History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2): Revised EditionDraper, John William
History
History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2): Revised Edition
Draper, John William
Europe -- Civilization
woman at the acts of a man who was too shiftless to have any concern for
his domestic honour. He would not gratify her urgent entreaties by
accepting from those upon whom he lavished his time the money that was
so greatly needed at home. After his condemnation, she carried her
children with her to his prison, and was dismissed by him, as he told
his friends, from his apprehension of her deep distress. To the last we
see her bearing herself in a manner honourable to a woman and a wife.
There is surely something wrong in a man's life when the mother of his
children is protesting against his conduct, and her complaints are
countenanced by the community. In view of all the incidents of the
history of Socrates, we can come to no other conclusion than that the
Athenians regarded him as an unworthy, and perhaps troublesome member of
society. There can be no doubt that his trial and condemnation were
connected with political measures. He himself said that he should have
suffered death previously, in the affair of Leon of Salamis, had not the
government been broken up. His bias was toward aristocracy, not toward
democracy. In common with his party, he had been engaged in undertakings
that could not do otherwise than entail mortal animosities; and it is
not to be overlooked that his indictment was brought forward by Anytus,
who was conspicuous in restoring the old order of things. The mistake
made by the Athenians was in applying a punishment altogether beyond the
real offence, and in adding thereto the persecution of those who had
embraced the tenets of Socrates by driving them into exile. Not only
admiration for the memory of their master, but also a recollection of
their own wrongs, made these men eloquent eulogists. Had Socrates
appeared to the Athenians as he appears to us, it is not consistent with
human proceedings that they should have acted in so barbarous and
totally indefensible a manner.
[Sidenote: The Dæmon of Socrates.]
If by the Dæmon to whose suggestions Socrates is said to have listened
anything more was meant than conscience, we must infer that he laboured
under that mental malady to which those are liable who, either through
penury or designedly, submit to extreme abstinence, and, thereby
injuring the brain, fall into hallucination. Such cases are by no means
of infrequent occurrence. Mohammed was affected in that manner.
[Sidenote: The Megaric school. The wise should be insensible to pain.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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