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SCIENCES IN CONNEXION WITH THE STATE. 205no Eastern nation could a Socrates have found his sphere.But he became a martyr to his doctrines. It would besuperfluous to prove anew, the groundlessness of thecharges, that he denied the popular religion, and was acorrupter of the youth. 1 But we will not neglect to observe, that by his death he produced even more importantconsequences than by his life. If he had been snatchedaway by sickness, who knows whether he would have beenremembered more than other meritorious instructers ? Hisfriends and pupils would have spoken of him with respect,but hardly with enthusiasm. But the poisoned cup insuredhim immortality. By his death, in connexion with his doctrines, he exhibited in reality one of those sublime idealconceptions, of which the Grecian nation alone is so fertile ;he presented what till then had been wanting, the image ofa sage who dies for his convictions.The philosophy of Socrates had no immediate relationswith politics.Its object was man, considered as a moralbeing, not as a citizen. Hence it was indirectly of the moreimportance to the state ;since it was nothing less than anattempt to meet the ruin, with which the state was threatened by a false kind of philosophy. This object was notfolly attained ;buted to Socrates ?From his school, orbut must the blame of the failure be attrirather, from his circle, a number ofdistinguished minds were produced, who in part differedfrom each other in their opinions and systems,as oppositepoles. This could not have happened, but because Socrateshad no system, and hence laid no chains on the spirit ofinquiry.He would but excite the minds of others ;andhence we perceive how there could have been among hisassociates, an Antisthenes, who made self-denial, and anAristippus, who made enjoyment, the basis of ethics; aPyrrho, whose object it was to doubt, and a Euclid, whowas eager to demonstrate. As the philosophy of these menwas in no manner connected with politics,we pass overthem, that we may not leave unmentioned the greatestofall the pupils of Socrates.To comprehend the character of Plato, a genius would be1See, beside the works on the history of philosophy, the Essay of Tyclisen,Ueber den Process des Socrates, in Bibl. d. alten LitL u* Ktmst St. L 2.