Socrates in a better light....

I've criticized Socrates for being hypocritical concerning his assumptions. A perfect example being the soul's existence. "Let us examine it in some such manner as this: whether the souls of men who have died exist in the underworld or not." Here he starts his logic with the affirmation of the soul rather than the question of it.
Recently, however, I've been thinking that, although I've always respected Socrates, I've been a little harsh. If I were to replace the word "assumption" with "belief" it makes Socrates look a whole lot better.
It's true, that an argument has to start out with an assumption, but there is a difference, I think, between just an assumption, and a belief. Socrates starts with certain beliefs, and then orders life around those core beliefs. He believes that man has a soul and a body and that these are at two ends of the spectrum of being. Those are his beliefs about the nature of man, and those who listen can make there own personal decisions concerning man and his/her nature.
The difference between a belief like that of Socrates, and the belief in the Greek gods, is that the Greek gods have elaborate stories of mythological proportions and have personalities of their own, while Socrates' belief about the nature of man is his attempt to describe the existence of something beyond the physical that we all feel and have in us in some way. The nature of the soul and body is debatable, as well as their separation on a "spectrum". But their is some soul-like essence and an obvious physical body to all of life. You could call the soul an "ego" a "self" an "identity", and give it any nature you want, but I think it is hard to say that there is nothing but physical body...So for the sake of argument I think that Socrates' logic isn't flawed by assumption after all. The logic is based on a belief or idea, which I think is fine.