SOCRATES. 



fent a private meffage to Socrates, afTuring him, that if he 

 would dehlt from cenfuring his conduft, he would with- 

 draw his accufation. But Socrates refufcd to comply 

 with fo degrading a condition, and, with his ufual fpirit, 

 replied, " Whilll I live I will never difguife the truth, nor 

 fpeak otherwife than my duty requires." The interval 

 between the accufation and the trial he fpent in philofo- 

 phical converfations with his friends, chufing to diicourfe 

 upon any other fubject, rather than his own fituation. Her- 

 mogenes, one of his friends, was much Itruck with this cir- 

 cumftance, and aflced him, why he did not employ his time 

 in preparing his defence : " Becaufe," replied Socrates, " I 

 have never in my life done any thing unjuft." The eminent 

 orator Lyfias compofed an apology, in the name of his 

 matter, which he requeued him to adopt ; but Socrates 

 excufed himfelf by faying, that though it was eloquently 

 written, it would not fuit his charafter. 



When the day of trial arrived, his accufers appeared in 

 the fenate, and attempted to fupport their charge in three 

 diilindl Ipccches, which llrongly marked their refpeftive cha- 

 rafters. Plato, who was a young man, and a zealous follower 

 of Socrates, then rofe up to addrefs the judges in defence of 

 his mafter : but whilft he was attempting to apologize for 

 his youth, he was abruptly commanded by the court to 

 fit down. Socrates, however, needed no advocate. Af- 

 cending the chair with all the ferenity of confcious inno- 

 cence, and with all the dignity of fuperior merit, he deli- 

 vered, in a firm and manly tone, an unpremeditated defence 

 of himfelf, which iilenced his opponents, and ought to have 

 convinced his judges. After tracing the progrefs of the 

 confpiracy which had been raifed againlt him to its true 

 fource, the jealoufy and refentment of men whofe ignorance 

 he had expofed, and whofe vices he had ridiculed and re- 

 proved, he diltinftly replied to the feveral charges brought 

 againll him by Melitus. To prove that he had not been 

 guilty of impiety towards the gods of his country, he ap- 

 pealed to his frequent praflice of attending the public reli- 

 gious feltivals. The crime of introducing new divinities, 

 with which he was charged, chiefly, as it feems, on the 

 ground of the admonitions which he profefTed to have re- 

 ceived from an invifibie power, he difclaimed, by pleading, 

 that it was no new thing for men to confult the gods, and 

 receive inllruftions from them. To refute the charge of 

 his having been a corrupter of youth, he urged the example 

 which he had uniformly exhibited of julUce, moderation, 

 and temperance, the moral fpirit and tendency of his dif- 

 courfes, and the effect which had aftually been produced by 

 his dodtrine upon the manners of the young. Then, dif- 

 daining to folicit the mercy of his judges, he called upon 

 them for that juflice, which their ofhce and their oath 

 obliged them to adminilter, and profefTing his faith and 

 confidence in God, rcfigned himfelf to their plcafiire. 



The judges, whofe prejudices would not fuffer them to 

 pay due attention to this apology, or to examine with im- 

 partiality the merits of the canl'e, immediately declared him 

 guilty of the crimes of which he flood accufed. Socrates, 

 in this ftage of the trial, had a right to enter his plea againft 

 the punifhment which the accufers demanded, and inflead 

 of the fentence of death, to propnfe forae pecuniary amerce- 

 ment. I5ut he, at firft, peremptorily refufcd to make any 

 [iropofal of this kind, imagining that it might be conflrued 

 itito aii acknowledgment of guilt ; and afferted, that his 

 conduft merited, from tlie Itate, reward rather than punifh- 

 ment. At length, however, he was prevailed upon by his 

 friends to offer, upon their credit, a fine of thirty mine. 

 The judges, notwithftanding, Hill remained inexorable : they 

 proceeded, without farther delay, to pronounce fentence 



upon him ; and he was condemned to be put to death by 

 the poifon of hemlock. Socrates received the fentence 

 with perfeifl compofure, and by a fmile teftified his con- 

 tempt both for his accufers and his judges. Then, turning 

 to his friends, he expreffed his entire fatisfaftion in the 

 recoUeftion of his pad life, and declared himfelf f;rmly 

 perfuaded, that pofterity would do fo much juflicc to bis 

 memory as to believe, that he had never injured or cor- 

 rupted any one, but had fpent his days in ferving his fellow, 

 citizens, by communicating to them, without reward, the 

 precepts of wifdom. Converfing in this manner, he was 

 conducted from the court to the prifon, which he entered 

 with a ferene countenance and a lofty mind, amidft the 

 lamentations of his friends. 



On the day of the condemnation, it happened that the 

 fliip, which was employed to carry a culfomary annual 

 offering to the ifiand of Delos, fet fail. It was contrary 

 to the law of Athens, that, during this voyage, any capital 

 punifhment (hould be infliCled within the city. Thi« cir- 

 cumflance delayed the execution of the fentence againfl 

 Socrates for thirty days. So long an interval of painful 

 expeftation, however, only ferved to aflord farther fcope 

 for the difplay of his conflaiicy. When his friends were 

 with him, he coiiverfed with his ufual cheerfulnefs. In 

 their abfence, he amufed himfelf witli writing verfes. He 

 compofed a hymn in honour of Apollo and Diana, and 

 verfitied a fable of iEfop. His friends, flill anxious to 

 fave fo valuable a life, urged him to attempt his efcape, 

 or at leait to permit them to convey him away ; and Crito 

 went fo far, as to affure him that, by his intereft with the 

 gaoler, it might be eafily accomplifhed, and to offer him 

 a retreat in Theffaly ; but Socrates rejefted the propofal, 

 as a criminal violation of the laws ; and aflced them, whether 

 there was any place out of Attica which death could not 

 reach. 



News being, at length, brought of the return of the fhip 

 from Delos, the officers, to whofe care he was committed, 

 delivered to Socrates, early in the morning, the final order 

 for his execution, and immediately, according to the law, 

 fet him at liberty from his bonds. His friends, who came 

 thus early to the prifon that they might have an oppor- 

 tunity of converfing with their mailer through the day, 

 found his wife fitting by him with a child in her arms. 

 As foon as Xantippe faw them, fhe burll into tears, and 

 faid, " O Socrates, this is the laft time your friends will 

 ever fpeak to you, or you to them." Socrates, that the 

 tranquillity of his lafl moments might not be diilurbed by 

 her unavailing lamentations, requcftcd that file might be 

 conducted home. With the mod frantic expreffions of 

 grief, flw left the prifon. An interefling converfation then 

 paffed between Socrates and his friends, which chiefly turned 

 upon the immortality of the foul. In the courfe of thi« 

 converfation, Socrates exprefled his difapprobation of the 

 pradlice of fuicide, and aflured his friends, that his chief 

 fupport in his prefent fituation was an expeftation, though 

 not unmixed with doubts, of a happy exiftcnce after 

 death. " It would be incxcufeable in me," faid he, " to 

 defpife death, if I were not perfuaded that it will conduft 

 me into the prefence of the gods, who are the moil 

 righteous governors, and into the focicty of jufl and good 

 men : but I derive confidence from the hope, that fome- 

 tliing of man remains after death, and that the condition of 

 good men will tiien be much better than that of the bad." 

 Crito, afterwards aflcing him in what manner he wifhed to 

 bo buried, Socrates replied, with a fmile, " As you pleafe, 

 provided 1 do not efcape out of your hands." Then, 

 turning to the red of his friends, he faid, " Is it not (Irange, 

 Hh 2 after 



