be unfair. You had your choice, and might have gone either to Lacedaemon
or Crete, both which states are often praised by you for their good
government, or to some other Hellenic or foreign state. Whereas you, above
all other Athenians, seemed to be so fond of the state, or, in other words,
of us her laws (and who would care about a state which has no laws?), that
you never stirred out of her; the halt, the blind, the maimed, were not
more stationary in her than you were. And now you run away and forsake
your agreements. Not so, Socrates, if you will take our advice; do not
make yourself ridiculous by escaping out of the city.

'For just consider, if you transgress and err in this sort of way, what
good will you do either to yourself or to your friends? That your friends
will be driven into exile and deprived of citizenship, or will lose their
property, is tolerably certain; and you yourself, if you fly to one of the
neighbouring cities, as, for example, Thebes or Megara, both of which are
well governed, will come to them as an enemy, Socrates, and their
government will be against you, and all patriotic citizens will cast an
evil eye upon you as a subverter of the laws, and you will confirm in the
minds of the judges the justice of their own condemnation of you. For he
who is a corrupter of the laws is more than likely to be a corrupter of the
young and foolish portion of mankind. Will you then flee from well-ordered
cities and virtuous men? and is existence worth having on these terms? Or
will you go to them without shame, and talk to them, Socrates? And what
will you say to them? What you say here about virtue and justice and
institutions and laws being the best things among men? Would that be
decent of you? Surely not. But if you go away from well-governed states
to Crito's friends in Thessaly, where there is great disorder and licence,
they will be charmed to hear the tale of your escape from prison, set off
with ludicrous particulars of the manner in which you were wrapped in a
goatskin or some other disguise, and metamorphosed as the manner is of