How you have felt, O men of Athens, at hearing the speeches of my accusers, I cannot tell;
but I know that their persuasive words almost made me forget who I was - such was the effect
of them; and yet they have hardly spoken a word of truth.
But many as their falsehoods were, there was one of them which quite amazed me; I mean
when they told you to be upon your guard, and not to let yourselves be deceived by the
force of my eloquence.
They ought to have been ashamed of saying this, because they were sure to be detected
as soon as I opened my lips and displayed my deficiency; they certainly did appear to
be most shameless in saying this, unless by the force of eloquence they mean the force
of truth; for then I do indeed admit that I am eloquent.
But in how different a way from theirs!
Well, as I was saying, they have hardly uttered a word, or not more than a word, of truth;
but you shall hear from me the whole truth: not, however, delivered after their manner,
in a set oration duly ornamented with words and phrases.
No indeed!
but I shall use the words and arguments which occur to me at the moment; for I am certain
that this is right, and that at my time of life I ought not to be appearing before you,
O men of Athens, in the character of a juvenile orator--let no one expect this of me.
And I must beg of you to grant me one favor, which is this: If you hear me using the same
words in my defence which I have been in the habit of using, and which most of you may
have heard in the agora, and at the tables of the money-changers, or anywhere else, I
would ask you not to be surprised at this, and not to interrupt me.
For I am more than seventy years of age, and this is the first time that I have ever appeared
in a court of law, and I am quite a stranger to the ways of the place; and therefore I
would have you regard me as if I were really a stranger, whom you would excuse if he spoke
in his native tongue, and after the fashion of his country; that I think is not an unfair
request.
Never mind the manner, which may or may not be good; but think only of the justice of
my cause, and give heed to that: let the judge decide justly and the speaker speak truly.
And first, I have to reply to the older charges and to my first accusers, and then I will
go to the later ones.
For I have had many accusers, who accused me of old, and their false charges have continued
during many years; and I am more afraid of them than of Anytus and his associates, who
are dangerous, too, in their own way.
But far more dangerous are these, who began when you were children, and took possession
of your minds with their falsehoods, telling of one Socrates, a wise man, who speculated
about the heaven above, and searched into the earth beneath, and made the worse appear
the better cause.
These are the accusers whom I dread; for they are the circulators of this rumor, and their
hearers are too apt to fancy that speculators of this sort do not believe in the gods.
And they are many, and their charges against me are of ancient date, and they made them
in days when you were impressible--in childhood, or perhaps in youth--and the cause when heard
went by default, for there was none to answer.
And, hardest of all, their names I do not know and cannot tell; unless in the chance
of a comic poet.
But the main body of these slanderers who from envy and malice have wrought upon you--and
there are some of them who are convinced themselves, and impart their convictions to others--all
these, I say, are most difficult to deal with; for I cannot have them up here, and examine
them, and therefore I must simply fight with shadows in my own defence, and examine when
there is no one who answers.
I will ask you then to assume with me, as I was saying, that my opponents are of two
kinds - one recent, the other ancient; and I hope that you will see the propriety of
my answering the latter first, for these accusations you heard long before the others, and much
oftener.
Well, then, I will make my defence, and I will endeavor in the short time which is allowed
to do away with this evil opinion of me which you have held for such a long time; and I
hope I may succeed, if this be well for you and me, and that my words may find favor with
you.
But I know that to accomplish this is not easy--I quite see the nature of the task.
Let the event be as God wills: in obedience to the law I make my defence.
I will begin at the beginning, and ask what the accusation is which has given rise to
this slander of me, and which has encouraged Meletus to proceed against me.
What do the slanderers say?
They shall be my prosecutors, and I will sum up their words in an affidavit.
"Socrates is an evil-doer, and a curious person, who searches into things under the earth and
in heaven, and he makes the worse appear the better cause; and he teaches the aforesaid
doctrines to others."
That is the nature of the accusation, and that is what you have seen yourselves in the
comedy of Aristophanes; who has introduced a man whom he calls Socrates, going about
and saying that he can walk in the air, and talking a deal of nonsense concerning matters
of which I do not pretend to know either much or little--not that I mean to say anything
disparaging of anyone who is a student of natural philosophy.
I should be very sorry if Meletus could lay that to my charge.
But the simple truth is, O Athenians, that I have nothing to do with these studies.
Very many of those here present are witnesses to the truth of this, and to them I appeal.
Speak then, you who have heard me, and tell your neighbors whether any of you have ever
known me hold forth in few words or in many upon matters of this sort.
[silence]
You hear their answer.
And from what they say of this you will be able to judge of the truth of the rest.
As little foundation is there for the report that I am a teacher, and take money; that
is no more true than the other.
Although, if a man is able to teach, I honor him for being paid.
There is Gorgias of Leontium, and Prodicus of Ceos, and Hippias of Elis, who go the round
of the cities, and are able to persuade the young men to leave their own citizens, by
whom they might be taught for nothing, and come to them, whom they not only pay, but
are thankful if they may be allowed to pay them.
There is actually a Parian philosopher residing in Athens, of whom I have heard; and I came
to hear of him in this way.
I met a man who has spent a world of money on the Sophists, Callias the son of Hipponicus,
and knowing that he had sons, I asked him: "Callias," I said, "if your two sons were
foals or calves, there would be no difficulty in finding someone to put over them; we should
hire a trainer of horses or a farmer probably who would improve and perfect them in their
own proper virtue and excellence; but as they are human beings, whom are you thinking of
placing over them?
Is there anyone who understands human and political virtue?
You must have thought about this as you have sons; is there anyone?"
"There is," he said.
"Who is he?" said I, "and of what country?
and what does he charge?"
"Evenus the Parian," he replied; "he is the man, and his charge is five minae."
Happy is Evenus, I said to myself, if he really has this wisdom, and teaches at such a modest
charge.
Had I the same, I should have been very proud and conceited; but the truth is that I have
no knowledge of the kind.
I dare say, Athenians, that someone among you will reply, "Why is this, Socrates, and
what is the origin of these accusations of you: for there must have been something strange
which you have been doing?
All this great fame and talk about you would never have arisen if you had been like other
men: tell us, then, why this is, as we should be sorry to judge hastily of you."
Now I regard this as a fair challenge, and I will endeavor to explain to you the origin
of this name of "wise," and of this evil fame.
Please to attend then.
And although some of you may think I am joking, I declare that I will tell you the entire
truth.
Men of Athens, this reputation of mine has come of a certain sort of wisdom which I possess.
If you ask me what kind of wisdom, I reply, such wisdom as is attainable by man, for to
that extent I am inclined to believe that I am wise; whereas the persons of whom I was
speaking have a superhuman wisdom, which I may fail to describe, because I have it not
myself; and he who says that I have, speaks falsely, and is taking away my character.
And here, O men of Athens, I must beg you not to interrupt me, even if I seem to say
something extravagant.
For the word which I will speak is not mine.
I will refer you to a witness who is worthy of credit, and will tell you about my wisdom--whether
I have any, and of what sort--and that witness shall be the god of Delphi.
You must have known Chaerephon; he was early a friend of mine, and also a friend of yours,
for he shared in the exile of the people, and returned with you.
Well, Chaerephon, as you know, was very impetuous in all his doings, and he went to Delphi and
boldly asked the oracle to tell him whether--as I was saying, I must beg you not to interrupt-he
asked the oracle to tell him whether there was anyone wiser than I was, and the Pythian
prophetess answered that there was no man wiser.
Chaerephon is dead himself, but his brother, who is in court, will confirm the truth of
this story.
Why do I mention this?
Because I am going to explain to you why I have such an evil name.
When I heard the answer, I said to myself, What can the god mean? and what is the interpretation
of this riddle?
For I know that I have no wisdom, small or great.
What can he mean when he says that I am the wisest of men?
And yet he is a god and cannot lie; that would be against his nature.
After a long consideration, I at last thought of a method of trying the question.
I reflected that if I could only find a man wiser than myself, then I might go to the
god with a refutation in my hand.
I should say to him, "Here is a man who is wiser than I am; but you said that I was the
wisest."
Accordingly I went to one who had the reputation of wisdom, and observed to him--his name I
need not mention; he was a politician whom I selected for examination--and the result
was as follows: When I began to talk with him, I could not help thinking that he was
not really wise, although he was thought wise by many, and wiser still by himself; and I
went and tried to explain to him that he thought himself wise, but was not really wise; and
the consequence was that he hated me, and his enmity was shared by several who were
present and heard me.
So I left him, saying to myself, as I went away: Well, although I do not suppose that
either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better off than he is--for
he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows.
I neither know nor think that I know.
In this latter particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him.
Then I went to another, who had still higher philosophical pretensions, and my conclusion
was exactly the same.
I made another enemy of him, and of many others besides him.
After this I went to one man after another, being not unconscious of the enmity which
I provoked, and I lamented and feared this: but necessity was laid upon me--the word of
God, I thought, ought to be considered first.
And I said to myself, 'Go I must to all who appear to know, and find out the meaning of
the oracle.'
And I swear to you, Athenians, by the dog I swear!
for I must tell you the truth--the result of my mission was just this: I found that
the men most in repute were all but the most foolish; and that some inferior men were really
wiser and better.
I will tell you the tale of my wanderings and of the "Herculean" labors, as I may call
them, which I endured only to find at last the oracle irrefutable.
When I left the politicians, I went to the poets: tragic, dithyrambic, and all sorts.
And there, I said to myself, you will be detected; now you will find out that you are more ignorant
than they are.
Accordingly, I took them some of the most elaborate passages in their own writings,
and asked what was the meaning of them--thinking that they would teach me something.
Will you believe me?
I am almost ashamed to speak of this, but still I must say that there is hardly a person
present who would not have talked better about their poetry than they did themselves.
That showed me in an instant that not by wisdom do poets write poetry, but by a sort of genius
and inspiration; they are like diviners or soothsayers who also say many fine things,
but do not understand the meaning of them.
And the poets appeared to me to be much in the same case; and I further observed that
upon the strength of their poetry they believed themselves to be the wisest of men in other
things in which they were not wise.
So I departed, conceiving myself to be superior to them for the same reason that I was superior
to the politicians.
At last I went to the artisans, for I was conscious that I knew nothing at all, as I
may say, and I was sure that they knew many fine things; and in this I was not mistaken,
for they did know many things of which I was ignorant, and in this they certainly were
wiser than I was.
But I observed that even the good artisans fell into the same error as the poets; because
they were good workmen they thought that they also knew all sorts of high matters, and this
defect in them overshadowed their wisdom--therefore I asked myself on behalf of the oracle, whether
I would like to be as I was, neither having their knowledge nor their ignorance, or like
them in both; and I made answer to myself and the oracle that I was better off as I
was.
This investigation has led to my having many enemies of the worst and most dangerous kind,
and has given occasion also to many calumnies, and I am called wise, for my hearers always
imagine that I myself possess the wisdom which I find wanting in others: but the truth is,
O men of Athens, that God only is wise; and in this oracle he means to say that the wisdom
of men is little or nothing; he is not speaking of Socrates, he is only using my name as an
illustration, as if he said, He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that
his wisdom is in truth worth nothing.
And so I go my way, obedient to the god, and make inquisition into the wisdom of anyone,
whether citizen or stranger, who appears to be wise; and if he is not wise, then in vindication
of the oracle I show him that he is not wise; and this occupation quite absorbs me, and
I have no time to give either to any public matter of interest or to any concern of my
own, but I am in utter poverty by reason of my devotion to the god.
There is another thing: young men of the richer classes, who have not much to do, come about
me of their own accord; they like to hear the pretenders examined, and they often imitate
me, and examine others themselves; there are plenty of persons, as they soon enough discover,
who think that they know something, but really know little or nothing: and then those who
are examined by them instead of being angry with themselves are angry with me: This confounded
Socrates, they say; this villainous misleader of youth!
And then if somebody asks them, Why, what evil does he practise or teach?
they do not know, and cannot tell; but in order that they may not appear to be at a
loss, they repeat the ready-made charges which are used against all philosophers about teaching
things up in the clouds and under the earth, and having no gods, and making the worse appear
the better cause; for they do not like to confess that their pretence of knowledge has
been detected--which is the truth: and as they are numerous and ambitious and energetic,
and are all in battle array and have persuasive tongues, they have filled your ears with their
loud and inveterate calumnies.
And this is the reason why my three accusers, Meletus and Anytus and Lycon, have set upon
me; Meletus, who has a quarrel with me on behalf of the poets; Anytus, on behalf of
the craftsmen; Lycon, on behalf of the rhetoricians: and as I said at the beginning, I cannot expect
to get rid of this mass of calumny all in a moment.
And this, O men of Athens, is the truth and the whole truth; I have concealed nothing,
I have dissembled nothing.
And yet I know that this plainness of speech makes them hate me, and what is their hatred
but a proof that I am speaking the truth?
This is the occasion and reason of their slander of me, as you will find out either in this
or in any future inquiry.