Dying Well Theme Analysis

Socrates is strikingly unfazed by the prospect of his own execution. According to his worldview, this attitude models a wise person’s approach to death: if one’s goodness matters more than one’s life, then death is insignificant for anyone who has lived well. The good philosopher can die without fear. This promise is one of the main concerns of Platonic philosophy: living by well-reasoned, consistent principles can liberate the individual from fleeting, day-to-day concerns in order to cultivate knowledge of an absolute, eternal truth that transcends life and death.

Very early in the dialogue, Crito notes that Socrates is able to face death with extraordinary tranquility. He does not immediately wake Socrates when he enters his cell, letting him sleep in order to spare him thought of the fate that awaits him. Crito assumes that this is the kindest course of action by picturing himself in a similar situation, imagining that he would not want to lie awake in distress, thinking of his impending death. However, when Socrates awakes, it is clear that Crito has failed to empathize with him. He appears quite calm, and gently reproaches Crito for not waking him right away. Crito can only respond to this attitude with uncomprehending wonder and admiration: “often in the past throughout my life, I have considered the way you live happy, and especially so now that you bear your present misfortune so easily and lightly.” Crito’s failure to anticipate his emotional state shows that they see death in fundamentally different ways. Socrates’ way of life seems to have granted him a happiness so deeply rooted that it holds out even in the face of death; however, this happiness remains beyond immediate comprehension for those who are not as wise. Somehow, the way Socrates lives his life has taught him to peacefully accept things that would make Crito miserable, enabling him to experience a uniquely stable and permanent sort of peace.

Socrates does not respond to Crito’s surprise beyond noting that it would not be reasonable for him to fear death. He neglects to justify this conviction, but it seems to have something to do with being old: “it would not be fitting at my age,” he says, “to resent the fact that I must die now.” Crito agrees, but notes that many other people of Socrates’ age are nevertheless quite frightened of it. Socrates merely confirms Crito’s comment––“that is so”––before turning the conversation in another direction. This response falls short of a full argument about why it is unreasonable for an old man to fear death. However, by emphasizing his age, Socrates implicitly stresses that he has lived a full life: it makes no sense, he seems to say, to resent the fact that his life is being cut short, since death would come soon anyways.

Though curt, Socrates’ response implicitly demonstrates what makes him different from other people. He and Crito agree that it would not make sense to resent the inevitability of death, especially as an old man. By admitting that others resent it all the same, Socrates shows that other people’s fear of death directly contradicts a logical perspective on the matter. His philosophical approach allows him to look death in the face and assess it reasonably, making peace with something that terrifies most everyone else. In this sense, the practice of philosophy has prepared him for death.

The end of the dialogue reinforces this interpretation, as Socrates concludes the part of his argument delivered through the persona of “the laws” by considering his fate in the underworld. He does not detail his views on the afterlife, but he makes the stakes of his decision quite clear: “do not value either your children or life or anything else more than goodness, in order than when you arrive in Hades you may have all this as your defense before the rulers there. ... If you depart ... the laws of the underworld will not receive you kindly, knowing that you tried to destroy us [the laws] as far as you could.” This conclusion aligns Socrates’ moral convictions with an absolute cosmic good attainable by acting in accordance with certain fixed moral principles. Modifying one’s beliefs to suit one’s circumstances, on the other hand, link one with the chaos of the mortal world, and apparently incurs some risk of punishment in the afterlife.

Finally, Socrates drops the voice of “the laws” to affirm his absolute belief in this approach to death: “be assured that these are the words I seem to hear, as the Corybants [a musical band of worshippers of the goddess Cybele] seem to hear the music of their flutes, and the echo of these words resounds in me, and makes it impossible to hear anything else.” Socrates’ relentless pursuit of logical conclusions has aligned him so thoroughly with the divine order of things that he perceives the certainty of his convictions as a mystical experience. His belief in absolute truth makes questions of life, death, and public opinion meaningless; he rests easy, surrounded by a divine music which only he can hear.

These discussions of death comprise the very beginning and very end of the Crito, structurally framing the entire dialogue. All the intervening topics discussed––politics, morality, and so on––are therefore, in some sense, inflected and shadowed by death. Through this structural choice, Plato implicitly makes the case for living as Socrates did: by following Socrates’ example, it stands to reason that the reader, too, can experience his uncanny, unshakeable happiness at the hour of death. This promise is a silent but central dynamic of the dialogue’s work, making the case that ceaselessly and rationally investigating the beliefs others take for granted can win the philosopher access to an permanent and transcendent peace.