CHAPTER VIII.

SOCRATES-concluded.

At this time, four centuries before the birth of Christ, the government of Athens had been conducted by nine chief magistrates, or Archons, chosen annually by vote, by the judges of the Areopagus, a seat of justice on a small hill near Athens, -and by the Senate, who met at the Prytaneum, the beautiful building which was, so to speak, the chief office of public hospitality, where sacred fire was kept perpetually burning, and where the tablets on which were inscribed the noble laws framed two hundred years before by Solon-the great Archon, and one of the seven wise men of Greece-were carefully preserved.

Before this, Athens, like her prototype, modern Paris, had endured alternately the horrors of extreme democracy and the weighty pressure of despotism. Now she was suffering from constant change of government, and perhaps from the government being shared by too many. We read of the Council of Thirty; of the Senate of four hundred (chosen from the various tribes) being replaced by one of five hundred members; and of factions headed by men whom we may with justice suspect of having severally aspired to the unthankful honour-supreme power.

The democracy was less unpopular with the citizens than the divided dictatorship-the hydra with thirty despotic brains, thirty all-powerful tongues-" the Thirty," as they are called in history, who were triumphantly

established in Athens by the conqueror Lysander after the surrender of the city.

It was during the cruel, murderous reign of the Thirty that Socrates held office. Tyranny, and the threats of tyranny, were as nothing to him. He was as a granite wall in the course of the impetuous torrent of unscrupulous terrorism that was dashed against the cowed Athenians by the Thirty, who began their reign by announcing their determination to "purge the city of evil-doers," a warning which was a prophecy of that which followed.

All who were known or suspected of democratical tendencies were seized, subjected to a mock trial in the Prytaneum-where the Thirty made a point of sitting,and condemned. Vengeance and violence became as laws. Executions or poisonings were so frequent as to be part of everyday life. To read the records of Grecian history during the predominance of the "Thirty" is to be irresistibly reminded of the "Reign of Terror" in France in the eighteenth century.

Near to the Prytaneum was a circular building with a dome called Tholus, where the tenth of the Five Hundred, who took it in turns with the rest to be in office, dined and sacrificed every day. Here the Thirty were in the habit of sending for citizens in office to share in, and therefore to tacitly acquiesce in, their violent deeds; and here one day they sent for five, one of whom happened to be Socrates, then representing his tribe as one of the Prytanes.

This time the five Prytanes were ordered to cross over to Salamis, to bring back a certain prisoner called Leon, whom the Thirty chose to suspect of democratic tendencies. Four of the five obeyed, but Socrates refused to have anything to do with the affair, and simply returned to his own house.

The vengeance of the Thirty was not wreaked upon him there and then, but no reader of the life of Socrates

can fail to believe that this opposition to those in power sealed his fate, which was rendered still more certain by his behaviour when in office as chief of the Prytanes on the subject of the battle of Arginusæ.

Alcibiades had been conquered, and being unable to face loss of popularity and the consequences of failure, had fled his country. A general named Conon, who had replaced him, was blockaded in the harbour of Mytilene by a Spartan admiral.

Athens sent a fine fleet of triremes or men-of-war to Conon's assistance. A battle ensued, with disastrous losses on both sides, but with victory to the Athenian fleet, which, taking a terrific storm for sufficient excuse, immediately sailed for home, without taking account of missing ships and their crews.

For this remissness they were summoned before the court. Among the Greeks, to neglect burial rites was almost a crime; and in this case the offending officers had not only ignored the dead, but fled from the living, who must in scores have been left fighting for life among the waves. The judges and the rest of the court were naturally incensed, their anger being fed by the appearance of the relatives of the lost and missing in deep mourning, demanding vengeance with wails and threats.

Voting was often arranged by ballot, but not in such a case as this. But ballot, whether or not the admirals were guilty, was declared for, and only Socrates was bold enough to protest against a method of procedure which seemed to him an unprecedented innovation. To ballot away men's lives was utterly against his sense of justice; he, at least, would not take part in such a proceeding. But the rest of his colleagues gave in; and whether the generals were to be killed or not for a step which might have been merely common prudence, was decided by the Athenian method of dropping beans of different colours into urns.

After this the philosopher spoke out more boldly than

ever against the existing ministration of justice, and but a few years after we find him brought before the very men he had denounced to answer vague charges of corrupting youth; of not worshipping the gods whom the city worshipped, but introducing new gods of his own; therefore, being guilty of crime."

This indictment was signed by a poet called Meletus, and by two others, Anytus and Lycon, and was, as was usual with such documents, hung up in the portico before the office of the second or King Archon, whose duty it was to pronounce upon all matters of religion, and before whom it was customary to lay all accusations of impiety.

There was doubtless little wonder expressed by any one when the indictment was suspended in the portico. The wonder was that no one had impeached the philosopher before. Nothing but the thoroughly changeable and democratic feelings of the versatile Athenians, whose sentiments of admiration and dislike were equally evanescent, could have prolonged their toleration of his teachings.

was

Now the unpopularity of the unsuccessful Alcibiades, whose name was associated with that of Socrates, reflected upon the philosopher, and private grudges, which had perhaps been smouldering for years, were made public, and helped to swell the tide of disfavour. Anytus (one of the three who signed the accusation) had a personal grievance against Socrates, because his young son had neglected his trade of leather-seller to follow the sage and to listen to his teaching.

Among the crowds who eagerly assembled at the courthouse that memorable day when Socrates was tried, perhaps but one-third, or less, retained their belief in his greatness. One-third were certainly his enemies, and the others were, to say the utmost, neutral. Were he to be condemned, they would think it was for the best. He was getting a nuisance, they considered, with his perpetual sermonising and daily raids against their favourite vices, not only by preaching but by practice.

As the old man, with the pale, furrowed face and grizzly beard, whose coarse, blanket-like cloak, that exposed his arm and shoulder, hardened and browned with exposure to weather, was so striking a contrast to the delicate pallia and bordered tunics of his little crowd of anxious friends, mounted what we now call the “dock with a firm step, his strong, calm gaze met more glances of animosity than of kindliness.

The King Archon is seated in his throne. The accusers are mounting the tribunes, the dicasts or jurymen, of whom six thousand were yearly chosen from among the citizens are assembling and taking their places on the circular rows of benches covered with matting, where it is their privilege to sit. The court is circular; but not being that where cases of murder are tried, and where superstition demands that the building shall be roofless, it has a dome, and broad bands of sunlight stream in from the oblong apertures below upon the crowd of citizens who are pressing against the rope, and upon the slaves who are stationed at intervals along the barrier between the spectators and the court.

As Meletus, Socrates' accuser-in-chief, is called upon to read the indictment, the hum dies away, the dicasts sit still and gravely contemplate the speaker, and the eyes of the crowd are fixed upon Socrates, as they cease to press forward and squeeze for the foremost place, and still their very breathing that no word shall escape them. As the sentence-" And for this you are held worthy of death' -rings out into the court, a visible tremor stirs the assemblage. In spite of themselves, something within them revolts against such language addressed to an old man on the brink of the grave, and the prevailing feeling of the crowd is a vague hope that Socrates may justify himself.

The accusation is completed, and Socrates begins to speak. "How you have felt, men of Athens, at hearing the speeches of my accusers, I cannot tell," he begins; "but I know that their persuasive words almost made me