services, the ungrateful city banished him, or condemned him to death.' As
if the statesman should not have taught the city better! He surely cannot
blame the state for having unjustly used him, any more than the sophist or
teacher can find fault with his pupils if they cheat him. And the sophist
and orator are in the same case; although you admire rhetoric and despise
sophistic, whereas sophistic is really the higher of the two. The teacher
of the arts takes money, but the teacher of virtue or politics takes no
money, because this is the only kind of service which makes the disciple
desirous of requiting his teacher.

Socrates concludes by finally asking, to which of the two modes of serving
the state Callicles invites him:--'to the inferior and ministerial one,' is
the ingenuous reply. That is the only way of avoiding death, replies
Socrates; and he has heard often enough, and would rather not hear again,
that the bad man will kill the good. But he thinks that such a fate is
very likely reserved for him, because he remarks that he is the only person
who teaches the true art of politics. And very probably, as in the case
which he described to Polus, he may be the physician who is tried by a jury
of children. He cannot say that he has procured the citizens any pleasure,
and if any one charges him with perplexing them, or with reviling their
elders, he will not be able to make them understand that he has only been
actuated by a desire for their good. And therefore there is no saying what
his fate may be. 'And do you think that a man who is unable to help
himself is in a good condition?' Yes, Callicles, if he have the true self-
help, which is never to have said or done any wrong to himself or others.
If I had not this kind of self-help, I should be ashamed; but if I die for
want of your flattering rhetoric, I shall die in peace. For death is no
evil, but to go to the world below laden with offences is the worst of
evils. In proof of which I will tell you a tale:--