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by
Plato
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September 24 - October 7, 2023
EUTHYPHRO: I would certainly say that the pious is what all the gods [e] love, and the opposite, what all the gods hate, is the impious. SOCRATES: Then let us again examine whether that is a sound statement, or do we let it pass, and if one of us, or someone else, merely {12} says that something is so, do we accept that it is so? Or should we examine what the speaker means? EUTHYPHRO: We must examine it, but I certainly think that this is now a fine statement.
Finally I went to the craftsmen, for I was conscious of knowing practically nothing, and I knew that I would find that they had knowledge [d] of many fine things. In this I was not mistaken; they knew things I did not know, and to that extent they were wiser than I. But, men of Athens, the good craftsmen seemed to me to have the same fault as the poets: each of them, because of his success at his craft, thought himself very wise in other most important pursuits, and this error of [e] theirs overshadowed the wisdom they had, so that I asked myself, on behalf of the oracle, whether I should
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Someone might say: “Are you not ashamed, Socrates, to have followed the kind of occupation that has led to your being now in danger of death?” However, I should be right to reply to him: “You are wrong, sir, if you think that a man who is any good at all should take into account the risk of life or death; he should look to this only in his {33} actions, whether what he does is right or wrong, whether he is acting like a good or a bad man.”
No one knows whether death may not be the greatest of all blessings for a man, yet men fear it as if they knew that it is the greatest of evils.
if you said to me in this regard: “Socrates, we do not believe Anytus now; we acquit you, but only on condition that you spend no more time on this investigation [d] and do not practice philosophy, and if you are caught doing so you will die”; if, as I say, you were to acquit me on those terms, I would say to you: “Men of Athens, I am grateful and I am your friend, but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and am able, I shall not cease to practice philosophy, to exhort you and in my usual way to point out to any one of you whom I happen to meet: ‘Good Sir, you are
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Then, if one of you disputes this and says he does care, I shall not let him go at once or leave him, but I shall question him, examine him, and test him, and if I do not think he has attained the goodness that he says he has, I shall reproach [30] him because he attaches little importance to the most important things and greater importance to inferior things.
Wealth does not bring about excellence, but excellence makes wealth and everything else good for men, both individually and collectively.”13
A man who really fights for justice must lead a private, not a public, life if he is to survive for even a short time.
the unexamined life is not worth living
It is not difficult to avoid death, [b] gentlemen; it is much more difficult to avoid wickedness, for it runs faster than death.
Now the hour to part has come. I go to die, you go to live. Which of us goes to the better lot is known to no one, except the god.
MENO: I think courage is a virtue, and moderation, wisdom, and munificence, and very many others. SOCRATES: We are having the same trouble again, Meno, though in another way; we have found many virtues while looking for one, but we cannot find the one which covers all the others. MENO: I cannot yet find, Socrates, what you are looking for, one [b] virtue for them all, as in the other cases.
Therefore, as I said at the beginning, it would be ridiculous for a man to train himself in life to live in a state as close to death as possible, [e] and then to resent it when it comes?
In fact, Simmias, he said, those who practice philosophy in the right way are in training for dying and they fear death least of all men.
