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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. How many years after The Clouds did the trial of Socrates happen?
(a) Two.
(b) Five.
(c) Twenty-four.
(d) One-hundred and eight.

2. What is Socrates' stance with respect to his sentence?
(a) He will find a way to avoid his sentence.
(b) He will not resist his sentence.
(c) He will fight his sentence aggressively.
(d) He will ask his friends to appeal to the court for mercy.

3. What position does Strepsiades have in society?
(a) Youth.
(b) Philosopher.
(c) Elder.
(d) Playwright.

4. Who is the god which the majority of Athenians pray to as their primary god?
(a) Zeus.
(b) Hermes.
(c) Poseidon.
(d) Apollo.

5. How would Aristophanes characterize the religious belief of Socrates?
(a) Anarchist.
(b) Deist.
(c) Atheist.
(d) Polytheist.

6. How does Socrates end the Crito dialogue?
(a) Resigned to prison.
(b) Confined to his school, awaiting his sentence.
(c) Plotting with Crito to break out of prison.
(d) Saying goodbye to several of his prized students.

7. Why does Socrates believe obedience to the law could not represent disrespectful behavior?
(a) Respecting one's death sentence is respecting death itself.
(b) The law is based upon the good, without question.
(c) Law is a great authority on earth, and should be respected.
(d) Prisoners serving their sentence with honor have a certain nobility about them.

8. What text does Pheidippides recite at the party Strepsiades throws for him?
(a) A poem about thievery.
(b) A dialogue in which Plato is humiliated by Socrates.
(c) A play about rape.
(d) A poem about incest.

9. On which point in Crito does Socrates differ markedly from his position in Apology?
(a) On the strength of his piety.
(b) On the certainty of his wisdom.
(c) On the importance of reputation.
(d) On what it is to be a just law.

10. What would happen if Socrates fled to a city that was well-governed?
(a) He could plot his revenge.
(b) He could live a life free from political ambition.
(c) He would finally get justice.
(d) He would be a law-breaker, and suffer from the same bad reputation.

11. What does Strepsiades think about the education Socrates offers him?
(a) Socrates' knowledge is rudimentary and beneath him.
(b) Strepsiades is too intellectually weak to make use of it.
(c) Strepsiades finds it fascinating and invaluable.
(d) Strepsiades is made immoral by Socrates' teachings.

12. Why does Strepsiades throw Pheidippides a party?
(a) Pheidippides successfully tricked Strepsiades' creditors.
(b) Pheidippides is getting married.
(c) Pheidippides has agreed to murder Socrates.
(d) Strepsiades is celebrating Pheidippides' passage into manhood.

13. Who wrote The Clouds?
(a) Aristophanes.
(b) Socrates.
(c) Aristotle.
(d) Plato.

14. According to The Clouds, what force holds communities and families together?
(a) Intellectual rigor.
(b) The oracle at Delphi.
(c) A faith in Zeus.
(d) Charity.

15. Why does law have authority?
(a) Laws are inherently good.
(b) Citizens have an interdependence on laws, and so give them authority.
(c) Laws have authority because of the threat of violent punishment.
(d) Laws are inherently just.

Short Answer Questions

1. Aristophanes' portrayal of Socrates would most closely match whose perception of Socrates?

2. Who is the first person to accuse Socrates of corrupting the youth?

3. Why doesn't Socrates try to argue about the principles of his philosophy with Crito?

4. What is the origin of the title The Clouds?

5. What relationship is Strepsiades to Pheidippides?

(see the answer keys)

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