Perhaps someone might say,
"Socrates, can you not go away from
us and live quietly, without talking?"
Now this is the hardest thing to make
some of you believe. For if I say that
such conduct would be disobedience
to the god and that therefore I cannot
keep quiet, you will think I am jesting
and will not believe me; and if again I
say that to talk every day about virtue
and the other things about which you
hear me talking and examining myself
and others is the greatest good to man,
and that the unexamined life is not
worth living, you will believe me still
less. This is as I say, gentlemen, but it
is not easy to convince you. Besides, I
am not accustomed to think that I
deserve anything bad. If I had money, I
would have proposed a fine, as large as
I could pay; for that would have done
me no harm. But as it is -- I have no
money, unless you are willing to
impose a fine which I could pay. I
might perhaps pay a mina of silver. So
I propose that penalty; but Plato here,
men of Athens, and Crito and
Critobulus, and Aristobulus tell me to
propose a fine of thirty minas, saying
that they are sureties for it. So I
propose a fine of that amount, and
these men, who are amply sufficient,
will be my sureties. | Student name:
Next section
|