User:DangerouslyPersuasiveWriter/sandbox/School Notes/Western Legal Tradition/Class 4 Reading Notes

The Apology of Socrates by Plato

Plato by Raphael

Quotes

section 3.1

"...think only of the justice of my cause, and give heed to that: let the judge decide justly and the speaker speak truly."

section 4.2: hidden accusers

"...I must simply fight with shadows in my own defence, and examine when there is no one who answers."

section 5

"...I hope I may succeed, if this be well for you and me, and that my words may find favor with you."

section 13.1: humility, self-awareness

"...He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing."

section 16.1

"And this, O men of Athens, is the truth and the whole truth; I have concealed nothing, I have dissembled nothing. And yet I know that this plainness of speech makes them hate me, and what is their hatred but a proof that I am speaking the truth?"

section 21.1: fear of death, duty

"Someone will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a course of life which is likely to bring you to an untimely end? To him I may fairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong - acting the part of a good man or of a bad."

section 21.5: duty

"For wherever a man's place is, whether the place which he has chosen or that in which he has been placed by a commander, there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he should not think of death or of anything, but of disgrace."

section 22.1: fear of death

"For this fear of death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being the appearance of knowing the unknown; since no one knows whether death, which they in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good."

section 22.2: self-awareness

"whereas I know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to a better, whether God or man, is evil and dishonorable, and I will never fear or avoid a possible good rather than a certain evil."

section 23.3: virtue

"I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue come money and every other good of man..."

section 25

"Now do you really imagine that I could have survived all these years, if I had led a public life, supposing that like a good man I had always supported the right and had made justice, as I ought, the first thing? No, indeed, men of Athens, neither I nor any other."