| Apology | |
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[17a - 18a] [18b - 20c] [20d - 24b] [24c - 25e] [26a - 28a] [28b - 30d] [30e - 31c] [31d - 33b]
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| I have said enough in answer to the charge of Meletus: any | Jowett's Notes |
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| elaborate defence is unnecessary; but I know only too well | ||
| how many are the enmity which I have incurred, and this is | ||
| what will be my destruction if I am destroyed; - not Meletus, | ||
| nor yet Anytus, but the envy and detraction of the world, | ||
| which has been the death of many good men, and will probably | ||
| be the death of many more; there is no danger of my being the | ||
| last of them. | ||
 The Trojan Horse
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28b |
Some one will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a | Let no man fear death or fear anything but d disgrace. |
| course of life which is likely to bring you to an untimely end? | ||
| To him I may fairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man | ||
| who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of | ||
| living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing | ||
| anything he is doing right or wrong - acting the part of a good | ||
| man or of a bad. Whereas, upon your view, the heroes who | ||
28c |
fell at Troy were not good for much, and the son of Thetis | |
| above all, who altogether despised danger in comparison with | ||
| disgrace; and when he was so eager to slay Hector, his | ||
| goddess mother said to him, that if he avenged his companion | ||
| Patroclus, and slew Hector, he would die himself - "Fate," she | ||
| said, in these or the like words, "waits for you next after | ||
| Hector;" he, receiving this warning, utterly despised danger | ||
| and death, and instead of fearing them, feared rather to live in | ||
28d |
dishonor, and not to avenge his friend. "Let me die | |
| forthwith," he replies, "and be avenged of my enemy, rather | ||
| than abide here by the beaked ships, a laughing-stock and a | ||
| burden of the earth." Had Achilles any thought of death and | ||
| danger? For wherever a man's place is, whether the place | ||
| which he has chosen or that in which he has been placed by a | ||
| commander, there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he | ||
| should not think of death or of anything but of disgrace. And | ||
| this, O men of Athens, is a true saying. | ||
 The Battle of Amphipolis
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28e |
Strange, indeed, would be my conduct, O men of Athens, if I | Socrates, who has often faced death in battle, will not make any condition in order to save his own life; for he does not know whether death is a good or an evil. |
| who, when I was ordered by the generals whom you chose to | ||
| command me at Potidaea and Amphipolis and Delium, | ||
| remained where they placed me, like any other man, facing | ||
| death - if now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God orders | ||
| me to fulfil the philosopher's mission of searching into myself | ||
| and other men, I were to desert my post through fear of death, | ||
| or any other fear; that would indeed be strange, and I might | ||
| justly be arraigned in court for denying the existence of the | ||
29a |
gods, if I disobeyed the oracle because I was afraid of death, | |
| fancying that I was wise when I was not wise. For the fear of | ||
| death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, and not real wisdom, | ||
| being a pretence of knowing the unknown; and no one knows | ||
| whether death, which men in their fear apprehend to be the | ||
29b |
greatest evil, may not be the greatest good. Is not this | |
| ignorance of a disgraceful sort, the ignorance which is the | ||
| conceit that man knows what he does not know? And in this | ||
| respect only I believe myself to differ from men in general, and | ||
| may perhaps claim to be wiser than they are: - that whereas I | ||
| know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I | ||
| know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to a | ||
| better, whether God or man, is evil and dishonorable, and I | ||
| will never fear or avoid a possible good rather than a certain | ||
| evil. And therefore if you let me go now, and are not | ||
29c |
convinced by Anytus, who said that since I had been | |
| prosecuted I must be put to death (or if not that I ought 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 you | ||
| say to me, Socrates, this time we will not mind Anytus, and | ||
| you shall be let off, but upon one condition, that you are not to | ||
| enquire and speculate in this way any more, and that if you are | ||
29d |
caught doing so again you shall die; - if this was the condition | |
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on which you let me go, I should reply: Athenians, I | He must always be a preacher of philosophy. |
| honor and love you; but I shall obey God rather than you, and | ||
| while I have life and strength I shall never cease from the | ||
| practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting any one whom | ||
| I meet and saying to him after my manner: You, my friend, - a | ||
| citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, - are | ||
| you not ashamed of heaping up the greatest amount of money | ||
29e |
and honor and reputation, and caring so little about wisdom | |
| and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul, which you | ||
| never regard or heed at all? And if the person with whom I am | ||
| arguing, says: Yes, but I do care; then I do not leave him or let | ||
| him go at once; but I proceed to interrogate and examine and | ||
| cross-examine him, and if I think that he has no virtue in him, | ||
| but only says that he has, I reproach him with undervaluing | ||
30a |
the greater, and overvaluing the less. And I shall repeat the | |
| same words to every one whom I meet, young and old, citizen | ||
| and alien, but especially to the citizens, inasmuch as they are | ||
| my brethren. For know that this is the command of God; and I | `Necessity" is laid upon me:'`I must obey God rather than man.' | |
| believe that no greater good has ever happened in the state | ||
| than my service to the God. For I do nothing but go about | ||
| persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought | ||
| for your persons or your properties, but first and chiefly to | ||
30b |
care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that | |
| virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes | ||
| money and every other good of man, public as well as private. | ||
| This is my teaching, and if this is the doctrine which corrupts | ||
| the youth, I am a mischievous person. But if any 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 not as | ||
| Anytus bids, and either acquit me or not; but whichever you | ||
| do, understand that I shall never alter my ways, not even if I | ||
30c |
have to die many times. | |
| Men of Athens, do not interrupt, but hear me; there was an | ||
| understanding between us that you should hear me to the end: | ||
| I have something more to say, at which you may be inclined to | ||
| cry out; but I believe that to hear me 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 will injure | ||
| yourselves more than you will injure me. Nothing will injure | Neither you nor Meletus can ever injure me. | |
| me, not Meletus nor yet Anytus - they cannot, for a bad man | ||
30d |
is not permitted to 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; and he may imagine, and others may | ||
| imagine, that he is inflicting a great injury upon him: but there I | ||
| do not agree. For the evil of doing as he is doing - the evil of | ||
| unjustly taking away the life of another - is greater far. | ||
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