The Memorabilia | Page 6

heart. Moreover, they are present everywhere,
and bestow signs upon man concerning all the things of man.
[17] Or "Senate." Lit. "the Boule."
[18] Lit. "Epistates of the Ecclesia." See Grote, "H. G." viii. 271; Plat.
"Apol." 32 B.
[19] {ennea} would seem to be a slip of the pen for {okto}, eight. See
"Hell." I. v. 16; vi. 16; vi. 29; vii. 1 foll.
I can, therefore, but repeat my former words. It is a marvel to me how
the Athenians came to be persuaded that Socrates fell short of sober-
mindedness as touching the gods. A man who never ventured one
impious word or deed against the gods we worship, but whose whole
language concerning them, and his every act, closely coincided, word
for word, and deed for deed, with all we deem distinctive of devoutest
piety.
II
No less surprising to my mind is the belief that Socrates corrupted the
young. This man, who, beyond what has been already stated, kept his
appetites and passions under strict control, who was pre-eminently
capable of enduring winter's cold and summer's heat and every kind of
toil, who was so schooled to curtail his needs that with the scantiest of
means he never lacked sufficiency--is it credible that such a man could
have made others irreverent or lawless, or licentious, or effeminate in
face of toil? Was he not rather the saving of many through the passion

for virtue which he roused in them, and the hope he infused that
through careful management of themselves they might grow to be truly
beautiful and good--not indeed that he ever undertook to be a teacher of
virtue, but being evidently virtuous himself he made those who
associated with him hope that by imitating they might at last resemble
him.
But let it not be inferred that he was negligent of his own body or
approved of those who neglected theirs. If excess of eating,
counteracted by excess of toil, was a dietary of which he
disapproved,[1] to gratify the natural claim of appetite in conjunction
with moderate exercise was a system he favoured, as tending to a
healthy condition of the body without trammelling the cultivation of the
spirit. On the other hand, there was nothing dandified or pretentious
about him; he indulged in no foppery of shawl or shoes, or other
effeminacy of living.
[1] See [Plat.] "Erast." 132 C.
Least of all did he tend to make his companions greedy of money. He
would not, while restraining passion generally, make capital out of the
one passion which attached others to himself; and by this abstinence, he
believed, he was best consulting his own freedom; in so much that he
stigmatised those who condescended to take wages for their society as
vendors of their own persons, because they were compelled to discuss
for the benefits of their paymasters. What surprised him was that any
one possessing virtue should deign to ask money as its price instead of
simply finding his rward in the acquisition of an honest friend, as if the
new-fledged soul of honour could forget her debt of gratitude to her
greatest benefactor.
For himself, without making any such profession, he was content to
believe that those who accepted his views would play their parts as
good and true friends to himself and one another their lives long. Once
more then: how should a man of this character corrupt the young?
unless the careful cultivation of virtue be corruption.
But, says the accuser,[2] by all that's sacred! did not Socrates cause his
associates to despise the established laws when he dwelt on the folly of
appointing state officers by ballot?[3] a principle which, he said, no one
would care to apply in selecting a pilot or a flute- player or in any
similar case, where a mistake would be far less disastrous than in

matters political. Words like these, according to the accuser, tended to
incite the young to contemn the established constitution, rendering
them violent and headstrong. But for myself I think that those who
cultivate wisdom and believe themselves able to instruct their
fellow-citizens as to their interests are least likely to become partisans
of violence. They are too well aware that to violence attach enmities
and dangers, whereas results as good may be obtained by persuasion
safely and amicably. For the victim of violence hates with
vindictiveness as one from whom something precious has been stolen,
while the willing subject of persuasion is ready to kiss the hand which
has done him a service. Hence compulsion is not the method of him
who makes wisdom his study, but of him who wields power
untempered by reflection. Once more: the man who ventures on
violence needs the support of many to fight his battles, while he whose
strength lies