me he who gave him the poison, taking hold of him, after a short
interval examined his feet and legs; and then having pressed his foot
hard, he asked if he felt it; he said that he did not. And after this
he pressed his thighs; and thus going higher he showed us that he was
growing cold and stiff. Then Socrates touched himself, and said that
when the poison reached his heart he should then depart. But now the
parts around the lower belly were almost cold; when uncovering
himself, for he had been covered over, he said; and they were his
{141} last words. 'Crito, we owe a cock to AEsculapius; pay it,
therefore, and do not neglect it.' 'It shall be done,' said Crito,
'but consider whether you have anything else to say.'

"To this question he gave no reply; but shortly after he gave a
convulsive movement, and the man covered him, and his eyes were fixed,
and Crito, perceiving it, closed his mouth and eyes.

"This, Echecrates, was the end of our friend, a man, as we may say,
the best of all of his time that we have known, and moreover, the most
wise and just."

Our knowledge of the teaching of Socrates is derived chiefly from two
sources, Plato and Xenophon, for the peculiarities of each of whom
allowances must be made. Plato in his dialogues makes Socrates the
mouthpiece of his own teaching, consequently the majority of the
tenets to which Socrates is made to give expression are purely
Platonic doctrines of which the historical Socrates could never even
have dreamed. It might, therefore, seem at first sight that there is
no possibility of ascertaining from Plato's dialogues any trustworthy
account of the ideas of Socrates. But on closer inspection this does
not turn out to be correct, because the earlier dialogues of Plato
were written before he had developed his own philosophy, and when he
was, to all intents and purposes, simply a disciple of Socrates, bent
only upon giving the best expression to the Socratic doctrine. Even in
these Socratic dialogues, however, we have what is no doubt an
idealized portrait of Socrates. Plato makes no pretence of being
merely a biographer or historian. The incidents and conversation,
although they are no doubt frequently founded upon facts, are, in the
{142} main, imaginary. All we can say is that they contain the gist
and substance of the philosophy of Socrates. The other source,
Xenophon, also has his peculiarities. If Plato was an idealizing
philosopher, Xenophon was a prosaic and m