ience at that time--which in all
probability did not prevent his Athenians from considering them as
exceedingly absurd and ridiculous.

What matters here, however, is only the accusation of atheism which he
made against Socrates. It is a little difficult to handle, in so far as
Aristophanes, for dramatic reasons, has equipped Socrates with a whole set
of deities. There are the clouds themselves, which are of Aristophanes's
own invention; there is also the air, which he has got from Diogenes of
Apollonia, and finally a "vortex" which is supposed to be derived from the
same source, and which at any rate has cast Zeus down from his throne. All
this we must ignore, as it is only conditioned partly by technical
reasons--Aristophanes had to have a chorus and chose the clouds for the
purpose--and partially by the desire to ridicule Ionic naturalism. But
enough is left over. In the beginning of the play Socrates expressly
declares that no gods exist. Similar statements are repeated in several
places. Zeus is sometimes substituted for the gods, but it comes to the
same thing. And at the end of the play, where the honest Athenian, who has
ventured on the ticklish ground of sophistic, admits his delusion, it is
expressly said:

"Oh, what a fool I am! Nay, I must have been mad indeed when I thought of
throwing the gods away for Socrates's sake!"

Even in the verses with which the chorus conclude the play it is insisted
that the worst crime of the sophists is their insult to the gods.

The inference to be drawn from all this is simply that the popular
Athenian opinion--for we may rest assured that this and the view of
Aristophanes are identical--was that the sophists were atheists. That says
but little. For popular opinion always works with broad categories, and
the probability is that in this case, as demonstrated above, it was in the
wrong, for, as a rule, the sophists were hardly conscious deniers of the
gods. But, at the same time, at the back of the onslaught of Aristophanes
there lies the idea that the teaching of the sophists led to denial of the
gods; that atheism was the natural outcome of their doctrine and way of
reasoning. And that there was some truth therein is proved by other
evidence which can hardly be rejected.

In the indictment of Socrates it is said that he "offended by not
believing in the gods in which the State believed." In the two apologies
for Socrates which have come down to us under Xenophon's name,