Page:Plato (IA platocollins00colliala).pdf/106

 young man named Meletus has brought against me on a charge of corrupting the youth;—and you?"

"I am prosecuting my father for murder," is the startling reply of Euthyphro; and then he proceeds to tell the story. A man employed on his father's estate, in the island of Naxos, had killed a fellow-slave in a drunken quarrel; and his father had bound the offender hand and foot, and thrown him into a ditch, while he sent to inquire of a diviner at Athens what he should do with him. But long before the messenger could return, the unfortunate slave had died of cold and hunger; and Euthyphro had felt it his duty to prosecute his father for murder. "My friends," says he, "call me impious and a madman for so doing; but I know better than they do in what true filial piety consists."

"And what is Piety?" asks Socrates; "the knowledge may be of use to me in my approaching trial."

"Doing as I am doing now," replies the other, in the true spirit of a Pharisee—"bringing a murderer to justice without respect of persons, and following the example set by the gods themselves."

But (asks Socrates again) what is the specific character of piety?—for there must be other pious acts besides prosecuting one's father, and the gods may disagree as to questions of right and wrong. Even suppose they all agree in loving a certain act, the fact of their loving it would not make it pious.

Then Euthyphro defines piety to be that branch of justice which chiefly concerns the gods; and that