ans, which, as I am sure, are
ample, are at your service, and if you have a scruple about spending
all mine, here are strangers who will give you the use of others; and
one of them, Simmias the Theban, has brought a sum of money for this
very purpose; and Cebes and many others are willing to spend their
money too. I say, therefore, do not on that account hesitate about
making your escape, and do not say, as you did in court, that you will
have difficulty in knowing what to do with yourself if you escape. For
men will love you in other places to which you may go, and not in
Athens only; there are friends of mine in Thessaly, if you like to go
to them, who will value and protect you, and no Thessalians will give
you any trouble.

Nor can I think that you are justified, Socrates, in betraying your
own life when you might be saved; this is playing into the hands of
your enemies and destroyers; and moreover I should say that you were
betraying your children; for you might bring them up and educate them;
instead of which you go away and leave them, and they will have to
take their chance; and if they do not meet with the usual fate of
orphans, there will be small thanks to you. No man should bring
children into the world who is unwilling to persevere to the end in
their nurture and education. But you are choosing the easier part, as
I think, not the better and manlier, which would rather have become
one who professes virtue in all his actions, like yourself. And indeed
I am ashamed not only of you, but of us who are your friends, when I
reflect that this entire business of yours will be attributed to our
want of courage. The trial need never have come on, or might have been
brought to another issue; and the end of all, which is the crowning
absurdity, will seem to have been permitted by us, through cowardice
and baseness, who might have saved you, as you might have saved
yourself, if we had been good for anything (for there was no
difficulty in escaping); and we did not see how disgraceful, Socrates,
and also miserable all this will be to us as well as you. Make your
mind up then, or rather have your mind already made up, for the time
of deliberation is over, and there is only one thing to be done, which
must be done, if at all, this very night, and which any delay will
render all but impossible; I beseech you therefore, Socrates, to be
persuaded by me, and to do as I say....

_Socrates_: From these premises I proceed to ar