Why He Would Not Stop, Even Now

One of the most important passages in all of Western philosophy. Socrates tells the jury directly that even if they offered to let him go on the condition that he stop asking questions, he would refuse. His explanation is a definition of what it means to live with integrity.

Someone may say: Socrates, are you not ashamed of a life that has brought you to this? To an early death?

My answer is this. A person who is good for anything should not calculate whether he will live or die. He should consider only whether what he is doing is right or wrong, and whether he is acting as a good person or a bad one.

Think about the soldier posted by his general to a position. Even when it gets dangerous. Especially when it gets dangerous. That is what it means to follow orders. That is what honor requires.

I was posted to my position by something greater than any general. Call it god. Call it conscience. Call it the deepest thing I understand about what a human life is for. My assignment has been this: live philosophically. Ask questions. Care about wisdom. Do not let people, including myself, get away with pretending to know things they do not know.

If I abandoned that out of fear of death, I would be doing something shameful. Worse, I would be pretending I know that death is bad, and therefore worth avoiding. The truth is, I do not know that. Nobody does. Death might be terrible. It might be wonderful. It might be nothing at all. Treating it as the worst possible outcome is exactly the kind of false certainty I have spent my life fighting against.

So if you said to me, Socrates, we will let you go, but you must stop your philosophical work, stop questioning people, stop all of it, my answer would be this. I love you and I am grateful. Still, I will obey god before I obey you.

As long as I am breathing, I will keep doing what I do. I will walk up to people and say, are you not embarrassed to care so much about money and reputation and status, while caring so little about whether your soul is actually good? I will say this to everyone, young and old, citizen and stranger.

This is not arrogance. This is service. You can verify it. I am a poor man. I have spent decades doing this work and I have nothing to show for it financially. Nobody does something that exhausting for that long without believing in it completely.