Plato

The Works of Plato (Volume 1)

Publisher Marketing: Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: PHDO, THE IMMOETALITY OF THE SOUL. First Echecrates, Ph.sdo. Then Socbates, Apollodorus, Cedes, Simmias, And Cairo. Ech. Were you personally present, Phsedo, with Socrates on that day when he drank the poison in prison ? or did you hear an account of it from some one else ? Pheed. I was there myself, Echecrates. Ech. What then did he say before his death ? and how did he die ? for I should be glad to hear: for scarcely any citizen of Phlius ever visits Athens now, nor has any stranger for a long time come from thence, who was able to give us a clear account of the particulars, except that he died from drinking poison; but he was unable to tell us any thing more. 2. Pheed. And did you not hear about the trial how it went off ? Ech. Yes; some one told me this; and I wondered, that as it took place so long ago, he appears to have died long afterwards. What was the reason of this, Phsedo ? Phted. An accidental circumstance happened in his favour, Echecrates: for the poop of the ship which the Athenians send to Delos, chanced to be crowned on the day before the trial; Ech. But what is this ship ? Pheed. It is the ship, as the Athenians say, in which Theseus formerly conveyed the fourteen boys and girls to Crete, and saved both then-, and himself. They, therefore, made a vow to Apollo on that occasion, as it is said, that if they were saved they would every year despatch a solemn embassy to Phlius, to which Echecrates helonged, was a town of Sicvonia in Peloponnesus. Delos; which from that time to the present, they send yearly to the god. 3. When they begin the preparations for this solemn embassy, they have a law that the city shall be purified during this period, and that no public execution shall take place until the ship has reached Delos... Contributor Bio:  Plato Catalin Partenie is co-editor of Plato's Complete Works in Romanian (2001-2005).