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7. Final Remarks
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Socrates |
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"For just consider, if you transgress and err in this sort of way, |
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| 53b |
what good will you do, either to yourself or to your friends? |
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That your friends will be driven into exile and deprived of |
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citizenship, or will lose their property, is tolerably certain; and |
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you yourself, if you fly to one of the neighboring cities, as, for |
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example, Thebes or Megara, both of which are well-governed |
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cities, will come to them as an enemy, Socrates, and their |
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government will be against you, and all patriotic citizens will |
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cast an evil eye upon you as a subverter of the laws, and you |
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will confirm in the minds of the judges the justice of
their own |
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condemnation of you. For he who is a corrupter of the laws is |
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more than likely to be corrupter of the young and foolish |
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portion of mankind. Will you then flee from well-ordered |
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cities and virtuous men? and is existence worth having on these |
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terms? Or will you go to them without shame, and talk to |
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| 53d |
them, Socrates? And what will you say to them? What you |
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say here about virtue and justice and institutions and laws |
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being the best things among men? Would that be decent of |
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you? Surely not. But if you go away from well-governed |
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States to Crito's friends in Thessaly,
where there is great |
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disorder and license, they will be charmed to have the tale of |
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your escape from prison, set off with ludicrous particulars of |
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the manner in which you were wrapped in a goatskin or some |
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other disguise, and metamorphosed as the fashion of runaways |
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is -- that is very likely; but will there be no one to remind you |
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that in your old age you violated the most sacred laws from a |
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miserable desire of a little more life? Perhaps not, if you keep |
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them in a good temper; but if they are out of temper you will |
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hear many degrading things; you will live, but how? -- as the |
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flatterer of all men, and the servant of all men; and doing |
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what? -- eating and drinking in Thessaly, having gone
abroad |
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in order that you may get a dinner. And where will be your |
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fine sentiments about justice and virtue then? Say that you |
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wish to live for the sake of your children, that you may
bring |
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them up and educate them -- will you take them into Thessaly
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and deprive them of Athenian citizenship? Is that the benefit |
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which you would confer upon them? Or are you under the |
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impression that they will be better cared for and educated here |
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if you are still alive, although absent from them; for that your |
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friends will take care of them? Do you fancy that if you are an |
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inhabitant of Thessaly they will take care of them, and if
you |
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are an inhabitant of the other world they will not take care of |
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them? Nay; but if they who call themselves friends are truly |
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friends, they surely will. |
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"Listen, then, Socrates, to us who have brought you
up. Think |
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but of |
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| justice first, that you may be justified before the princes of
the |
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world below. For neither will you nor any that belong to
you |
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be happier or holier or juster in this life, or happier in another, |
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if you do as Crito bids. Now you depart in innocence, a |
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sufferer and not a doer of evil; a victim, not of the laws, but of |
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men. But if you go forth, returning evil for evil, and injury
for |
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injury, breaking the covenants and agreements which you |
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have made with us, and wronging those whom you ought least |
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to wrong, that is to say, yourself, your friends, your country, |
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and us, we shall be angry with you while you live, and our |
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brethren, the laws in the world below, will receive you as an |
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enemy; for they will know that you have done your best to |
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destroy us. Listen, then, to us and not to Crito." |
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This is the voice which I seem to hear murmuring in my ears, I |
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like the sound of the flute in the ears of the mystic; that voice, |
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say, is humming in my ears, and prevents me from hearing any |
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other. And I know that anything more which you may say will |
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be in vain. Yet speak, if you have anything to say. |
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Cr. I have nothing to say, Socrates. |
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| 54e |
Soc. Then let me follow the intimations of the will of God |
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