Socrates, Simmias, Crito.
But do you mean to take away your thoughts with you, Socrates? said Simmias. Will you not impart them to us?—for they are a benefit in which we too are entitled to share. Moreover, if you succeed in convincing us, that will be an answer to the charge against yourself.
I will do my best, replied Socrates. But you must first let me hear what Crito wants; he has long been wishing to say something to me.
Only this, Socrates, replied Crito:—the attendant who is to give you the poison has been telling me, and he wants me to tell you, that you are not to talk much; talking, he says, increases heat, and this is apt to interfere with the action of the poison; persons who excite themselves are sometimes obliged to take a second or even a third dose.
Then, said Socrates, let him mind his business and be prepared to give the poison twice or even thrice if necessary; that is all.
I knew quite well what you would say, replied Crito; but 1 was obliged to satisfy him.
Never mind him, he said.
The true philosopher is always dying:—why then should he avoid the death which he desires? And now, O my judges, I desire to prove to you that the real philosopher has reason to be of good cheer 64when he is about to die, and that after death he may hope to obtain the greatest good in the other world. And how this may be, Simmias and Cebes, I will endeavour to explain. For I deem that the true votary of philosophy is likely to be misunderstood by other men; they do not perceive that he is always pursuing death and dying; and if this be so, and he has had the desire of death all his life long, why when his time comes should he repine at that which he has been always pursuing and desiring?
‘How the world will laugh when they hear this!’ Simmias said laughingly: Though not in a laughing humour, you have made me laugh, Socrates; for I cannot help thinking that the many when they hear your words will say how truly you have described philosophers, and our people at home will likewise say that the life which philosophers desire is in reality death, and that they have found them out to be deserving of the death which they desire.
Yes, they do not understand the nature of death, or why the philosopher desires or deserves it.
And they are right, Simmias, in thinking so, with the exception of the words ‘they have found them out;’ for they
