The accusation of “putting himself above the laws,” appears in the same way in the Nubes of Aristophanes, 1035-1400, &c.:—

ὡς ἡδὺ καινοῖς πράγμασιν καὶ δεξιοῖς ὁμιλεῖν
καὶ τῶν καθεστώτων νόμων ὑπερ φρονεῖν δύνασθαι.

Compare the rhetor Aristeides — Ὑπὲρ τῶν Τεττάρων, p. 133; vol. iii. p. 480, Dindorf.

[12] The dramatic position of Sokrates has been compared by Köchly, p. 382, very suitably with that of Antigoné, who, in burying her deceased brother, acts upon her own sense of right and family affections, in defiance of an express interdict from sovereign authority. This tragical conflict of obligations, indicated by Aristotle as an ethical question suited for dialectic debate (Topic. i. p. 105, b. 22), was handled by all the three great tragedians; and has been ennobled by Sophokles in one of his best remaining tragedies. The Platonic Apology presents many points of analogy with the Antigoné, while the Platonic Kriton carries us into an opposite vein of sentiment. Sokrates after sentence, and Antigoné after sentence, are totally different persons. The young maiden, though adhering with unshaken conviction to the rectitude of her past disobedience, cannot submit to the sentence of death without complaint and protestation. Though above all fear she is clamorous in remonstrances against both the injustice of the sentence and the untimely close of her career: so that she is obliged to be dragged away by the officers (Soph. Antig. 870-877; compare 497-508, with Plato, Krito. p. 49 C; Apolog. p. 28 D, 29 C). All these points enhance the interest of the piece, and are suited to a destined bride in the flower of her age. But an old philosopher of seventy years of age has no such attachment to life remaining. He contemplates death with the eye of calm reason: he has not only silenced “the child within us who fears death” (to use the remarkable phrase of Plato, Phædon, p. 77 E), but he knows well that what remains to him of life must be short; that it will probably be of little value, with diminished powers, mental as well as bodily; and that if passed in exile, it will be of no value at all. To close his life with dignity is the best thing which can happen to him. While by escape from the prison he would have gained little or nothing; he is enabled, by refusing the means of escape, to manifest an ostentatious deference to the law, and to make peace with the Athenian authorities after the opposition which had been declared in his Apology. Both in the Kriton and in the Phædon, Sokrates exhibits the specimen of a man adhering to previous conviction, unaffected by impending death, and by the apprehensions which that season brings upon ordinary minds; estimating all things then as before, with the same tranquil and independent reason.

Harangue of Sokrates delivered in the name of the Laws, would have been applauded by all the democratical patriots of Athens.

This dialogue puts into the mouth of Sokrates a rhetorical harangue forcible and impressive, which he supposes himself to hear from personified Nomos or Athens, claiming for herself and her laws plenary and unmeasured obedience from all her citizens, as a covenant due to her from each. He declares his own heartfelt adhesion to the claim. Sokrates is thus made to express the feelings and repeat the language of a devoted democratical patriot. His doctrine is one which every Athenian audience would warmly applaud — whether heard from speakers in the assembly, from litigants in the Dikastery, or from dramatists in the theatre. It is a doctrine which orators of all varieties (Perikles, Nikias, Kleon, Lysis, Isokrates, Demosthenes, Æschines, Lykurgus) would be alike emphatic in upholding: upon which probably Sophists habitually displayed their own eloquence, and tested the talents of their pupils. It may be considered as almost an Athenian common-place. Hence it is all the better fitted for Plato’s purpose of restoring Sokrates to harmony with his fellow-citizens. It serves as his protestation of allegiance to Athens, in reply to the adverse impressions prevalent against him. The only singularity which bestows special pertinence on that which is in substance a discourse of venerated common-place, is — that Sokrates proclaims and applies his doctrine of absolute submission, under the precise circumstances in which many others, generally patriotic, might be disposed to recede from it — where he is condemned (unjustly, in his own persuasion) to suffer death — yet has the opportunity to escape. He is thus presented as a citizen not merely of ordinary loyalty but of extraordinary patriotism. Moreover his remarkable constancy of residence at Athens is produced as evidence, showing that the city was eminently acceptable to him, and that he had no cause of complaint against it.[13]

[13] Plato, Krito. c. 14, p. 52 B. οὐ γὰρ ἄν ποτε τῶν ἄλλων Ἀθηναίων ἁπάντων διαφερόντως ἐν αὐτῇ ἐπεδήμεις, εἰ μή σοι διαφερόντως ἤρεσκε· c. 12, p. 50 D. φέρε γάρ, τί ἐγκαλῶν ἡλῖν τε καὶ τῇ πόλει ἐπιχειρεῖς ἡμᾶς ἀπολλύναι;

The harangue insists upon topics common to Sokrates with other citizens, overlooking the specialties of his character.

Throughout all this eloquent appeal addressed by Athens to her citizen Sokrates, the points insisted on are those common to him with other citizens: the marked specialties of his character being left unnoticed. Such are the points suitable to the purpose (rather Xenophontic than Platonic, herein) of the Kriton; when Sokrates is to be brought back within the pale of democratical citizenship, and exculpated from the charge of incivism. But when we read the language of Sokrates both in the Apology and in the Gorgias, we find a very different picture given of the relations between him and Athens. We find him there presented as an isolated and eccentric individual, a dissenter, not only departing altogether from the character and purposes general among his fellow-citizens, but also certain to incur dangerous antipathy, in so far as he publicly proclaimed what he was. The Kriton takes him up as having become a victim to such antipathy: yet as reconciling himself with the laws by voluntarily accepting the sentence; and as persuaded to do so, moreover, by a piece of rhetoric imbued with the most genuine spirit of constitutional democracy. It is the compromise of his long-standing dissent with the reigning orthodoxy, just before his death. Ἐν εὐφημίᾳ χρὴ τελευτᾷν.[14]

[14] Plato, Phædon, p. 117 D.