Philosophy

The conversation between these two friends presents two moralities of reasoning and sanity (rationalism) that continues to form basic foundations of a society. Socrates found himself in a tough position after his friend Crito visited him in prison with an intention of helping him escape. Socrates had been wrongly accused of being immoral and corrupting the youth of Athens. Socrates was full aware of his sentence of death by drinking poison yet when his friend came to rescue him, he preferred to face the judgment rather than running away. Through Crito, his friends were concerned of losing a dear friend and that is why they were willing to corrupt the law and get their friend out of prison.  Socrates is seen here to side with the harsh decision government than his friends (Benson, 1992). The moral stand taken by Socrates is guided by his reasoning that, the society has its right in asserting its morals. To him, the society he was living in had found him guilty of contradicting its morals.

He explains that the society had judged him justly according to its standards of right and wrong. He therefore saw no reason of running away from his government. By the fact that he had accepted himself and was willing to remain as a member of Athenian society, he felt that he had made an agreement with that society to live by its laws. In his argument, corruption and escaping from prison presented a potential mischief and hurt to the overall society by trying to preserve his self-being out of justice system of the government (Benson, 1992). In this aspect, he wanted to remain as a good citizen, therefore, the idea of escaping to exile seemed dishonorable to him and therefore he could not abide to it.

In his other opinion, he feels proud of the kind of life he had led. In his part, He had accomplished his social responsibility for all of his life. Yet the same society had judge him unjustly. To Socrates, two wrongs do not make a right. Society had wronged by judging him unjustly, therefore, did not have to commit a counter-offence by escaping from prison.