[328c]
concerning laws and government, now was the time to undertake it; for should I succeed in convincing one single person sufficiently I should have brought to pass all manner of good. Holding this view and in this spirit of adventure it was that I set out from home,—not in the spirit which some have supposed, but dreading self-reproach most of all, lest haply I should seem to myself to be utterly and absolutely nothing more than a mere voice and never to undertake willingly any action, and now to be in danger of proving false, in the first1 instance, to my friendship
1 The second danger was of “proving false to Philosophy,” see Plat. L. 7.328e below.