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of speaking in this place . As then , if I were really a stranger , you would have pardoned me for speaking in the language and style in which I was brought up , so I now ask of you this justice , as it appears to me , that you will disregard the manner of my speech—which perhaps may be better , perhaps worse—but consider and attend to this , whether what I say is just or not . For that is the excellence of a judge ; an orator ' s is to speak the truth .
I have to defend myself first , O Athenians , from the first False accusations against me , and from my first accusers ; and afterwards from the more recent ones . For I have had many accusers ; who have spoken fakely of me now for many years : whom I fear more than AnytuB and his associates , although these also are formidable ; but those are still more so , O Athenians , who have begun with most of you
from your childhood upwards , and poured into your ears false accusations of me , saying that there is one Socrates , a wise man , who has explored the things which are in the sky and under the earth , and who makes the worse appear the better reason . They , O Athenians , who have spread such a character of me , are my really dangerous accusers ; for their hearers believe that those who are addicted to such inquiries do not even believe in gods . * These accusers , too , are numerous ; they have now
spoken ill of me for a long time , and to many of you in the most credulous time of your lives , when you were children , or mere lads , and with all the advantage of an undefended cause , no one replying to them . And , what is hardest of all , one cannot so much as know the names of any of these people , except , perhaps , a play-writer or BO . f Neither they who , by calumnies and invidious speaking , have wrought upon you ,
nor they who , being themselves persuaded , have persuaded others , can be cited to appear in this place . I cannot confute them , but must fight , as it were , with shadows , and refute when there is no one here to answer my questions . Consider , then , that I have to do with two sets of accusers , my present ones , and those ancient ones whom I have mentioned ; and observe , that I must reply to the old accusers first , for you heard them first , and during a much longer time than these later
ones . Be it so , then ; I must defend myself , and endeavour to expel from your minds , in so short a time , the calumny which has had so long a time to fix itself there . I should be glad ( if it be for your good and my own ) that this were possible ; but 1 think it is difficult ; I do not conceal from myself the weightiness of the task . The event , however , must beas the god pleases . I must obey the law , and make my defence .
Let us go back , then , to the beginning , and see upon what accusation has been founded that prejudice against me , in reliance on which Melitus has brought the present impeachment . What , then , did my assailants allege ? for we must consider them as accusers , and read the words of their indictment . 4 Socrates is guilty of occupying himself with frivolous and criminal pursuits ; exploring the things which are under the earth and in the sky ; and making the worse appear the better reason ; and teaching others to do the same . ' Something of this Bort is
* This passage , and much other evidence , shows that physical speculation of a recondite kind was regarded by the Greeks as a sort of black art , like witchcraft and sorcery among the moderns : * an attempt to know more than in permitted . ' There is remarkable sameness in superstition , ail over the world . f vr \ v \ v &i Ttf Ko / jt . ybo'rotoe rvy % dLvit « 2 v . Aii allusion to Aristophanes , and his comedy of ' The Clouds / a pprosB and ignorant libel on ( Socrates .
Untitled Article
114 Plato * s Dialogues ; the Apology of Socrates .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1835, page 114, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2642/page/34/
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