'"
"We meet again."
"Good! and when we meet again, we will go with the children together
into the woods."
"Socrates was not what I thought he was."
"Go! I want to sleep."
She went, but met in the doorway Plato and Crito.
"The hour approaches, friends," said Socrates wearily, and with
feverish eyes.
"Are you calm, Master?"
"To say the truth, I am quite calm. I will not assert that I am
joyful, but my conscience does not trouble me."
"When, Socrates, when--will it happen?"
"You mean, When is it to happen,--the last thing? Plato, my friend,
my dearest ... it hastens.... I have just now enjoyed a sleep. I
have been over the river on the other side; I have seen for a moment
the original forms of imperishable Beauty, of which things on earth
are only dim copies.... I have seen the future, the destinies of the
human race; I have spoken to the mighty, the lofty, and the pure; I
have learnt the wise Order which guides the apparent great disorder;
I trembled at the unfathomable secret of the Universe of which I had
a glimmering perception, and I felt the immensity of my ignorance.
Plato, you shall write what I have seen. You shall teach the
children of men to estimate things at their proper value, to look up
to the Invisible with awe, to revere Beauty, to cultivate virtue,
and to hope for final deliverance, as they work, through faithful
performance of duty and self-renunciation.
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