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xxxiv SOME ACCOUNT OF THE LIFE, ETC. OF PLATO.

Vatic. upon the authority of J. Bartoloc. Bibl. magna Rabbin. tom. 353."

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A catalogue of the various works written upon the subject of Plato, his doctrine, and writings, will be found in Tennemann's Manual of Philosophy, translated by the Rev. A. Johnson, M. A. Oxford, D. A. Talboys, 1832.

TRINITY COLLEGE,

March 19, M.DCCC.XXXV.

The edition of Matthia's Grammar, to which frequent allusion is made in the course of this work, is the fifth, revised and enlarged by John Kenrick, M. A. London, J. Murray, 1832.

The Reader will please to make the following Corrections:

Page 58. note; read-" without an additional," &c.

99. note; for Sect. 63. read Lect. 63.

126. note; read-"deny that they were extant, in a collected form, in the time," &c. 150. note; read-" If any where at all."

172. note; for lorqu'un read lorsqu'un.

ΑΠΟΛΟΓΙΑ

ΣΩΚΡΑΤΟΥΣ.

THE Apology consists of three parts; of which the first contains the general answer of Socrates to his accusers, both open and concealed. He meets the objection, that he had brought his misfortunes on himself, by showing that death, which was only feared by those who pretended to wisdom, should never influence him to abandon the course assigned him by integrity and truth. He then proceeds, in a strain of well managed irony, to describe the loss which the Athenians should suffer in him, inasmuch as one who should prefer their interest to his own, and to the prejudice of his personal safety, was not likely to be met with again. He assigns as a reason for his withdrawing from the management of the republic, that his Genius, or Dæmon, did not allow him to engage in civil affairs; that his appearance in public had not been different from that of any one in a private capacity, and that he had never fulfilled the office of a public preceptor, or given different instructions to one of his followers from what he prescribed to the rest. He then explains the cause why his acquaintance and conversation were so eagerly courted by numbers of the citizens, whom he proves plainly not to have been corrupted by him, from the sympathy they evinced in his distress, and their solicitude to extricate him from peril. In fine, he manifests to his judges his courage and magnanimity, by declining to avail himself of those appeals to their pity and compassion, which were usually adopted by the accused, and which he had refused to resort to, not through pride, but because such conduct would be but little consistent with his general reputation for wisdom. Besides, he would have shown but little respect for the laws, had he endeavoured by supplications and tears to mislead their ministers, and so to check the progress of justice and truth.

The second part of the defence contains what Socrates is supposed to have addressed to his judges, when he had been condemned by their first sentence, and was directed to assign his own penalty; an order with which he was so far from complying, that he asserted himself, on the contrary, to be worthy rather of public support in the Prytaneum; since it could not be just, that one who had never done injury to others should wrong himself. Having added, then, a few observations upon his plan of life, he offers to fine himself in a sum evidently expressive of his self-acquittal.

The third portion of the defence contains what Socrates is supposed to have said after he had been condemned to die; in which he first forewarns the authors of his sentence of the evils which were likely to befal them, in consequence of their injustice towards him; then addressing himself to those who had moved for his acquittal, he expresses his readiness to encounter death, which he had ceased to regard as a misfortune; the Deity having given him no intimation of any calamity having been likely to befal him, either at his departure from home, or when he came before the tribunal. Hence he was induced to hope, that what was about to occur was to be regarded as a blessing; for if death were an end of all consciousness, it could not be a misfortune, and if it were the passage to a better life, it should be a blessing. Therefore, he entertained no feelings of enmity or anger towards those by whom he was condemned, since he had learned to regard his decease as, in any case, desirable to himself. Adding a few words upon the subject of his children, he concludes in a manner worthy of the intrepidity and integrity which had made his life eminent, and his fame imperishable.

ΑΠΟΛΟΓΙΑ

ΣΩΚΡΑΤΟΥΣ.

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§. 1. Ο τι μὲν ὑμεῖς, ὦ ἄνδρες Αθηναῖοι, πεπόνθατε ὑπὸ τῶν ἐμῶν κατηγόρων, οὐκ οἶδα· ἐγὼ δ ̓ οὖν

ΑΠΟΛΟΓΙΑ ΣΩΚΡΑΤΟΥΣ.] This apology contains the substance of the defence delivered by Socrates, in answer to the accusations of Anytus, Melitus, and Lycon, who brought a two-fold charge against him; the introduction of new gods, to the prejudice of those already acknowledged, and the corruption of the Athenian youth. His accusers, influenced solely by an invidious jealousy of his great reputation, espoused, severally, the cause of the different classes to which, from the severity of his censures, the philosopher had become an object of extreme dislike. Anytus urged his condemnation in behalf of the craftsmen and burghers, whilst Lycon advocated the interests of the rhetoricians, and Melitus of the poets.

Several apologies were drawn up for Socrates by his own immediate friends, or admirers of his wisdom and integrity: of these, two only, beside the present, are now extant, one by Libanius, and the other compiled by Xenophon, from the instructions of Hermogenes, son of Hipponicus. As the writer was absent, himself, from Athens at the period of the trial, the work was but indifferently executed; it is useful, however, as corroborating the leading points of the

above. Lysias, who was one of the most distinguished orators of the age, prepared a defence, which he submitted to Socrates, to be delivered in presence of the judges. It was highly and elaborately wrought, but the philosopher declined it, observing, that with all its merits as a composition, it was deficient in those qualities which were best adapted to evince the magnanimity, firmness, and dignity, no less requisite for the position in which he was then placed, than he had previously considered them for the purposes of his profession. Hence he preferred the plainness and simplicity, at all times characteristic of his argumentative discussions, and the efficacy of which he had long learned to appreciate, to the ordinary form of a forensic address, with which he was but little familiar, and which consequently, under the circumstances, it should have been hazardous to adopt.

The law which Socrates was accused of having violated, and by which he was condemned, appears, according to the digest and commentary of the learned Petit upon the Athenian laws, to have been the following, the second in the code ; Θεσμὸς ἀιώνιος τοῖς Ατθίδα νεμομένοις κύριος τὸν ἅπαντα χρό

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3 καὶ αὐτὸς ὑπ ̓ αὐτῶν ὀλίγου ἐμαυτοῦ ἐπελαθόμην οὕτω πιθανῶς ἔλεγον. καί τοι ἀληθές γε ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν οὐδὲν εἰρήκασι. μάλιστα δὲ αὐτῶν ἓν ἐθαύμασα τῶν πολλῶν ὧν ἐψεύσαντο, τοῦτο ἐν ᾧ ἔλεγον ὡς 1 χρὴν ὑμᾶς εὐλαβεῖσθαι μὴ ὑπ ̓ ἐμοῦ ἐξαπατηθῆτε, ὡς

νον, Θεούς τιμᾶν καὶ Ηρωας, ἐγχωρίους ἐν κοινῷ, ἐμποινίμοις νόμοις πατρίοις, ἰδίᾳ, κατὰ δυνάμιν σὺν εὐφημία, καὶ ἀρχαῖς καρπῶν πελάνους ἐπετείους. The infringement of this law brought the offender before the court of the Areopagus, where he also received sentence, as appears in the case of St. Paul, Acts, xvii. 18, and Diodorus, surnamed Αθεος, mentioned by Diogenes Laertius. As Socrates, however, though charged with a similar offence, does not appear to have been summoned before the same tribunal, Petit conjectures that it only took cognizance of such delinquencies, when committed by those who were not freemen of Athens, as in the instances mentioned above; "Licetque suspicari, civibus dicam (hujuscemodi) non fuisse scriptam apud Areopagitas, sed peregrinis tantum, quales erant male compositum par B. Paulus et Diodorus." In Legg. Attic. Comment. S. Petit.

§. 1. "Ο, τι μὲν.] Le Clerc, Art. Crit. i. p. 165. Amstel. reads ὃ μὲν ; Cod. Coislin. 155. apud Montefalcon. Catal. bibl. Coisl. p. 218. Τί μὴν ὑμεῖς πεπόνθατε. Fisch. Tr. How, or, in what degree, you have been influenced, men of Athens, by my accusers. For the construction of vro with a neuter verb, see Matthiae, Gr. s. 496. 3.

Ὦ ἄνδρες Αθηναῖοι.] In so addressing his judges, Socrates pays them a peculiar compliment; 'A0nvaloc signifying not merely a citizen of Athens, but more emphatically, one who was worthy of such a privilege, as being ́eminently remarkable for every moral and social quality. See cap. 17. a med. ὅτι ὦ ἄριστε ἀνδρῶν ̓Αθηναῖος ὤν, &c. STALL.

Ὑπ ̓ ἀυτῶν.] Pra eorum oratione. STALL., who compares it with ὑπὸ φοβου, ὑπὸ φιλίας, ὑπὸ μίσους, &c.

Ολίγου.] i. e. σχεδόν, ἐγγύς, almost, nearly, Hesych. and Suid. It occurs frequently without dei or deiv. Bos. El

lips. Græc. Schaef. Δεῖν, abesse, cum ωστε, eleganter reticetur in ὀλίγου, et μικροῦ, ut apud Alianum Var. Hist. lib. ν. 8. Καὶ ὀλίγου καὶ την πόλιν κατελαβον.

Ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν.] For ὡς ἐν (ἑνὶ) λόγῳ εἰπεῖν, in one word; or συντό μως, concisely. Fisch. There is some difference of opinion upon the exact meaning of this phrase. Le Clerc considers it as intended to soften or qualify an expression which might otherwise appear too harsh, and so compares it to the French, pour dire le mot. This is approved by Weiske, in reference to the passage in the text, and several other instances where the form occurs. Stephens also prefers a nearly similar interpretation, ut ita dicam; prope dixerim. Thes. Ling. Græc. in voc. V. Cousin renders it, a parler franchement.

Οὐδὲν.] Several editions read οὐθέν; which, however, is the Æolic form, and not likely to have occurred in an Attic writer.

Μάλιστα δὲ αὐτῶν, κ. τ. λ.] But one, in particular, of the many falsehoods which they advanced, I wondered at in them; αὐτῶν being masculine, and referring to the accusers. STALL. See Matthiæ Gr. s. 317, and Obs.

'Ev .] By or through which; an ordinary acceptation of iv, especially in Pindar, when a mean or cause is assign ed, on which something depends. Matthis Gr. s. 577. Viger. c. ix. s. 3. 11.

Ὡς χρῆν, κ. τ. λ.] The imperf. χρῆν, ἔδει, προσῆκεν, are often used, not for the presents, but like the Latin oportebat, debebam, to denote that something should be, or should have been, which is not; so Cic. Phil. i. 11, “Irasci quidem vos mihi-non oportebat.”— Hence the accusers are to be understood as charging the Athenians with having neglected the precaution, which the character of Socrates had rendered indispensable, against deception on his part.

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