t the matter alone; but
if unjustly, then even if the murderer lives under the same roof with
you and eats at the same table, proceed against him. Now the man who is
dead was a poor dependant of mine who worked for us as a field labourer
on our farm in Naxos, and one day in a fit of drunken passion he got
into a quarrel with one of our domestic servants and slew him. My father
bound him hand and foot and threw him into a ditch, and then sent to
Athens to ask of a diviner what he should do with him. Meanwhile he
never attended to him and took no care about him, for he regarded him as
a murderer; and thought that no great harm would be done even if he did
die. Now this was just what happened. For such was the effect of cold
and hunger and chains upon him, that before the messenger returned from
the diviner, he was dead. And my father and family are angry with me for
taking the part of the murderer and prosecuting my father. They say
that he did not kill him, and that if he did, the dead man was but a
murderer, and I ought not to take any notice, for that a son is impious
who prosecutes a father. Which shows, Socrates, how little they know
what the gods think about piety and impiety.

SOCRATES: Good heavens, Euthyphro! and is your knowledge of religion
and of things pious and impious so very exact, that, supposing the
circumstances to be as you state them, you are not afraid lest you too
may be doing an impious thing in bringing an action against your father?

EUTHYPHRO: The best of Euthyphro, and that which distinguishes him,
Socrates, from other men, is his exact knowledge of all such matters.
What should I be good for without it?

SOCRATES: Rare friend! I think that I cannot do better than be your
disciple. Then before the trial with Meletus comes on I shall challenge
him, and say that I have always had a great interest in religious
questions, and now, as he charges me with rash imaginations and
innovations in religion, I have become your disciple. You, Meletus, as
I shall say to him, acknowledge Euthyphro to be a great theologian, and
sound in his opinions; and if you approve of him you ought to approve of
me, and not have me into court; but if you disapprove, you should begin
by indicting him who is my teacher, and who will be the ruin, not of the
young, but of the old; that is to say, of myself whom he instructs,
and of his old father whom he admonishes and chastises. And if Meletus
refuses to listen to me, but wil