=49.= So teaching and influencing men Socrates lived in Athens till his seventieth year was past, and then died by the hands of the public executioner. This fate he might so easily have avoided that it seemed almost to be self-chosen. His disciple Xenophon expresses amazement that the jurors should have condemned a man so modest and so wise, and so practical a benefactor of the Athenian people[77]. Modern historians, with a wider knowledge of human nature, wonder rather that Socrates was allowed to live so long[78]. The accusers complained that Socrates offended by disbelieving in the gods of the city, introducing new deities, and corrupting the youth of Athens. From the point of view of conservatively-minded Athenians, the charges were amply justified. Clearly Socrates disbelieved, not merely in the official gods of the city, but also in the deities it worshipped most earnestly, democracy and empire. Not only did he introduce new deities, but it might fairly be argued that he was introducing the most essential parts of the religion of the national enemy, Persia. Daily inculcating these heretical doctrines upon young men of the highest families in Athens, he might well be the cause that the Athenian state was less unquestioningly served than before. That the heresies of Socrates were soundly founded on wide observation and general truths could not be considered to make them less dangerous. Athens had already passed the time when its political power could be of service to its neighbours; it had not reached that when it could be content with intellectual influence; Socrates, just because he was in harmony with the future of Athens, was a discordant element in its present. [Sidenote: The companions of Socrates.]