe in the existence of the gods. And they aremany, and their charges against me are of ancient date, and they weremade by them in the days when you were more impressible than you arenow--in childhood, or it may have been in youth--and the cause whenheard went by default, for there was none to answer. And hardest of all, I do not know and cannot tell the names of my accusers; unless in thechance case of a Comic poet. All who from envy and malice have persuadedyou--some of them having first convinced themselves--all this class ofmen are most difficult to deal with; for I cannot have them up here, andcross-examine them, and therefore I must simply fight with shadows in myown defence, and argue when there is no one who answers. I will ask youthen to assume with me, as I was saying, that my opponents are of twokinds; one recent, the other ancient: and I hope that you will see thepropriety of my answering the latter first, for these accusations youheard long before the others, and much oftener. 

Well, then, I must make my defence, and endeavour to clear away in ashort time, a slander which has lasted a long time. May I succeed, if tosucceed be for my good and yours, or likely to avail me in my cause!The task is not an easy one; I quite understand the nature of it. And soleaving the event with God, in obedience to the law I will now make mydefence. 

I will begin at the beginning, and ask what is the accusation which hasgiven rise to the slander of me, and in fact has encouraged Meletus toproof this charge against me. Well, what do the slanderers say? Theyshall be my prosecutors, and I will sum up their words in an affidavit:'Socrates is an evil-doer, and a curious person, who searches intothings under the earth and in heaven, and he makes the worse appear thebetter cause; and he teaches the aforesaid doctrines to others. ' Such isthe nature of the accusation: it is just what you have yourselves seenin the comedy of Aristophanes (Aristoph. , Clouds. ), who has introduced aman whom he calls Socrates, going about and saying that he walks inair, and talking a deal of nonsense concerning matters of which I donot pretend to know either much or little--not that I mean to speakdisparagingly of any one who is a student of natural philosophy. Ishould be very sorry if Meletus could bring so grave a charge againstme. But the simple truth is, O Athenians, that I have nothing to do withphysical speculations. Very many of those here present are witnesses tothe truth of this, and to them I appeal. Speak then, you who have heardme, and tell your neighbours whether any of you have ever known me holdforth in few words or in many upon such matters. . . You hear their answer. And from what they say of this part of the charge you will be able tojudge of the truth of the rest. 

As little foundation is there for the report that I am a teacher, andtake money; this accusation has no more truth in it than the other. Although, if a man were really able to instruct mankind, to receivemoney for giving instruction would, in my opinion, be an honour to him. There is Gorgias of Leontium, and Prodicus of Ceos, and Hippias of Elis, who go the round of the cities, and are able to persuade the young mento leave their own citizens by whom they might be taught for nothing, and come to them whom they not only pay, but are thankful if they may beallowed to pay them. There is at this time a Parian philosopher residingin Athens, of whom I have heard; and I came to hear of him in thisway:--I came across a man who has spent a world of money on theSophists, Callias, the son of Hipponicus, and knowing that he had sons, I asked him: 'Callias, ' I said, 'if your two sons were foals or calves, there would be no difficulty in finding some one to put over them; weshould hire a trainer of horses, or a farmer probably, who would improveand perfect them in their own proper virtue and excellence; but as theyare human beings, whom are you thinking of placing over them? Is thereany one who understands human and political virtue? You must havethought about the matter, for you have sons; is there any one?' 'Thereis, ' he said. 'Who is he?' said I; 'and of what country? and what doeshe charge?' 'Evenus the Parian, ' he replied; 'he is the man, and hischarge is five minae. ' Happy is Evenus, I said to myself, if he reallyhas this wisdom, and teaches at such a moderate charge. Had I the same, I should have been very proud and conceited; but the truth is that Ihave no knowledge of the kind. 

I dare say, Athenians, that some one among you will reply, 'Yes, Socrates, but what is the origin of these accusations which are broughtagainst you; there must have been something strange which you have beendoing? All these rumours and this talk about you would never have arisenif you had been like other men: tell us, then, what is the cause ofthem, for we should be sorry to judge hastily of you. ' Now I regard thisas a fair challenge, and I will endeavour to explain to you the reasonwhy I am called wise and have such an evil fame. Please to attend then. And although some of you may think that I am joking, I declare that Iwill tell you the entire truth. Men of Athens, this reputation of minehas come of a certain sort of wisdom which I possess. If you ask me whatkind of wisdom, I reply, wisdom such as may perhaps be attained by man, for to that extent I am inclined to believe that I am wise; whereas thepersons of whom I was speaking have a superhuman wisdom which I may failto describe, because I have it not myself; and he who says that I have, speaks falsely, and is taking away my character. And here, O men ofAthens, I must beg you not to interrupt me, even if I seem to saysomething extravagant. For the word which I will speak is not mine. Iwill refer you to a witness who is worthy of credit; that witness shallbe the God of Delphi--he will tell you about my wisdom, if I have any, and of what sort it is. You must have known Chaerephon; he was early afriend of mine, and also a friend of yours, for he shared in the recentexile of the people, and returned with you. Well, Chaerephon, as youknow, was very impetuous in all his doings, and he went to Delphi andboldly asked the oracle to tell him whether--as I was saying, I must begyou not to interrupt--he asked the oracle to tell him whether anyone waswiser than I was, and the Pythian prophetess answered, that there was noman wiser. Chaerephon is dead himself; but his brother, who is in court, will confirm the truth of what I am saying. 

Why do I mention this? Because I am going to explain to you why I havesuch an evil name. When I heard the answer, I said to myself, What canthe god mean? and what is the interpretation of his riddle? for I knowthat I have no wisdom, small or great. What then can he mean when hesays that I am the wisest of men? And yet he is a god, and cannot lie;that would be against his nature. After long consideration, I thought ofa method of trying the question. I reflected that if I could only finda man wiser than myself, then I might go to the god with a refutation inmy hand. I should say to him, 'Here is a man who is wiser than I am; butyou said that I was the wisest. ' Accordingly I went to one who had thereputation of wisdom, and observed him--his name I need not mention; hewas a politician whom I selected for examination--and the result was asfollows: When I began to talk with him, I could not help thinking thathe was not really wise, although he was thought wise by many, andstill wiser by himself; and thereupon I tried to explain to him that hethought himself wise, but was not really wise; and the consequence wasthat he hated me, and his enmity was shared by several who were presentand heard me. So I left him, saying to myself, as I went away: Well, although I do not suppose that either of us knows anything reallybeautiful and good, I am better off than he is, --for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows; I neither know nor think that I know. In thislatter particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him. Then I went to another who had still higher pretensions to wisdom, andmy conclusion was exactly the same. Whereupon I made another enemy ofhim, and of many others besides him. 

Then I went to one man after another, being not unconscious of theenmity which I provoked, and I lamented and feared this: but necessitywas laid upon me, --the word of God, I thought, ought to be consideredfirst. And I said to myself, Go I must to all who appear to know, andfind out the meaning of the oracle. And I swear to you, Athenians, by the dog I swear!--for I must tell you the truth--the result of mymission was just this: I found that the men most in repute were all butthe most foolish; and that others less esteemed were really wiser andbetter. I will tell you the tale of my wanderings and of the 'Herculean'labours, as I may call them, which I endured only to find at last theoracle irrefutable. After the politicians, I went to the poets; tragic, dithyrambic, and all sorts. And there, I said to myself, you will beinstantly detected; now you will find out that you are more ignorantthan they are. Accordingly, I took them some of the most elaboratepassages in their own writings, and asked what was the meaning ofthem--thinking that they would teach me something. Will you believe me?I am almost ashamed to confess the truth, but I must say that there ishardly a person present who would not have talked better about theirpoetry than they did themselves. Then I knew that not by wisdom do poetswrite poetry, but by a sort of genius and inspiration; they are likediviners or soothsayers who also say many fine things, but do notunderstand the meaning of them. The poets appeared to me to be much inthe same case; and I further observed that upon the strength of theirpoetry they believed themselves to be the wisest of men in other thingsin which they were not wise. So I departed, conceiving myself tobe superior to them for the same reason that I was superior to thepoliticians. 

At last I went to the artisans. I was conscious that I knew nothing atall, as I may say, and I was sure that they knew many fine things; andhere I was not mistaken, for they did know many things of which Iwas ignorant, and in this they certainly were wiser than I was. But Iobserved that even the good artisans fell into the same error as thepoets;--because they were good workmen they thought that they also knewall sorts of high matters, and this defect in them overshadowed theirwisdom; and therefore I asked myself on behalf of the oracle, whetherI would like to be as I was, neither having their knowledge nor theirignorance, or like them in both; and I made answer to myself and to theoracle that I was better off as I was. 

This inquisition has led to my having many enemies of the worst and mostdangerous kind, and has given occasion also to many calumnies. And Iam called wise, for my hearers always imagine that I myself possessthe wisdom which I find wanting in others: but the truth is, O men ofAthens, that God only is wise; and by his answer he intends to showthat the wisdom of men is worth little or nothing; he is not speakingof Socrates, he is only using my name by way of illustration, as ifhe said, He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that hiswisdom is in truth worth nothing. And so I go about the world, obedientto the god, and search and make enquiry into the wisdom of any one, whether citizen or stranger, who appears to be wise; and if he is notwise, then in vindication of the oracle I show him that he is not wise;and my occupation quite absorbs me, and I have no time to give either toany public matter of interest or to any concern of my own, but I am inutter poverty by reason of my devotion to the god. 

There is another thing:--young men of the richer classes, who have notmuch to do, come about me of their own accord; they like to hear thepretenders examined, and they often imitate me, and proceed to examineothers; there are plenty of persons, as they quickly discover, who thinkthat they know something, but really know little or nothing; and thenthose who are examined by them instead of being angry with themselvesare angry with me: This confounded Socrates, they say; this villainousmisleader of youth!--and then if somebody asks them, Why, what evil doeshe practise or teach? they do not know, and cannot tell; but in orderthat they may not appear to be at a loss, they repeat the ready-madecharges which are used against all philosophers about teaching thingsup in the clouds and under the earth, and having no gods, and makingthe worse appear the better cause; for they do not like to confess thattheir pretence of knowledge has been detected--which is the truth; andas they are numerous and ambitious and energetic, and are drawn up inbattle array and have persuasive tongues, they have filled your earswith their loud and inveterate calumnies. And this is the reason why mythree accusers, Meletus and Anytus and Lycon, have set upon me; Meletus, who has a quarrel with me on behalf of the poets; Anytus, on behalf ofthe craftsmen and politicians; Lycon, on behalf of the rhetoricians: andas I said at the beginning, I cannot expect to get rid of such a mass ofcalumny all in a moment. And this, O men of Athens, is the truth and thewhole truth; I have concealed nothing, I have dissembled nothing. Andyet, I know that my plainness of speech makes them hate me, and what istheir hatred but a proof that I am speaking the truth?--Hence has arisenthe prejudice against me; and this is the reason of it, as you will findout either in this or in any future enquiry. 

I have said enough in my defence against the first class of my accusers;I turn to the second class. They are headed by Meletus, that good manand true lover of his country, as he calls himself. Against these, too, I must try to make a defence:--Let their affidavit be read: it containssomething of this kind: It says that Socrates is a doer of evil, whocorrupts the youth; and who does not believe in the gods of the state, but has other new divinities of his own. Such is the charge; and now letus examine the particular counts. He says that I am a doer of evil, andcorrupt the youth; but I say, O men of Athens, that Meletus is a doer ofevil, in that he pretends to be in earnest when he is only in jest, andis so eager to bring men to trial from a pretended zeal and interestabout matters in which he really never had the smallest interest. Andthe truth of this I will endeavour to prove to you. 

Come hither, Meletus, and let me ask a question of you. You think agreat deal about the improvement of youth?

Yes, I do. 

Tell the judges, then, who is their improver; for you must know, as youhave taken the pains to discover their corrupter, and are citing andaccusing me before them. Speak, then, and tell the judges who theirimprover is. --Observe, Meletus, that you are silent, and have nothing tosay. But is not this rather disgraceful, and a very considerable proofof what I was saying, that you have no interest in the matter? Speak up, friend, and tell us who their improver is. 

The laws. 

But that, my good sir, is not my meaning. I want to know who the personis, who, in the first place, knows the laws. 

The judges, Socrates, who are present in court. 

What, do you mean to say, Meletus, that they are able to instruct andimprove youth?

Certainly they are. 

What, all of them, or some only and not others?

All of them. 

By the goddess Here, that is good news! There are plenty of improvers, then. And what do you say of the audience, --do they improve them?

Yes, they do. 

And the senators?

Yes, the senators improve them. 

But perhaps the members of the assembly corrupt them?--or do they tooimprove them?

They improve them. 

Then every Athenian improves and elevates them; all with the exceptionof myself; and I alone am their corrupter? Is that what you affirm?

That is what I stoutly affirm. 

I am very unfortunate if you are right. But suppose I ask you aquestion: How about horses? Does one man do them harm and all the worldgood? Is not the exact opposite the truth? One man is able to do themgood, or at least not many;--the trainer of horses, that is to say, doesthem good, and others who have to do with them rather injure them?Is not that true, Meletus, of horses, or of any other animals? Mostassuredly it is; whether you and Anytus say yes or no. Happy indeedwould be the condition of youth if they had one corrupter only, andall the rest of the world were their improvers. But you, Meletus, havesufficiently shown that you never had a thought about the young: yourcarelessness is seen in your not caring about the very things which youbring against me. 

And now, Meletus, I will ask you another question--by Zeus I will:Which is better, to live among bad citizens, or among good ones? Answer, friend, I say; the question is one which may be easily answered. Do notthe good do their neighbours good, and the bad do them evil?

Certainly. 

And is there anyone who would rather be injured than benefited by thosewho live with him? Answer, my good friend, the law requires you toanswer--does any one like to be injured?

Certainly not. 

And when you accuse me of corrupting and deteriorating the youth, do youallege that I corrupt them intentionally or unintentionally?

Intentionally, I say. 

But you have just admitted that the good do their neighbours good, andthe evil do them evil. Now, is that a truth which your superior wisdomhas recognized thus early in life, and am I, at my age, in such darknessand ignorance as not to know that if a man with whom I have to live iscorrupted by me, I am very likely to be harmed by him; and yet I corrupthim, and intentionally, too--so you say, although neither I nor anyother human being is ever likely to be convinced by you. But either I donot corrupt them, or I corrupt them unintentionally; and on either viewof the case you lie. If my offence is unintentional, the law hasno cognizance of unintentional offences: you ought to have taken meprivately, and warned and admonished me; for if I had beenbetter advised, I should have left off doing what I only didunintentionally--no doubt I should; but you would have nothing to say tome and refused to teach me. And now you bring me up in this court, whichis a place not of instruction, but of punishment. 

It will be very clear to you, Athenians, as I was saying, that Meletushas no care at all, great or small, about the matter. But still I shouldlike to know, Meletus, in what I am affirmed to corrupt the young. Isuppose you mean, as I infer from your indictment, that I teach them notto acknowledge the gods which the state acknowledges, but some other newdivinities or spiritual agencies in their stead. These are the lessonsby which I corrupt the youth, as you say. 

Yes, that I say emphatically. 

Then, by the gods, Meletus, of whom we are speaking, tell me and thecourt, in somewhat plainer terms, what you mean! for I do not as yetunderstand whether you affirm that I teach other men to acknowledgesome gods, and therefore that I do believe in gods, and am not an entireatheist--this you do not lay to my charge, --but only you say that theyare not the same gods which the city recognizes--the charge is that theyare different gods. Or, do you mean that I am an atheist simply, and ateacher of atheism?

I mean the latter--that you are a complete atheist. 

What an extraordinary statement! Why do you think so, Meletus? Do youmean that I do not believe in the godhead of the sun or moon, like othermen?

I assure you, judges, that he does not: for he says that the sun isstone, and the moon earth. 

Friend Meletus, you think that you are accusing Anaxagoras: and you havebut a bad opinion of the judges, if you fancy them illiterate to sucha degree as not to know that these doctrines are found in the books ofAnaxagoras the Clazomenian, which are full of them. And so, forsooth, the youth are said to be taught them by Socrates, when there are notunfrequently exhibitions of them at the theatre (Probably in allusion toAristophanes who caricatured, and to Euripides who borrowed the notionsof Anaxagoras, as well as to other dramatic poets. ) (price of admissionone drachma at the most); and they might pay their money, and laugh atSocrates if he pretends to father these extraordinary views. And so, Meletus, you really think that I do not believe in any god?

I swear by Zeus that you believe absolutely in none at all. 

Nobody will believe you, Meletus, and I am pretty sure that you do notbelieve yourself. I cannot help thinking, men of Athens, that Meletusis reckless and impudent, and that he has written this indictment in aspirit of mere wantonness and youthful bravado. Has he not compounded ariddle, thinking to try me? He said to himself:--I shall see whetherthe wise Socrates will discover my facetious contradiction, or whether Ishall be able to deceive him and the rest of them. For he certainly doesappear to me to contradict himself in the indictment as much as if hesaid that Socrates is guilty of not believing in the gods, and yet ofbelieving in them--but this is not like a person who is in earnest. 

I should like you, O men of Athens, to join me in examining what Iconceive to be his inconsistency; and do you, Meletus, answer. AndI must remind the audience of my request that they would not make adisturbance if I speak in my accustomed manner:

Did ever man, Meletus, believe in the existence of human things, and notof human beings?. . . I wish, men of Athens, that he would answer, and notbe always trying to get up an interruption. Did ever any man believein horsemanship, and not in horses? or in flute-playing, and not influte-players? No, my friend; I will answer to you and to the court, asyou refuse to answer for yourself. There is no man who ever did. But nowplease to answer the next question: Can a man believe in spiritual anddivine agencies, and not in spirits or demigods?

He cannot. 

How lucky I am to have extracted that answer, by the assistance of thecourt! But then you swear in the indictment that I teach and believe indivine or spiritual agencies (new or old, no matter for that); at anyrate, I believe in spiritual agencies, --so you say and swear in theaffidavit; and yet if I believe in divine beings, how can I helpbelieving in spirits or demigods;--must I not? To be sure I must; andtherefore I may assume that your silence gives consent. Now what arespirits or demigods? Are they not either gods or the sons of gods?

Certainly they are. 

But this is what I call the facetious riddle invented by you: thedemigods or spirits are gods, and you say first that I do not believe ingods, and then again that I do believe in gods; that is, if I believe indemigods. For if the demigods are the illegitimate sons of gods, whetherby the nymphs or by any other mothers, of whom they are said to be thesons--what human being will ever believe that there are no gods if theyare the sons of gods? You might as well affirm the existence of mules, and deny that of horses and asses. Such nonsense, Meletus, could onlyhave been intended by you to make trial of me. You have put this intothe indictment because you had nothing real of which to accuse me. Butno one who has a particle of understanding will ever be convinced by youthat the same men can believe in divine and superhuman things, and yetnot believe that there are gods and demigods and heroes. 

I have said enough in answer to the charge of Meletus: any elaboratedefence is unnecessary, but I know only too well how many are theenmities which I have incurred, and this is what will be my destructionif I am destroyed;--not Meletus, nor yet Anytus, but the envy anddetraction of the world, which has been the death of many good men, andwill probably be the death of many more; there is no danger of my beingthe last of them. 

Some one will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a course oflife which is likely to bring you to an untimely end? To him I mayfairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man who is good for anythingought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only toconsider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong--actingthe part of a good man or of a bad. Whereas, upon your view, the heroeswho fell at Troy were not good for much, and the son of Thetis aboveall, who altogether despised danger in comparison with disgrace; andwhen he was so eager to slay Hector, his goddess mother said to him, that if he avenged his companion Patroclus, and slew Hector, he woulddie himself--'Fate, ' she said, in these or the like words, 'waits foryou next after Hector;' he, receiving this warning, utterly despiseddanger and death, and instead of fearing them, feared rather to livein dishonour, and not to avenge his friend. 'Let me die forthwith, 'he replies, 'and be avenged of my enemy, rather than abide here by thebeaked ships, a laughing-stock and a burden of the earth. ' Had Achillesany thought of death and danger? For wherever a man's place is, whetherthe place which he has chosen or that in which he has been placed by acommander, there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he shouldnot think of death or of anything but of disgrace. And this, O men ofAthens, is a true saying. 

Strange, indeed, would be my conduct, O men of Athens, if I who, when Iwas ordered by the generals whom you chose to command me at Potidaeaand Amphipolis and Delium, remained where they placed me, like any otherman, facing death--if now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God ordersme to fulfil the philosopher's mission of searching into myself andother men, I were to desert my post through fear of death, or any otherfear; that would indeed be strange, and I might justly be arraigned incourt for denying the existence of the gods, if I disobeyed the oraclebecause I was afraid of death, fancying that I was wise when I was notwise. For the fear of death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, and notreal wisdom, being a pretence of knowing the unknown; and no one knowswhether death, which men in their fear apprehend to be the greatestevil, may not be the greatest good. Is not this ignorance of adisgraceful sort, the ignorance which is the conceit that a man knowswhat he does not know? And in this respect only I believe myself todiffer from men in general, and may perhaps claim to be wiser thanthey are:--that whereas I know but little of the world below, I do notsuppose that I know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to abetter, whether God or man, is evil and dishonourable, and I will neverfear or avoid a possible good rather than a certain evil. And thereforeif you let me go now, and are not convinced by Anytus, who said thatsince I had been prosecuted I must be put to death; (or if not that Iought never to have been prosecuted at all); and that if I escape now, your sons will all be utterly ruined by listening to my words--if yousay to me, Socrates, this time we will not mind Anytus, and you shallbe let off, but upon one condition, that you are not to enquire andspeculate in this way any more, and that if you are caught doing soagain you shall die;--if this was the condition on which you let me go, I should reply: Men of Athens, I honour and love you; but I shall obeyGod rather than you, and while I have life and strength I shall nevercease from the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet and saying to him after my manner: You, my friend, --acitizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, --are younot ashamed of heaping up the greatest amount of money and honour andreputation, and caring so little about wisdom and truth and the greatestimprovement of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all? And ifthe person with whom I am arguing, says: Yes, but I do care; then I donot leave him or let him go at once; but I proceed to interrogate andexamine and cross-examine him, and if I think that he has no virtue inhim, but only says that he has, I reproach him with undervaluing thegreater, and overvaluing the less. And I shall repeat the same words toevery one whom I meet, young and old, citizen and alien, but especiallyto the citizens, inasmuch as they are my brethren. For know that this isthe command of God; and I believe that no greater good has ever happenedin the state than my service to the God. For I do nothing but go aboutpersuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for yourpersons or your properties, but first and chiefly to care about thegreatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not givenby money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good ofman, public as well as private. This is my teaching, and if this is thedoctrine which corrupts the youth, I am a mischievous person. But ifany one says that this is not my teaching, he is speaking an untruth. Wherefore, O men of Athens, I say to you, do as Anytus bids or notas Anytus bids, and either acquit me or not; but whichever you do, understand that I shall never alter my ways, not even if I have to diemany times. 

Men of Athens, do not interrupt, but hear me; there was an understandingbetween us that you should hear me to the end: I have something more tosay, at which you may be inclined to cry out; but I believe that to hearme will be good for you, and therefore I beg that you will not cry out. I would have you know, that if you kill such an one as I am, you willinjure yourselves more than you will injure me. Nothing will injure me, not Meletus nor yet Anytus--they cannot, for a bad man is not permittedto injure a better than himself. I do not deny that Anytus may, perhaps, kill him, or drive him into exile, or deprive him of civil rights; andhe may imagine, and others may imagine, that he is inflicting a greatinjury upon him: but there I do not agree. For the evil of doing ashe is doing--the evil of unjustly taking away the life of another--isgreater far. 

And now, Athenians, I am not going to argue for my own sake, as you maythink, but for yours, that you may not sin against the God by condemningme, who am his gift to you. For if you kill me you will not easily finda successor to me, who, if I may use such a ludicrous figure of speech, am a sort of gadfly, given to the state by God; and the state is a greatand noble steed who is tardy in his motions owing to his very size, and requires to be stirred into life. I am that gadfly which God hasattached to the state, and all day long and in all places am alwaysfastening upon you, arousing and persuading and reproaching you. Youwill not easily find another like me, and therefore I would advise youto spare me. I dare say that you may feel out of temper (like a personwho is suddenly awakened from sleep), and you think that you mighteasily strike me dead as Anytus advises, and then you would sleep onfor the remainder of your lives, unless God in his care of you sent youanother gadfly. When I say that I am given to you by God, the proof ofmy mission is this:--if I had been like other men, I should not haveneglected all my own concerns or patiently seen the neglect of themduring all these years, and have been doing yours, coming to youindividually like a father or elder brother, exhorting you to regardvirtue; such conduct, I say, would be unlike human nature. If I hadgained anything, or if my exhortations had been paid, there would havebeen some sense in my doing so; but now, as you will perceive, not eventhe impudence of my accusers dares to say that I have ever exactedor sought pay of any one; of that they have no witness. And I have asufficient witness to the truth of what I say--my poverty. 

Some one may wonder why I go about in private giving advice and busyingmyself with the concerns of others, but do not venture to come forwardin public and advise the state. I will tell you why. You have heard mespeak at sundry times and in divers places of an oracle or signwhich comes to me, and is the divinity which Meletus ridicules in theindictment. This sign, which is a kind of voice, first began to cometo me when I was a child; it always forbids but never commands me todo anything which I am going to do. This is what deters me from being apolitician. And rightly, as I think. For I am certain, O men of Athens, that if I had engaged in politics, I should have perished long ago, anddone no good either to you or to myself. And do not be offended at mytelling you the truth: for the truth is, that no man who goes to warwith you or any other multitude, honestly striving against the manylawless and unrighteous deeds which are done in a state, will save hislife; he who will fight for the right, if he would live even for a briefspace, must have a private station and not a public one. 

I can give you convincing evidence of what I say, not words only, butwhat you value far more--actions. Let me relate to you a passage of myown life which will prove to you that I should never have yielded toinjustice from any fear of death, and that 'as I should have refused toyield' I must have died at once. I will tell you a tale of the courts, not very interesting perhaps, but nevertheless true. The only office ofstate which I ever held, O men of Athens, was that of senator: the tribeAntiochis, which is my tribe, had the presidency at the trial of thegenerals who had not taken up the bodies of the slain after the battleof Arginusae; and you proposed to try them in a body, contrary to law, as you all thought afterwards; but at the time I was the only one of thePrytanes who was opposed to the illegality, and I gave my vote againstyou; and when the orators threatened to impeach and arrest me, and youcalled and shouted, I made up my mind that I would run the risk, havinglaw and justice with me, rather than take part in your injustice becauseI feared imprisonment and death. This happened in the days of thedemocracy. But when the oligarchy of the Thirty was in power, they sentfor me and four others into the rotunda, and bade us bring Leon theSalaminian from Salamis, as they wanted to put him to death. This was aspecimen of the sort of commands which they were always giving withthe view of implicating as many as possible in their crimes; and then Ishowed, not in word only but in deed, that, if I may be allowed to usesuch an expression, I cared not a straw for death, and that my great andonly care was lest I should do an unrighteous or unholy thing. Forthe strong arm of that oppressive power did not frighten me into doingwrong; and when we came out of the rotunda the other four went toSalamis and fetched Leon, but I went quietly home. For which I mighthave lost my life, had not the power of the Thirty shortly afterwardscome to an end. And many will witness to my words. 

Now do you really imagine that I could have survived all these years, if I had led a public life, supposing that like a good man I had alwaysmaintained the right and had made justice, as I ought, the first thing?No indeed, men of Athens, neither I nor any other man. But I have beenalways the same in all my actions, public as well as private, and neverhave I yielded any base compliance to those who are slanderously termedmy disciples, or to any other. Not that I have any regular disciples. But if any one likes to come and hear me while I am pursuing my mission, whether he be young or old, he is not excluded. Nor do I converse onlywith those who pay; but any one, whether he be rich or poor, may ask andanswer me and listen to my words; and whether he turns out to be a badman or a good one, neither result can be justly imputed to me; for Inever taught or professed to teach him anything. And if any one saysthat he has ever learned or heard anything from me in private which allthe world has not heard, let me tell you that he is lying. 

But I shall be asked, Why do people delight in continually conversingwith you? I have told you already, Athenians, the whole truth about thismatter: they like to hear the cross-examination of the pretenders towisdom; there is amusement in it. Now this duty of cross-examining othermen has been imposed upon me by God; and has been signified to me byoracles, visions, and in every way in which the will of divine power wasever intimated to any one. This is true, O Athenians, or, if not true, would be soon refuted. If I am or have been corrupting the youth, thoseof them who are now grown up and have become sensible that I gave thembad advice in the days of their youth should come forward as accusers, and take their revenge; or if they do not like to come themselves, someof their relatives, fathers, brothers, or other kinsmen, should say whatevil their families have suffered at my hands. Now is their time. Manyof them I see in the court. There is Crito, who is of the same age andof the same deme with myself, and there is Critobulus his son, whom Ialso see. Then again there is Lysanias of Sphettus, who is the father ofAeschines--he is present; and also there is Antiphon of Cephisus, who isthe father of Epigenes; and there are the brothers of several who haveassociated with me. There is Nicostratus the son of Theosdotides, andthe brother of Theodotus (now Theodotus himself is dead, and thereforehe, at any rate, will not seek to stop him); and there is Paralus theson of Demodocus, who had a brother Theages; and Adeimantus the son ofAriston, whose brother Plato is present; and Aeantodorus, who is thebrother of Apollodorus, whom I also see. I might mention a great manyothers, some of whom Meletus should have produced as witnesses inthe course of his speech; and let him still produce them, if he hasforgotten--I will make way for him. And let him say, if he has anytestimony of the sort which he can produce. Nay, Athenians, the veryopposite is the truth. For all these are ready to witness on behalf ofthe corrupter, of the injurer of their kindred, as Meletus and Anytuscall me; not the corrupted youth only--there might have been a motivefor that--but their uncorrupted elder relatives. Why should they toosupport me with their testimony? Why, indeed, except for the sake oftruth and justice, and because they know that I am speaking the truth, and that Meletus is a liar. 

Well, Athenians, this and the like of this is all the defence which Ihave to offer. Yet a word more. Perhaps there may be some one who isoffended at me, when he calls to mind how he himself on a similar, oreven a less serious occasion, prayed and entreated the judges with manytears, and how he produced his children in court, which was a movingspectacle, together with a host of relations and friends; whereas I, who am probably in danger of my life, will do none of these things. Thecontrast may occur to his mind, and he may be set against me, and votein anger because he is displeased at me on this account. Now if therebe such a person among you, --mind, I do not say that there is, --to him Imay fairly reply: My friend, I am a man, and like other men, a creatureof flesh and blood, and not 'of wood or stone, ' as Homer says; and Ihave a family, yes, and sons, O Athenians, three in number, one almost aman, and two others who are still young; and yet I will not bring any ofthem hither in order to petition you for an acquittal. And why not? Notfrom any self-assertion or want of respect for you. Whether I am or amnot afraid of death is another question, of which I will not now speak. But, having regard to public opinion, I feel that such conduct would bediscreditable to myself, and to you, and to the whole state. One whohas reached my years, and who has a name for wisdom, ought not to demeanhimself. Whether this opinion of me be deserved or not, at any rate theworld has decided that Socrates is in some way superior to othermen. And if those among you who are said to be superior in wisdomand courage, and any other virtue, demean themselves in this way, howshameful is their conduct! I have seen men of reputation, when they havebeen condemned, behaving in the strangest manner: they seemed to fancythat they were going to suffer something dreadful if they died, and thatthey could be immortal if you only allowed them to live; and I thinkthat such are a dishonour to the state, and that any stranger coming inwould have said of them that the most eminent men of Athens, to whom theAthenians themselves give honour and command, are no better than women. And I say that these things ought not to be done by those of us who havea reputation; and if they are done, you ought not to permit them; youought rather to show that you are far more disposed to condemn the manwho gets up a doleful scene and makes the city ridiculous, than him whoholds his peace. 

But, setting aside the question of public opinion, there seems to besomething wrong in asking a favour of a judge, and thus procuring anacquittal, instead of informing and convincing him. For his duty is, not to make a present of justice, but to give judgment; and he has swornthat he will judge according to the laws, and not according to his owngood pleasure; and we ought not to encourage you, nor should you allowyourselves to be encouraged, in this habit of perjury--there can beno piety in that. Do not then require me to do what I considerdishonourable and impious and wrong, especially now, when I am beingtried for impiety on the indictment of Meletus. For if, O men of Athens, by force of persuasion and entreaty I could overpower your oaths, thenI should be teaching you to believe that there are no gods, and indefending should simply convict myself of the charge of not believing inthem. But that is not so--far otherwise. For I do believe that thereare gods, and in a sense higher than that in which any of my accusersbelieve in them. And to you and to God I commit my cause, to bedetermined by you as is best for you and me. 

*****

There are many reasons why I am not grieved, O men of Athens, at thevote of condemnation. I expected it, and am only surprised that thevotes are so nearly equal; for I had thought that the majority againstme would have been far larger; but now, had thirty votes gone over tothe other side, I should have been acquitted. And I may say, I think, that I have escaped Meletus. I may say more; for without the assistanceof Anytus and Lycon, any one may see that he would not have had a fifthpart of the votes, as the law requires, in which case he would haveincurred a fine of a thousand drachmae. 

And so he proposes death as the penalty. And what shall I propose on mypart, O men of Athens? Clearly that which is my due. And what is my due?What return shall be made to the man who has never had the wit to beidle during his whole life; but has been careless of what the many carefor--wealth, and family interests, and military offices, and speaking inthe assembly, and magistracies, and plots, and parties. Reflecting thatI was really too honest a man to be a politician and live, I did not gowhere I could do no good to you or to myself; but where I could do thegreatest good privately to every one of you, thither I went, and soughtto persuade every man among you that he must look to himself, and seekvirtue and wisdom before he looks to his private interests, and look tothe state before he looks to the interests of the state; and that thisshould be the order which he observes in all his actions. What shall bedone to such an one? Doubtless some good thing, O men of Athens, if hehas his reward; and the good should be of a kind suitable to him. Whatwould be a reward suitable to a poor man who is your benefactor, andwho desires leisure that he may instruct you? There can be no reward sofitting as maintenance in the Prytaneum, O men of Athens, a reward whichhe deserves far more than the citizen who has won the prize at Olympiain the horse or chariot race, whether the chariots were drawn by twohorses or by many. For I am in want, and he has enough; and he onlygives you the appearance of happiness, and I give you the reality. Andif I am to estimate the penalty fairly, I should say that maintenance inthe Prytaneum is the just return. 

Perhaps you think that I am braving you in what I am saying now, as inwhat I said before about the tears and prayers. But this is not so. Ispeak rather because I am convinced that I never intentionally wrongedany one, although I cannot convince you--the time has been too short; ifthere were a law at Athens, as there is in other cities, that a capitalcause should not be decided in one day, then I believe that I shouldhave convinced you. But I cannot in a moment refute great slanders; and, as I am convinced that I never wronged another, I will assuredly notwrong myself. I will not say of myself that I deserve any evil, orpropose any penalty. Why should I? because I am afraid of the penalty ofdeath which Meletus proposes? When I do not know whether death is a goodor an evil, why should I propose a penalty which would certainly be anevil? Shall I say imprisonment? And why should I live in prison, and bethe slave of the magistrates of the year--of the Eleven? Or shall thepenalty be a fine, and imprisonment until the fine is paid? There is thesame objection. I should have to lie in prison, for money I have none, and cannot pay. And if I say exile (and this may possibly be the penaltywhich you will affix), I must indeed be blinded by the love of life, ifI am so irrational as to expect that when you, who are my own citizens, cannot endure my discourses and words, and have found them so grievousand odious that you will have no more of them, others are likely toendure me. No indeed, men of Athens, that is not very likely. And whata life should I lead, at my age, wandering from city to city, everchanging my place of exile, and always being driven out! For I am quitesure that wherever I go, there, as here, the young men will flock tome; and if I drive them away, their elders will drive me out at theirrequest; and if I let them come, their fathers and friends will drive meout for their sakes. 

Some one will say: Yes, Socrates, but cannot you hold your tongue, andthen you may go into a foreign city, and no one will interfere with you?Now I have great difficulty in making you understand my answer to this. For if I tell you that to do as you say would be a disobedience to theGod, and therefore that I cannot hold my tongue, you will not believethat I am serious; and if I say again that daily to discourse aboutvirtue, and of those other things about which you hear me examiningmyself and others, is the greatest good of man, and that the unexaminedlife is not worth living, you are still less likely to believe me. YetI say what is true, although a thing of which it is hard for me topersuade you. Also, I have never been accustomed to think that I deserveto suffer any harm. Had I money I might have estimated the offence atwhat I was able to pay, and not have been much the worse. But I havenone, and therefore I must ask you to proportion the fine to my means. Well, perhaps I could afford a mina, and therefore I propose thatpenalty: Plato, Crito, Critobulus, and Apollodorus, my friends here, bidme say thirty minae, and they will be the sureties. Let thirty minae bethe penalty; for which sum they will be ample security to you. 

*****

Not much time will be gained, O Athenians, in return for the evil namewhich you will get from the detractors of the city, who will say thatyou killed Socrates, a wise man; for they will call me wise, evenalthough I am not wise, when they want to reproach you. If you hadwaited a little while, your desire would have been fulfilled in thecourse of nature. For I am far advanced in years, as you may perceive, and not far from death. I am speaking now not to all of you, but only tothose who have condemned me to death. And I have another thing to say tothem: you think that I was convicted because I had no words of the sortwhich would have procured my acquittal--I mean, if I had thought fit toleave nothing undone or unsaid. Not so; the deficiency which led to myconviction was not of words--certainly not. But I had not the boldnessor impudence or inclination to address you as you would have liked me todo, weeping and wailing and lamenting, and saying and doing many thingswhich you have been accustomed to hear from others, and which, as Imaintain, are unworthy of me. I thought at the time that I ought not todo anything common or mean when in danger: nor do I now repent of thestyle of my defence; I would rather die having spoken after my manner, than speak in your manner and live. For neither in war nor yet at lawought I or any man to use every way of escaping death. Often in battlethere can be no doubt that if a man will throw away his arms, and fallon his knees before his pursuers, he may escape death; and in otherdangers there are other ways of escaping death, if a man is willing tosay and do anything. The difficulty, my friends, is not to avoid death, but to avoid unrighteousness; for that runs faster than death. I am oldand move slowly, and the slower runner has overtaken me, and my accusersare keen and quick, and the faster runner, who is unrighteousness, hasovertaken them. And now I depart hence condemned by you to suffer thepenalty of death, --they too go their ways condemned by the truthto suffer the penalty of villainy and wrong; and I must abide by myaward--let them abide by theirs. I suppose that these things may beregarded as fated, --and I think that they are well. 

And now, O men who have condemned me, I would fain prophesy to you;for I am about to die, and in the hour of death men are gifted withprophetic power. And I prophesy to you who are my murderers, thatimmediately after my departure punishment far heavier than you haveinflicted on me will surely await you. Me you have killed because youwanted to escape the accuser, and not to give an account of your lives. But that will not be as you suppose: far otherwise. For I say that therewill be more accusers of you than there are now; accusers whomhitherto I have restrained: and as they are younger they will be moreinconsiderate with you, and you will be more offended at them. If youthink that by killing men you can prevent some one from censuring yourevil lives, you are mistaken; that is not a way of escape which iseither possible or honourable; the easiest and the noblest way is notto be disabling others, but to be improving yourselves. This is theprophecy which I utter before my departure to the judges who havecondemned me. 

Friends, who would have acquitted me, I would like also to talk with youabout the thing which has come to pass, while the magistrates are busy, and before I go to the place at which I must die. Stay then a little, for we may as well talk with one another while there is time. You are myfriends, and I should like to show you the meaning of this event whichhas happened to me. O my judges--for you I may truly call judges--Ishould like to tell you of a wonderful circumstance. Hitherto the divinefaculty of which the internal oracle is the source has constantly beenin the habit of opposing me even about trifles, if I was going to makea slip or error in any matter; and now as you see there has come upon methat which may be thought, and is generally believed to be, the last andworst evil. But the oracle made no sign of opposition, either when I wasleaving my house in the morning, or when I was on my way to the court, or while I was speaking, at anything which I was going to say; and yet Ihave often been stopped in the middle of a speech, but now in nothingI either said or did touching the matter in hand has the oracle opposedme. What do I take to be the explanation of this silence? I will tellyou. It is an intimation that what has happened to me is a good, andthat those of us who think that death is an evil are in error. For thecustomary sign would surely have opposed me had I been going to evil andnot to good. 

Let us reflect in another way, and we shall see that there is greatreason to hope that death is a good; for one of two things--either deathis a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and migration of the soul from this world to another. Now if you suppose that there is no consciousness, but a sleep likethe sleep of him who is undisturbed even by dreams, death will be anunspeakable gain. For if a person were to select the night in which hissleep was undisturbed even by dreams, and were to compare with this theother days and nights of his life, and then were to tell us how manydays and nights he had passed in the course of his life better and morepleasantly than this one, I think that any man, I will not say a privateman, but even the great king will not find many such days or nights, when compared with the others. Now if death be of such a nature, I saythat to die is gain; for eternity is then only a single night. But ifdeath is the journey to another place, and there, as men say, all thedead abide, what good, O my friends and judges, can be greater thanthis? If indeed when the pilgrim arrives in the world below, he isdelivered from the professors of justice in this world, and finds thetrue judges who are said to give judgment there, Minos and Rhadamanthusand Aeacus and Triptolemus, and other sons of God who were righteous intheir own life, that pilgrimage will be worth making. What would not aman give if he might converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod andHomer? Nay, if this be true, let me die again and again. I myself, too, shall have a wonderful interest in there meeting and conversing withPalamedes, and Ajax the son of Telamon, and any other ancient hero whohas suffered death through an unjust judgment; and there will be nosmall pleasure, as I think, in comparing my own sufferings with theirs. Above all, I shall then be able to continue my search into true andfalse knowledge; as in this world, so also in the next; and I shall findout who is wise, and who pretends to be wise, and is not. What wouldnot a man give, O judges, to be able to examine the leader of the greatTrojan expedition; or Odysseus or Sisyphus, or numberless others, menand women too! What infinite delight would there be in conversing withthem and asking them questions! In another world they do not put a manto death for asking questions: assuredly not. For besides being happierthan we are, they will be immortal, if what is said is true. 

Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know of acertainty, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life orafter death. He and his are not neglected by the gods; nor has my ownapproaching end happened by mere chance. But I see clearly that thetime had arrived when it was better for me to die and be released fromtrouble; wherefore the oracle gave no sign. For which reason, also, I amnot angry with my condemners, or with my accusers; they have done me noharm, although they did not mean to do me any good; and for this I maygently blame them. 

Still I have a favour to ask of them. When my sons are grown up, I wouldask you, O my friends, to punish them; and I would have you troublethem, as I have troubled you, if they seem to care about riches, oranything, more than about virtue; or if they pretend to be somethingwhen they are really nothing, --then reprove them, as I have reprovedyou, for not caring about that for which they ought to care, andthinking that they are something when they are really nothing. Andif you do this, both I and my sons will have received justice at yourhands. 

The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways--I to die, and youto live. Which is better God only knows.