Kitap 11
1.9
Sometimes, however, the two are at variance. Now, whenever this occurs, expediency must yield to the demands of what is becoming. Who is there who does not realise that nothing would have contributed more to secure the acquittal of Socrates than if he had employed the ordinary forensic methods of defence and had conciliated the minds of his judges by adopting a submissive tone and had devoted his attention to refuting the actual charge against him?
1.10
But such a course would have been unworthy of his character, and, therefore, he pleaded as one who would account the penalty to which he might be sentenced as the highest of honours. The wisest of men preferred to sacrifice the remnant of his days rather than to cancel all his past life. And since he was but ill understood by the men of his own day, he reserved his case for the approval of posterity and at the cost of a few last declining years achieved through all the ages life everlasting.
