Abstract: For the past twenty or more years historians of Greek philosophy have given an account of Socratic ethics as reflected in the Socratic dialogues of Plato that emphasizes the agent’s pursuit of his/her own well-being. For example, Terrence Irwin summarizes the ethical position to which he thinks Socrates is committed in Plato’s Socratic dialogues, Charmides and Euthydemus as follows: in all our rational actions, we pursue our own happiness and if we do not pursue our own happiness, we are not acting rationally. (Plato’s Ethics: 53) In this paper I interrogate and ultimately reject this standard view of Socratic ethics by studying the eudaimonist implications of the so-called prudential principle (the principle that everyone desires the good) in light of Shantideva’s Bodhicaryaavatara. In what follows, I first discuss the work that the prudential principle is commonly made to do in rational eudaimonist accounts of Socratic ethics. I then contrast the altruism inherent in Shantideva’s treatment of what he calls the “sama dukha sukhaa sarveheh:  the equality of all beings with respect to well-being and suffering,” with the purportedly egoistic implications of the prudential principle. My purpose is to show the prudential principle in the Socratic dialogues is not tied in any substantive way to eudaimonism construed as agent-centered. In the second part of this paper, I compare the function of arguments from transmigration in Shantideva’s text and in Plato’s text in terms of how such arguments are used to undermine strictly egoistic accounts of rational motivation. The paper concludes with a discussion of the virtue of equanimity as discussed by both authors. I argue that the Socratic dialogue has the intended, though not necessarily realized goal of creating an association between persons who will the good based on the shared awareness that everyone desires the good.  This awareness, that everyone desires the good, has its own motivating force that can be expressed as the desire to benefit others. Fundamental to Socratic ethics is this orientation of extending the good. Thus I want to underscore the importance of the prudential principle for an interpretation of Socratic eudaimonism in which the equality of self and other form a part of Socratic teaching. I hope that by studying this principle of equality as it appears in the 7th^th century madhymaka text alongside of Plato’s Socratic dialogues, we can test the meaning of Classical Greek eudaimonism.