Just before the break of dawn in the Athenian prison, a solemn Socrates greets his visitor Crito, who wastes little time in revealing his plans for Socrates’ immediate escape. However, Socrates, somewhat surprisingly, does not seem quite so willing to leave his cell. Instead, to Crito’s shock and disappointment, he seems far more eager to remain, patiently awaiting his approaching execution. (Crito 43a - 44b)

What is appalling to Crito might be equally

”Apart from that, Socrates, it is actually wrong, in my opinion, to sacrifice your self, as you are proposing to do, when you could escape. You seem to be voluntarily choosing for yourself the kind of fate your enemies would have chosen for you-and did choose for you when they were trying to destroy you. (Crito 45c-d)”

Socrates says that Crito, “should only respect the opinions of wise men who interpret the events properly.” However, how might a wise man interpret the events Socrates is allowing to transpire, by not running off? Would they see it as a noble acceptance of his fate, or as acquiescence with an unjust ruling? Although Crito accepts this defense, I am not very sure he believes it. In fact, I’m sure that if he believed as Socrates did, that would have been the end of the encounter and Crito would have allowed the sentence to be conducted without any other intervention. Therefore, a subsequent argument proposed by Crito. However, this next argument is a bit more difficult for the evasive philosopher to tackle. It seems as though Crito would like to know the answer to what “wise men” might say about his submission to execution. That in fact he may be as unjust as those who condemn him.

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