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Athens, 399 BC. In what may be remembered as the first trial for crimes of opinion, Socrates is sentenced to death. Accused of corrupting youth with atheistic doctrines, the philosopher's line of defense is uncompromising and defiant. He is thus sentenced to drink hemlock by an even larger majority of jurors, and once in prison, awaiting execution, he refuses to flee lest he violate those laws to which he has always been devoted. Socrates was not only one of the best known and most influential philosophers in human history, but also the first martyr for his own ideas. His trial tells how the greatest democracy of the time could have sentenced the best of its citizens to death.
Athens, 399 BC. In what may be remembered as the first trial for crimes of opinion, Socrates is sentenced to death. Accused of corrupting youth with atheistic doctrines, the philosopher's line of defense is uncompromising and defiant. He is thus sentenced to drink hemlock by an even larger majority of jurors, and once in prison, awaiting execution, he refuses to flee lest he violate those laws to which he has always been devoted. Socrates was not only one of the best known and most influential philosophers in human history, but also the first martyr for his own ideas. His trial tells how the greatest democracy of the time could have sentenced the best of its citizens to death.