l go on, and will not shift the
indictment from me to you, I cannot do better than repeat this challenge
in the court.

EUTHYPHRO: Yes, indeed, Socrates; and if he attempts to indict me I am
mistaken if I do not find a flaw in him; the court shall have a great
deal more to say to him than to me.

SOCRATES: And I, my dear friend, knowing this, am desirous of becoming
your disciple. For I observe that no one appears to notice you--not even
this Meletus; but his sharp eyes have found me out at once, and he has
indicted me for impiety. And therefore, I adjure you to tell me the
nature of piety and impiety, which you said that you knew so well, and
of murder, and of other offences against the gods. What are they? Is
not piety in every action always the same? and impiety, again--is it not
always the opposite of piety, and also the same with itself, having, as
impiety, one notion which includes whatever is impious?

EUTHYPHRO: To be sure, Socrates.

SOCRATES: And what is piety, and what is impiety?

EUTHYPHRO: Piety is doing as I am doing; that is to say, prosecuting any
one who is guilty of murder, sacrilege, or of any similar crime--whether
he be your father or mother, or whoever he may be--that makes no
difference; and not to prosecute them is impiety. And please to
consider, Socrates, what a notable proof I will give you of the truth
of my words, a proof which I have already given to others:--of the
principle, I mean, that the impious, whoever he may be, ought not to go
unpunished. For do not men regard Zeus as the best and most righteous of
the gods?--and yet they admit that he bound his father (Cronos) because
he wickedly devoured his sons, and that he too had punished his own
father (Uranus) for a similar reason, in a nameless manner. And yet when
I proceed against my father, they are angry with me. So inconsistent are
they in their way of talking when the gods are concerned, and when I am
concerned.

SOCRATES: May not this be the reason, Euthyphro, why I am charged with
impiety--that I cannot away with these stories about the gods? and
therefore I suppose that people think me wrong. But, as you who are well
informed about them approve of them, I cannot do better than assent to
your superior wisdom. What else can I say, confessing as I do, that
I know nothing about them? Tell me, for the love of Zeus, whether you
really believe that they are true.

EUTHYPHRO: Yes, Socrates; and things more wonderful still, of wh