The Apology of Socrates by Plato

the apology of Socrates by Plato how you men of Athens have been affected by my accusers I do not know for my part even I nearly forgot myself because of them so persuasively did they speak and yet they have said so to speak nothing true I wondered most of one of the many falsehoods they told when they said that you should be aware that you are not deceived by me since I'm a clever speaker they are not ashamed that they will immediately be refuted by me indeed and as soon as it becomes apparent that I am NOT a clever speaker at all this seemed to be most shameless of them unless of course they call a clever speaker one who speaks the truth for if this is what they are saying then I too would agree that I am an orator but not a vert salt so they as I say have said little or nothing true while from me you will hear the whole truth but by Zeus men of Athens not beautifully spoken speeches like theirs adorned with phrases and words rather what you hear will be spoken at random in the words that I happen upon for I trust that the things I say are just and let none of you expect otherwise for surely it would not be becoming men for someone of my age to come before you fabricating speeches like a youth and men of Athens I do very much beg and beseech this of you if you hear me speaking in my defence with the same speech as I'm accustomed to speak both in the marketplace at the money tables where many of you have heard me and elsewhere do not wonder or make a disturbance because of this for this is how it is now is the first time that I've come before a law calls at the age of seventy hence I am simply foreign to the manner of speech here so just as if I really did happen to be a foreigner you would surely sympathize with me if I spoke in the dialect and way in which I was raised so also I do beg this of you now and it is just at least as it seems to me leave aside the manner of speech for perhaps it may be worse perhaps better and instead consider this very thing and apply your mind to it whether the things I say are just or not for this is the virtue of a judge while that an orator is to speak the truth so first men of Athens it is just for me to speak in defense against the first false charges filed against me and the first accusers and next against the later charges and the later accusers for many have accused me to you even long ago talking now for many years and saying nothing true and I fear them more than anitha's and those around him although they too are dangerous but the others are more dangerous men they got hold of the many of you from childhood and they accused me and persuaded you although it is no more true than the present charge that there is a certain Socrates a wise man a thinker on things our loft who investigated all things under the earth who makes the weakest speech the stronger those men of Athens who have scattered this report about our my dangerous accusers for their listeners hold that investigators of things also do not believe in gods besides there are many of these accusers and they have been accusing for a long time now moreover they spoke to you at the age when you were most trusting when some of you were children and youths and they accused me in a case that simply went by default for no one spoke in my defense and the most unreasonable thing of all is that it is not even possible to know and to say their names unless a certain one happens to be a comic poet those who persuaded you using envy and slander those who persuaded others after being convinced themselves all of these are most difficult to get at for it is also not possible to have any of them come forward here and to refute him but it is necessary for me simply to speak in my defense as fighting with shadows and refuting with no one to answer so you too must deem it to be as I say that there have been two groups of accusers the ones accusing me now and the others long ago of whom I speak and you must also suppose that I should first speak in defence against the latter for you heard them accusing me earlier and much more than these later ones here well then a defense speech must be made men of Athens and an attempt must be made in this short time to take away from you this slander which you acquired a very long time now I would wish that it may turn out like this if it is in any way better both for you and for me and that I may accomplish something by making a defense speech but I suppose this is hard and I'm not at all unaware of what sort of thing it is nevertheless let this proceed in whichever way is dear to the God but the law must be obeyed and a defense speech must be made so let us take up from the beginning what the accusation is from which has arisen slander against me which in fact is what Meletis trusted in when he brought this indictment against me well then what did the slanderous say to slander me their sworn statement just as though their accusers must be read Socrates does injustice and is meddlesome by investigating the things under the earth and the heavenly things and by making the weakest speech the stronger and by teaching others these same things it is something like this for you yourselves also used to see these things in the comedy of Aristophanes ascertain socrates was carried around there claiming that he was treading on air and spouting much of the drivel about which I have no expertise either much or little if anyone is wise in such things may I never be prosecuted with such great lawsuit by milita's but in fact I men of Athens have no share in these things again I offer many of you as the witnesses and I maintain that you should teach and tell each other those of you who have ever heard me conversing and there are many of such among you tell each other then if any of you ever heard me conversing about such things even much or little and from this you will recognize that the same holds also for other things that many say about me but in fact none of these things is so and if you have heard from anyone that I attempted to educate human beings and make money from it that is not true either though this too seems to me to be Noble if one should be able to educate human beings like Gorgas of Leon tini and Prodicus of seals and Hippias release for each of them men is able going into each of the cities to persuade the young who can associate with whomever of their own citizens they wish to for free they persuade these young men to leave off their associations with the latter and to associate with themselves instead and to give them money and acknowledge gratitude besides and as for that there is another man here from Paris a wise man who I perceived was in the town for I happened to meet a man who has paid more money to Sophists than to all the others callias the son of hipponicus so I questioned him for he has two sons Callias I said if your two sons had been born Colts or calves we would have been able to get and hire an overseer for them who could make the two of them Noble and good in their appropriate virtue and he would have been someone from among those skilled with horses or skilled in farming but as it is since they are two human beings whom do you have in mind to get as an overseer for the two of them who is knowledgeable in such virtue that of human being and citizen for I suppose you have considered it since you possess sons is there someone I said or not quite so he said Who I said and where is he from and for how much does he teach a Venus he said Socrates from Paris five mean any and I regarded a Venus as blast if he should truly have this arts and teaches at such a modest rate as for myself I would be pluming and priding myself on it if I had knowledge of these things but I do not have knowledge of them men of Athens perhaps then one of you might retort well Socrates what is your affair where have these slanders against you come from for surely if you were in fact practicing nothing more uncommon than others such as a report and account would not have arisen unless you are doing something different from the many so tell us what it is so that we do not deal unadvisedly with you in this it seems to me what the speaker says is just and I will try to demonstrate to you whatever it is that has brought me to this name and slander so listen now perhaps I will seem to some of you to be joking no well however that I will tell you the whole truth for I men of Athens have gotten this name through nothing but a certain wisdom just what sort of wisdom is this that which is perhaps human wisdom for probably I really am wise in this but those of whom I just spoke might perhaps be wise in some wisdom greater than human or else I cannot say what it is for I at least do not have knowledge of it but whoever asserts that I do lies and speaks in order to slander me now please men of Athens do not make a disturbance not even if I seem to you to be boasting somewhat for not mine is the story that I will tell rather I will refer it to a speaker trustworthy to you of my wisdom if indeed it is wisdom of any kind and what sort of thing it is I will offer for you as witness the God in Delfy now you know Kara fond no doubt he was my comrade from youth as well as a comrade of your multitude and he shared in your recent excellent turned with you you do know what sort of man Cara fawn was how ver meant he was in whatever he set out to do and in particular he once even went to Delfy and dead consult the Oracle about this now as I say do not make disturbances man and he asked whether there was anyone wiser than I the Pythia replied that no one was wiser and concerning these things his brother here will be a witness to you since he himself has met his end now consider why I say these things I'm going to teach you where the slander against me comes from when I heard these things I pondered them like this whatever is the God saying and what riddle is he posing for unconscious that I'm not at all wise either much or little so whatever is he saying when he claims that I am wisest surely he is not saying something false at least for that is not sanctioned for him and for a long time I was at a loss about whatever he was saying but then very reluctantly I turned to something like the following investigation of it I went to one of those reputed to be wise on the ground that there if anywhere I would refute the divination and show the Oracle this man is wiser than I but you declared that I was the wisest so I considered him thoroughly I need not speak of him by name but he was one of the politicians and when I considered him and conversed with him men of Athens I was affected something like this it seemed to me that this man seemed to be wise both to many other human beings and most of all to himself but he was not and then I tried to show him that he supposed he was wise but it was not so from this I became hateful to both him and to many of those present for my parts I went away I reasoned with regard to myself I am wiser than this human being for probably neither of us knows anything Noble and good but he supposes he knows something when he does not know while I just as I do not know do not even suppose that I do I am likely to be a little bit wiser than here in this very thing that whatever I do not know I do not even suppose I know from there I went to someone else to one of those reputed to be wiser than he and these things seem to me to be the same and there I became hateful to both him and to many others after this then I kept going to one after another all the while perceiving with pain and fear that I was becoming hated nevertheless it seemed to be necessary to regard the matter of the God as most important so I had to go in considering what the Oracle was saying to all those reputed to know something and by the Dogman of Athens for it is necessary to speak truth before you I swear I was effected something like this those with the best reputations seem to me nearly the most deficient in my investigation accordance with the God while others with more poultry reputations seem to be men more fit in regards to being prudent indeed I must display my wondering to you as a performing of certain Labour's so that the divination would turn out to be unrefuted after the politicians I went to the poets those of tragedies and did rooms and the others in order that I would catch myself in the act of being more ignorant than they so I would take up those poems of theirs which it seemed to me they had worked on the most and I would ask them thoroughly what they meant so that I might learn something from them at the same time I am ashamed to tell you the truth man nevertheless it must be said almost everyone present so to speak would have spoken better than the poets did about the poetry that they themselves had made so again also concerning the poets I soon recognized that they do not make what they make by wisdom but by some sort of nature while inspired like the diviners and those who deliver Oracle's for they too say many noble things but they know nothing of what they speak it was apparent me that the poets are also affected in the same sort of way at the same time I perceived that they were supposed on account of that poetry that they were the wisest of human beings also in the other things in which they were not so I went away from there to supposing that I had turned out to be superior to them in the very same thing which I was to the politicians finally then I went to the manual artisans for I was conscious that I had knowledge of nothing so to speak but I knew that I would discover that they at least have the knowledge of many noble things and I was not played false about this they did have knowledge of things which I did not have knowledge of and in this way they were wiser than I but men of Athens the good craftsmen also seemed to me to go wrong in the same way as the poet's because he performed his art nobly each one deemed himself wisest in all other things the greatest things and this discordant note of theirs seemed to hide that wisdom so I asked myself on behalf of the Oracle whether I should prefer to be as I am being in no way wise in their wisdom or ignorant in their ignorance or to have both things that they have I answered myself in the Oracle that it profits me to be just as I am this is the examination men of Athens from which I have incurred many hatreds the sort that are harshest and gravest so that many slanders have arisen from them and I got of this name of being wise for the present on each occasion suppose that I myself am wise in the things concerning which I refute someone else or as it is probable men that really the God is wise and that in this Oracle he is saying that human wisdom is worth little or nothing and he appears to say this of Socrates and have made use of my name in order to make me a pattern as if he would say that one of you Oh human beings is wisest who like Socrates has become cognizant in the truth that he is worth nothing with respect to wisdom that is why even now I still go around seeking and investigating in accordance with the god ne townsmen or foreigner I supposed to be wise and whenever someone does not seem so to me I come to the gods aid and show that he is not wise and because of this occupation I have had no leisure either to do any of the things of the city worth speaking of or any of the things of my family instead I'm in ten thousandfold poverty because of my devotion to the God in addition to these things the young who follow me of their own accord those who have them as leisure the sons of the wealthiest enjoy hearing human beings examined and they themselves often imitate me and in turn they attempt to examine others and then I suppose they discover a great abundance of human beings who suppose they know something but know little or nothing thereupon those examined by them are angry at me not at themselves and they say that Socrates is someone most disgusting and that he corrupts the young and whenever someone asks them by doing in teaching what they have nothing to say but are ignorant so in order not to seem to be as a loss they say things that are ready at hand against all who philosophize the things aloft and under the earth and not believing in the gods and making the weaker speech the stronger for I do not suppose they would be willing to speak the truth that it becomes quite clear that they pretend to know but know nothing so since they are I suppose ambitious environments and many and since they speak about me in an organized and persuasive way they have filled up your ears slandering me vehement Lee for a long time from among these men Meletis attacked me and Anytus and Lycon Meletis being vexed on behalf of the poet's Anytus on behalf of the craftsmen and the politicians and Lycon on behalf of the orator 'he's therefore as I said when I began it would be a wonder to meet if I should be able in this short time to take away from you this slander which has become so great this is the truth for you men of Athens I am hiding nothing from you either great or small in my speech nor am i holding anything back and yet I know rather well that I incur hatred by these very things which is also a proof that I speak the truth and this is the slander against me and these are its causes whether you investigate these things now or later you will discover that this is so so about the things which the first accusers accuse me of let this be a sufficient defense speech for you but against Meletis the good and patriotic as he says and the later accusers I will try to speak next in my defence now again just as though these were other accusers let us take up their sworn statement it is something like this it asserts that Socrates does injustice by corrupting the young and by not believing in the gods in whom the city believes but in other demonio that a novel the charges of this sort but let us examine one of the parts of this charge now he asserts that I do injustice by corrupting the young but I men of Athens assert that mellitus does injustice in that he jests in a serious matter easily bringing human beings to trial pretending to be serious and concerned about things for which he never cared at all that this is so I will try to display to you as well come here Meletis tell me do you not regard it as most important how the youth will be the best possible Meletis I do Socrates come now tell these men who makes them better for it is clear that you know since you care at least for since you have discovered the one who corrupts them as you say namely me you are bringing me before these men and accusing me but of the one who makes them better come tell them and reveal to them who it is do you see Meletis that you are silent and have nothing to say and yet does it not seem to be shameful to you and a sufficient proof of just what I say that you have never cared but tell my good man who makes them better Meletis the laws Socrates but I'm not asking this best of men rather than what human being is it who knows first all of this very thing of the laws Meletis these men Socrates the judges Socrates what are you saying Meletis are these men here able to educate the young and do they make them better Meletis very much so Socrates all of them or some of them and some not Meletis all of them Socrates well said by Hera and you speak of a great abundance of benefit --is what then do the listeners here make them better or not Meletis these two Socrates and what about the councilmen milita's the councilmen - Socrates well mellitus then surely those in the assembly the Assemblyman do not corrupt the youth or do all those to make them better Meletis those two Socrates then all the Athenians as it appears make them noble and good except me and I alone corrupt them is that what you're saying Meletis I do say this most vehemently Socrates you have charged me with great misfortune now answer me does it seem to you to be also so concerning horses that all human beings make them better while one certain one is the corruptor or is it wholly opposite to this that one certain one is able to make them better or very few those skilled with horses while the many if they ever associate with horses and use them corrupt them is this not so ëletís both concerning horses and the other animals of course it is all together so whether you and Anytus do nah or affirm it for it would be a great happiness for the young if one alone corrupts them while the others benefit them but in fact Meletis you have sufficiently displayed that you never yet gave a thought to the young and you are making your own lack of care plainly apparent since you have cared nothing about the things for which you bring me in here but tell us further Meletis before zeus whether it is better to dwell among upright citizens or villainous ones sir answer for surely I am asking nothing hard do not the villainous do something bad to whoever in nearest to them while the good do something good milita's quite so Socrates is there anyone then who wishes to be harmed by those he associates with rather than to be benefited keep answering my good man for the law orders you to answer is there anyone who wishes to be harmed Meletis of course not Socrates come then do you bring me in here saying that I voluntarily corrupt the young and make them more villainous or involuntarily Melisa's voluntarily I say Socrates what then Meletis are you so much wiser at your age than I had mine that you have become cognizant that the bad always do something bad to those who are closest to them and the good do something good whereas I have come into so much ignorance that I'm not even cognizant that if I ever do something wretched to any of my associates I will risk getting back something bad from him so that I do so much bad voluntarily as you assert of this I am not convinced by you mellitus nor do I suppose is any other human being that either I do not corrupt or if I do corrupt I do it involuntarily so in both cases what you say is false and if I corrupt involuntarily the law is not that you bring me in here for such involuntary wrongs but that you take me aside in private to teach and admonish me for it is clear that if I learn I will at least stop doing what I do involuntarily but you avoided associating with me and teaching me and you are not willing to but instead you brought me in here where the law is to bring those in need of punishment not learning but in fact men of Athens what I was saying was already clear that Meletis never cared about these things either much or little nevertheless speak to us how do you say that I corrupt the youth Meletis or is it clear according to the indictment that you brought that is by teaching them not to believe in the gods whom the city believes but in other demonio that are a novel do you not say that it is by teaching these things that I corrupt them Melisa's I certainly do say this most vehemently Socrates then before these very gods milita's about whom our speech now is speak to me and to these men still more plainly but I am NOT able to understand whether you are saying that I teach them to believe that there are gods of some sort and so I myself do believe that there are gods and are not completely atheistic and do not do injustice in this way but that I do not believe in those whom the city believes but in others and this is what you charge me with that I believe in others or do you assert that I myself do not believe in God's at all and that I teach this to others Meletis this is what I say that you do not believe in God's at all Socrates wonderous Meletis why do you say this do I not even believe then that the Sun and Moon are gods as other human beings do know by Zeus judges he declares that the Sun is a stone and the moon is earth Socrates do you suppose you are accusing anaxagoras my dear Melisa's and do you so much despise these men here and suppose that they are so inexperienced in letters that they do not know the books of an axe a gross of class a mean a are full of these speeches more / do the young learn these things from me when it is sometimes possible from to buy them in the orchestra for a drachma if the price is very high and then to laugh at Socrates if he pretends that they are his own especially since they are so strange but before Zeus is this how I seem to you do I believe there is no God milita's you certainly do not by Zeus not in any way at all Socrates you are unbelievable Melisa's even as you seem to meet yourself this man seems to me men of Athens to be very hubristic and unrestrained and simply to have brought this indictment with a certain hubris and unrestrained and youthful rashness he is like someone testing me by putting together a riddle well Socrates the wise recognized the time jesting and contradicting myself or will I deceive him and the rest of the listeners for he himself appears to me to be contradicting himself in the indictment as if he were to say Socrates does injustice by not believing in gods but believing in gods and yet this is the conduct of one who jokes now consider this with me men how he appears to me to be saying this and you answer Meletis but you others as I begged of you from the beginning please remember not to make disturbances if I make speeches in my custom dawei is there any human-being Melisa's who believes that there are human matters but does not believe in human beings let him keep answering man and lets him not make disturbances again and again is there anyone who does not believe in horses but believes in horse matters or anyone who does not believe in flute-players but believes in flute masses there is not best of men if you do not wish to answer I say it for you and for those others but at least answer what comes next is there anyone who believes that they are demonic matters but does not believe in demons Melisa's there is not Socrates how helpful you were thereby answering reluctantly when compelled by these men now then you say that I believe and teach Dame olya so whether they are novel or ancient or at any rate I do believe in Dimona according to your own speech and you also swore to this in the indictment but if I believe in demonio then surely there is also a great necessity that I believe in diamonds is this not so of course it is I set you down as agreeing since you do not answer and do we not believe that diamonds are either gods or children of gods do you affirm this or not Meletis quite so Socrates therefore if I do believe in demons as you say and if on the one hand demons are gods of some sort then this would be what I say you are riddling and jesting about when you say I do not believe in gods and again that I believe in God's since I in fact do believe in demons on the other hand if demons are certain bastard children of gods whether from nymphs or certain others of whom it is said they are born then what human being would believe that there are children of gods but not gods it would be as strange as if someone believed in the children of horses or asses mules but did not believe that there are horses and asses buts Meletis there is no way that you did not bring this indictment either to test us in these things or else because you were at a loss about what true injustice you might charge me with there is no device by which you could persuade any human being who is even slightly intelligent that is not part of the same man to believe in both died Monia and divine beings and further that this same man believes in neither Damons nor gods nor heroes but in fact men of Athens that I do not do injustice according to Meletis as indictment does not seem to me to require much of a defense speech but even this is sufficient but what I was saying earlier that I have incurred much hatred and among many men know well that this is true and this is what will convict me if it does victim II not Melisa's not Anytus but the slander and envy of many this has convicted many other good men too and I suppose it will also convict me there is no danger that it will stop with me perhaps then someone might say then are you not ashamed Socrates of having followed the sort of pursuit from which you now run the risk of dying I would respond to him with just a speech what you say is ignoble fellow if you suppose that a man who is of even a little benefit should take into account the danger of living or dying but not rather consider this alone whenever he acts whether his actions are just or unjust and the deeds of a good man or bad for according to your speech those of the demigods who met to their end at Troy would be poultry especially the son of Thetis rather than endure anything shameful he despised danger so much that when his mother a goddess spoke to him as he was eager to kill Hector something like this as I suppose son if you avenge the murder of your comrade Patroclus and kill Hector you yourself will die for straightaway she says after Hector your fate is ready at hand he upon hearing this belittle death and danger fearing much more to live as a band man and not avenge his friends straight away he says may I die after I inflict a penalty on the doer of injustice so that I may not stay here ridiculous beside the curved ships a burden on the land surely you do not suppose that he gave any thoughts to death and danger this is the way it is men of Athens in truth whenever someone stations himself holding that it is best or wherever he is stationed by a ruler there he must stay and run the risk as it seems to me and do not take into account death or anything else compared to what is shameful so I would have done terrible deeds men of Athens if when the rulers whom you had elected to rule me stationed me in pata dia and amphibole and adi liam i stayed then where they stationed me and around the risk of dying like anyone else but when the god stationed me as i supposed and assumed ordering me to live philosophizing and examining myself and others i had then left my station because i feared death or any other matter whatever terrible that would be and truly when someone might justly bring me into a law court saying that i do not believe that there are gods since i would be disobeying the divination and fearing death and supposing that i am wise when i am not for to fear death men is in fact nothing other than to seem wise but not to be so for it is to seem to know that one does not know no one knows whether death does not even happen to be the greatest of all goods for the human being but people fear it as though they knew well that it is the greatest of Evil's and how is this not that reproachable ignorance of supposing that one knows what one does not know but i men and perhaps distinguished from the many human beings also here in this and if i were to say that i am wiser than anyone in anything it would be in this that since I do not know sufficiently about the things in Hades so also I suppose that I do not know but I do know that it is bad and shameful to do injustice and to disobey ones better whether God or human being so compared to the bad things which I know bad I will never fear or flee the things about which I do not know whether they can even happen to be good so that not even if you let me go now and if you disobey Anytus who said that either I should not have been brought in here in the beginning or since I was brought in that it is not possible not to kill me he said before you that if I am acquitted soon your sons pursuing what Socrates teachers will all be completely corrupted if you would say to me with regard to this Socrates for now we will not obey Anytus we will let you go but on this condition that you no longer spend time in this investigation or philosophize and if you are caught still doing this you will die if you would let me go then as I said on these occasions I would say to you I men of Athens salute you and love you but I will obey the God rather than you and as long as I breathe and I am able to I will certainly not stop philosophizing and I will exhort you and explain this to whom ever view I happen to meet and I will speak just the sort of things I'm accustomed to best of men you're an Athenian from the city that is greatest and best reputed for wisdom and strength are you not ashamed that you care for having as much money as possible and reputation and honor but that you neither care for nor give thought to prudence and truth and how your soul will be the best possible and if one of you disputes it and asserts that he does care I will not immediately let him go normal I go away but I will speak to him and examine and test him and if he does not seem to me to possess virtue but only says he does I will reproach him saying that he regards the things worth the most as the least important and the poultry of things is more important I will do this to whomever younger or older I happen to meet both foreigner and townsman but more so to the townsmen in as much as you are closer to me in kin no well then that the God orders this and I suppose that until now no greater good has arisen for you in the city than my service to the God for I go around and do nothing but persuade you both younger and older not to care for bodies and money before nor as ver mentally as how your soul will be the best possible I say not from money does virtue come but from virtue comes money and all of the other good things for human beings both privately and publicly if then I corrupt the young by saying these things they may be harmful but if someone asserts that what I say is other than this he speaks nonsense with a view to these things men of Athens I would say either obey Anytus or nots and either let me go or not since I would not do otherwise not even if I were going to die many times do not make disturbances men of Athens but abide by what I begged of you not to make disturbances at the things I say but to listen for as I suppose you will even be helped by listening for in fact I'm going to tell you certain other things at which you will perhaps cry out but do not do this in any way for know well that if you kill me since I am the sort of man that I say I am you will not harm me more than yourselves for Meletis or Anytus would not harm me he would not even be able to for I do not suppose it is sanctioned that a better man be harmed by worse perhaps however he might kill or banish or dishonor me but this man no doubt supposes and others to that these are great evils while I do not suppose that these are but much rather doing what this man here is now doing attempting to kill a man unjustly so I men of Athens I am now far from making a defense speech on my own behalf as someone might suppose I do it rather on your behalf so that you do not do something wrong concerning the gift of the to you by voting to condemn me for if you kill me you will not easily discover another of my sort who even if it is a rather ridiculous thing to say has simply been set upon the city by the God as though upon a great and well born horse who is rather sluggish because of his great size and needs to be awakened by some gadfly just so in fact the God seems to me to have set me upon the city as someone of this sort I awaken and persuade and reproach each one of you and I do not stop settling down everywhere upon you the whole day someone else of this sort will certainly not easily arise for you man well if you obey me you will spare me but perhaps you may be vexed like The Drowsy when they are awakened and if you obey Anytus and slap me you would easily kill me then you would spend the rest of your lives asleep unless the God sends you someone else in his concern for you that I happen to be someone of this sort given to the city by the God you might am pre hend from this it does not seem human on one hand that I have been careless of all my own things and that for so many years now I have endured that the things of my family being cared for and on the other hand that I always do your business going to each of you privately as a father or an older brother might do persuading you to care for virtue if I was getting something out of this and if I was receiving pay while I exhorted you to these things then it would be somewhat reasonable but as it is even you yourself see that the accusers who accused me so shamelessly in everything else in this have not been able to become so utterly shameless as to offer a witness to assert that I ever took any pay or asked for it for I suppose I offer a sufficient witness that I speak the truth my poverty perhaps then it might seem to be strange that I do go around counseling these things and being a busybody in private but that in public I do not dare go up before your multitude to counsel the city the cause of this is what you have heard me speak of in many times and in many places that something Devine and Damon egg comes to me a voice which of course is also what Meletis wrote about in the indictment making a comedy over it this is something which began for me in childhood a sort of voice comes and whenever it comes it always turns me away from whatever I'm about to do but never turns me forward this is what opposes my political activity and its opposition seems to me altogether Noble for no well men of Athens if I had long ago attempted to be politically active I would long ago have perished and I would have benefited neither you nor myself now do not be vexed with me when I speak the truth for there is no human being who will preserve his life if he genuinely opposes either you or any other multitude and prevents many unjust and unlawful things from happening in the city rather if someone who really fights for the just is going to preserve himself even for a short time it is necessary for him to lead a private rather than public life I for my part will offer you great proofs of these things for you not speeches but what you honor deeds do listen to what happened to me so that you may see that I would not yield to even one man against the just because of a fear of death even if I were to perish by refusing to yield I will tell you vulgar things typical of the law courts but true i men of athens never held any office in the city except for once being on the council and it happened that our tribe Antiochus held the pretty knee when you wish to judge the ten generals the ones who did not pick up the men from the naval battle as a group unlawfully as it seemed to all of you in the time afterwards I alone of the pertains opposed your doing anything against the laws then and I voted against it and although the auditors were ready to indict me and arrest me and you were ordering and shouting I suppose that I should run the risk with the law and the just rather than side with you because of fear of prisoner death when you're counseling unjust things now this was when the city was still under the democracy but again when the oligarchy came to be the thirty summoned five of us to the tholos they ordered us to arrest Leon thus our minion and bring him from Salamis to die they ordered many others to do many things of this sort wishing that as many as possible would be implicated in the responsibility then however I showed again not in speech but in deed that I do not even care about death in any way it's Hall if it is not too crude to say so but that my whole care is to commit no unjust or impious deed that government as strong as it was did not shock me into doing anything unjust when we came out of the tholos the other four went to Salamis and arrested Leon but I departed and went home and perhaps I would have died because of this if that government had not been quickly overthrown and you will have many witnesses of these things do you suppose then that I would have survived so many years if I had been publicly active and had acted in a manner worthy of a good man coming to the aid of the just things and as one ought regarding this as most important far from its men of Athens nor would any other human being but through all my life if ever I was active in public at all it is apparent that I was the source of man and in private I was the same who never conceded anything to anyone contraire - the just neither to anyone else not to any of those who might slander a say on my students I have never been anyone's feature but if anyone either younger or older designed to hear me speaking and doing my own things I never begrudged it to him and I do not converse only when I receive money and not when I do not receive it rather I offer myself to both rich and poor alike for questioning and if anyone wishes to hear what I say he may answer me and whether any of them becomes an upright man or not I would not justly be held responsible since I have never promised or taught any instruction to any of them if someone says that he has ever learned from me or heard privately anything that everyone else did not know know well that he does not speak the truth but why then do some enjoy spending so much time with me you have heard men of Athens I told you the whole truth it is because they enjoy hearing men examined who suppose they are wise but are not for it is not unpleasant I have been ordered to this practice by the God as I affirm from divination and from dreams and in every way that any divine allotment ever ordered human being to practice anything at all these things men of Athens are both true and easy to test now if for my part I am corrupting some of the young and have already corrupted others and if any of them when they became older had recognized that I ever counseled them badly in anything while they were young then now no doubt they should have come forward to accuse me and take their vengeance if they themselves were not willing to then some of their families fathers and brothers and their other relatives should now have remembered it and taken their vengeance if their families had suffered anything bad from me in any event there are present here many of them whom I see first of all cryto here of my age and deem the father of crota beulas here next Lysanias this fete Ian the father of a skein ease here further here is antiphon thus Ephesian and the father of epigenesis moreover here are the others whose brothers have spent time in this way Theo's a 2ds son of Nico Stratos the brother of Theodotus and Theodotus met his end so that he at least would not beg him to and Dima doukas son of perilous whose brother was thei AG's and here is Ariston son Andy Montes whose brother is Plato here and aunt Doris whose brother is Apollodorus here and I can tell you of many others from among whom milita's should particularly have offered someone as a witness during his own speech if he forgot then let him offer one now I will yield and let him say if he has any one of this sort at all but you will discover that it is wholly opposite to this men that everyone is ready come to aid me the corruptor the one who does evil to their families as Meletus and Anytus say now the corrupted ones themselves would perhaps have a reason to come to my aid but the uncorrupted ones their relatives are now older men so what other reason would they have to come to my aid except the correct and just one that their conscious that Malita speaks falsely while I am being truthful well then men these and perhaps other such things are about all I would have to say in my defence perhaps someone among you may be indignant when he recalls himself if in contesting a trial even smaller than this trial he begged and supplicated the judges with many tears bringing forward his own children and many of the others of his family and friends so as to be pitied as much as possible while I do none of these things although in this too I am risking as it might seem the extreme danger perhaps then someone thinking about this may be rather stubborn towards me and angered by this very thing he sat down his vote in anger if there is someone among you like this for I at least do not deem that there is but if there is to me it seems decent for me to say to this man I best of men surely do have some family for this is also just what Homer says not even have I grown up from an oak or a rock but from human beings so that I do have a family and sons two men of Athens three of them one already a youth and two still children nevertheless I will bring none of them forward here in order to beg you to vote to acquit me why then will I do none of these things not because I am stubborn men of Athens nor because I dishonor you whether I am daring with regard to death or not is another story but at any rate as to reputation mine and yours and to the whole cities to me it does not seem to be noble for me to do any of these things for I am old and have this name and whether it is true or false it is reputed that at least Socrates is distinguished from the many human beings in some way if then those of you who are reputed to be distinguished whether in wisdom or courage or any other virtue at all will act in this way it would be shameful I have often seen some who are just like this when they are judged although they are reputed to be something they do wondrous deeds says they suppose that they will suffer something terrible if they die as though they would be immortal if you did not kill them they seem to me to attach shame to the city so there's a foreigner might take it that those Athenians who had distinguished in virtue the ones whom they pick out from among themselves for their offices and for their honors are not at all distinguished from women for those of you men of Athens who are reputed to be something in any way at all should not do these things nor whenever we do them should you allow it instead you should show that you would much rather vote to convict one who brings in these piteous dramas and makes the city ridiculous than the one who keeps quiet apart from the reputation man to me it also does not seem to be just to beg the judge nor to be acquitted by begging but rather to teach and to persuade for the judge is not seated to give way to the just things as gratification but to judge them for he has not sworn to gratify whoever seems favorable to him but to give judgment according to the laws therefore we should not accustom you to swear falsely nor should you be accustomed to it for neither of us would be pious so do not deem that I men of Athens should practice such things before you which I hold to be neither noble nor just nor pious and certainly by Zeus above all not when I'm being prosecuted for impiety by Meletis here for plainly if I should persuade and force you by begging after you have sworn an oath I would be teaching you not to hold that there are gods and in making my defense speech I would simply be accusing myself of not believing in gods but that is by far from being so for I believe men of Athens as none of my accusers does and I turn it over to you and to the God to judge me in whatever way is going to be best for both me and for you the jury votes on Socrates innocence of guilt and the majority finds him guilty as charged Meletis then makes a speech proposing the death penalty and socrates must offer a counterproposal many things contribute to my not being indignant men of Athens at what has happened that you voted to convict me and one of them is that what has happened was not unexpected by me but I wonder much more at the number of the votes on each side for I at least did not suppose it would be by so little but by much but as it is and is rely if only 30 of the votes had fallen differently I would have been acquitted so as it seems to me I have even now been acquitted as far as Meletis is concerned and not only have I been acquitted but it is clear to everyone if Anytus and Lycon had not come forward to accuse me he would not have had to pay a fine of a thousand have had gotten a fifth of the votes at any rate the man proposes death as my dessert well then what counter proposal shall I make to you men of Athens or is it not clear that it should be whatever I am worthy of what then what am i worthy to suffer or to pay because I did not keep quiet during my life and I did not care for the things that many do money-making and household management and general ships and popular oratory and the other offices and conspiracies and factions that come to be in the city since I held that I myself was really too decent to survive if I went into these things I did not go into matters where if I did go I was going to be of no benefit either to you or to myself instead I went to each of you privately to perform the greatest benefaction as I affirm I tempted to persuade each of you not to care for any of his own things until he cares for himself how he will be the best and most prudent possible nor to care for the things of the city until he cares for the city itself and so to care for the other things in the same way what's then am i worthy to suffer being such as this something good men of athens at least if you give me what I deserve according to my worth in truth and besides a good of a sort there would be fitting to me what then is for a poor man a benefactor who needs to have leisure to exhort you there is nothing more fitting men of Athens than for such a man to be given his meals in the prytaneum much more so than if any of you has won a victory at the Olympia with a horse or two or a four-horse chariot for he makes you seem happy while I make you be so and he is not in need of sustenance while I am in need of it so if I must propose what I am worthy of in accordance with the just I propose this to given my meals in the prytaneum perhaps then when I say this I seem to you to speak in nearly the same way as when I spoke about lament and supplication quite stubbornly it is not like that men of Athens but rather like this I am convinced that I do not do injustice to any human being voluntarily but I am NOT persuading you of this for we have conversed with each other in a short time and since as I suppose if you had a law like any other human beings not to judge anyone in a matter of death in one day alone but over many you would be persuaded but as it is it is not easy in a short time to do away with any great slanders I being convinced indeed that I do not do injustice to anyone and far from doing injustice to myself and from saying against myself that I am worthy of something bad and from proposing this sort of thing as my dessert what would I fear that I might suffer what Meletis proposes for me about which I say I do not know whether is good or bad or instead of this should I choose something from among the things that I know well are bad and propose that should it be prison and why should I live in jail enslaved to the authority that is regularly established there the eleven or money and imprisonment until I pay but for me this is the same as what I was just saying now for I have no money to pay well should I propose exile when for perhaps you would grant me this as my dessert I would certainly be possessed by much love of soul men of Athens if I was so unreasonable that I were not able to reason that you who are my fellow citizens were not able to bear my ways of spending time in my speeches but instead they have become quite grave and hateful to you so that you are now seeking to be released from them will others then bear them easily far from its men of Athens noble indeed would life be for me a human being of my age to go into exile and live exchanging one city for another always being driven out for I know well that wherever I go the young will listen to me when I speak just as they do here and if I drive them away they themselves will drive me out by persuading their elders but if I do not drive them away their fathers and families will drive me out because of these same ones perhaps then someone might say by being silent and keeping quiet Socrates won't you be able to live in exile for us it is hardest of all to persuade some of you about this for if I say that this is to disobey the God and that because of this it is impossible to keep quiet you will not be persuaded by me on the ground that I'm being ironic and on the other hand if I say that this even happens to be a very great good for a human being to make speeches every day about virtue and the other things about which you hear me conversing and examining both myself and others and that the unexamined life is not worth living for a human being you will be persuaded by me still less when I say these things this is the way it is as I affirm men but to persuade you is not easy and at the same time I am not accustomed to deem myself worthy of anything bad for if I had money I would have proposed as much money as I could pay for that would not harm me but as it is I do not have any unless of course you would wish me to propose as much money as I am able to pay perhaps I would be able to pay you say a meter of silver so I proposed that much but Plato here men of Athens in cryto and cry tabulous and Apollodorus bid me to propose thirty minae and they will stand as the guarantor so I proposed that much and they will be trustworthy guarantor of the money for you voting between penalties proposed by the accuser and the accused the jury condemned Socrates to death he has time to make some further remarks before he is taken away to prison to await execution for the sake of a little time men of Athens you will get a name and be charged with the responsibility by those wishing to revile the city for having killed Socrates a wise man for those wishing to reproach you will assert that I am wise even if I am not at any rate if you had waited a short time this would have come about for you of its own accord you see that my age is already far advanced in life and close to death I say this not to all of you but to those who voted to condemn me to death I also say the following to these same ones perhaps you suppose men of Athens that I have been convicted because I was at a loss for the sort of speeches that would have persuaded you if I had supposed that I should do and say anything at all to escape the penalty far from it rather I have been convicted because I was at a loss not however for speeches but for daring and shamelessness and willingness to say the sorts of things to you that you would have been most pleased to hear me wailing and lamenting and doing and saying many other things unworthy of me as I affirm such things as you have been accustomed to hear from others but neither did I then suppose that I should do anything unsuitable for a free man because of the danger nor do I now regret that I made my defense speech like this I much prefer to die having made my defense speech in this way than to live in that way for neither in a court case not in a war should I or anyone else devise a way to escape death by doing anything at all in battles it often becomes clear that one might escape death at least by letting go of his arms and turning around to supplicate his pursuers and there are many other devices to escape death in each of the dangers if one dares to do and say anything at all but I suspect it is not hard men to escape death but it is much harder to escape villainy for it runs faster than death and now I since I am slow and old and caught by the slower while my accusers since they are clever and sharp are caught by the faster by evil and now I go away condemned by you to pay the penalty of death while they have been convicted by the truth of wretchedness and injustice I abide by my penalty and so do they perhaps these things even had to be so and I suppose there is a do measure in them after this I desire to deliver Oracle's to you o you who voted to condemn me for in fact I am now we're human beings particularly deliver Oracle's when they're about to die I affirm you men who condemned me to death that vengeance will come upon you right after my death and much harsher by Zeus than any of the sort you give by killing me for you have now done this deed supposing that you will be released from giving an account of your life but it will turn out to be much the opposite for you as I affirm there will be more who will refute you whom I have now been holding back you did not perceive them and they will be harsher in as much as they are younger you will be more indignant for if you suppose that by killing human beings you will prevent someone from approaching you for not living correctly you do not think nobly for that kind of release is not at all possible or noble rather the kind that is both noblest and easiest is not to restrain others but to equip oneself to be the best possible so having divined these things for you who voted against me I am released but with those who voted for me I would be pleased to converse on behalf of this affair which has happened while the officials are occupied and I do not yet go to the place where when I do go I must die please stay with me man for this much time nothing prevents how telling tales to one another as long as it is possible for I am willing to display to you as two friends whatever this thing means which has occurred to me just now for to me judges for by calling you judges I would address you correctly something wonderous has happened from my customary divination to the Dominion which was always very frequent in the former time by opposing me in even quite small matters if I were about to do something incorrectly now you yourselves see what has occurred to me these very things which someone might suppose to be and are believed to be extreme evils but the sign of the god did not oppose me when I left my house this morning nor when I came up here to the law courts nor anywhere in the speech when I was about to say anything though in other speeches it has often stopped me in the middle while I was speaking but as it is it has nowhere opposed me in either deed or speech concerning this action what then do I take to be the cause of this I will tell you probably what has occurred to me has turned out to be good and there is no way that those of us take it correctly who suppose that being dead is bad in my view a great proof of this as happened for there is no way that the accustomed sign would not have been opposed to me unless are about to do something good let us also think in the following way of how great a hope there is that it is good now being dead is either of two things for either it is like being nothing and the dead man has no perception of anything or else in accordance with the things that are said it happens to be a sort of change in migration of the soul from one place here to another place and if in fact there is no perception but it is like a sleep in which the sleeper has no dream at all death would be a wonderous game for i suppose that if someone had to select that night in which he slept so soundly that he did not even dream and to compare it to the other nights and days of his own life of that night then had to say on consideration how many days and nights in his own life he has lived better and more pleasantly than that night then I suppose that the great king himself not to mention some private man would discover that they are easily to count in comparison with the other days and nights so if death is something like this I at least say it is a game for all time appears in this way indeed to be nothing more than one night on the other hand if death is like a journey from here to another place and if the things that are said are true that in fact all the dead are there then what greater good could there be than this judges for if one arrives in Hades released from those who claim to be judges will find those who are judges in truth the very ones who are said to give judgment there Minos and Rhadamanthus a ACCA's and trip dilemmas and those of the other demigods who turned out to be just in their own lives would this journey be a paltry one or again to associate with Orpheus and Lucius and Hesiod and Homer how much would any of you give for I am willing to many times if these things are true especially since for myself spending time there would be wonderous whenever I happen to meet pala me DS and telamonian Ajax or anyone else of the Ancients who died because of an unjust judgment I would compare my own experiences with theirs as I suppose it would not be unpleasant and certainly the greatest thing is that I would pass my time examining and searching out among those there just as I do to those here who among them is wise and who supposes he is but is not how much would one give judges to examine him who led the great army against Troy or Odysseus or Sisyphus or the thousand others whom one might mention both men and women to converse and to associate with them and to examine them there would be inconceivable happiness certainly those there surely do not kill on this account for those that are happier than those here not only in other things but also in things that they are immortal henceforth for the rest of time at least if the things that are said are in fact true but you two judges should be of good hope towards death and you should think this one thing to be true that there is nothing bad for a good man whether living or dead that the gods are not without care for his troubles nor have my present troubles arisen of their own accord but it is clear to me that is now better after all for me to be dead and to have been released from my troubles this is also why the sign did not turn me away anywhere and I at least am not at all angry of those who voted to condemn me and as my accusers and yet it was not with this thought in mind that they voted to condemn me and accuse me rather they suppose they would harm me for this they are worthy of blame this much however I beg of them when my sons grow up punish them men and pain them in the very same way I pained you if they seem to you to care for money or for anything else before virtue and if they're reputed to be something when they are nothing reproach them just as I did you tell them that they do not care for the things they should and that they suppose they are something when they are worth nothing and if you do these things we will have been treated justly by you both I myself and my sons but now it is time to go away I to die and you to live which of us goes to a better thing is unclear to everyone except to the God

Channel: Ancient Recitations

Views: 517,335

Rating: 4.7948174 out of 5

Keywords: history, audiobook, text, ancient writing, book

Id: F1GhJo1QcJQ

Length: 76min 20sec (4580 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 23 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/kurtgustavwilckens]

By none other than Sargon of Akkad! I don't like the guys' ideas at all, not one bit, but I find this enterprise of his very worthy of respect, philosophically worthy, and, gotta grant it to the guy, he does have a great reading voice and his diction is quite nice.

So, kuddos to him, he has a bunch of readings of ancient texts in his channel, and maybe this can get people that like Sargon more into the good old canon, a man can hope!