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.

Men of Athens, I honor and love you; but I shall obey God rather than you, and while I have life and strength I shall never cease from the practice and teaching of philosophy, exhorting anyone whom I meet and saying to him after my manner: 'You, my friend—a citizen of the great and wise city of Athens—are you not ashamed of heaping up the greatest amount of money and honor and reputation, and caring so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul?'

And if the person with whom I am arguing says: Yes, but I do care; then I do not depart or let him go at once; I interrogate and examine and cross-examine him, and if I think that he has no virtue in him, but only says that he has, I reproach him with undervaluing the greater, and overvaluing the less.

For I do nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for your persons or your properties, but first and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue comes money and every other good of man, public as well as private.

The unexamined life is not worth living for human beings.

The hour of departure has arrived, and we go our ways—I to die, and you to live. Which is better only God knows.

On the morning of his death, we went to the prison early. Socrates had just been released from his chains. Xanthippe his wife was sitting by him with their youngest child in her arms. When she saw us, she cried aloud: 'O Socrates, this is the last time you will ever speak to your friends, or they to you!' Socrates looked at Crito and said gently: 'Crito, let someone take her home.'

Socrates rubbed his leg where the chain had rested, and said: 'How singular is that thing called pleasure, and how curiously related to pain, which might be thought to be its opposite! Men cannot have both at once, but if they pursue the one, they are almost sure to catch the other. If Aesop had noticed them, he would have made a fable of how God tried to reconcile their strife, and failing, tied their two heads together.'

Simmias and Cebes asked: 'How can you, Socrates, who are about to die, be so cheerful? Why does a philosopher welcome death?'

Socrates answered: 'True philosophers make dying their profession. To them of all men, death is least terrible. For what is death but the separation of the soul from the body? And is not the whole life of the philosopher a freeing of the soul from the distractions of the flesh, its appetites and its fears, that it may behold pure truth?'

The sun was setting behind the hills. The jailer entered and stood by him, weeping: 'To you, Socrates, whom I know to be the noblest and gentlest and best of all who ever came to this place, I will not say what I say to others when they are angry with me. You know that I am only the servant of the magistrates. Farewell, and try to bear what must be as easily as you can.' And bursting into tears, he turned and went out.

Crito said: 'The sun is still upon the hilltops, Socrates. Many a man delays drinking the poison until late in the evening.' Socrates answered: 'They do so, Crito, because they think they gain something by holding on to life a little longer. But I gain nothing by drinking a few moments later; I should only be laughing at myself for being so greedy of life.'

The cup of poison was brought. Socrates held the cup, and with complete calmness, without trembling or changing color, he looked up at the man and asked: 'What do you say about pouring a libation to the gods from this cup?' 'We only prepare as much as is sufficient, Socrates.' 'I understand,' he said, 'yet I may and must pray to the gods that my journey from this world to the other may be prosperous.' And holding the cup to his lips, cheerfully and quietly, he drank off the poison.

Until then, most of us had been able to restrain our tears, but when we saw him drinking, and that he had finished the draught, we could hold back no longer. Tears flowed fast; we covered our faces and wept, not for him, but for our own calamity in being bereaved of such a father and companion.

Socrates looked at us and said: 'What are you doing, my strange friends? I sent the women away mainly that they might not behave like this, for I have heard that a man should die in silence. Be quiet, then, and have patience.'

When he felt his limbs growing cold, he uncovered his face and spoke his last words: 'Crito, we owe a rooster to Asclepius; pay it and do not neglect it.' 'It shall be done,' said Crito; 'is there anything else?' To this question there was no reply. A moment later he stirred, and Crito closed his eyes and mouth.

Such was the end of our companion, a man who was, of all those whom we knew in that age, the wisest, the justest, and the best.