SOKRATES: by F. S. Darrow, A. M., Ph. D. (Harv.)
SOKRATES was born in 469 b. c. and was put to death in 399 b. c. at the age of seventy. He grew to manhood among the splendors of the Periklean Age; took an active and honorable part in the Peloponnesian War; saw the Long Walls, extending from Athens to its harbor, Peiraeeus, destroyed at the blast of Lysander's trumpet, and displayed the fearlessness and nobility of his nature during the Reign of Terror when the Thirty Tyrants ruled at Athens. Finally he was accused of heresy and was condemned by his fellow-citizens to drink the hemlock—the immemorial fate of great believers, to be condemned for unbelief by unbelievers.
Three dialogs of Plato depict the last month of his master's life, the Apology, the Crito, and the Phaedo. The Apology is a reproduction of the extemporaneous defense made by Sokrates at his trial. The Crito is a discussion between Sokrates and his old friend Kriton on the subject: Would it be right and just for Sokrates to accept Kriton's proffered assistance and escape? The Phaedo is a most beautiful and inspiring account of the last day of Sokrates' life, when in prison surrounded by a few devoted disciples, in discussing the nature and destiny of the soul he avowed his belief in its immortality, its pre-existence, and its rebirth.
The personality of Sokrates was strikingly unique. He was unusually robust and strong, capable of enduring fatigue and hardship to a surprising degree. He went barefoot throughout the year, even when campaigning at Potidaea and among the severe snows of Thrace. The same clothing sufficed him in winter as in summer. His diet was simple and temperate, and "he used to say in jest that Circe transformed men into hogs by entertaining them with an abundance of luxury, but that Odysseus through his temperance was not changed into a hog." Nevertheless, at festivals and banquets when joviality and indulgence were in order, Sokrates was able to outdo all the others. He consciously limited the number of his wants and repressed all artificial tastes. He was just, moderate, and above all independent in thought and action, absolutely regardless of danger when confident that he was acting rightly. His features were extremely ugly and grotesque: his nose was flat, his nostrils large, his lips thick, his eyes bulging; so that his companions jokingly compared him to the mythical old Satyr, Silenus. He purposely avoided politics and never held any public office until 406 b. c., when for a single day, as chairman of the Prytanes, he presided at a meeting of the Popular Assembly and refused to put to vote the unconstitutional proposal that the victorious generals of Arginusae be condemned collectively and be executed for their alleged neglect of duty. Heedless of threats and protests, at the greatest personal risk Sokrates persisted in his noble refusal to listen to the clamor of the mob. He was so law-abiding, such an advocate of peace and stranger to violence, so diligent in the performance of the duties of an upright man and of a brave and righteous citizen, that despite his many enemies he was never summoned to appear in court until in his seventieth year he was accused of atheism and impiety. He was pre-eminently a teacher of ethics, a preacher of morality, a defender of right, an earnest believer in duty. He is the Prophet of Reason, who "more than any other one of the great teachers of religion sought to sanctify the mind and to give to common sense a sacramental power."
Three peculiarities mark Sokrates as a loyal member of that splendid band of brothers who possess that wisdom which in all ages, entering into noble souls, makes them prophets and reformers. First, he passed his long life teaching in contented poverty, and devoted all his energy to pointing out piety, self-control, and justice to all, young and old alike. Secondly, he was of a deeply sensitive, religious nature, and firmly believed that he had a divine mission to perform under the inspiration of his Daemon or Higher Self. Thirdly, he was intellectually original both in choice of subject and in method of teaching. Plato calls him "a cross-examining God."
His lecture-room was the street; his auditors were shoemakers, tanners, sailors, and other craftsmen; his philosophy was for the market-place. His disciples were young men whose minds he had quickened and whose lives he had elevated. He aimed to prick the bubble of pretension everywhere.... To Sokrates the precept inscribed on the Delphian temple, "Know thyself," was the holiest of all texts.
He accepted no salary for the instruction he gave and refused the many rich gifts which were offered to him, spending the entire day in conversing with all who cared to listen to him, treating without any distinction rich and poor, never withholding his assistance from any one who consulted him in the spirit of truth. As his words were both interesting and instructive, some regularly attended him in public, and these were commonly called his disciples of students, although neither Sokrates nor his personal friends used the terms teacher and disciple because of the disrepute then attached to them as a result of the mercenary and casuistical teachings of the Sophists. Early in the morning Sokrates frequented the public walks, the gymnasia, and the schools. Then later, between nine and ten, he went to the market-place, when it was most crowded.
Sokrates' power of meditation was developed very exceptionally. Frequently for hours at a time the strength of his inner life made him entirely oblivious to the outer world. In proof of this it is recorded that while he was a soldier at Potidaea
One morning he was thinking about something which he could not resolve; and he would not give it up but continued thinking from early dawn until noon—there he stood fixed in thought; and at noon attention was drawn to him and the rumor ran through the wondering crowd that Sokrates had been standing and thinking about something ever since the break of day. At last, in the evening after supper, some Ionians out of curiosity (I should explain that this was not in winter but in summer), brought out their mats and slept in the open air that they might watch him and see whether he would stand all night. There he stood all night as well as all day and the following morning; and with the return of light he offered up a prayer to the sun and went his way.
Two nights before he died, when the date of his execution was not known by him or his friends, it was revealed to him by a vision "in the likeness of a woman, fair and comely, clothed in white raiment, who called out and cried: 'O Sokrates, the third day hence, to Phthia shalt thou go.'" Sokrates also declares:
In the course of my life I have often had intimations in dreams that "I should make music." The same dream came to me sometimes in one form and sometimes in another but always saying the same or nearly the same words: "Make and cultivate music," said the dream. And hitherto I imagined that this was only intended to exhort and encourage me in the study of philosophy, which has always been the pursuit of my life and is the noblest and best of music.
Also, Sokrates heard even in childhood a divine voice, which all through his life acted as a restraining influence whenever he was about to take a false step. This never urged him to adopt any particular line of action but always served as a prohibitory warning. He heard it not only on great but also on small occasions when it frequently prevented him from continuing what he had begun to say or do. Later writers refer to this as the Daemon or Genius of Sokrates, but he always spoke of it as a "Divine Sign, a Prophetic Voice," and obeyed it implicitly, referring to it publicly and familiarly to others. It had continually forbidden him to enter public life, and after he was indicted it forbade him to take any thought of what he should then do or say, bidding him to trust that all would come out for the best. So completely, he tells us, did he walk with a consciousness of this bridle that whenever he felt no check he was confident that all was well. His enemies asserted that this belief was an offensive heresy, an impious innovation on the orthodox creed, atheistic and immoral. Hence they accused him of not worshiping the recognized gods but of introducing new and false divinities of his own. The truth is that Sokrates believed in One Divine Life, the One in All and the All in One, while he did not deny the existence of the popular gods but declared that the popular conceptions were erroneous and imperfect.
To appreciate the mission of Sokrates, the message he had to deliver, it is necessary to refer to the Oracle of Delphi, in which Apollo proclaimed to Chaerephon, an intimate friend and enthusiastic follower, that Sokrates was the wisest of all men of his time. This declaration exerted a very great influence upon the subsequent life of Sokrates in that it caused him to inquire continually, What is wisdom? and made him not only a philosopher but a religious reformer as well. In the words of Cicero: "Sokrates labored to bring philosophy from heaven to earth."
Sokrates taught:
There is no better way to true glory than to endeavor to be good rather than to seem so.
A man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong—acting the part of a good man or of a bad. For wherever a man's place is, whether the place he has chosen or that in which he has been placed by a commander, there he ought to remain in the hour of danger; he should not think of death or of anything but of disgrace.
The difficulty, my friends, is not in avoiding death, but in avoiding unrighteousness; for that runs faster than death.
Let every man be of good cheer about his soul, who has ruled his body and followed knowledge and goodness in this life; for if death be a journey to another place and there all the dead are, what good can be greater than this? Be of good cheer about death and know this of a truth that no evil can happen to a good man either in life or after death.
To want as little as possible is to make the nearest approach to the Deity.
Knowledge is the food of the soul.
We ought not to retaliate and render evil for evil to any one, whatever evil we may have suffered from him. Neither injury nor retaliation nor warding off evil by evil is ever right. Act toward others as you would have others act toward you. Forgive your enemies, render good for evil, and kiss even the hand that is upraised to smite.
Grant me to be beautiful in soul and may all I possess of outward things be at harmony with those within. Teach me to think wisdom the only riches.
If thou wouldst know what is the wisdom of the gods and what their love is, render thyself deserving the communication of some of those divine secrets, which may not be penetrated by man and which are imparted to those alone who consult, adore, and obey the Deity.
Sokrates, speaking of his life-work, says:
In this research and scrutiny I have been long engaged. I interrogate every man of reputation. I prove him to be defective in wisdom but I can not prove it so as to make him sensible of the defect. Fulfilling the mission imposed upon me, I have established the veracity of the god (Apollo), who meant to pronounce that human wisdom is of little reach and worth; and that he who like Sokrates feels most convinced of his own worthlessness as to wisdom is really the wisest of men, for the truth is, O men of Athens, the Deity only is wise. My service to the god has not only constrained me to live in constant poverty and neglect of political estimation, but has brought upon me a host of bitter enemies in those whom I have examined and exposed, while the bystanders talk of me as a wise man because they give me credit for wisdom respecting all the points on which my exposure of others turns.
Whatever be the danger and obloquy which I may incur, it would be monstrous indeed, if having maintained my place in the ranks as an hoplite under your generals at Delium and Potidaea, I were now from fear of death or anything else to disobey the oracle and desert the post which the god has assigned to me, the duty of living for philosophy and cross-questioning both myself and others. And should you even now offer to acquit me, on condition of my renouncing this duty, I should tell you with all respect and affection that I will obey the god rather than you and that I will persist until my dying day in cross-questioning you, exposing your want of wisdom and virtue and reproaching you until the defect be remedied. My mission as your monitor is a mark of the special favor of the gods to you and if you condemn me it will be your loss; for you will find none other such. Perhaps you will ask me, Why cannot you go away, Sokrates, and live in peace and silence? This is the hardest of all questions for me to answer to your satisfaction. If I tell you that silence on my part would be disobedience to the god, you will think me in jest and not believe me. You will believe me still less, if I tell you that the greatest blessing which can happen to man is to carry on discussions every day about virtue and those other matters which you hear me conversing, when I cross-examine myself and others and that life without such examination is no life at all. Nevertheless so stands the fact, incredible as it may seem to you.
I certainly have my enemies [the Pharisaical party and the High Priests of orthodoxy] and these will be my destruction if I am destroyed; of that I am certain; not that Meletos, nor yet Anytos, but the envy and detraction of the world, which has been the death of many more—there is no danger of my being the last of them.
Later, after his condemnation, he added:
And I prophesy to you, my murderers, that immediately after my death, punishment far heavier than you have inflicted on me will surely await you. Me you have killed because you wanted to escape the accuser and not to give an account of your lives. But that will not be as you suppose; far otherwise. For I say that there will be more accusers of you than there are now. For if you think that by killing men you can avoid the accuser censuring your lives, you are mistaken—that is not a way of escape which is either possible or honorable; the easiest and noblest way is not to be crushing others but to be improving yourselves. This is the prophecy which I utter to the judges who have condemned me.
How true have the last twenty-three centuries proved these words to be! How many deaths and ruined lives have been accomplished by that same spirit of intolerance! It led the way from Gethsemane to Golgotha. It is responsible for the death of the martyrs in all ages. It lighted the fagots that consumed the bodies of Giordano Bruno and Joan of Arc. Yes, and hundreds of others. How just is the praise with which the Saint Mark of Sokrates ends the Memorabilia of his master:
Of those who know what sort of a man Sokrates was, such as are lovers of virtue continue to regret him above all other men even to the present date, as having contributed in the highest degree to their advancement in goodness. To me, being such as I have described him, so pious that he did nothing without the sanction of the gods; so just, that he wronged no man even in the most trifling affair, but was of service in most important matters to those who enjoyed his society; so temperate that he never preferred pleasure to virtue; so wise that he never erred in distinguishing the better from the worse, needing no counsel from others but being sufficient in himself to discriminate between them; and so capable of discovering the character of others, of confuting those who were in error and of exhorting them to virtue and honor, he seemed to be such as the best and happiest of men would be.
Then to side with Truth is noble, when we share her wretched crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and profit and 'tis prosperous to be just,
Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside,
Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified,
And the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied.
Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes—they were souls that stood alone
While the men they agonized for, hurled the contumelious stone;
Stood serene, and down the future saw the golden beam incline,
To the side of perfect justice, mastered by their faith divine.—
They must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth.
Sokrates was early canonized as a Christian Saint, and Professor John Stuart Blackie (1808-1895) "Scotland's greatest Greek scholar," has taken the idea of his Latin refrain in the following poem from a rosary by an early Christian father beginning "Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis:"—"O, Sainted Socrates, pray for us."
O SANCTE SOCRATES, ORA PRO NOBIS!
Dear God by wrathful routs
How is thy church divided,
And how may he that doubts
In such turmoil be guided!
When weeping I behold
How Christian people quarrel,
Ofttimes from Heathens old
I fetch a saintly moral;
And while they fret with rage
The sore-distraught community,
I look for some Greek sage
Who preaches peace and unity.
And thus I pray:
O Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis!
Let faith and love and joy increase,
And reason rule and wrangling cease,
Good saint, we pray thee!
They pile a priestly fence
Of vain scholastic babble,
To keep out common sense
With the unlearned rabble.
A curious creed they weave,
And, for the church commands it,
All men must needs believe,
Though no man understands it;
Thus while they rudely ban
All honest thought as treason
I from the Heathen clan
Seek solace to my reason.
And thus I pray:
O Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis!
From creeds that men believe because
They fear a damnatory clause,
Good saint, deliver us!
Some preach a God so grim
That when his anger swelleth,
They crouch and cower to him
When sacred fear compelleth;
God loves his few pet lambs,
And saves his one pet nation,
The rest he largely damns
With swinging reprobation.
Thus banished from the fold,
I wisely choose to follow
Some sunny preacher old
Who worshiped bright Apollo.
And thus I pray:
O Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis!
From silly flocks of petted lambs,
And from a faith that largely damns,
Good saint, deliver us!
* * * * *
Such eager fancies vain
Shape forth the rival churches;
And each man's fuming brain
God's holy light besmirches;
And thus they all conspire
The primal truth to smother,
And think they praise their sire
By hating well their brother.
Such wrangling when I see
Such storms of godly rancor,
To Heathendom I flee
To cast a peaceful anchor.
And thus I pray:
O Sancte Socrates, ora pro nobis!
Let love and faith and joy increase,
And reason rule and wrangling cease,
Good saint, we pray thee!
Lomaland Photo. and Engraving Dept.
SOKRATES AND SENECA
(Berlin Museum)
Lomaland Photo. and Engraving Dept.
AVENUE OF ROYAL PALMS, CUBA
Lomaland Photo. and Engraving Dept.
CUBAN COUNTRY SCENE
FLORIDA PALMETTOS
ONE-HALF MILE AVENUEA CASUARINA AVENUE
TREES 13 YEARS OLD
ROYAL POINCIANA HOTEL, PALM BEACH, FLORIDA
Photos by Puffer, New York and Palm Beach
A VISIT TO A LOUISIANA SUGAR PLANTATION:
by Barbara McClung
THE writer recently made a visit to a section of the country that still retains much of its own distinctive individuality and charm, most delightful in these days, when the various widely-differing regions of our vast commonwealth seem to be trying to become as much alike as possible, and the very word provincial is a name of scorn. We left New Orleans in the early morning and much time was consumed in crossing the Mississippi on a ferry. Soon after reaching the other side, the sugar plantations began, and our way lay through mile after mile of brown furrowed fields stretching, as flat as the sea, to the distant river levee, the only high ground in sight. What a glorious scene it must be in the spring, when the young green cane begins to sprout, or in the fall, when it stands drawn up full height, waiting to be cut! It is an extremely wet country, full of countless ditches and trenches, and there is something about the flat land and straight, intersecting canals that reminds one of Holland. As the train swept through one plantation after another, we could see in the distance, gleaming white homesteads, set in little islands of green live-oaks, cut off by a fence from the spreading sea of bare fields. Each plantation had its sugar-house, lifting four or five tall smoke-stacks in air, and its laborers' quarters—quite a little village of cabins or cottages, and sometimes, we ran close enough to see old-time darkies in actual red bandannas, staring at the train.
There is a class of French "poor whites" in this region, called "Cajins"—a corruption of "Arcadians"—and they are indeed a forlorn remnant of those unfortunate exiles who wandered all the way from Nova Scotia to the bayous of Louisiana. The writer's memory reverted in a flash to the fields of Grandpré, which she had visited only last summer, and to the vision of the lonely well-sweep and straggling line of ancient French willows, which once bordered the vanished village street. Strange to say, there is a noticeable resemblance between the flat, inlet-threaded meadows of the Minas Basin and the winding bayous around us. Occasionally the plantations would give way to swamps, where palmettos, bamboos, and cypresses with their weirdly beautiful trailing moss, were growing out of a watery, glassy floor, and it was hard to realize that if drained, these marshes would be quite as good soil as the rest. We saw a solitary hunter, gun in hand, standing on a bit of tree trunk in the bog; how he could have gotten there without a boat or else wings, is a mystery.
The house at which we visited, realized in every way one's ideal of what an old plantation home should be. It is an immense square building with double galleries, tall white columns and green shutters; it faces the Mississippi, which, however, cannot be seen from the ground floor on account of the levee. The architecture is of engaging simplicity—four large rooms, each exactly twenty-five feet square, upstairs and down, with a hall eighteen feet wide between. At the rear is a long wing, perhaps a later addition, with the inevitable and delightful gallery around it. The house contains many treasures of beautiful antique workmanship and mementos of a by-gone time. Our hostess pointed with pride to an immense pair of glass candle shields, about two feet high, which had belonged to her grandmother. They stood on each side of the mantelpiece, over tall silver candlesticks, whose flame they could protect from all possible draughts. We slept in a high four-poster bed, with a canopy, lined with red pleated cloth, like the inside of a mushroom, which would have done credit to a lady of the ancient régime.
Though the sugar-making season was over on our host's plantation, he took us to one in the neighborhood that was still in operation. The equipment was of the most up-to-date kind—great iron claws to rake the cane from the cars to a sort of traveling trough, called a conveyor, which carries it up to the chopper: from whence it travels through several crushers until all the juice is squeezed out and the remaining pulp is as dry as tinder. This is carried off to be used as fuel or fertilizer. The cane juice goes from one boiling vat to another, being purified with lime and sulphur, and refined again and again, smelling more and more delicious at every stage of its progress. We watched the syrup being changed to sugar by a very interesting centrifugal process, and then shaken into barrels. Two barrels at a time were placed upon metal plates, and by means of an electric current, were made to dance gaily, shaking down the sugar as it fell until it was firmly packed. It was an absurd sight, and the writer was reminded at once of dancing furniture at a spiritualistic séance. We were surprised to learn that one-third of the ground has to be planted in corn to supply the stock; the crops are rotated so as to allow sugar-cane for two successive years, then corn the third, etc.
Our host and hostess and their family were true types of southern hospitality. The occasion of our visit was a wedding, and the old house was crowded to its utmost capacity, with new guests arriving on every train. Yet there was no stir of nervous excitement: everything moved with a tranquil gaiety, and we felt a delightful sense of informality as if we were a part of the household. Perhaps the strongest sense-impression which remains with the writer, is the memory of waking in the early morning and looking out, at the dawn-flushed sky beyond the white pillars of the verandah and the gray Spanish moss draping the live-oak trees. That tender, peaceful moment, full of color and soft brightness, seemed to seal upon the mind something of the poetry and the romance of the old South.