Socrates^ Schleiermacher^ and Delhriceck. 567 vered, with a piety which was incontestably proved by the obedience he had shown to to the Delphic god (p. 65). But, independent of the fallacy just exposed, there is an- other in this argument so glaring that Mr D. can scarcely believe Socrates to have been in earnest : for, in Meletus^ charge, the word on which Socrates plays has not the meaning which he induces Meletus to assign to it. In many passages of Homer, with which Socrates was perfectly familiar, it means nothing more than superhuman in general : the signification to which Socrates confines it was of later origin, and arose after a new class of beings had been distinguished from the gods under the name of daemons : and the earlier sense, to which the argument of Socrates does not apply, is manifestly that which Meletus really intended, though he let himself be surprised into an admission which overturned his charge. But an impartial hearer might justly have censured Socrates for descending to such a paltry shift, and relying upon his adver- sary's weakness and shortsightedness, instead of meeting the charge with a manly avowal, and a philosophical explanation, such as Mr D. would have put into his mouth. But we must pass over the many severe things which the court might have said, if it had been usual so to interrupt the prisoner'^s defense (p. 6S)^ that we may proceed to the third of the obnoxious passages, which scandalizes Mr D. as much as either of the former. It is contained in the concluding address, which follows the final sentence. Socrates endeavours to calm the regret which those who had voted in his favour might feel at the issue of the trial, by some reflexions on the nature of death and the prospects of a future state. Death is either a mere privation of sense, or it is a transfer of the soul from one place to another. On the former of these suppositions it resembles a dreamless sleep, and so considered it would be a great gain to man. For if any one were to compare a night spent in such a sleep, with all the other nights or days of his life, and were to consider how many among them he has spent better or more pleasantly than this night, the num- ber would bear a very small proportion to the rest, even if it were not a private man, but the Great King himself, who instituted the inquiry. So that as the eternity after death
