thing unjust or
unholy. For that government, strong as it was, did not so overawe me as
to make me commit an unjust action; but when we came out from the
Tholus, the four went to Salamis, and brought back Leon; but I went away
home. And perhaps for this I should have been put to death, if that
government had not been speedily broken up. And of this you can have
many witnesses.

21. Do you think, then, that I should have survived so many years if I
had engaged in public affairs, and, acting as becomes a good man, had
aided the cause of justice, and, as I ought, had deemed this of the
highest importance? Far from it, O Athenians! nor would any other man
have done so. But I, through the whole of my life, if I have done
anything in public, shall be found to be a man, and the very same in
private, who has never made a concession to any one contrary to justice,
neither to any other, nor to any one of these whom my calumniators say
are my disciples. I, however, was never the preceptor of any one; but if
any one desired to hear me speaking, and to see me busied about my own
mission, whether he were young or old, I never refused him. Nor do I
discourse when I receive money, and not when I do not receive any, but I
allow both rich and poor alike to question me, and, if any one wishes
it, to answer me and hear what I have to say. And for these, whether any
one proves to be a good man or not, I cannot justly be responsible,
because I never either promised them any instruction or taught them at
all. But if any one says that he has ever learned or heard anything from
me in private which all others have not, be well assured that he does
not speak the truth.

22. But why do some delight to spend so long a time with me? Ye have
heard, O Athenians! I have told you the whole truth, that they delight
to hear those closely questioned who think that they are wise but are
not; for this is by no means disagreeable. But this duty, as I say, has
been enjoined me by the deity, by oracles, by dreams, and by every mode
by which any other divine decree has ever enjoined anything to man to
do. These things, O Athenians! are both true, and easily confuted if not
true. For if I am now corrupting some of the youths, and have already
corrupted others, it were fitting, surely, that if any of them, having
become advanced in life, had discovered that I gave them bad advice when
they were young, they should now rise up against me, accuse me, and have
me pu