Apology | Page 9

words may have been spoken by Socrates himself, we cannot exclude
the possibility, that like so much else, e.g. the wisdom of Critias, the
poem of Solon, the virtues of Charmides, they may have been due only
to the imagination of Plato. The arguments of those who maintain that
the Apology was composed during the process, resting on no evidence,
do not require a serious refutation. Nor are the reasonings of
Schleiermacher, who argues that the Platonic defence is an exact or
nearly exact reproduction of the words of Socrates, partly because Plato
would not have been guilty of the impiety of altering them, and also
because many points of the defence might have been improved and
strengthened, at all more conclusive. (See English Translation.) What
effect the death of Socrates produced on the mind of Plato, we cannot
certainly determine; nor can we say how he would or must have written
under the circumstances. We observe that the enmity of Aristophanes to
Socrates does not prevent Plato from introducing them together in the
Symposium engaged in friendly intercourse. Nor is there any trace in
the Dialogues of an attempt to make Anytus or Meletus personally
odious in the eyes of the Athenian public.
APOLOGY

by
Plato
Translated by Benjamin Jowett
How you, O Athenians, have been affected by my accusers, I cannot
tell; but I know that they almost made me forget who I was--so
persuasively did they speak; and yet they have hardly uttered a word of
truth. But of the many falsehoods told by them, there was one which
quite amazed me;--I mean when they said that you should be upon your
guard and not allow yourselves to be deceived by the force of my
eloquence. To say this, when they were certain to be detected as soon
as I opened my lips and proved myself to be anything but a great
speaker, did indeed appear to me most shameless--unless by the force
of eloquence they mean the force of truth; for is such is their meaning, I
admit that I am eloquent. But in how different a way from theirs! Well,
as I was saying, they have scarcely spoken the truth at all; but from me
you shall hear the whole truth: not, however, delivered after their
manner in a set oration duly ornamented with words and phrases. No,
by heaven! but I shall use the words and arguments which occur to me
at the moment; for I am confident in the justice of my cause (Or, I am
certain that I am right in taking this course.): 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 it of me. And I must beg of you to
grant me a favour:--If I defend myself in my accustomed manner, and
you hear me using the words which I have been in the habit of using in
the agora, at the tables of the money-changers, or anywhere else, I
would ask you not to be surprised, and not to interrupt me on this
account. For I am more than seventy years of age, and appearing now
for the first time in a court of law, I am quite a stranger to the language
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:--Am I making an unfair
request of you? Never mind the manner, which may or may not be
good; but think only of the truth of my words, and give heed to that: let
the speaker speak truly and the judge decide justly.
And first, I have to reply to the older charges and to my first accusers,
and then I will go on to the later ones. For of old I have had many
accusers, who have accused me falsely to you 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 the others,
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. The disseminators of this
tale are the accusers whom I dread; for their hearers are apt to fancy
that such enquirers do not believe in the existence of the gods. And
they are many, and their charges against me are of ancient date, and
they were made by them in the days when you were more impressible
than