Translated by Benjamin Jowett�
PERSONS OF THE
DIALOGUE: Phaedo, who is the narrator of the dialogue to Echecrates of Phlius.
Socrates, Apollodorus, Simmias, Cebes, Crito and an Attendant of the Prison.
SCENE:� The Prison of Socrates.
PLACE OF THE
NARRATION:� Phlius.�
ECHECRATES:� Were you yourself, Phaedo, in the prison
with Socrates on the day when he drank the poison?
PHAEDO:� Yes, Echecrates, I was.
ECHECRATES:� I should so like to hear about his
death.� What did he say in his last
hours?� We were informed that he died by
taking poison, but no one knew anything more; for no Phliasian ever goes to
Athens now, and it is a long time since any stranger from Athens has found his
way hither; so that we had no clear account.
PHAEDO:� Did you not hear of the proceedings at the
trial?
ECHECRATES:� Yes; some one told us about the trial, and
we could not understand why, having been condemned, he should have been put to
death, not at the time, but long afterwards.�
What was the reason of this?
PHAEDO:� An accident, Echecrates:� the stern of the ship which the Athenians
send to Delos happened to have been crowned on the day before he was tried.
ECHECRATES:� What is this ship?
PHAEDO:� It is the ship in which, according to
Athenian tradition, Theseus went to Crete when he took with him the fourteen
youths, and was the saviour of them and of himself.� And they were said to have vowed to Apollo at the time, that if
they were saved they would send a yearly mission to Delos.� Now this custom still continues, and the
whole period of the voyage to and from Delos, beginning when the priest of
Apollo crowns the stern of the ship, is a holy season, during which the city is
not allowed to be polluted by public executions; and when the vessel is
detained by contrary winds, the time spent in going and returning is very
considerable.� As I was saying, the ship
was crowned on the day before the trial, and this was the reason why Socrates
lay in prison and was not put to death until long after he was condemned.
ECHECRATES:� What was the manner of his death,
Phaedo?� What was said or done?� And which of his friends were with him?� Or did the authorities forbid them to be
present--so that he had no friends near him when he died?
PHAEDO:� No; there were several of them with him.
ECHECRATES:� If you have nothing to do, I wish that you
would tell me what passed, as exactly as you can.
PHAEDO:� I have nothing at all to do, and will try to
gratify your wish.� To be reminded of
Socrates is always the greatest delight to me, whether I speak myself or hear
another speak of him.
ECHECRATES:� You will have listeners who are of the same
mind with you, and I hope that you will be as exact as you can.
PHAEDO:� I had a singular feeling at being in his
company.� For I could hardly believe
that I was present at the death of a friend, and therefore I did not pity him,
Echecrates; he died so fearlessly, and his words and bearing were so noble and
gracious, that to me he appeared blessed.�
I thought that in going to the other world he could not be without a
divine call, and that he would be happy, if any man ever was, when he arrived
there, and therefore I did not pity him as might have seemed natural at such an
hour.� But I had not the pleasure which
I usually feel in philosophical discourse (for philosophy was the theme of
which we spoke).� I was pleased, but in
the pleasure there was also a strange admixture of pain; for I reflected that
he was soon to die, and this double feeling was shared by us all; we were
laughing and weeping by turns, especially the excitable Apollodorus--you know
the sort of man?
ECHECRATES:� Yes.
PHAEDO:� He was quite beside himself; and I and all
of us were greatly moved.
ECHECRATES:� Who were present?
PHAEDO:� Of native Athenians there were, besides
Apollodorus, Critobulus and his father Crito, Hermogenes, Epigenes, Aeschines,
Antisthenes; likewise Ctesippus of the deme of Paeania, Menexenus, and some
others; Plato, if I am not mistaken, was ill.
ECHECRATES:� Were there any strangers?
PHAEDO:� Yes, there were; Simmias the Theban, and
Cebes, and Phaedondes; Euclid and Terpison, who came from Megara.
ECHECRATES:� And was Aristippus there, and Cleombrotus?
PHAEDO:� No, they were said to be in Aegina.
ECHECRATES:� Any one else?
PHAEDO:� I think that these were nearly all.
ECHECRATES:� Well, and what did you talk about?
PHAEDO:� I will begin at the beginning, and endeavour
to repeat the entire conversation.� On
the previous days we had been in the habit of assembling early in the morning at
the court in which the trial took place, and which is not far from the
prison.� There we used to wait talking
with one another until the opening of the doors (for they were not opened very
early); then we went in and generally passed the day with Socrates.� On the last morning we assembled sooner than
usual, having heard on the day before when we quitted the prison in the evening
that the sacred ship had come from Delos, and so we arranged to meet very early
at the accustomed place.� On our arrival
the jailer who answered the door, instead of admitting us, came out and told us
to stay until he called us.� 'For the
Eleven,' he said, 'are now with Socrates; they are taking off his chains, and
giving orders that he is to die to-day.'�
He soon returned and said that we might come in.� On entering we found Socrates just released
from chains, and Xanthippe, whom you know, sitting by him, and holding his
child in her arms.� When she saw us she
uttered a cry and said, as women will:�
'O Socrates, this is the last time that either you will converse with
your friends, or they with you.'�
Socrates turned to Crito and said:�
'Crito, let some one take her home.'�
Some of Crito's people accordingly led her away, crying out and beating
herself.� And when she was gone, Socrates,
sitting up on the couch, bent and rubbed his leg, saying, as he was
rubbing:� How singular is the thing
called pleasure, and how curiously related to pain, which might be thought to
be the opposite of it; for they are never present to a man at the same instant,
and yet he who pursues either is generally compelled to take the other; their
bodies are two, but they are joined by a single head.� And I cannot help thinking that if Aesop had remembered them, he
would have made a fable about God trying to reconcile their strife, and how,
when he could not, he fastened their heads together; and this is the reason why
when one comes the other follows, as I know by my own experience now, when
after the pain in my leg which was caused by the chain pleasure appears to
succeed.
Upon this Cebes
said:� I am glad, Socrates, that you
have mentioned the name of Aesop.� For
it reminds me of a question which has been asked by many, and was asked of me
only the day before yesterday by Evenus the poet --he will be sure to ask it
again, and therefore if you would like me to have an answer ready for him, you
may as well tell me what I should say to him:--he wanted to know why you, who
never before wrote a line of poetry, now that you are in prison are turning
Aesop's fables into verse, and also composing that hymn in honour of Apollo.
Tell him, Cebes,
he replied, what is the truth--that I had no idea of rivalling him or his
poems; to do so, as I knew, would be no easy task.� But I wanted to see whether I could purge away a scruple which I
felt about the meaning of certain dreams.�
In the course of my life I have often had intimations in dreams 'that I
should compose music.'� The same dream
came to me sometimes in one form, and sometimes in another, but always saying
the same or nearly the same words:�
'Cultivate and make music,' said the dream.� And hitherto I had imagined that this was only intended to exhort
and encourage me in the study of philosophy, which has been the pursuit of my
life, and is the noblest and best of music.�
The dream was bidding me do what I was already doing, in the same way
that the competitor in a race is bidden by the spectators to run when he is
already running.� But I was not certain
of this, for the dream might have meant music in the popular sense of the word,
and being under sentence of death, and the festival giving me a respite, I
thought that it would be safer for me to satisfy the scruple, and, in obedience
to the dream, to compose a few verses before I departed.� And first I made a hymn in honour of the god
of the festival, and then considering that a poet, if he is really to be a
poet, should not only put together words, but should invent stories, and that I
have no invention, I took some fables of Aesop, which I had ready at hand and
which I knew--they were the first I came upon--and turned them into verse.� Tell this to Evenus, Cebes, and bid him be
of good cheer; say that I would have him come after me if he be a wise man, and
not tarry; and that to-day I am likely to be going, for the Athenians say that
I must.
Simmias
said:� What a message for such a man!
having been a frequent companion of his I should say that, as far as I know
him, he will never take your advice unless he is obliged.
Why, said
Socrates,--is not Evenus a philosopher?
I think that he
is, said Simmias.
Then he, or any
man who has the spirit of philosophy, will be willing to die, but he will not
take his own life, for that is held to be unlawful.
Here he changed
his position, and put his legs off the couch on to the ground, and during the
rest of the conversation he remained sitting.
Why do you say,
enquired Cebes, that a man ought not to take his own life, but that the
philosopher will be ready to follow the dying?
Socrates
replied:� And have you, Cebes and
Simmias, who are the disciples of Philolaus, never heard him speak of this?
Yes, but his
language was obscure, Socrates.
My words, too,
are only an echo; but there is no reason why I should not repeat what I have
heard:� and indeed, as I am going to
another place, it is very meet for me to be thinking and talking of the nature
of the pilgrimage which I am about to make.�
What can I do better in the interval between this and the setting of the
sun?
Then tell me,
Socrates, why is suicide held to be unlawful? as I have certainly heard
Philolaus, about whom you were just now asking, affirm when he was staying with
us at Thebes:� and there are others who
say the same, although I have never understood what was meant by any of them.
Do not lose
heart, replied Socrates, and the day may come when you will understand.� I suppose that you wonder why, when other
things which are evil may be good at certain times and to certain persons,
death is to be the only exception, and why, when a man is better dead, he is
not permitted to be his own benefactor, but must wait for the hand of another.
Very true, said
Cebes, laughing gently and speaking in his native Boeotian.
I admit the
appearance of inconsistency in what I am saying; but there may not be any real
inconsistency after all.� There is a
doctrine whispered in secret that man is a prisoner who has no right to open
the door and run away; this is a great mystery which I do not quite
understand.� Yet I too believe that the
gods are our guardians, and that we are a possession of theirs.� Do you not agree?
Yes, I quite
agree, said Cebes.
And if one of
your own possessions, an ox or an ass, for example, took the liberty of putting
himself out of the way when you had given no intimation of your wish that he
should die, would you not be angry with him, and would you not punish him if
you could?
Certainly,
replied Cebes.
Then, if we look
at the matter thus, there may be reason in saying that a man should wait, and
not take his own life until God summons him, as he is now summoning me.
Yes, Socrates,
said Cebes, there seems to be truth in what you say.� And yet how can you reconcile this seemingly true belief that God
is our guardian and we his possessions, with the willingness to die which we
were just now attributing to the philosopher?�
That the wisest of men should be willing to leave a service in which
they are ruled by the gods who are the best of rulers, is not reasonable; for
surely no wise man thinks that when set at liberty he can take better care of
himself than the gods take of him.� A
fool may perhaps think so--he may argue that he had better run away from his
master, not considering that his duty is to remain to the end, and not to run
away from the good, and that there would be no sense in his running away.� The wise man will want to be ever with him
who is better than himself.� Now this,
Socrates, is the reverse of what was just now said; for upon this view the wise
man should sorrow and the fool rejoice at passing out of life.
The earnestness
of Cebes seemed to please Socrates.�
Here, said he, turning to us, is a man who is always inquiring, and is
not so easily convinced by the first thing which he hears.
And certainly,
added Simmias, the objection which he is now making does appear to me to have
some force.� For what can be the meaning
of a truly wise man wanting to fly away and lightly leave a master who is
better than himself?� And I rather
imagine that Cebes is referring to you; he thinks that you are too ready to
leave us, and too ready to leave the gods whom you acknowledge to be our good
masters.
Yes, replied
Socrates; there is reason in what you say.�
And so you think that I ought to answer your indictment as if I were in
a court?
We should like
you to do so, said Simmias.
Then I must try to make a more successful
defence before you than I did when before the judges.� For I am quite ready to admit, Simmias and Cebes, that I ought to
be grieved at death, if I were not persuaded in the first place that I am going
to other gods who are wise and good (of which I am as certain as I can be of
any such matters), and secondly (though I am not so sure of this last) to men
departed, better than those whom I leave behind; and therefore I do not grieve
as I might have done, for I have good hope that there is yet something remaining
for the dead, and as has been said of old, some far better thing for the good
than for the evil....
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