"Socrates," he says, "disliked the Athenian constitution. For he saw that democracy is tyrannical, and abounds with all the evils of absolute monarchy." But though the political circumstances of the times made it necessary for cotemporary writers to speak with caution, yet both Xenophon and Plato have declared enough to show that the assertion of Ælian was well founded; and farther proof, were it wanted, may be derived from another early writer, nearly cotemporary, and deeply versed in the politics of his age, the orator Æschines. Indeed, though not stated in the indictment, yet it was urged against Socrates by his prosecutors before the court, that he was disaffected to the democracy; and in proof they affirmed it to be notorious that he had ridiculed, what the Athenian constitution prescribed, the appointment to magistracy by lot. "Thus," they said, “he taught his nu merous followers, youths of the principal families of the city, to despise the established government, and to be turbulent and seditious; and his success had been seen in the conduct of two, the most eminent, Alcibiades and Critias. Even the best things he converted to these ill purposes. From the most esteemed poets, and particularly from Homer, he selected passages to enforce his anti-democratical principles.”

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Socrates, it appears, indeed, was not inclined to deny his disapprobation of the Athenian constitution. His defence itself, as it is reported by Plato, contains matter on which to found an accusation against him of disaffection to the sovereignty of the people, such as, under the jealous tyranny of the Athenian democracy, would sometimes subject a man to the penalties of high treason. You well know," he says, "Athenians, that had I engaged in public business, I should long ago have perished, without procuring any advantage either to you or to myself. Let not the truth offend you: it is no peculiarity of your democracy, nor of your national character: but, wherever the people is sovereign, no man who shall dare honestly to oppose injustice, frequent and extravagant injustice, can avoid destruction."

Without this proof, indeed, we might reasonably believe,

that though Socrates was a good and faithful subject of the Athenian government, and would promote no sedition, no political violence, yet he could not like the Athenian constitution. He wished for wholesome changes by gentle means; and it seems even to have been a principal object of the labours to which he dedicated himself, to infuse principles into the rising generation that might bring about the desirable change insensibly. His scholars were chiefly sons of the wealthiest citizens, whose easy circumstances afforded leisure to attend him; and some of these, zealously adopting his tenets, others merely pleased with the ingenuity of his arguments, and the liveliness of his manner, and desirous to emulate his triumphs over his opponents, were forward, after his example, to engage in disputation upon all the subjects on which he was accustomed to discourse. Thus employed, and thus followed, though himself avoiding office and public business, those who governed, or desired to govern, the commonwealth, through their influence among the many, might, perhaps, not unreasonably, consider him as one who was, or might become, a formidable adversary; and at the same time it might not be difficult to excite popular jealousy against

him.

Melitus, who stood forward as his principal accuser, was, as Plato informs us, no way a man of any great consideration. His legal description gives some probability to the conjecture, that his father was one of the commissioners sent to Lacedæmon, from the moderate party, who opposed the ten successors of the Thirty Tyrants while Thrasybulus held Piræus, and Pausanias was encamped before Athens. He was a poet, and stood forward as in a common cause of the poets, who esteemed the doctrine of Socrates injurious to their interest. Unsupported, his accusation would have been little formidable: but he seems to have been a mere instrument in the business. He was soon joined by Lycon, one of the most powerful speakers of his time. Lycon was the avowed patron of the rhetoricians, who, as well as the poets, thought their interest injured by the moral philosopher's doc

trine. I know not that on any other occasion in Grecian history, we have any account of this kind of party interest operating; but from circumstances nearly analogous in England, if we substitute for poets the clergy, and for rhetoricians the lawyers, we may gather what might be the party spirit, and what the weight of influence of the rhetoricians and poets in Athens. With Lycon, Anytus, a man scarcely second to any in the commonwealth in rank and general estimation, who had supported high command with reputation in the Peloponnesian war, and had been the principal associate of Thrasybulus in the war against the Thirty, and the restoration of the democracy, declared himself a supporter of the prosecution. Nothing in the accusation could, by any known law of Athens, affect the life of the accused. In England, no man would be put upon trial on so vague a charge: no grand jury would listen to it. But in Athens, if the party was strong enough, it signified little what was the law. When Lycon and Anytus came forward, Socrates saw that his condemnation was already decided.

By the course of his life, however, and by the turn of his thoughts for many years, he had so prepared himself for all events, that, far from alarmed at the probability of his condemnation, he rather rejoiced at it as, at his age, a fortunate occurrence. He was persuaded of the soul's immortality, and of the superintending providence of an all-good Deity, whose favour he had always been assiduously endeavouring to deserve. Men fear death, he said, as if unquestionably the greatest evil; and yet no man knows that it may not be the greatest good. If, indeed, great joys were in prospect for him, he and his friends might, with more show of reason, regret his losing it; but at his years, and with his scanty fortune, on the contrary, though he was happy enough at seventy still to preserve both body and mind in vigour, yet even his present gratifications must necessarily soon decay. To avoid, therefore, the evils of age, pain, sickness, decay of sight, decay of hearing, perhaps decay of understanding, by the easiest of deaths, (for such the Athenian mode of execution, by a

draught of hemlock, was reputed,) cheered with the company of surrounding friends, could not be otherwise than a bless

ing.

Xenophon says, that by condescending to a little supplica tion, Socrates might easily have obtained his acquittal. No admonition or entreaty of his friends, however, could persuade him to such an unworthiness. On the contrary, when put upon his defence, he told the people that he did not plead for his own sake, but for theirs; wishing them to avoid the guilt of an unjust condemnation. It was usual for accused persons to bewail their apprehended lot, with tears to supplicate favour, and, by exhibiting their children upon the bema, to endeavour to excite pity. He thought it, he said, more respectful to the court, as well as more becoming himself, to omit all this; though he was aware their sentiments were likely so far to differ from his, that judgment would be given in anger for it.

Condemnation pronounced wrought no change upon him. He again addressed the court, declared his innocence of the matters laid against him, and observed, that even if every charge had been completely proved, still, all together did not, according to any known law, amount to a capital crime. "But," in conclusion, he said, "it is time to depart; I to die; you to live: but which for the greater good, God only knows."

It was usual at Athens for execution very soon to follow condemnation, commonly on the morrow. But it happened that the condemnation of Socrates took place on the eve of the day appointed for the sacred ceremony of crowning the galley which carried the annual offerings to the gods worshipped at Delos; and immemorial tradition forbade all executions till the sacred vessel's return. Thus the death of Socrates was respited thirty days, and his friends had free access to him in prison. During all that time he admirably supported his constancy. Means were concerted for his escape; the jailer was bribed, a vessel prepared, and a secure retreat in Thessaly provided. No arguments, no prayers,

could persuade him to use the opportunity offered. He had, he said, always taught the duty of obedience to the laws, and he would not furnish an example of the breach of it. To no purpose it was urged that he had been unjustly condemned: he had always held that wrong did not justify wrong. He waited with perfect composure the return of the sacred vessel, reasoned on the immortality of the soul, the advantage of virtue, the happiness of having made it, through life, his pursuit; and, with his friends about him, took the fatal cup and died.

Writers who, after Xenophon and Plato, have related the death of Socrates, seem to have held themselves bound to vie with those who preceded them in giving pathos to the story.