stead
of refuting me; just now you were calling witnesses against me. But
please to refresh my memory a little; did you say--'in an unjust attempt
to make himself a tyrant'?

POLUS: Yes, I did.

SOCRATES: Then I say that neither of them will be happier than the
other,--neither he who unjustly acquires a tyranny, nor he who suffers
in the attempt, for of two miserables one cannot be the happier, but
that he who escapes and becomes a tyrant is the more miserable of the
two. Do you laugh, Polus? Well, this is a new kind of refutation,--when
any one says anything, instead of refuting him to laugh at him.

POLUS: But do you not think, Socrates, that you have been sufficiently
refuted, when you say that which no human being will allow? Ask the
company.

SOCRATES: O Polus, I am not a public man, and only last year, when my
tribe were serving as Prytanes, and it became my duty as their president
to take the votes, there was a laugh at me, because I was unable to take
them. And as I failed then, you must not ask me to count the suffrages
of the company now; but if, as I was saying, you have no better argument
than numbers, let me have a turn, and do you make trial of the sort of
proof which, as I think, is required; for I shall produce one witness
only of the truth of my words, and he is the person with whom I am
arguing; his suffrage I know how to take; but with the many I have
nothing to do, and do not even address myself to them. May I ask then
whether you will answer in turn and have your words put to the proof?
For I certainly think that I and you and every man do really believe,
that to do is a greater evil than to suffer injustice: and not to be
punished than to be punished.

POLUS: And I should say neither I, nor any man: would you yourself, for
example, suffer rather than do injustice?

SOCRATES: Yes, and you, too; I or any man would.

POLUS: Quite the reverse; neither you, nor I, nor any man.

SOCRATES: But will you answer?

POLUS: To be sure, I will; for I am curious to hear what you can have to
say.

SOCRATES: Tell me, then, and you will know, and let us suppose that I am
beginning at the beginning: which of the two, Polus, in your opinion, is
the worst?--to do injustice or to suffer?

POLUS: I should say that suffering was worst.

SOCRATES: And which is the greater disgrace?--Answer.

POLUS: To do.

SOCRATES: And the greater disgrace is the greater evil?

POLUS: Certainly not.

SOCRATES: I unde