The Dialogue must be read in the light of the situation. And first of all we are struck by the calmness of the scene. Like the spectators at the time, we cannot pity Socrates; his mien and his language are so noble and fearless. He is the same that he ever was, but milder and gentler, and he has in no degree lost his interest in dialectics; he will not forego the delight of an argument in compliance with the jailer’s intimation that he should not heat himself with talking. At such a time he naturally expresses the hope of his life, that he has been a true mystic and not a mere routineer or wand-bearer: and he refers to passages of his personal history. To his old enemies the Comic poets, and to the proceedings on the trial, he alludes playfully; but he vividly remembers the disappointment which he felt in reading the books of Anaxagoras. The return of Xanthippè and his children indicates that the philosopher is not ‘made of oak or rock.’ Some other traits of his character may be noted; for example, the courteous manner in which he inclines his head to the last objector, or the ironical touch, ‘Me already, as the tragic poet would say, the voice of fate calls;’ or the depreciation of the arguments with which ‘he comforted himself and them;’ or his fear of ‘misology;’ or his references to Homer; or the playful smile with which he ‘talks like a book’ about greater and less; or the allusion to the possibility of finding another teacher among barbarous races (cp. Polit. 262 D); or the mysterious reference to another science (mathematics?) of generation and destruction for which he is vainly feeling. There is no change in him; only now he is invested with a sort of sacred character, as the prophet or priest of Apollo the God of the festival, in whose honour he first of all composes a hymn, and then like the swan pours forth his dying lay. Perhaps the extreme elevation of Socrates above his own situation, and the ordinary interests of life (compare his _jeu d’esprit_ about his burial, in which for a moment he puts on the ‘Silenus mask’), create in the mind of the reader an impression stronger than could be derived from arguments that such a one has in him ‘a principle which does not admit of death.’ * * * * * [Sidenote: _Socrates and his friends._] The other persons of the Dialogue may be considered under two heads: (1) private friends; (2) the respondents in the argument.