I think, perhaps every day, about the obligations of the philosopher. I do not fault those who only devote themselves to the learning and teaching of ethics. They have an immeasurable impact on their students, and those students go out, at least we hope, to be good citizens who act in the best interests of the society. Day after day, year after year, they patiently teach, trying to enlighten and engage young minds. They formulate the values and ideals that make these people who we hope they will be. There cannot be any democracy worthy of the name without these teachers.

In this regard, I will always honor and appreciate my teacher and friend Theophrastos. His real name is Tyrtamos but Aristotle gave him his nickname, 'godly-phrased', because he has a divine style of expression. He studied with Plato and then Aristotle, and then he became the head of the Lyceum and it has flourished for a generation under him. He studies plants like no one has ever done. He teaches everything: from physics to grammar to logic to virtue. He taught me in the tradition of our great Athenian ethical and political philosophers, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. He taught me about laws, institutions and in general about how Greeks should think about politics. I honor him and he will continue to be a great influence on me in this new stage of my life.

I know that I do not have a mind equal to his or to his teachers. I write my books, collect fables, transmit learning and insight. I am many things: I am productive, talented, and I am interested in many subjects.

But I have another part of me that those great men did not have. It is my hope, in this new role, to apply their wisdom to life.

And even before I start to rule, I know the path and I know the goal and I even know how I hope to be remembered. I do not want to be a king. I want to create laws and apply them. I want to be a lawgiver. Because all the philosophy and ethics and science are abstractions if they do not inform how people interact in a society. After all the eloquence and morality, there is real life.

I know that for all my efforts, I will not be remembered in the great line of my teacher and his teachers. But perhaps all this talk of greatness and memory is just another abstraction.

I think a great deal about the Peripatos, the walkway that connects the shrines around the Acropolis. To me, the law is the walkway that connects the shrines of knowledge and wisdom. It is where I want to walk. I want to live this life, right now, among living people, who are breathing and talking and raising their children. I want to create a pathway that will connect the living to the ideals of a true democracy.

I have written a work on Socrates, but I wonder if people will understand my intent. When one thinks of Socrates, one cannot help but think about his death. And the conclusion one may draw is that the people of Athens are militantly against the intellectuals such as Socrates.

I am afraid that my work will be misunderstood. I do not mean it as an attack on Athens's treatment of philosophers. I allude often to locate Socrates' life within the continuum of philosophical activity in Athens, in temporal and social terms, and moreover in terms of the influences on his ideas. I try to synchronize the birth dates and dates of deaths for leading philosophers. I talk about the relationship between philosophers: Who were the teachers? Who were the pupils? I talk about their positive impact on the society and its values.

I fear that the story of Socrates will be remembered as the death of a philosopher for being a philosopher. Anti-intellectualism is a great danger for any society. The whole problem of democracy is that the demos, the average citizens, can be manipulated by a rousing speech, a slogan, a trumped-up charge or accusation, or a false polemic against a foreign enemy.

But another danger is to be so against anti-intellectualism that one enrages those who may be induced to hate philosophers and then, by extension, their logic and values.

Only a few of us are philosophers. Only a few of us have the knowledge and the intellect to approach the world by applying theory to life and practice. Few of us are truly logical. Most of us allow ourselves to be controlled by our emotions and passions. The challenge is to provide a sensible context for the society through laws that are the practical applications of important principles.

An ideal society would be governed by philosopher-leaders who are intellectual but not elitist and condescending. If they present the wrong model, unscrupulous leaders will rise and prey on the resentments of the citizens who know that they are neither intellectual nor members of the elite and who will then throw wisdom and institutions and laws right into the sea.

The death of Socrates was indeed a terrible tragedy, but the tragedy will only expand if Athenians identify with those who in their injustice and superstition, sentenced him to death. Instead, they should identify with a man who told the truth, who revered the laws, and who, despite everything, believed in his fellow human-beings.

In my book of Aesop’s fables, I recount the story about dreams, to explain why people have both true and false dreams. The story starts when Zeus gives Apollo the power of prophecy so that he excels all others. But Apollo acts superior to others, so Zeus fashions certain dreams which tell men in their sleep what was really going to happen. Apollo discovers that no one needs his prophecy, so he begs Zeus to relent and stop ruining the business of his oracle. Zeus compromises by fashioning certain dreams for men which would show them false things in their sleep; in order that, having been deceived about the truth in their dreams, they might turn again to the oracles of the god. So, dreams could be either true or false.

As simple as the stories of the gods or fables based on them may be, they have much to tell us. In my mind, dreams and prophecies and oracles are all guesses about the future, and we validate them if they come true and make excuses for them if they don’t. Calling some dreams “lying dreams” is a way to defend the others as true.

I have made a prediction that one empire will fall and another will arise. When one empire is in power, it feels like it will rule forever. It goes to great lengths to give the impression of permanence. But one thing is for certain: nothing is for certain. Therefore, another thing is for certain as well: No kingdom will rule forever. The very nature of empire is to rule over many different peoples and kingdoms, and at least some of them, at any time, will resist and, if they can, revolt.

One day, some wise man might take my prediction that the Persians will fall and say that this proves that there is destiny, since I foretold it. But I am not an oracle; I just have a sense of how the world works. Which is probably all that oracles are, anyway: Using the information at hand to make a prediction. I’ll say it again: The problem with dreams and oracles is that we draw huge conclusions about fate and destiny if they come true and somehow excuse them if they don’t.

But no one and nothing knows the future.

One of the fundamental stories of Athens is about Theseus and the ship in which he sailed here. After mastering the Labyrinth and slaying the Minotaur, Theseus voyaged from Crete and landed in Delos. He danced a dance with his youths called The Crane (which I hear is still performed by the Delians), imitating the circling passages in the Labyrinth, and consisting of certain rhythmic and twisting movements.

My first thought is that this dance is born from myth, and it is still danced today. And my second thought is about the next part of the story, when Theseus approached the coast of Attica and forgot to hoist the sail which was to have been the sign of their safe return to his father Aegeus. This one threw himself down from the rock in mistaken grief and drowned in the Aegean Sea.

There are other aspects of the story that are very interesting to me, but I think a great deal about, and I have now acted on this, the ship itself. Yes, there is an ancient thirty-oared galley which is said to be the very ship on which Theseus sailed and returned in safety. It has been preserved by the Athenians down to my time. And now I have been active in its maintenance.

Like anything else, and quite properly, it is the subject of discussion and debate. Some insist that it is not the same vessel. Some insist that it is the very vessel and should not be tampered with, even as it rots. But I have acted on behalf of the prevailing side which believes that the old timbers should be removed from time to time when necessary, and that new and sound ones should be put in their places.

I know what it meant to me as I grew up in Phalerum that Theseus set sail from our port. I always thought of myself, setting sail into life’s adventures from the same harbor. Was there a Theseus? Did he set sail from that port? Did he dance a dance celebrating his mythic adventures? Is this ship his ship?

But I am thinking, in my jumbled thoughts, about continuing to dance a mythic dance, celebrating the victory over the mazes and beasts of life. And I am thinking about continuing to preserve and sustain and renew a ship that is at least supposedly a relic of that epic voyage. The dance and the ship give us active, visual, physical symbols of a mythic past.

If we are to be a people and a state, we need these symbols of a common past when we were not dependent on any foreign power, when our king was a champion of civilization who fought the symbol of men who are half-beasts, when his father fell into the sea that bears his name, reminding us of the love of all fathers for their sons, how one generation lives and dies for the next.

The more difficult question is about the relationship between sons and their fathers: What does the new generation owe the old? Certainly, to continue the traditions, to dance the dances and fix the timbers. But then to find its own way in the new labyrinths, to set out on its own voyages, to use the old to create the new.

I have been thinking about the two brothers, Helikon, the good and loyal son, and Kithairon, the disloyal son and patricide, who tries to kill Helikon by throwing him over the cliff, only to be borne with him over the edge. They are both turned into the mountains in Boeotia that bear their names.

So much happens on Mount Kithairon. It is sacred to Dionysus, who dances there in his wild rites with his bacchants. Pentheus and Actaeon are dismembered there. It is where Oedipus is exposed to the elements. Heracles hunts and kills the Lion of Kithairon.

Mount Helikon, on the other hand, is the home of the Muses and Apollo, the place of the springs of art and light and wisdom. Hesiod draws his inspiration from the sacred groves and flowing streams.

I am thinking about the story in which Mount Helikon and Mount Kithairon compete in a musical contest. Kithairon wins. Helikon knows that art should not be used to rile up the wild and savage in humans. Thus gripped in anguish, he tears out a smooth rock, and the mountain shudders; and groaning pitiably he dashes it from on high into ten thousand stones.

I see Kithairon trying to throw Helikon off the mountain and both of them going over the cliff. Evil will always try to destroy good but will destroy itself in the process. And I hear Helikon’s anguish at losing the contest.

Of course, we are speaking of the two possibilities of being human, evil, and good. I know that I have my many faults, and I certainly have many excesses. I have lived these last years, ruling Athens with great energy which spilled over like wine all over the floor. I know that I have done the will of the powerful to gain power myself.

But I have been a person of books, laws, legislation, constitutions, statesmanship, politics, and I have tried to use all of these to build walls around Athens. I have tried to sing the songs of Helikon.

My faults are trivial in contrast to my namesake, the Besieger at our walls. He will not only knock down the outer walls but destroy all the walls and buildings that I have built to make the city great and peaceful. The rocks are flying, and the mountain shudders, and I hear my own pitiable groaning, and I feel Athens dashed into ten thousand stones.

I not only can see the future, but also hear it. I can hear the hymns and the poems and the mixture of the political and the religious, as my beloved Athens will pay tribute to their new master. Demetrius is riding high right now; he is a master of the world. I admit that he has bested me. And the songs will be sung in his honor. But these are the songs of Kithairon.

And I can see that at some point, his violence will be his undoing. Someday, he will throw himself over the cliff and turn into stone.

Athens is a proud city and justly so. Our accomplishments in government and culture are unsurpassed in this world. And yet we have suffered through excruciating moments and periods in our history. Major developments caused us to change and adapt. Say, when after Alexander’s death we were forced into agreement with Antipater, or when he died and Polyperchon allowed us to restore democracy. Or when Cassander installed a new government and I emerged to head the new government.

I know that I was a figure of controversy. I know that I took and gained a great deal of power, and that I was like a king in some ways. I always knew that my downfall could come from my fellow citizens rather than my enemies. And now I must leave.

Yet I hope that much of what I legislated and did will be remembered for the good. I hope that it will be remembered that I strove to keep Athenian autonomy in the face of Macedonian domination. I hope that the peace and prosperity of my years, which cannot be denied even by my detractors, will be a major part of my legacy. It feels like my enemy Demetrius is allowing me to flee to Thebes. Perhaps this is because in some way, even he respects me.

Most of all, I re-invented Athens for ten years and enabled it to flourish. And now I must re-invent myself. I have been the intellectual, the politician, the lawgiver and now I am the exile, fortunate just to survive in disgrace. I came from books, and perhaps now I will return to books. I will certainly have plenty of time to write. I will spend my life reading and conversing with the wise of the ages through their writings.

The philosopher in me says: States and individuals must always be prepared to change, to adapt to unforeseen situations, to be re-inventive. It is the only way to survive.

But as I leave, ready to enter the new stage of my life, whatever it may be, I do so with intense regret. What a glorious opportunity I had! I just wish it had lasted a little longer. For this was the time in my life when I could apply all the philosophy and all the books to the real lives of real people. For what is the wisdom of the ages if it does not inform the present?