Socrates Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Socrates - Essay Example Socrates was a Greek philosopher, whereas Cicero was a Roman rhetor. Socrates was born in 469 BC, while Cicero was born in 106 BC, so these philosophers expressed their wisdom in different epochs. They both used dialogues as a narrative and a polemical form to develop the state of mind of their students. Socratic dialogues criticized practices of the society, and it appeared that Socrates pretended to undermine undoubtful opinions of his students. On the other hand, Socrates and Cicero imposed different arguments to provide an understanding on the subject of justice. Therefore, 'Crito' implicated a hypothesis on a problem whether philosophers' escapes from jails would have been defined as an act of justice. Furthermore, Cicero analyzed the duties of justice from two relevant perspectives. According to him, justice must have been treated with only a respect for humanity. At the same time, he defined justice as not causing harm to any individual; analogically, Cicero forbade to lay a c laim on property that belonged to another person. Socrates and Cicero both stated that justice was a key virtue in the society. These philosophers had a clear opinion that justice dealt with matters relating to an idea of fairness (Cicero, 20; Jowett, 4). For instance, Cicero stated that righteous behaviour was a key ingredient of justice. According to the rhetor, meritocracy deserved to be extremely important for a justice' hegemony in the society. In order to achieve meritocracy, people needed to abide the laws that were issued in their community. From the other perspective, Socrates refused to escape from prison stating that this possible action of him must have been regarded as being totally unjust. He assumed that escaping from prison was equal to injuring the laws of Athens (Jowett, 5). Philosopher believed that escaping from prison would have been a case of returning an injustice for an injustice. Socrates and Cicero both believed that justice dealt with an idea of fairness. Therefore, Cicero argued that abiding the rule of law ensured equal distribution of rights in the society (Cicero, 21). Similarly, just law promoted fairness. In fact, these philosophers stated that justice demanded that people got what they truly deserved (Cicero, 20; Jowett, 2). Socrates always explained that emotions could alter one's judgement when deciding between a just decision and an unjust decision, because emotions could force an individual to commit an act of injustice. So, Socrates denied Crito’s plan to help him in a form of escaping from the gail. But, Crito forced a thesis that the philosopher's escape would have been just because the sentence he faced in Athens was injust. Socrates answered that justice at all time involved facing a fair trial and getting a fair sentence afterwards. He stated that although his sentence was unjust he had an obligation to obey the laws of Athens (Jowett, 12). He argued that his duty to Athens was to accept the sentence. Generall y, Socrates and Cicero acknowledged that the laws served interests of the people and they did not subjugate to desires of the prominent leaders of demos or populi Roma (Cicero, 35; Jowett, 15). Then, Socrates said that justice was all about fulfilling one's obligation; for example, when an individual had a debt the just thing to do was to return the debt in time. He strongly discouraged people from viewing justice as a punishment or a revenge. According to the philosopher, retaliation was unacceptable. Analogically, philosopher considered retaliation as a wrong way of justifying his escape from the gail; according to Socrates, act of retaliation, as a rule, resulted in harming another individual. He argued that if in the process of seeking justice one ended up harming another person, then the person seeking justice was committing an injustice (Jowett, 13). From Crito’s view (when planning Socrates' escape), every philosopher was supposed to fight against the unjust sentence. Then, Socrates stated that retaliation against the unjust