Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates | Page 3

call him eloquent who speaks the truth. For, if they mean
this, then I would allow that I am an orator, but not after their fashion
for they, as I affirm, have said nothing true, but from me you shall hear
the whole truth. Not indeed, Athenians, arguments highly wrought, as
theirs were, with choice phrases and expressions, nor adorned, but you
shall hear a speech uttered without premeditation in such words as first
present themselves. For I am confident that what I say will be just, and
let none of you expect otherwise, for surely it would not become my
time of life to come before you like a youth with a got up speech.
Above all things, therefore, I beg and implore this of you, O Athenians!
if you hear me defending myself in the same language as that in which
I am accustomed to speak both in the forum at the counters, where
many of you have heard me, and elsewhere, not to be surprised or
disturbed on this account. For the case is this: I now for the first time
come before a court of justice, though more than seventy years old; I
am therefore utterly a stranger to the language here. As, then, if I were
really a stranger, you would have pardoned me if I spoke in the
language and the manner in which I had been educated, so now I ask
this of you as an act of justice, as it appears to me, to disregard the
manner of my speech, for perhaps it may be somewhat worse, and
perhaps better, and to consider this only, and to give your attention to
this, whether I speak what is just or not; for this is the virtue of a judge,
but of an orator to speak the truth.
2. First, then, O Athenians! I am right in defending myself against the
first false accusations alleged against me, and my first accusers, and
then against the latest accusations, and the latest accusers. For many
have been accusers of me to you, and for many years, who have
asserted nothing true, of whom I am more afraid than of Anytus and his
party, although they too are formidable; but those are still more
formidable, Athenians, who, laying hold of many of you from
childhood, have persuaded you, and accused me of what is not true:
"that there is one Socrates, a wise man, who occupies himself about
celestial matters, and has explored every thing under the earth, and
makes the worse appear the better reason." Those, O Athenians! who
have spread abroad this report are my formidable accusers; for they

who hear them think that such as search into these things do not believe
that there are gods. In the next place, these accusers are numerous, and
have accused me now for a long time; moreover, they said these things
to you at that time of life in which you were most credulous, when you
were boys and some of you youths, and they accused me altogether in
my absence, when there was no one to defend me. But the most
unreasonable thing of all is, that it is not possible to learn and mention
their names, except that one of them happens to be a comic poet.[1]
Such, however, as, influenced by envy and calumny, have persuaded
you, and those who, being themselves persuaded, have persuaded
others, all these are most difficult to deal with; for it is not possible to
bring any of them forward here, nor to confute any; but it is altogether
necessary to fight, as it were with a shadow, in making my defense, and
to convict when there is no one to answer. Consider, therefore, as I
have said, that my accusers are twofold, some who have lately accused
me, and others long since, whom I have made mention of; and believe
that I ought to defend myself against these first; for you heard them
accusing me first, and much more than these last.
Well. I must make my defense, then, O Athenians! and endeavor in this
so short a space of time to remove from your minds the calumny which
you have long entertained. I wish, indeed, it might be so, if it were at
all better both for you and me, and that in making my defense I could
effect something more advantageous still: I think, however, that it will
be difficult, and I am not entirely ignorant what the difficulty is.
Nevertheless, let this turn out as may be pleasing to God, I must obey
the law and make my defense.
3. Let us, then, repeat from the beginning what the accusation is from
which the calumny against me has arisen, and relying on which Melitus
has preferred