crime that it is difficult to
avoid; crime moves faster than death. So I, old and heavy as I am, have
allowed myself to be overtaken by death, while my accusers, light and
vigorous, have allowed themselves to be overtaken by the light-footed
crime. I go, then, to suffer death; they to suffer shame and iniquity. I
abide by my punishment, as they by theirs. All is according to order.'
It was the same fidelity to duty that made Socrates refuse to escape
from prison, in order not to violate the laws of his country, to which,
even though irritated, more respect is due than to a father. 'Let us
walk in the path,' he says 'that God has traced for us.' These last
words show the profound religious sentiment which animated Socrates....
It is impossible not to feel that there was something divine in such a
life crowned with such a death."[914]

[Footnote 911: Homer, Hesiod, etc.]

[Footnote 912: "Memorabilia," bk. i. ch. i. p. 16.]

[Footnote 913: Lewes's "Biographical History of Philosophy," p. 122.]

[Footnote 914: Watson's "Institutes of Theology," vol. i. p. 374.]

[Footnote 915: Pressense, "Religions before Christ," pp. 109-111.]

Socrates laid the foundation for conscious morality by placing the
ground of right and wrong in an eternal and unchangeable reason which
illuminates the reason and conscience of every man. He often asserted
that morality is a science which can not be taught. It depends mainly
upon principles which are discovered by an inward light. Accordingly he
regarded it as the main business of education to "draw out" into the
light of consciousness the principles of right and justice which are
infolded within the conscience of man--to deliver the mind of the secret
truth which was striving towards the light of day. Therefore he called
his method the "maieutic" or "obstetric" art. He felt there was
something divine in all men (answering to his _to daimonion_ or
_daimonion ti_--a divine and supernatural something--a warning
"voice"--a gnomic "sign"--a "law of God written on the heart"), which by
a system of skillful interrogations he sought to elicit, so that each
might hear for himself the voice of God, and, hearing, might obey. Thus
was he the "great prophet of the human conscience," and a messenger of
God to the heathen world, to prepare the way of the Lord.

The morality of conscience was carried to its highest point by Plato.
From the moment he became the disciple of Socrates he sympathized deeply
wit