BOOK I
I
I have often wondered by what arguments those who indicted[1]
Socrates could have persuaded the Athenians that his life was justly forfeit
to the state. The indictment was to this effect: "Socrates is guilty of crime
in refusing to recognise the gods acknowledged by the state, and importing
strange divinities of his own; he is further guilty of corrupting the young."
[1] {oi grapsamenoi} = Meletus (below, IV. iv. 4, viii. 4; "Apol." 11,
19), Anytus ("Apol." 29), and Lycon. See Plat. "Apol." II. v. 18;
Diog. Laert. II. v. (Socr.); M. Schanz, "Plat. Apol. mit deutschen
Kemmentar, Einleitung," S. 5 foll.
In the first place, what evidence did they produce that Socrates refused
to recognise the gods acknowledged by the state? Was it that he did not
sacrifice? or that he dispensed with divination? On the contrary, he was
often to be seen engaged in sacrifice, at home or at the common altars of
the state. Nor was his dependence on divination less manifest. Indeed that
saying of his, "A divinity[2] gives me a sign," was on everybody\'s lips. So
much so that, if I am not mistaken, it lay at the root of the imputation that
he imported novel divinities; though there was no greater novelty in his
case than in that of other believers in oracular help, who commonly rely
on omens of all sorts: the flight or cry of birds, the utterances of man,
chance meetings,[3] or a victim\'s entrails. Even according to the popular
conception, it is not the mere fowl, it is not the chance individual one
meets, who knows what things are profitable for a man, but it is the gods
who vouchsafe by such instruments to signify the same. This was also the
tenet of Socrates.