Page:Greece from the Coming of the Hellenes to AD. 14.djvu/228

200 Politics—the art of social life. The leading names among them were Protagoras of Abdera, Gorgias of Leontini, Polus of Agrigentum, Hippias of Elis, Prodicus of Ceos. The apologue called "The Choice of Heracles," by the last named, has been preserved by Xenophon, and has been copied and translated everywhere. It is a plea for the strenuous life of virtue against the charms of pleasure and self-indulgence. The Sophists all differed in their views and methods and ought to be judged separately. They have, however, frequently been spoken of as a class, as if the tendency of their teaching was identical. Perhaps this view is not confined to moderns. The ordinary Athenian was apt to have the same idea of them, just as in our day men of business dismiss certain views and opinions with the contemptuous epithet of "academic." That this was in part at any rate the case is evident from the fact that when Aristophanes wished to attack them he selected as their representative the well-known figure of Socrates. In the "Clouds" there are attributed to Socrates many opinions and studies from which he was specially averse. The Satire is not even a parody of his teaching; it is quite beside the mark. But it showed what a certain sort of Athenians in the professional class thought of what we should call the "higher education." And the fate that shortly afterwards befel Socrates is connected with the popular view as to the evil tendency of sophistic teaching.

Socrates was born about B.C. 469, was brought up as a sculptor, and duly served his turn in the army—at Potidaea, Delium, and Amphipolis. But he very