Plato

...

Next point though, aimed not anymore at Socrates, but rather at his friends and family, which he, Socrates, would put in danger of exile, disfranchisement, and loss of property in the case of him escaping the prison. Also escaping the prison would not help Socrates to bring children up and educate them, as if he lives the city and take them with him out of the city, he would make them strangers, too, by depriving them from their homeland. Even if he would not take children with him, but escape himself, how would his absence be different from his death? In both cases he is not bringing them up, nor does he educate them. In any way, if his friends can be considered friends, they will look after Socrates children both in the case him living in a different city and in the case him going away to the underworld.

Last, but not least argument Socrates implies against him escaping the prison is that if he accepts his fate, he will go to the underworld wronged by people, but not by the laws. However, if he does otherwise and violates the laws, their brothers, the laws of the underworld, will not receive Socrates kindly, knowing that he tried to destroy the laws as far as he could.

My personal opinion is that very similar reasoning holds for us today. We may not think about this matter and why we obey the laws of our states and countries, but the implications of the existence of the laws are still be quite the same. We are required to obey our country’s laws for extremely similar reasons that were presented throughout this essay. For example, we the same as Socrates have a right to leave our country of the birth and go to other country by our own will, if we do not like it, the only point, the only point is if the other country will be willing to accept you, but the same was held for Socrates, too. So, if we still living in our country, we show the agreement with its laws and the way of living and therefore, according to an agreement we must obey its laws and fulfill our duties to our country. Finally, we can see this opposition of an individual against the country with its laws in the case of violation of the last in our modern judicial system, when an individual commits a criminal crime he or she is defending him or her against state’s or country’s charges.

The conclusion here is that the laws of country must be followed by its citizens and stay superior to family and friends. Of course, there is a choice whether to obey the laws and follow them or not to do so and by that violate them and so do a wrongdoing. Different can consider the same situations in different way, but from the common view perspective of the just, one must obey the laws of his or her country both in ancient times and today.

References

Plato, translated by G.M.A. Grube (2002). Five Dialogues (2nd ed.). Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.