BOOK I. XXIX. 15-21
ments, and the ten have not. What then? Can they overcome in this point? How can they? But if we are weighed in the balance, must not the heavier draw down the scales?
So that a Socrates may suffer what he did at the hands of the Athenians?[1]—Slave, why do you say "Socrates"? Speak of the matter as it really is and say: That the paltry body of Socrates may be carried off and dragged to prison by those who were stronger than he, and that some one may give hemlock to the paltry body of Socrates, and that it may grow cold and die? Does this seem marvellous to you, does this seem unjust, for this do you blame God? Did Socrates, then, have no compensation for this? In what did the essence of the good consist for him? To whom shall we listen, to you or to Socrates himself? And what does he say? "Anytus and Meletus can kill me, but they cannot hurt me."[2] And again, "If so it is pleasing to God, so let it be."[3] But do you prove that one who holds inferior judgements prevails over the man who is superior in point of judgements. You will not be able to prove this; no, nor even come near proving it. For this is a law of nature and of God: "Let the better always prevail over the worse." Prevail in what? In that in which it is better. 20One body is stronger than another body; several persons are stronger than one; the thief is stronger than the man who is not a thief. That is why I lost my lamp,[4] because in the matter of keeping awake the thief was better than I was. However, he bought a lamp for a very
- ↑ The interlocutor takes the case of Socrates as proving that a question of right cannot be settled by weighing judgements in the ordinary fashion, i.e., by counting votes.
- ↑ Plato, Apology, 30 C.
- ↑ Plato, Crito, 43 D.
- ↑ See I. 18, 15.
