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Section 67

"Completely, Socrates." "Then if this is true, my friend, there is great hope for anyone who arrives where I am going, that there, if anywhere, he will adequately acquire that for which we have made such great effort in our past life. So the journey now commanded of me is undertaken with good hope, as it would be by any man who believes his mind has been prepared by being purified." "Certainly," said Simmias. "And does not purification consist exactly in what was mentioned in the old argument—in separating the soul from the body as much as possible, and accustoming it to gather and collect itself from all parts of the body, and to dwell as far as possible, both in the present and in the future, alone by itself, freed from the body as if from bonds?" "Exactly," he said. "And is this very thing not called death—the release and separation of the soul from the body?" "Entirely so," he said. "And as we assert, the true philosophers are those who are most eager to release it, and this very thing—the release and separation of the soul from the body—is the practice of philosophers. Is that not so?" "It appears so." "Would it not be ridiculous, then, as I said at the beginning, for a man to train himself his whole life to live as close to death as possible, and then be aggrieved when death comes to him?" "Ridiculous, of course." "In truth, then, Simmias," he said, "those who practice philosophy rightly are practicing dying, and to them least of all men is being dead terrible. Consider it this way: if they are everywhere at odds with their body and desire to have their soul by itself, would it not be great unreasonableness if, when this finally happens, they should fear and be aggrieved, instead of going gladly to a place where they have hope of attaining what they loved throughout their life—which is wisdom—and of being rid of the association with the thing they despised? Many men, when their human loves—boyfriends, wives, or sons—have died, have been willing to descend voluntarily to Hades, drawn by the hope of seeing there those they desired, and being with them. Will a true lover of wisdom, who has firmly grasped this same hope that he will never find wisdom purely anywhere else but in Hades, be aggrieved at dying, and not go there gladly? We must believe he goes gladly, my comrade, if he is truly a philosopher. For he will firmly believe that nowhere else will he attain pure wisdom but there. And if this is so, as I just said, would it not be great unreasonableness if such a man feared death?" "Great indeed, by Zeus," he said.