From Plato’s Crito: Socrates explains his decision not to escape

but to face execution rather than defy the laws

Soc. Then consider the matter in this way: Imagine that I intend to

skip out... and the laws and the government come and interrogate me:

 "Tell us, Socrates," they say; "what are you about? are you going to

overthrow us- the laws and the whole State, as much as you can?

Do you imagine that a State can subsist and not be overthrown, in

which the decisions of law have no power, but are set aside and

overthrown by individuals?" What will be our answer, Crito, to these

and the like words? Anyone, and especially a clever rhetorician,

will have a good deal to urge about the evil of setting aside the

law which requires a sentence to be carried out; and we might reply,

"Yes; but the State has injured us and given an unjust sentence."

Suppose I say that?

Cr. Very good, Socrates.

Soc. "And was that our agreement with you?" the law would say, "or

were you to abide by the sentence of the State?" And if I were to

express astonishment at their saying this, the law would probably

add: "Answer, Socrates, instead of opening your eyes: you are in the

habit of asking and answering questions. Tell us what complaint you

have to make against us which justifies you in attempting to destroy

us and the State? In the first place did we not bring you into existence?

Your father married your mother by our aid and begat you. Say whether

you have any objection to urge against those of us who regulate marriage?"

None, I should reply. "Or against those of us who regulate the system

of nurture and education of children in which you were trained? Were

not the laws, who have the charge of this, right in commanding your

father to train you in music and gymnastic?" Right, I should reply.

"Well, then, since you were brought into the world and nurtured and

educated by us, can you deny in the first place that you are our child

and slave, as your fathers were before you? And if this is true you

are not on equal terms with us; nor can you think that you have a

right to do to us what we are doing to you. Would you have any right

to strike or revile or do any other evil to a father or to your master,

if you had one, when you have been struck or reviled by him, or received

some other evil at his hands?- you would not say this? And because

we think right to destroy you, do you think that you have any right

to destroy us in return, and your country as far as in you lies? And

will you, O professor of true virtue, say that you are justified in

this? Has a philosopher like you failed to discover that our country

is more to be valued and higher and holier far than mother or father

or any ancestor, and more to be regarded in the eyes of the gods and

of men of understanding? also to be soothed, and gently and reverently

entreated when angry, even more than a father, and if not persuaded,

obeyed? And when we are punished by her, whether with imprisonment

or stripes, the punishment is to be endured in silence; and if she

leads us to wounds or death in battle, thither we follow as is right;

neither may anyone yield or retreat or leave his rank, but whether

in battle or in a court of law, or in any other place, he must do

what his city and his country order him; or he must change their view

of what is just: and if he may do no violence to his father or mother,

much less may he do violence to his country." What answer shall we

make to this, Crito? Do the laws speak truly, or do they not?

Cr. I think that they do.

Soc. Then the laws will say: "Consider, Socrates, if this is true,

that in your present attempt you are going to do us wrong. For, after

having brought you into the world, and nurtured and educated you,

and given you and every other citizen a share in every good that we

had to give, we further proclaim and give the right to every Athenian,

that if he does not like us when he has come of age and has seen the

ways of the city, and made our acquaintance, he may go where he pleases

and take his goods with him; and none of us laws will forbid him or

interfere with him. Any of you who does not like us and the city,

and who wants to go to a colony or to any other city, may go where

he likes, and take his goods with him. But he who has experience of

the manner in which we order justice and administer the State, and

still remains, has entered into an implied contract that he will do

as we command him. And he who disobeys us is, as we maintain, thrice

wrong: first, because in disobeying us he is disobeying his parents;

secondly, because we are the authors of his education; thirdly, because

he has made an agreement with us that he will duly obey our commands;

and he neither obeys them nor convinces us that our commands are wrong;

and we do not rudely impose them, but give him the alternative of

obeying or convincing us; that is what we offer and he does neither.

These are the sort of accusations to which, as we were saying, you,

Socrates, will be exposed if you accomplish your intentions; you,

above all other Athenians." Suppose I ask, why is this? they will

justly retort upon me that I above all other men have acknowledged

the agreement. "There is clear proof," they will say, "Socrates, that

we and the city were not displeasing to you. Of all Athenians you

have been the most constant resident in the city, which, as you never

leave, you may be supposed to love. For you never went out of the

city either to see the games, except once when you went to the Isthmus,

or to any other place unless when you were on military service; nor

did you travel as other men do. Nor had you any curiosity to know

other States or their laws: your affections did not go beyond us and

our State; we were your especial favorites, and you acquiesced in

our government of you; and this is the State in which you begat your

children, which is a proof of your satisfaction. Moreover, you might,

if you had liked, have fixed the penalty at banishment in the course

of the trial-the State which refuses to let you go now would have

let you go then. But you pretended that you preferred death to exile,

and that you were not grieved at death. And now you have forgotten

these fine sentiments, and pay no respect to us, the laws, of whom

you are the destroyer; and are doing what only a miserable slave would

do, running away and turning your back upon the compacts and agreements

which you made as a citizen. And first of all answer this very question:

Are we right in saying that you agreed to be governed according to

us in deed, and not in word only? Is that true or not?" How shall

we answer that, Crito? Must we not agree?

Cr. There is no help, Socrates.

Soc. Then will they not say: "You, Socrates, are breaking the covenants

and agreements which you made with us at your leisure, not in any

haste or under any compulsion or deception, but having had seventy

years to think of them, during which time you were at liberty to leave

the city, if we were not to your mind, or if our covenants appeared

to you to be unfair. You had your choice, and might have gone either

to Lacedaemon or Crete, which you often praise for their good government,

or to some other Hellenic or foreign State. Whereas you, above all

other Athenians, seemed to be so fond of the State, or, in other words,

of us her laws (for who would like a State that has no laws?), that

you never stirred out of her: the halt, the blind, the maimed, were

not more stationary in her than you were. And now you run away and

forsake your agreements. Not so, Socrates, if you will take our advice;

do not make yourself ridiculous by escaping out of the city.

"For just consider, if you transgress and err in this sort of way,

what good will you do, either to yourself or to your friends? That

your friends will be driven into exile and deprived of citizenship,

or will lose their property, is tolerably certain; and you yourself,

if you fly to one of the neighboring cities, as, for example, Thebes

or Megara, both of which are well-governed cities, will come to them

as an enemy, Socrates, and their government will be against you, and

all patriotic citizens will cast an evil eye upon you as a subverter

of the laws, and you will confirm in the minds of the judges the justice

of their own condemnation of you. For he who is a corrupter of the

laws is more than likely to be corrupter of the young and foolish

portion of mankind. Will you then flee from well-ordered cities and

virtuous men? and is existence worth having on these terms? Or will

you go to them without shame, and talk to them, Socrates? And what

will you say to them? What you say here about virtue and justice and

institutions and laws being the best things among men? Would that

be decent of you? Surely not. But if you go away from well-governed

States to Crito's friends in Thessaly, where there is great disorder

and license, they will be charmed to have the tale of your escape

from prison, set off with ludicrous particulars of the manner in which

you were wrapped in a goatskin or some other disguise, and metamorphosed

as the fashion of runaways is- that is very likely; but will there

be no one to remind you that in your old age you violated the most

sacred laws from a miserable desire of a little more life? Perhaps

not, if you keep them in a good temper; but if they are out of temper

you will hear many degrading things; you will live, but how?- as the

flatterer of all men, and the servant of all men; and doing what?-

eating and drinking in Thessaly, having gone abroad in order that

you may get a dinner. And where will be your fine sentiments about

justice and virtue then? Say that you wish to live for the sake of

your children, that you may bring them up and educate them- will you

take them into Thessaly and deprive them of Athenian citizenship?

Is that the benefit which you would confer upon them? Or are you under

the impression that they will be better cared for and educated here

if you are still alive, although absent from them; for that your friends

will take care of them? Do you fancy that if you are an inhabitant

of Thessaly they will take care of them, and if you are an inhabitant

of the other world they will not take care of them? Nay; but if they

who call themselves friends are truly friends, they surely will.

       "Listen, then, Socrates, to us who have brought you up.

Think not of life and children first, and of justice afterwards, but of

justice first, that you may be justified before the princes of the world

below. For neither will you nor any that belong to you be happier or

holieror juster in this life, or happier in another, if you do as Crito

bids. Now you depart in innocence, a sufferer and not a doer of evil;

a victim, not of the laws, but of men. But if you go forth, returning

evil for evil, and injury for injury, breaking the covenants and agreements

which you have made with us, and wronging those whom you ought least

to wrong, that is to say, yourself, your friends, your country, and

us, we shall be angry with you while you live, and our brethren, the

laws in the world below, will receive you as an enemy; for they will

know that you have done your best to destroy us. Listen, then, to

us and not to Crito."

This is the voice which I seem to hear murmuring in my ears, like

the sound of the flute in the ears of the mystic . . .