an. And, to the utmost of my power, I exhort
all other men to do the same. And, in return for your exhortation of me,
I exhort you also to take part in the great combat, which is the combat
of life, and greater than every other earthly conflict. And I retort
your reproach of me, and say, that you will not be able to help yourself
when the day of trial and judgment, of which I was speaking, comes upon
you; you will go before the judge, the son of Aegina, and, when he has
got you in his grip and is carrying you off, you will gape and your head
will swim round, just as mine would in the courts of this world, and
very likely some one will shamefully box you on the ears, and put upon
you any sort of insult.

Perhaps this may appear to you to be only an old wife's tale, which you
will contemn. And there might be reason in your contemning such tales,
if by searching we could find out anything better or truer: but now
you see that you and Polus and Gorgias, who are the three wisest of the
Greeks of our day, are not able to show that we ought to live any life
which does not profit in another world as well as in this. And of all
that has been said, nothing remains unshaken but the saying, that to do
injustice is more to be avoided than to suffer injustice, and that the
reality and not the appearance of virtue is to be followed above all
things, as well in public as in private life; and that when any one has
been wrong in anything, he is to be chastised, and that the next
best thing to a man being just is that he should become just, and
be chastised and punished; also that he should avoid all flattery of
himself as well as of others, of the few or of the many: and rhetoric
and any other art should be used by him, and all his actions should be
done always, with a view to justice.

Follow me then, and I will lead you where you will be happy in life and
after death, as the argument shows. And never mind if some one despises
you as a fool, and insults you, if he has a mind; let him strike you, by
Zeus, and do you be of good cheer, and do not mind the insulting blow,
for you will never come to any harm in the practice of virtue, if you
are a really good and true man. When we have practised virtue together,
we will apply ourselves to politics, if that seems desirable, or we will
advise about whatever else may seem good to us, for we shall be better
able to judge then. In our present condition we ought not to give
ourselves airs, for ev