Euthyphro | Page 7

EUTHYPHRO: I am never likely to try their temper in this way.
SOCRATES: I dare say not, for you are reserved in your behaviour,
and seldom impart your wisdom. But I have a benevolent habit of
pouring out myself to everybody, and would even pay for a listener,
and I am afraid that the Athenians may think me too talkative. Now if,

as I was saying, they would only laugh at me, as you say that they
laugh at you, the time might pass gaily enough in the court; but perhaps
they may be in earnest, and then what the end will be you soothsayers
only can predict.
EUTHYPHRO: I dare say that the affair will end in nothing, Socrates,
and that you will win your cause; and I think that I shall win my own.
SOCRATES: And what is your suit, Euthyphro? are you the pursuer or
the defendant?
EUTHYPHRO: I am the pursuer.
SOCRATES: Of whom?
EUTHYPHRO: You will think me mad when I tell you.
SOCRATES: Why, has the fugitive wings?
EUTHYPHRO: Nay, he is not very volatile at his time of life.
SOCRATES: Who is he?
EUTHYPHRO: My father.
SOCRATES: Your father! my good man?
EUTHYPHRO: Yes.
SOCRATES: And of what is he accused?
EUTHYPHRO: Of murder, Socrates.
SOCRATES: By the powers, Euthyphro! how little does the common
herd know of the nature of right and truth. A man must be an
extraordinary man, and have made great strides in wisdom, before he
could have seen his way to bring such an action.
EUTHYPHRO: Indeed, Socrates, he must.

SOCRATES: I suppose that the man whom your father murdered was
one of your relatives--clearly he was; for if he had been a stranger you
would never have thought of prosecuting him.
EUTHYPHRO: I am amused, Socrates, at your making a distinction
between one who is a relation and one who is not a relation; for surely
the pollution is the same in either case, if you knowingly associate with
the murderer when you ought to clear yourself and him by proceeding
against him. The real question is whether the murdered man has been
justly slain. If justly, then your duty is to let the matter alone; but if
unjustly, then even if the murderer lives under the same roof with you
and eats at the same table, proceed against him. Now the man who is
dead was a poor dependant of mine who worked for us as a field
labourer on our farm in Naxos, and one day in a fit of drunken passion
he got into a quarrel with one of our domestic servants and slew him.
My father bound him hand and foot and threw him into a ditch, and
then sent to Athens to ask of a diviner what he should do with him.
Meanwhile he never attended to him and took no care about him, for he
regarded him as a murderer; and thought that no great harm would be
done even if he did die. Now this was just what happened. For such
was the effect of cold and hunger and chains upon him, that before the
messenger returned from the diviner, he was dead. And my father and
family are angry with me for taking the part of the murderer and
prosecuting my father. They say that he did not kill him, and that if he
did, the dead man was but a murderer, and I ought not to take any
notice, for that a son is impious who prosecutes a father. Which shows,
Socrates, how little they know what the gods think about piety and
impiety.
SOCRATES: Good heavens, Euthyphro! and is your knowledge of
religion and of things pious and impious so very exact, that, supposing
the circumstances to be as you state them, you are not afraid lest you
too may be doing an impious thing in bringing an action against your
father?
EUTHYPHRO: The best of Euthyphro, and that which distinguishes
him, Socrates, from other men, is his exact knowledge of all such

matters. What should I be good for without it?
SOCRATES: Rare friend! I think that I cannot do better than be your
disciple. Then before the trial with Meletus comes on I shall challenge
him, and say that I have always had a great interest in religious
questions, and now, as he charges me with rash imaginations and
innovations in religion, I have become your disciple. You, Meletus, as I
shall say to him, acknowledge Euthyphro to be a great theologian, and
sound in his opinions; and if you approve of him you ought to approve
of me, and not have me into court; but if you disapprove, you should
begin by indicting him who is my teacher, and who will be the ruin, not
of the