The Memorable Thoughts of Socrates | Page 4

and
took delight to argue of piety and impiety, of honesty and dishonesty,
of justice and injustice, of wisdom and folly, of courage and cowardice,
of the State, and of the qualifications of a Minister of State, of the

Government, and of those who are fit to govern; in short, he enlarged
on the like subjects, which it becomes men of condition to know, and
of which none but slaves should be ignorant.
It is not strange, perhaps, that the judges of Socrates mistook his
opinion in things concerning which he did not explain himself; but I am
surprised that they did not reflect on what he had said and done in the
face of the whole world; for when he was one of the Senate, and had
taken the usual oath exactly to observe the laws, being in his turn
vested with the dignity of Epistate, he bravely withstood the populace,
who, against all manner of reason, demanded that the nine captains,
two of whom were Erasinides and Thrasilus, should be put to death, he
would never give consent to this injustice, and was not daunted at the
rage of the people, nor at the menaces of the men in power, choosing
rather not to violate the oath he had taken than to yield to the violence
of the multitude, and shelter himself from the vengeance of those who
threatened him. To this purpose he said that the gods watch over men
more attentively than the vulgar imagine; for they believe there are
some things which the gods observe and others which they pass by
unregarded; but he held that the gods observe all our actions and all our
words, that they penetrate even into our most secret thoughts, that they
are present at all our deliberations, and that they inspire us in all our
affairs.
It is astonishing, therefore, to consider how the Athenians could suffer
themselves to be persuaded that Socrates entertained any unworthy
thoughts of the Deity; he who never let slip one single word against the
respect due to the gods, nor was ever guilty of any action that savoured
in the least of impiety; but who, on the contrary, has done and said
things that could not proceed but from a mind truly pious, and that are
sufficient to gain a man an eternal reputation of piety and virtue.
CHAPTER II.
SOCRATES NOT A DEBAUCHER OF YOUTH.
What surprises me yet more is, that some would believe that Socrates

was a debaucher of young men! Socrates the most sober and most
chaste of all men, who cheerfully supported both cold and heat; whom
no inconvenience, no hardships, no labours could startle, and who had
learned to wish for so little, that though he had scarce anything, he had
always enough. Then how could he teach impiety, injustice, gluttony,
impurity, and luxury? And so far was he from doing so, that he
reclaimed many persons from those vices, inspiring them with the love
of virtue, and putting them in hopes of coming to preferment in the
world, provided they would take a little care of themselves. Yet he
never promised any man to teach him to be virtuous; but as he made a
public profession of virtue, he created in the minds of those who
frequented him the hopes of becoming virtuous by his example.
He neglected not his own body, and praised not those that neglected
theirs. In like manner, he blamed the custom of some who eat too much,
and afterwards use violent exercises; but he approved of eating till
nature be satisfied, and of a moderate exercise after it, believing that
method to be an advantage to health, and proper to unbend and divert
the mind. In his clothes he was neither nice nor costly; and what I say
of his clothes ought likewise to be understood of his whole way of
living. Never any of his friends became covetous in his conversation,
and he reclaimed them from that sordid disposition, as well as from all
others; for he would accept of no gratuity from any who desired to
confer with him, and said that was the way to discover a noble and
generous heart, and that they who take rewards betray a meanness of
soul, and sell their own persons, because they impose on themselves a
necessity of instructing those from whom they receive a salary. He
wondered, likewise, why a man, who promises to teach virtue, should
ask money; as if he believed not the greatest of all gain to consist in the
acquisition of a good friend, or, as if he feared, that he who, by his
means, should become virtuous, and be obliged to him for so great a
benefit, would not be sufficiently grateful for it. Quite different from