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[ 19-01-2017 ]
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[ Philosophy ]
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[Aristotle on Rhetoric
Book I - Chapter 1
[1354a] Rhetoric is the counterpart of Dialectic. Both alike are concerned with such things as come, more or less, within the general ken of all men and belong to no definite science. Accordingly all men make use, more or less, of both; for to a certain extent all men attempt to discuss statements and to maintain them, to defend themselves and to attack others. Ordinary people do this either at random or through practice and from acquired habit. Both ways being possible, the subject can plainly be handled systematically, for it is possible to inquire the reason why some speakers succeed through practice and others spontaneously; and every one will at once agree that such an inquiry is the function of an art.
Now, the framers of the current treatises on rhetoric have constructed but a small portion of that art. The modes of persuasion are the only true constituents of the art: everything else is merely accessory. These writers, however, say nothing about enthymemes, which are the substance of rhetorical persuasion, but deal mainly with non-essentials. The arousing of prejudice, pity, anger, and similar emotions has nothing to do with the essential facts, but is merely a personal appeal to the man who is judging the case. Consequently if the rules for trials which are now laid down some states -- especially in well-governed states -- were applied everywhere, such people would have nothing to say. All men, no doubt, think that the laws should prescribe such rules, but some, as in the court of Areopagus, give practical effect to their thoughts and forbid talk about non-essentials. This is sound law and custom. It is not right to pervert the judge by moving him to anger or envy or pity -- one might as well warp a carpenter's rule before using it. Again, a litigant has clearly nothing to do but to show that the alleged fact is so or is not so, that it has or has not happened. As to whether a thing is important or unimportant, just or unjust, the judge must surely refuse to take his instructions from the litigants: he must decide for himself all such points as the law-giver has not already defined for him.
Now, it is of great moment that well-drawn laws should themselves define all the points they possibly can and leave as few as may be to the decision of the judges; and this for several reasons. First, to find one man, or a few men, who are sensible persons and [1354b] capable of legislating and administering justice is easier than to find a large number. Next, laws are made after long consideration, whereas decisions in the courts are given at short notice, which makes it hard for those who try the case to satisfy the claims of justice and expediency. The weightiest reason of all is that the decision of the lawgiver is not particular but prospective and general, whereas members of the assembly and the jury find it their duty to decide on definite cases brought before them. They will often have allowed themselves to be so much influenced by feelings of friendship or hatred or self-interest that they lose any clear vision of the truth and have their judgement obscured by considerations of personal pleasure or pain. In general, then, the judge should, we say, be allowed to decide as few things as possible. But questions as to whether something has happened or has not happened, will be or will not be, is or is not, must of necessity be left to the judge, since the lawgiver cannot foresee them. If this is so, it is evident that any one who lays down rules about other matters, such as what must be the contents of the "introduction" or the "narration" or any of the other divisions of a speech, is theorizing about non-essentials as if they belonged to the art. The only question with which these writers here deal is how to put the judge into a given frame of mind. About the orator's proper modes of persuasion they have nothing to tell us; nothing, that is, about how to gain skill in enthymemes.
Hence it comes that, although the same systematic principles apply to political as to forensic oratory, and although the former is a nobler business, and fitter for a citizen, than that which concerns the relations of private individuals, these authors say nothing about political oratory, but try, one and all, to write treatises on the way to plead in court. The reason for this is that in political oratory there is less inducement to talk about nonessentials. Political oratory is less given to unscrupulous practices than forensic, because it treats of wider issues. In a political debate the man who is forming a judgement is making a decision about his own vital interests. There is no need, therefore, to prove anything except that the facts are what the supporter of a measure maintains they are. In forensic oratory this is not enough; to conciliate the listener is what pays here. It is other people's affairs that are to be decided, so that the judges, intent on their own satisfaction and listening with partiality, surrender themselves to the disputants instead of judging between them. [1355a] Hence in many places, as we have said already, irrelevant speaking is forbidden in the law-courts: in the public assembly those who have to form a judgement are themselves well able to guard against that.
It is clear, then, that rhetorical study, in its strict sense, is concerned with the modes of persuasion. Persuasion is clearly a sort of demonstration, since we are most fully persuaded when we consider a thing to have been demonstrated. The orator's demonstration is an enthymeme, and this is, in general, the most effective of the modes of persuasion. The enthymeme is a sort of syllogism, and the consideration of syllogisms of all kinds, without distinction, is the business of dialectic, either of dialectic as a whole or of one of its branches. It follows plainly, therefore, that he who is best able to see how and from what elements a syllogism is produced will also be best skilled in the enthymeme, when he has further learnt what its subject-matter is and in what respects it differs from the syllogism of strict logic. The true and the approximately true are apprehended by the same faculty; it may also be noted that men have a sufficient natural instinct for what is true, and usually do arrive at the truth. Hence the man who makes a good guess at truth is likely to make a good guess at probabilities.
It has now been shown that the ordinary writers on rhetoric treat of non-essentials; it has also been shown why they have inclined more towards the forensic branch of oratory.
Rhetoric is useful (1) because things that are true and things that are just have a natural tendency to prevail over their opposites, so that if the decisions of judges are not what they ought to be, the defeat must be due to the speakers themselves, and they must be blamed accordingly. Moreover, (2) before some audiences not even the possession of the exactest knowledge will make it easy for what we say to produce conviction. For argument based on knowledge implies instruction, and there are people whom one cannot instruct. Here, then, we must use, as our modes of persuasion and argument, notions possessed by everybody, as we observed in the Topics when dealing with the way to handle a popular audience. Further, (3) we must be able to employ persuasion, just as strict reasoning can be employed, on opposite sides of a question, not in order that we may in practice employ it in both ways (for we must not make people believe what is wrong), but in order that we may see clearly what the facts are, and that, if another man argues unfairly, we on our part may be able to confute him.
No other of the arts draws opposite conclusions: dialectic and rhetoric alone do this. Both these arts draw opposite conclusions impartially. Nevertheless, the underlying facts do not lend themselves equally well to the contrary views. No; things that are true and things that are better are, by their nature, practically always easier to prove and easier to believe in. [1355b] Again, (4) it is absurd to hold that a man ought to be ashamed of being unable to defend himself with his limbs, but not of being unable to defend himself with speech and reason, when the use of rational speech is more distinctive of a human being than the use of his limbs. And if it be objected that one who uses such power of speech unjustly might do great harm, that is a charge which may be made in common against all good things except virtue, and above all against the things that are most useful, as strength, health, wealth, generalship. A man can confer the greatest of benefits by a right use of these, and inflict the greatest of injuries by using them wrongly.
It is clear, then, that rhetoric is not bound up with a single definite class of subjects, but is as universal as dialectic; it is clear, also, that it is useful. It is clear, further, that its function is not simply to succeed in persuading, but rather to discover the means of coming as near such success as the circumstances of each particular case allow. In this it resembles all other arts. For example, it is not the function of medicine simply to make a man quite healthy, but to put him as far as may be on the road to health; it is possible to give excellent treatment even to those who can never enjoy sound health. Furthermore, it is plain that it is the function of one and the same art to discern the real and the apparent means of persuasion, just as it is the function of dialectic to discern the real and the apparent syllogism. What makes a man a "sophist" is not his faculty, but his moral purpose. In rhetoric, however, the term "rhetorician" may describe either the speaker's knowledge of the art, or his moral purpose. In dialectic it is different: a man is a "sophist" because he has a certain kind of moral purpose, a "dialectician" in respect, not of his moral purpose, but of his faculty.
Let us now try to give some account of the systematic principles of Rhetoric itself -- of the right method and means of succeeding in the object we set before us. We must make as it were a fresh start, and before going further define what rhetoric is.
Book I - Chapter 2
Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion. This is not a function of any other art. Every other art can instruct or persuade about its own particular subject-matter; for instance, medicine about what is healthy and unhealthy, geometry about the properties of magnitudes, arithmetic about numbers, and the same is true of the other arts and sciences. But rhetoric we look upon as the power of observing the means of persuasion on almost any subject presented to us; and that is why we say that, in its technical character, it is not concerned with any special or definite class of subjects.
Of the modes of persuasion some belong strictly to the art of rhetoric and some do not. By the latter I mean such things as are not supplied by the speaker but are there at the outset -- witnesses, evidence given under torture, written contracts, and so on. By the former I mean such as we can ourselves construct by means of the principles of rhetoric. The one kind has merely to be used, the other has to be invented.
[1356a] Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker; the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind; the third on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself. Persuasion is achieved by the speaker's personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. We believe good men more fully and more readily than others: this is true generally whatever the question is, and absolutely true where exact certainty is impossible and opinions are divided. This kind of persuasion, like the others, should be achieved by what the speaker says, not by what people think of his character before he begins to speak. It is not true, as some writers assume in their treatises on rhetoric, that the personal goodness revealed by the speaker contributes nothing to his power of persuasion; on the contrary, his character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion he possesses. Secondly, persuasion may come through the hearers, when the speech stirs their emotions. Our judgements when we are pleased and friendly are not the same as when we are pained and hostile. It is towards producing these effects, as we maintain, that present-day writers on rhetoric direct the whole of their efforts. This subject shall be treated in detail when we come to speak of the emotions. Thirdly, persuasion is effected through the speech itself when we have proved a truth or an apparent truth by means of the persuasive arguments suitable to the case in question.
There are, then, these three means of effecting persuasion. The man who is to be in command of them must, it is clear, be able (1) to reason logically, (2) to understand human character and goodness in their various forms, and (3) to understand the emotions-that is, to name them and describe them, to know their causes and the way in which they are excited. It thus appears that rhetoric is an offshoot of dialectic and also of ethical studies. Ethical studies may fairly be called political; and for this reason rhetoric masquerades as political science, and the professors of it as political experts-sometimes from want of education, sometimes from ostentation, sometimes owing to other human failings. As a matter of fact, it is a branch of dialectic and similar to it, as we said at the outset. Neither rhetoric nor dialectic is the scientific study of any one separate subject: both are faculties for providing arguments. This is perhaps a sufficient account of their scope and of how they are related to each other.
With regard to the persuasion achieved by proof or [1356b] apparent proof: just as in dialectic there is induction on the one hand and syllogism or apparent syllogism on the other, so it is in rhetoric. The example is an induction, the enthymeme is a syllogism, and the apparent enthymeme is an apparent syllogism. I call the enthymeme a rhetorical syllogism, and the example a rhetorical induction. Every one who effects persuasion through proof does in fact use either enthymemes or examples: there is no other way. And since every one who proves anything at all is bound to use either syllogisms or inductions (and this is clear to us from the Analytics ), it must follow that enthymemes are syllogisms and examples are inductions. The difference between example and enthymeme is made plain by the passages in the Topics where induction and syllogism have already been discussed. When we base the proof of a proposition on a number of similar cases, this is induction in dialectic, example in rhetoric; when it is shown that, certain propositions being true, a further and quite distinct proposition must also be true in consequence, whether invariably or usually, this is called syllogism in dialectic, enthymeme in rhetoric. It is plain also that each of these types of oratory has its advantages. Types of oratory, I say: for what has been said in the Methodics applies equally well here; in some oratorical styles examples prevail, in others enthymemes; and in like manner, some orators are better at the former and some at the latter. Speeches that rely on examples are as persuasive as the other kind, but those which rely on enthymemes excite the louder applause. The sources of examples and enthymemes, and their proper uses, we will discuss later. Our next step is to define the processes themselves more clearly.
A statement is persuasive and credible either because it is directly self-evident or because it appears to be proved from other statements that are so. In either case it is persuasive because there is somebody whom it persuades. But none of the arts theorize about individual cases. Medicine, for instance, does not theorize about what will help to cure Socrates or Callias, but only about what will help to cure any or all of a given class of patients: this alone is business: individual cases are so infinitely various that no systematic knowledge of them is possible. In the same way the theory of rhetoric is concerned not with what seems probable to a given individual like Socrates or Hippias, but with what seems probable to men of a given type; and this is true of dialectic also. Dialectic does not construct its syllogisms out of any haphazard materials, such as the fancies of crazy people, but out of materials that call for discussion; and rhetoric, too, draws upon the regular subjects of debate. [1357a] The duty of rhetoric is to deal with such matters as we deliberate upon without arts or systems to guide us, in the hearing of persons who cannot take in at a glance a complicated argument, or follow a long chain of reasoning. The subjects of our deliberation are such as seem to present us with alternative possibilities: about things that could not have been, and cannot now or in the future be, other than they are, nobody who takes them to be of this nature wastes his time in deliberation.
It is possible to form syllogisms and draw conclusions from the results of previous syllogisms; or, on the other hand, from premisses which have not been thus proved, and at the same time are so little accepted that they call for proof. Reasonings of the former kind will necessarily be hard to follow owing to their length, for we assume an audience of untrained thinkers; those of the latter kind will fail to win assent, because they are based on premisses that are not generally admitted or believed.
The enthymeme and the example must, then, deal with what is in the main contingent, the example being an induction, and the enthymeme a syllogism, about such matters. The enthymeme must consist of few propositions, fewer often than those which make up the normal syllogism. For if any of these propositions is a familiar fact, there is no need even to mention it; the hearer adds it himself. Thus, to show that Dorieus has been victor in a contest for which the prize is a crown, it is enough to say "For he has been victor in the Olympic games," without adding "And in the Olympic games the prize is a crown," a fact which everybody knows.
There are few facts of the "necessary" type that can form the basis of rhetorical syllogisms. Most of the things about which we make decisions, and into which therefore we inquire, present us with alternative possibilities. For it is about our actions that we deliberate and inquire, and all our actions have a contingent character; hardly any of them are determined by necessity. Again, conclusions that state what is merely usual or possible must be drawn from premisses that do the same, just as 'necessary' conclusions must be drawn from "necessary" premisses; this too is clear to us from the Analytics . It is evident, therefore, that the propositions forming the basis of enthymemes, though some of them may be "necessary," will most of them be only usually true. Now the materials of enthymemes are Probabilities and Signs, which we can see must correspond respectively with the propositions that are generally and those that are necessarily true. A Probability is a thing that usually happens; not, however, as some definitions would suggest, anything whatever that usually happens, but only if it belongs to the class of the "contingent" or "variable."
It bears the same relation to that in respect of which it is probable as the universal bears to the particular. [1357b] Of Signs, one kind bears the same relation to the statement it supports as the particular bears to the universal, the other the same as the universal bears to the particular. The infallible kind is a "complete proof" (tekmerhiou); the fallible kind has no specific name. By infallible signs I mean those on which syllogisms proper may be based: and this shows us why this kind of Sign is called "complete proof": when people think that what they have said cannot be refuted, they then think that they are bringing forward a "complete proof," meaning that the matter has now been demonstrated and completed (peperhasmeuou ); for the word perhas has the same meaning (of "end" or "boundary") as the word tekmarh in the ancient tongue. Now the one kind of Sign (that which bears to the proposition it supports the relation of particular to universal) may be illustrated thus. Suppose it were said, "The fact that Socrates was wise and just is a sign that the wise are just."
Here we certainly have a Sign; but even though the proposition be true, the argument is refutable, since it does not form a syllogism. Suppose, on the other hand, it were said, "The fact that he has a fever is a sign that he is ill," or, "The fact that she is giving milk is a sign that she has lately borne a child." Here we have the infallible kind of Sign, the only kind that constitutes a complete proof, since it is the only kind that, if the particular statement is true, is irrefutable. The other kind of Sign, that which bears to the proposition it supports the relation of universal to particular, might be illustrated by saying, "The fact that he breathes fast is a sign that he has a fever." This argument also is refutable, even if the statement about the fast breathing be true, since a man may breathe hard without having a fever.
It has, then, been stated above what is the nature of a Probability, of a Sign, and of a complete proof, and what are the differences between them. In the Analytics a more explicit description has been given of these points; it is there shown why some of these reasonings can be put into syllogisms and some cannot.
The "example" has already been described as one kind of induction; and the special nature of the subject-matter that distinguishes it from the other kinds has also been stated above. Its relation to the proposition it supports is not that of part to whole, nor whole to part, nor whole to whole, but of part to part, or like to like. When two statements are of the same order, but one is more familiar than the other, the former is an "example." The argument may, for instance, be that Dionysius, in asking as he does for a bodyguard, is scheming to make himself a despot. For in the past Peisistratus kept asking for a bodyguard in order to carry out such a scheme, and did make himself a despot as soon as he got it; and so did Theagenes at Megara; and in the same way all other instances known to the speaker are made into examples, in order to show what is not yet known, that Dionysius has the same purpose in making the same request: all these being instances of the one general principle, that a man who asks for a bodyguard is scheming to make himself a despot. [1358a] We have now described the sources of those means of persuasion which are popularly supposed to be demonstrative.
There is an important distinction between two sorts of enthymemes that has been wholly overlooked by almost everybody -- one that also subsists between the syllogisms treated of in dialectic. One sort of enthymeme really belongs to rhetoric, as one sort of syllogism really belongs to dialectic; but the other sort really belongs to other arts and faculties, whether to those we already exercise or to those we have not yet acquired. Missing this distinction, people fail to notice that the more correctly they handle their particular subject the further they are getting away from pure rhetoric or dialectic. This statement will be clearer if expressed more fully. I mean that the proper subjects of dialectical and rhetorical syllogisms are the things with which we say the regular or universal Lines of Argument are concerned, that is to say those lines of argument that apply equally to questions of right conduct, natural science, politics, and many other things that have nothing to do with one another. Take, for instance, the line of argument concerned with 'the more or less'. On this line of argument it is equally easy to base a syllogism or enthymeme about any of what nevertheless are essentially disconnected subjects -- right conduct, natural science, or anything else whatever.
But there are also those special Lines of Argument which are based on such propositions as apply only to particular groups or classes of things. Thus there are propositions about natural science on which it is impossible to base any enthymeme or syllogism about ethics, and other propositions about ethics on which nothing can be based about natural science. The same principle applies throughout. The general Lines of Argument have no special subject-matter, and therefore will not increase our understanding of any particular class of things. On the other hand, the better the selection one makes of propositions suitable for special Lines of Argument, the nearer one comes, unconsciously, to setting up a science that is distinct from dialectic and rhetoric. One may succeed in stating the required principles, but one's science will be no longer dialectic or rhetoric, but the science to which the principles thus discovered belong. Most enthymemes are in fact based upon these particular or special Lines of Argument; comparatively few on the common or general kind. As in the Topics , therefore, so in this work, we must distinguish, in dealing with enthymemes, the special and the general Lines of Argument on which they are to be founded. By special Lines of Argument I mean the propositions peculiar to each several class of things, by general those common to all classes alike. We may begin with the special Lines of Argument. But, first of all, let us classify rhetoric into its varieties. Having distinguished these we may deal with them one by one, and try to discover the elements of which each is composed, and the propositions each must employ.
Book I - Chapter 4
First, we must ascertain what are the kinds of things, good or bad, about which the political orator offers counsel. Are these kind of things, good or bad, about which the political orator offers counsel. For he does not deal with all things, only with such as may or may not take place. Concerning things which exist or will exist inevitably, or which cannot possibly exist or take place, no counsel is to be given about the whole class of things which may or may not take place; for this class includes some good things that occur naturally, and some that do not. [1359b]
Now to enumerate and classify accurately the usual subjects of public business, and further to frame, as far as possible, true definitions of them is a task which we must not attempt on the present occasion. For it does not belong to the art of rhetoric, but to a more instructive art and a more real branch of knowledge; and as it is, rhetoric has been given a far wider subject-matter than strictly belongs to it. The truth is, as indeed we have said already, that rhetoric is a combination of the science of logic and of the ethical branch of politics; and it is partly like dialectic, partly like sophistical reasoning. But the more we try to make either dialectic rhetoric not, what they really are, practical faculties, but sciences, the more we shall inadvertently be destroying their true nature; for we shall be re-fashioning them and shall be passing into the region of sciences dealing with definite subjects rather than simply with words and forms of reasoning. Even here, however, we will mention those points which it is of practical importance to distinguish, their fuller treatment falling naturally to political science.
The main matters on which all men deliberate and on which political speakers make speeches are some five in number: ways and means, war and peace, national defence, imports and exports, and legislation.
As to Ways and Means, then, the intending speaker will need to know the number and extent of the country's sources of revenue, so that, if any is being overlooked, it may be added, and, if any is defective, it may be increased. Further, he should know all the expenditure of the country, in order that, if any part of it is superfluous, it may be abolished, or, if any is too large, it may be reduced. For men become richer not only by increasing their existing wealth but also by reducing their expenditure. A comprehensive view of these questions cannot be gained solely from experience in home affairs; in order to advise on such matters a man must be keenly interested in the methods worked out in other lands.
As to Peace and War, he must know the extent of the military strength of his country, both actual and potential, and also the mature of that actual and potential strength; and further, what wars his country has waged, and how it has waged them. He must know these facts not only about his own country, but also about neighbouring countries; and also about countries with which war is likely, in order that peace may be maintained with those stronger than his own, [1360a] and that his own may have power to make war or not against those that are weaker. He should know, too, whether the military power of another country is like or unlike that of his own; for this is a matter that may affect their relative strength. With the same end in view he must, besides, have studied the wars of other countries as well as those of his own, and the way they ended; similar causes are likely to have similar results.
With regard to National Defence: he ought to know all about the methods of defence in actual use, such as the strength and character of the defensive force and the positions of the forts -- this last means that he must be well acquainted with the lie of the country -- in order that a garrison may be increased if it is too small or removed if it is not wanted, and that the strategic points may be guarded with special care.
With regard to the Food Supply: he must know what outlay will meet the needs of his country; what kinds of food are produced at home and what imported; and what articles must be exported or imported. This last he must know in order that agreements and commercial treaties may be made with the countries concerned. There are, indeed, two sorts of state to which he must see that his countrymen give no cause for offence, states stronger than his own, and states with which it is advantageous to trade.
But while he must, for security's sake, be able to take all this into account, he must before all things understand the subject of legislation; for it is on a country's laws that its whole welfare depends. He must, therefore, know how many different forms of constitution there are; under what conditions each of these will prosper and by what internal developments or external attacks each of them tends to be destroyed. When I speak of destruction through internal developments I refer to the fact that all constitutions, except the best one of all, are destroyed both by not being pushed far enough and by being pushed too far. Thus, democracy loses its vigour, and finally passes into oligarchy, not only when it is not pushed far enough, but also when it is pushed a great deal too far; just as the aquiline and the snub nose not only turn into normal noses by not being aquiline or snub enough, but also by being too violently aquiline or snub arrive at a condition in which they no longer look like noses at all.
It is useful, in framing laws, not only to study the past history of one's own country, in order to understand which constitution is desirable for it now, but also to have a knowledge of the constitutions of other nations, and so to learn for what kinds of nation the various kinds of constitution are suited. From this we can see that books of travel are useful aids to legislation, since from these we may learn the laws and customs of different races. The political speaker will also find the researches of historians useful. But all this is the business of political science and not of rhetoric.
These, then, are the most important kinds of information which the political speaker must possess. [1360b] Let us now go back and state the premisses from which he will have to argue in favour of adopting or rejecting measures regarding these and other matters.
Book III - Chapter 17
The duty/purpose of the Argument is to attempt demonstrate proof. These proofs must bear directly upon the question in dispute. That is,
1) If you maintain that the act was not committed, your main task is to prove this.
(2) If you maintain that the act did no harm, prove this.
(3) If you maintain that the act was less than is alleged, or
(4) justified
Then prove these facts, just as you would prove the act not to have been justified, not or less than alleged or did not do harm.
In ceremonial speeches you will develop your case mainly by arguing that what has been done is, e.g., noble and useful. The facts themselves are to be taken on trust; proof of them is only submitted on those rare occasions when they are not easily credible or when they have been set down to some one else.
In political speeches you may maintain that a proposal is impracticable; or that, though practicable, it is unjust, or will do no good, or is not so important as its proposer thinks. Note any falsehoods about irrelevant matters -- they will look like proof that his other statements also are false. [1418a] Argument by "example" is highly suitable for political oratory, argument by "enthymeme" better suits forensic. Political oratory deals with future events, of which it can do no more than quote past events as examples. Forensic oratory deals with what is or is not now true, which can better be demonstrated, because not contingent -- there is no contingency in what has now already happened.
Do not use a continuous succession of enthymemes: intersperse them with other matter, or they will spoil one another's effect. There are limits to their number - Friend, you have spoken as much as a sensible man would have spoken. - "as much" says Homer, not "as well" Nor should you try to make enthymemes on every point; if you do, you will be acting just like some students of philosophy, whose conclusions are more familiar and believable than the premisses from which they draw them. And avoid the enthymeme form when you are trying to rouse feeling; for it will either kill the feeling or will itself fall flat: all simultaneous motions tend to cancel each other either completely or partially. Nor should you go after the enthymeme form in a passage where you are depicting character -- the process of demonstration can express neither moral character nor moral purpose. Maxims should be employed in the Arguments-and in the Narration too -- since these do express character: "I have given him this, though I am quite aware that one should 'Trust no man.'" Or if you are appealing to the emotions: "I do not regret it, though I have been wronged; if he has the profit on his side, I have justice on mine."
Political oratory is a more difficult task than forensic; and naturally so, since it deals with the future, whereas the pleader deals with the past, which, as Epimenides of Crete said, even the diviners already know. (Epimenides did not practise divination about the future; only about the obscurities of the past.) Besides, in forensic oratory you have a basis in the law; and once you have a starting-point, you can prove anything with comparative ease. Then again, political oratory affords few chances for those leisurely digressions in which you may attack your adversary, talk about yourself, or work on your hearers' emotions; fewer chances indeed, than any other affords, unless your set purpose is to divert your hearers' attention. Accordingly, if you find yourself in difficulties, follow the lead of the Athenian speakers, and that of Isocrates, who makes regular attacks upon people in the course of a political speech, e.g. upon the Lacedaemonians in the Panegyricus, and upon Chares in the speech about the allies. In ceremonial oratory, intersperse your speech with bits of episodic eulogy, like Isocrates, who is always bringing some one forward for this purpose. And this is what Gorgias meant by saying that he always found something to talk about. For if he speaks of Achilles, he praises Peleus, then Aeacus, then Zeus; and in like manner the virtue of valour, describing its good results, and saying what it is like.
Now if you have proofs to bring forward, bring them forward, and your moral discourse as well; if you have no enthymemes, then fall back upon moral discourse: [1418b] after all, it is more fitting for a good man to display himself as an honest fellow than as a subtle reasoner. Refutative enthymemes are more popular than demonstrative ones: their logical cogency is more striking: the facts about two opposites always stand out clearly when the two are nut side by side.
The "Reply to the Opponent" is not a separate division of the speech; it is part of the Arguments to break down the opponent's case, whether by objection or by counter-syllogism. Both in political speaking and when pleading in court, if you are the first speaker you should put your own arguments forward first, and then meet the arguments on the other side by refuting them and pulling them to pieces beforehand. If, however, the case for the other side contains a great variety of arguments, begin with these, like Callistratus in the Messenian assembly, when he demolished the arguments likely to be used against him before giving his own. If you speak later, you must first, by means of refutation and counter-syllogism, attempt some answer to your opponent's speech, especially if his arguments have been well received. For just as our minds refuse a favourable reception to a person against whom they are prejudiced, so they refuse it to a speech when they have been favourably impressed by the speech on the other side. You should, therefore, make room in the minds of the audience for your coming speech; and this will be done by getting your opponent's speech out of the way. So attack that first - either the whole of it, or the most important, successful, or vulnerable points in it, and thus inspire confidence in what you have to say yourself - First, champion will I be of Goddesses . .Never, I ween, would Hera . . . : where the speaker has attacked the silliest argument first. So much for the Arguments.
With regard to the element of moral character: there are assertions which, if made about yourself, may excite dislike, appear tedious, or expose you to the risk of contradiction; and other things which you cannot say about your opponent without seeming abusive or ill-bred. Put such remarks, therefore, into the mouth of some third person. This is what Isocrates does in the Philippus and in the Antidosis, and Archilochus in his satires. The latter represents the father himself as attacking his daughter in the lampoon
Think nought impossible at all, Nor swear that it shall not befall . . . and puts into the mouth of Charon the carpenter the lampoon which begins Not for the wealth of Gyges . . . So too Sophocles makes Haemon appeal to his father on behalf of Antigone as if it were others who were speaking.
Again, sometimes you should restate your enthymemes in the form of maxims; e.g. "Wise men will come to terms in the hour of success; for they will gain most if they do." Expressed as an enthymeme, this would run, "If we ought to come to terms when doing so will enable us to gain the greatest advantage, then we ought to come to terms in the hour of success."
Book II - Chapter 22
Enthymemes and Reasons
Enthymemes, is a syllogism, but in what sense? There is a noted differences between it and the syllogism of dialectic.
An enthymeme is a categorical syllogism with one premise left unstated. We can use what we know about categorical syllogisms to reconstruct the missing premise.
An informal method of reasoning, typical of rhetorical discourse, enthymeme is sometimes defined as a "truncated syllogism" since either the major or minor premise found in that more formal method of reasoning is left implied.
Position and Terms
First, from the conclusion we will be able to identify the premise we have been given as either the major or the minor premise. If the subject term of the conclusion occurs in the premise, it is the minor premise, while if the the predicate term of the conclusion occurs in the premise it is the major premise. The other term given in the premise must be the middle term. Whichever premise we have been given the missing premise must be the other. Thus if we have been given the minor premise then the missing one must be the major premise and should be placed first and should have the major term as well as the middle term in it. On the other hand, if we have been given the major premise then the missing one must be the minor premise and should be placed second and should have the minor term as well as the middle term in it. In this way we can quickly identify the position of the premise in the argument and the terms which belong to the missing premise.
Type of Proposition and Order of Terms
Determining the type of proposition and the order for the terms is somewhat more difficult. At this point one should be guided by the principle of charity. In many cases one could easily construct an invalid argument, but this may not be the premise the originator had in mind. One ought instead to try to build a valid syllogism. Then if the enthymeme turns out to be invalid after your best efforts, the reason will be because it is unavoidably invalid rather than because you deliberately made it so. In other words, the fault will lie with the argument rather than with you. On the other hand, if the argument turns out to be valid, but you disagree with the conclusion, you will likely be able to attack one of the premises as untrue. Indeed, people will sometimes leave out an unreasonable premise in the hope that the audience will not bother to reconstruct the premise and so will not notice how unreasonable it is. Of course, there is a slight possibility that the given premise is the unreasonable one. Finally, do not overlook the possibility that you are wrong and the argument sound. (A sound argument is a valid argument with all true premises.)
In attempting to make the argument valid, one makes use of the rules from the rule method. One can quickly determine whether the premise must be affirmative or negative. If the conclusion is affirmative, the missing premise must also be so. If the conclusion is negative, the missing premise must be negative, unless the other premise is negative, in which case the missing premise must be affirmative. In this way one eliminates two proposition types. Whether the missing premise is particular or universal may sometimes be determined by the requirements of distribution. If the middle term is undistributed in the given premise, it will need to be distributed in the missing premise; so if one already knows that the missing premise is affirmative, this will show that it must be an A-form and the middle term must be in the subject position. On the other hand, if the missing premise must be negative, the distribution of the middle term alone will not determine the type. In such a case one would look at the term in the conclusion which is also in the missing premise. If the term is distributed in the conclusion it must also be so in its premise. Thus if both the middle term and the term form the conclusion required distributing, one would need an E-form proposition.
Enthymemes are a manner of presenting a deductive argument. A deductive argument consists of three elements:
major premise: All men are mortal.
minor premise: Socrates is a man.
conclusion: Therefore, Socrates is mortal.
An enthymeme is a truncated deductive argument; one of the members is left unstated. From a formal point of view, there are three ways to
make an enthymeme:
1. conclusion + major P.: Socrates is mortal because all men are mortal.
2. conclusion + minor P.: Socrates is mortal because he is a man.
3. major P. + minor P.: All men are mortal and Socrates is a man.
By far the most common enthymeme form is the one which combines the conclusion with the minor premise.
What Enthymemes Do
Enthymemes are a very efficient and effective form of argument. First, it identifies and states the conclusion you want your audience to accept. Second, it identifies what has to be argued for, that is, the minor premise. Finally, it maintains an argumentative bridge between writer and audience through the unstated member; the audience must accept that unstated member or the argument will fall flat on its face. Consider the argument:
Grades inhibit education because grades increase anxiety.
1. I want my audience to assent to the claim that grades inhibit education, my conclusion.
2. To get there I know that they agree to the idea that anxiety inhibits education.
3. Third, the because clause tells the writer what must be explicitly argued for.
First, one needs to generate arguments about the nature of grading, either by args of classification, division or definition. Second, one needs to generates arguments about the nature of anxiety, with the same argumentative choices. Finally, one needs to have some way to explain (& possibly measure) the'increase' of anxiety under various grading systems (arg. from degree).
If a claim has a single premise then the claim is said to be 'simple'. If one has a claim supported by two or more premises, then one's claim is said to be 'complex'. If bot premises are phrased the same way, that is, both are asserted positively or both negatively, then the claim is 'unmixed'; when one premise differs from the others by possessing or lacking the logical operation of negation, then the claim is 'mixed'. This taxonomy allows the writer to consider which possible logical forms of the premises, possessing or not possessing negation, will be most effective.
Finally, the character of the because clause tells the writer what kind of paper this is.
1. The claim, 'Adolph Eichmann should not be executed because he was insane' requires that the writer argue the factual or interpretative merits of competing diagnoses.
2. the claim: 'Because master war criminals deserve the death penalty, Adolph Eichmann should have been executed' is argumentative rather
than informative as in previous claim.
Enthymemes and Practical Arguments
We divide reasoning into two domains: theoretical reasoning tells us the way the world is, and practical reasoning tells us what we have to do. Explanations of both domains of reasons use terminology that can be confusing or just appear to be ambiguous. For example, we distinguish 3 categories of reasons:
1) evidencing, a reason that shows or tends to show that p is true;
2) causally necessitating, that which explains and names all of the causal reasons why a volcano, say, erupted.
Finally, we have
3) motivating reasons, reasons for performing a certain action.
In practical reasoning we want to distinguish between what causes us to be motivated and what reasons we can give for having or acting on a certain motivation. We want to distinguish between reason states, mental or psychological states like wanting, hoping, fearing, and intending and reasons which cause events to occur.
Desires can be expressed by the statement,
"I want to X,"
where X stands for some action like I want a piece of cheesecake, I want to read this novel, or I want a little night life. The desire expressed here is called our 1st order desire, and it is to be distinguished form our second order desires. Second order desires name the reason we want (or don't want) the first order desire to be satisfied. Second order desires are expressed by the statement,
"I want to want to X."
Fears are expressed first by a wish that some event q not happen and by an attitudinal belief in the form of a conditional, if p, then q. Fear involves some uncertainty about the future causal event p, that is whether it will happen or not. A desire to prevent if p, then q is then formed. We then find reasons that will bring about the action sufficient to bring about not (if p, then q).In enthymematic practical arguments that involve either desires or fears we have two persuasive resources at our disposal. First, we can assess the type of practical reason that will be most efficacious on our audience, and secondly we can reinforce the effectiveness of that expressed reason by properly identifying the unstated premise or reason that supports the enthymeme. We recognize five types of practical reasons.
Five Types of Practical Reasons
1. Normative Reasons: These are objective or agent-neutral reasons for acting.A reason for you will be a reason for me. These appeals will be to intrinsic goods or moral principles that are seen as relevant and operative in this situation.
2. Person-Relative Normative Reasons: These are reasons for me (say) to believe.Just as I may have objective desires, a desire for health say, I can also have self-related desires. A self-related desire is one that is important in defining who I am, but I recognize that while the satisfaction of that desire is important to my well-being it is not important to everyone's well-being.
3. Subjective Reasons: These are reasons I (say) have to believe.Subjective reasons are those personal reasons that people may have for believing or acting, but they are not normative. They may arise from mistaken beliefs, falsehoods, or ignorance. The motivations may be expedient or even ignoble. They need not be worthwhile.
4. Explanatory Reasons: These are reasons why I believe.Explanatory reasons are causal explanations for one's behavior or conduct. It explains the relationships among particular and specific intentions which guide stages of actions well as their relationship to the overall intention which coordinates and guides all else.
5. Motivating Reasons: These are reasons for which I believe. As we will use the term, a 'motivating reason' is the richest kind of reason we have. It is personal and normative, but it is not necessarily self related. One can internalize a moral duty, say, so that it becomes obligating as well as motivating. Motivating reasons are both causal and justificatory. As such they require some sort of dispositional state behind them.Enthymemes in practical arguments are most effective when one knows the kind of unstated reason the audience holds in this case as well as the psychological attitude underlying it. the writer will then recognize which type of stated reason will be efficacious.
Book III - Chapter 23
Positive proof is based upon consideration of the opposite of the thing in question. Observe or consider the opposite of the thing in question. Does the opposite have an opposite quality or ability to refute the original?
1. One line of positive proof is based upon consideration of the opposite of the thing in question. Observe whether that opposite has the opposite quality. If it has not, you refute the original proposition; if it has, you establish it. E.g. "Temperance is beneficial; for licentiousness is hurtful." Or, as in the Messenian speech, "If war is the cause of our present troubles, peace is what we need to put things right again.
" Or - if not even evil-doers should Anger us if they meant not what they did,
Then can we owe no gratitude to such as were constrained to do the good they did us.
Or --
Since in this world liars may win belief,
Be sure of the opposite likewise-that this world
Hears many a true word and believes it not.
2. Another line of proof is got by considering some modification of the key-word, and arguing that what can or cannot be said of the one, can or cannot be said of the other: e.g. "just" does not always mean "beneficial," or "justly" would always mean "beneficially," whereas it is not desirable to be justly put to death.
3. Another line of proof is based upon correlative ideas. If it is true that one man gave noble or just treatment to another, you argue that the other must have received noble or just treatment; or that where it is right to command obedience, it must have been right to obey the command. Thus Diomedon, the tax-farmer, said of the taxes: "If it is no disgrace for you to sell them, it is no disgrace for us to buy them." Further, if "well" or "justly" is true of the person to whom a thing is done, you argue that it is true of the doer. But it is possible to draw a false conclusion here. It may be just that A should be treated in a certain way, and yet not just that he should be so treated by B. Hence you must ask yourself two distinct questions: [1397b] (1) Is it right that A should be thus treated? (2) Is it right that B should thus treat him? and apply your results properly, according as your answers are Yes or No. Sometimes in such a case the two answers differ: you may quite easily have a position like that in the Alcmaeon of Theodectes:
And was there none to loathe thy mother's crime?
to which question Alcmaeon in reply says,
Why, there are two things to examine here.
And when Alphesiboea asks what he means, he rejoins:
They judged her fit to die, not me to slay her.
Again there is the lawsuit about Demosthenes and the men who killed Nicanor; as they were judged to have killed him justly, it was thought that he was killed justly. And in the case of the man who was killed at Thebes, the judges were requested to decide whether it was unjust that he should be killed, since if it was not, it was argued that it could not have been unjust to kill him.
4. Another line of proof is the a fortiori. Thus it may be argued that if even the gods are not omniscient, certainly human beings are not.
The principle here is that, if a quality does not in fact exist where it is more likely to exist, it clearly does not exist where it is less likely. Again, the argument that a man who strikes his father also strikes his neighbours follows from the principle that, if the less likely thing is true, the more likely thing is true also; for a man is less likely to strike his father than to strike his neighbours. The argument, then, may run thus. Or it may be urged that, if a thing is not true where it is more likely, it is not true where it is less likely; or that, if it is true where it is less likely, it is true where it is more likely: according as we have to show that a thing is or is not true. This argument might also be used in a case of parity, as in the lines:
Thou hast pity for thy sire, who has lost his sons. Hast none for Oeneus, whose brave son is dead?
And, again, "if Theseus did no wrong, neither did Paris"; or "the sons of Tyndareus did no wrong, neither did Paris"; or "if Hector did well to slay Patroclus, Paris did well to slay Achilles." And "if other followers of an art are not bad men, neither are philosophers." And "if generals are not bad men because it often happens that they are condemned to death, neither are sophists." And the remark that "if each individual among you ought to think of his own city's reputation, you ought all to think of the reputation of Greece as a whole."
5. Another line of argument is based on considerations of time. Thus Iphicrates, in the case against Harmodius, said, "if before doing the deed I had bargained that, if I did it, I should have a statue, you would have given me one. Will you not give me one now that I have done the deed? You must not make promises when you are expecting a thing to be done for you, and refuse to fulfil them when the thing has been done." And, again, to induce the Thebans to let Philip pass through their territory into Attica, [1398a] it was argued that "if he had insisted on this before he helped them against the Phocians, they would have promised to do it. It is monstrous, therefore, that just because he threw away his advantage then, and trusted their honour, they should not let him pass through now."
6. Another line is to apply to the other speaker what he has said against yourself. It is an excellent turn to give to a debate, as may be seen in the Teucer. It was employed by Iphicrates in his reply to Aristophon. "Would you," he asked, "take a bribe to betray the fleet?" "No," said Aristophon; and Iphicrates replied, "Very good: if you, who are Aristophon, would not betray the fleet, would I, who am Iphicrates?" Only, it must be recognized beforehand that the other man is more likely than you are to commit the crime in question. Otherwise you will make yourself ridiculous; it is Aristeides who is prosecuting, you cannot say that sort of thing to him. The purpose is to discredit the prosecutor, who as a rule would have it appear that his character is better than that of the defendant, a pretension which it is desirable to upset. But the use of such an argument is in all cases ridiculous if you are attacking others for what you do or would do yourself, or are urging others to do what you neither do nor would do yourself.
7. Another line of proof is secured by defining your terms. Thus, "What is the supernatural? Surely it is either a god or the work of a god. Well, any one who believes that the work of a god exists, cannot help also believing that gods exist." Or take the argument of Iphicrates, "Goodness is true nobility; neither Harmodius nor Aristogeiton had any nobility before they did a noble deed." He also argued that he himself was more akin to Harmodius and Aristogeiton than his opponent was. "At any rate, my deeds are more akin to those of Harmodius and Aristogeiton than yours are." Another example may be found in the Alexander. "Every one will agree that by incontinent people we mean those who are not satisfied with the enjoyment of one love." A further example is to be found in the reason given by Socrates for not going to the court of Archelaus. He said that "one is insulted by being unable to requite benefits, as well as by being unable to requite injuries." All the persons mentioned define their term and get at its essential meaning, and then use the result when reasoning on the point at issue.
8. Another line of argument is founded upon the various senses of a word. Such a word is "rightly," as has been explained in the Topics.
9. Another line is based upon logical division. Thus, "All men do wrong from one of three motives, A, B, or C: in my case A and B are out of the question, and even the accusers do not allege C."
10. Another line is based upon induction. Thus from the case of the woman of Peparethus it might be argued that women everywhere can settle correctly the facts about their children. [1398b] Another example of this occurred at Athens in the case between the orator Mantias and his son, when the boy's mother revealed the true facts: and yet another at Thebes, in the case between Ismenias and Stilbon, when Dodonis proved that it was Ismenias who was the father of her son Thettaliscus, and he was in consequence always regarded as being so. A further instance of induction may be taken from the Law of Theodectes: "If we do not hand over our horses to the care of men who have mishandled other people's horses, nor ships to those who have wrecked other people's ships, and if this is true of everything else alike, then men who have failed to secure other people's safety are not to be employed to secure our own." Another instance is the argument of Alcidamas: "Every one honours the wise." Thus the Parians have honoured Archilochus, in spite of his bitter tongue; the Chians Homer, though he was not their countryman; the Mytilenaeans Sappho, though she was a woman; the Lacedaemonians actually made Chilon a member of their senate, though they are the least literary of men; the Italian Greeks honoured Pythagoras; the inhabitants of Lampsacus gave public burial to Anaxagoras, though he was an alien, and honour him even to this day. (It may be argued that peoples for whom philosophers legislate are always prosperous) on the ground that the Athenians became prosperous under Solon's laws and the Lacedaemonians under those of Lycurgus, while at Thebes no sooner did the leading men become philosophers than the country began to prosper.
11. Another line of argument is founded upon some decision already pronounced, whether on the same subject or on one like it or contrary to it. Such a proof is most effective if every one has always decided thus; but if not every one, then at any rate most people; or if all, or most, wise or good men have thus decided, or the actual judges of the present question, or those whose authority they accept, or any one whose decision they cannot gainsay because he has complete control over them, or those whom it is not seemly to gainsay, as the gods, or one's father, or one's teachers. Thus Autocles said, when attacking Mixidemides, that it was a strange thing that the Dread Goddesses could without loss of dignity submit to the judgement of the Areopagus, and yet Mixidemides could not. Or as Sappho said, "Death is an evil thing; the gods have so judged it, or they would die." Or again as Aristippus said in reply to Plato when he spoke somewhat too dogmatically, as Aristippus thought: "Well, anyhow, our friend," meaning Socrates, "never spoke like that." And Hegesippus, having previously consulted Zeus at Olympia, asked Apollo at Delphi "whether his opinion was the same as his father's," [1399a] implying that it would be shameful for him to contradict his father. Thus too Isocrates argued that Helen must have been a good woman, because Theseus decided that she was; and Paris a good man, because the goddesses chose him before all others; and Evagoras also, says Isocrates, was good, since when Conon met with his misfortune he betook himself to Evagoras without trying any one else on the way.
12. Another line of argument consists in taking separately the parts of a subject. Such is that given in the Topics: "What sort of motion is the soul? for it must be this or that." The Socrates of Theodectes provides an example: "What temple has he profaned? What gods recognized by the state has he not honoured?"
13. Since it happens that any given thing usually has both good and bad consequences, another line of argument consists in using those consequences as a reason for urging that a thing should or should not be done, for prosecuting or defending any one, for eulogy or censure. E.g. education leads both to unpopularity, which is bad, and to wisdom, which is good. Hence you either argue, "It is therefore not well to be educated, since it is not well to be unpopular": or you answer, "No, it is well to be educated, since it is well to be wise." The Art of Rhetoric of Callippus is made up of this line of argument, with the addition of those of Possibility and the others of that kind already described.
14. Another line of argument is used when we have to urge or discourage a course of action that may be done in either of two opposite ways, and have to apply the method just mentioned to both. The difference between this one and the last is that, whereas in the last any two things are contrasted, here the things contrasted are opposites. For instance, the priestess enjoined upon her son not to take to public speaking: "For," she said, "if you say what is right, men will hate you; if you say what is wrong, the gods will hate you." The reply might be, "On the contrary, you ought to take to public speaking: for if you say what is right the gods will love you; if you say what is wrong, men will love you." This amounts to the proverbial "buying the marsh with the salt." It is just this situation, viz. when each of two opposites has both a good and a bad consequence opposite respectively to each other, that has been termed divarication.
15. Another line of argument is this: The things people approve of openly are not those which they approve of secretly: openly, their chief praise is given to justice and nobleness; but in their hearts they prefer their own advantage. Try, in face of this, to establish the point of view which your opponent has not adopted. This is the most effective of the forms of argument that contradict common opinion.
16. Another line is that of rational correspondence. E.g. Iphicrates, when they were trying to compel his son, a youth under the prescribed age, to perform one of the state duties because he was tall, said "If you count tall boys men, you will next be voting short men boys." [1399b] And Theodectes in his Law said, "You make citizens of such mercenaries as Strabax and Charidemus, as a reward of their merits; will you not make exiles of such citizens as those who have done irreparable harm among the mercenaries?"
17. Another line is the argument that if two results are the same their antecedents are also the same. For instance, it was a saying of Xenophanes that to assert that the gods had birth is as impious as to say that they die; the consequence of both statements is that there is a time when the gods do not exist. This line of proof assumes generally that the result of any given thing is always the same: e.g. "you are going to decide not about Isocrates, but about the value of the whole profession of philosophy." Or, "to give earth and water" means slavery; or, "to share in the Common Peace" means obeying orders. We are to make either such assumptions or their opposite, as suits us best.
18. Another line of argument is based on the fact that men do not always make the same choice on a later as on an earlier occasion, but reverse their previous choice. E.g. the following enthymeme: "When we were exiles, we fought in order to return; now we have returned, it would be strange to choose exile in order not to have to fight." one occasion, that is, they chose to be true to their homes at the cost of fighting, and on the other to avoid fighting at the cost of deserting their homes.
19. Another line of argument is the assertion that some possible motive for an event or state of things is the real one: e.g. that a gift was given in order to cause pain by its withdrawal. This notion underlies the lines:
God gives to many great prosperity,
Not of good God towards them, but to make
The ruin of them more conspicuous.
Or take the passage from the Meleager of Antiphon:
To slay no boar, but to be witnesses
Of Meleager's prowess unto Greece.
Or the argument in the Ajax of Theodectes, that Diomede chose out Odysseus not to do him honour, but in order that his companion might be a lesser man than himself -- such a motive for doing so is quite possible.
20. Another line of argument is common to forensic and deliberative oratory, namely, to consider inducements and deterrents, and the motives people have for doing or avoiding the actions in question. These are the conditions which make us bound to act if they are for us, and to refrain from action if they are against us: that is, we are bound to act if the action is possible, easy, and useful to ourselves or our friends or hurtful to our enemies; this is true even if the action entails loss, provided the loss is outweighed by the solid advantage. A speaker will urge action by pointing to such conditions, and discourage it by pointing to the opposite. [1400a] These same arguments also form the materials for accusation or defence -- the deterrents being pointed out by the defence, and the inducements by the prosecution. As for the defence,...This topic forms the whole Art of Rhetoric both of Pamphilus and of Callippus.
21. Another line of argument refers to things which are supposed to happen and yet seem incredible. We may argue that people could not have believed them, if they had not been true or nearly true: even that they are the more likely to be true because they are incredible. For the things which men believe are either facts or probabilities: if, therefore, a thing that is believed is improbable and even incredible, it must be true, since it is certainly not believed because it is at all probable or credible. An example is what Androcles of the deme Pitthus said in his well-known arraignment of the law. The audience tried to shout him down when he observed that the laws required a law to set them right. "Why," he went on, "fish need salt, improbable and incredible as this might seem for creatures reared in salt water; and olive-cakes need oil, incredible as it is that what produces oil should need it."
22. Another line of argument is to refute our opponent's case by noting any contrasts or contradictions of dates, acts, or words that it anywhere displays; and this in any of the three following connexions. (1) Referring to our opponent's conduct, e.g. "He says he is devoted to you, yet he conspired with the Thirty." (2) Referring to our own conduct, e.g. "He says I am litigious, and yet he cannot prove that I have been engaged in a single lawsuit." (3) Referring to both of us together, e.g. "He has never even lent any one a penny, but I have ransomed quite a number of you."
23. Another line that is useful for men and causes that have been really or seemingly slandered, is to show why the facts are not as supposed; pointing out that there is a reason for the false impression given. Thus a woman, who had palmed off her son on another woman, was thought to be the lad's mistress because she embraced him; but when her action was explained the charge was shown to be groundless. Another example is from the Ajax of Theodectes, where Odysseus tells Ajax the reason why, though he is really braver than Ajax, he is not thought so.
24. Another line of argument is to show that if the cause is present, the effect is present, and if absent, absent. For by proving the cause you at once prove the effect, and conversely nothing can exist without its cause. Thus Thrasybulus accused Leodamas of having had his name recorded as a criminal on the slab in the Acropolis, and of erasing the record in the time of the Thirty Tyrants: to which Leodamas replied, "Impossible: for the Thirty would have trusted me all the more if my quarrel with the commons had been inscribed on the slab."
25. Another line is to consider whether the accused person can take or could have taken a better course than that which he is recommending or taking, or has taken. [1400b] If he has not taken this better course, it is clear that he is not guilty, since no one deliberately and consciously chooses what is bad. This argument is, however, fallacious, for it often becomes clear after the event how the action could have been done better, though before the event this was far from clear.
26. Another line is, when a contemplated action is inconsistent with any past action, to examine them both together. Thus, when the people of Elea asked Xenophanes if they should or should not sacrificeto Leucothea and mourn for her, he advised them not to mourn for her if they thought her a goddess, and not to sacrifice to her if they thought her a mortal woman.
27. Another line is to make previous mistakes the grounds of accusation or defence. Thus, in the Medea of Carcinus the accusers allege that Medea has slain her children; "at all events," they say,"they are not to be seen" -- Medea having made the mistake of sending her children away. In defence she argues that it is not her children, but Jason, whom she would have slain; for it would have been a mistake on her part not to do this if she had done the other. This special line of argument for enthymeme forms the whole of the Art of Rhetoric in use before Theodorus. Another line is to draw meanings from names. Sophocles, forinstance, says,
O steel in heart as thou art steel in name.
This line of argument is common in praises of the gods. Thus, too, Conon called Thrasybulus rash in counsel. And Herodicus said of Thrasymachus, "You are always bold in battle"; of Polus, "you are always a colt"; and of the legislator Draco that his laws were those not of a human being but of a dragon, so savage were they. And, in Euripides, Hecuba says of Aphrodite,
Her name and Folly's (aphrosuns) lightly begin alike,
and Chaeremon writes
Pentheus -- aname foreshadowing grief (penthos) to come.
The Refutative Enthymeme has a greater reputation than the Demonstrative, because within a small space it works out two opposing arguments, and arguments put side by side are clearer to the audience. But of all syllogisms, whether refutative or demonstrative, those are most applauded of which we foresee the conclusions from the beginning, so long as they are not obvious at first sight -- for part of the pleasure we feel is at our own intelligent anticipation; or those which we follow well enough to see the point ofthem as soon as the last word has been uttered.
Index to Book I
Chapter 1 (1354a, 1354b, 1355a, 1355b)
Rhetoric is the counterpart of Dialectic. It is a subject that can be treated systematically. The argumentative modes of persuasion are the essence of the art of rhetoric: appeals to the emotions warp the judgement. The writers of current text- books on rhetoric give too much attention to the forensic branch (in which chicanery is easier) and too little to the political (where the issues are larger). Argumentative persuasion is a sort of demonstration, and the rhetorical form of demonstration is the enthymeme. Four uses of rhetoric. Its possible abuse is no argument against its proper use on the side of truth and justice. The honest rhetorician has no separate name to distinguish him from the dishonest.
Chapter 2 (1356a, 1356b, 1357a, 1357b, 1358a)
Definition of rhetoric as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion." Of the modes of persuasion some belong strictly to the art of rhetoric and some do not. The rhetorician finds the latter kind (viz. witnesses, contracts, and the like) ready to his hand. The former kind he must provide himself; and it has three divisions -- (1) the speaker's power of evincing a personal character which will make his speech credible (ethos ); (2) his power of stirring the emotions of his hearers (pathos ); (3) his power of proving a truth, or an apparent truth, by means of persuasive arguments (logos ). Hence rhetoric may be regarded as an offshoot of dialectic, and also of ethical (or political) studies. The persuasive arguments are (a) the example, corresponding to induction in dialectic; (b) the enthymeme, corresponding to the syllogism; (c) the apparent enthymeme, corresponding to the apparent syllogism. The enthymeme is a rhetorical syllogism, and the example a rhetorical induction. Rhetoric has regard to classes of men, not to individual men; its subjects, and the premisses from which it argues, are in the main such as present alternative possibilities in the sphere of human action; and it must adapt itself to an audience of untrained thinkers who cannot follow a long train of reasoning. The premisses from which enthymemes are formed are "probabilities" and "signs"; and signs are either fallible or infallible.... The lines of argument, or topics, which enthymemes follow may be distinguished as common (or, general) and special (i.e. special to a single study, such as natural science or ethics). The special lines should be used discreetly, if the rhetorician is not to find himself deserting his own field for another.
Chapter 3(1358b, 1359a)
There are three kinds of rhetoric: A. political (deliberative), B. forensic (legal), and C. epideictic (the ceremonial oratory of display). Their (1) divisions, (2) times, and (3) ends are as follows: A. Political (1) exhortation and dehortation, (2) future, (3) expediency and inexpediency; B. Forensic (1) accusation and defence, (2) past, (3) justice and injustice; C. Epideictic (1) praise and censure, (2) present, (3) honour and dishonour.
Chapter 4(1359b, 1360a , 1360b)
The subjects of Political Oratory fall under five main heads: (1) ways and means, (2) war and peace, (3) national defence, (4) imports and exports, (5) legislation. The scope of each of these divisions.
Chapter 5(1361a, 1361b, 1362a)
In urging his hearers to take or to avoid a course of action, the political orator must show that he has an eye to their happiness. Four definitions (of a popular kind: as usual in the Rhetoric, and some fourteen constituents, of happiness.
Chapter 6(1362b, 1363a, 1363b)
The political speaker will also appeal to the interest of his hearers, and this involves a knowledge of what is good. Definition and analysis of things "good."
Chapter 7(1364a, 1364b, 1365a, 1365b)
Comparison of "good" things. Of two "good" things, which is the better? This entails a consideration of degree -- the lore of "less or more."
Chapter 8 (1366a)
The political speaker will find his powers of persuasion most of all enhanced by a knowledge of the four sorts of government -- democracy, oligarchy, aristocracy, monarchy, and their characteristic customs, institutions, and interests. Definition of the four sorts severally. Ends of each.
Chapter 9(1366b, 1367a, 1367b, 1368a )
The Epideictic speaker is concerned with virtue and vice, praising the one and censuring the other. The forms of virtue. Which are the greatest virtues? Some rhetoric devices used by the epideictic speaker: "amplification," especially. Amplification is particularly appropriate to epideictic oratory; examples, to political; enthymemes, to forensic.
Chapter 10(1368b, 1369a, 1369b)
The Forensic speaker should have studied wrongdoing -- its motives, its perpetrators, and its victims. Definitions of wrongdoing as injury voluntary inflicted contrary to law. Law is either (a) special, viz. that written law which regulates the life of a particular community, or (b) general, viz. all those unwritten principles which are supposed to be acknowledged everywhere. Enumeration and elucidation of the seven causes of human action, viz. three involuntary, (1) chance, (2) nature, (3) compulsion; and four voluntary, viz. (4) habit, (5) reasoning, (6) anger, (7) appetite. All voluntary actions are good or apparently good, pleasant or apparently pleasant. The good (or expedient) has been discussed under political oratory. The pleasant has yet to be considered.
Chapter 11(1370a, 1370b, 1371a, 1371b, 1372a)
Definition of pleasure, and analysis of things pleasant. -- The motives for wrongdoing, viz. advantage and pleasure, have thus been discussed in chapters 6, 7, 11.
Chapter 12 (1372b, 1373a
The characters and circumstances which lead men to commit wrong, or make them the victions of wrong.
Chapter 13(1373b, 1374a, 1374b)
Actions just and unjust may be classified in relation to (1) the law, (2) the persons affected. The law may be (a) special, i.e. the law of a particular State, or (b) universal, i.e. the law of Nature. The persons affected may be (a) the entire community, (b) individual members of it. A wrongdoer must either understand and intend the action, or not understand and intend it. In the former case, he must be acting either from deliberate choice or from passion. It is deliberate purpose that constitutes wickedness and criminal guilt. Un written law (1) includes in its purview the conduct that springs from exceptional goodness or badness, e.g. our behaviour towards benefactors and friends; (2) makes up for the defects in a community's written code or law. This second kind is equity. Its existence party is, and partly is not, intended by legislators; not intended, where they have noticed no defect in the law; intended, where they find themselves unable to define things exactly, and are obliged to legislate as if that held good always which in fact only holds good usually. -- Further remarks on the nature and scope of equity.
Chapter 14 (1375a)
The worse of two acts of wrong done to others is that which is prompted by the worse disposition. Other ways of computing the comparative badness of actions.
Chapter 15(1375b, 1376a, 1376b, 1377a , 1377b)
The "non-technical" (extrinsic) means of persuasion -- those which do not strictly belong to the art of rhetoric. They are five in number, and pertain especially to forensic oratory: (1) laws, (2) witnesses, (3) contracts (4) tortures, (5) oaths. How laws may be discredited or upheld, according as it suits the litigant. Witnesses may be either ancient (viz. poets and other notable persons; soothsayers; proverbs); or recent (viz. well-known contemporaries who have expressed their opinions about some disputed matter, and witnesses who give their evidence in court). Ancient witnesses are more trustworthy than contemporary. How contracts, and evidence given under torture, may be belittled or represented as important. In regard to oaths, a fourfold division exists: a man may either both offer and accept an oath, or neither, or one without the other -- that is, he may offer an oath but not accept one, or accept an oath but not offer one.
A hypertextual resource compiled by Lee Honeycutt (mailto:honeyl@iastate.edu)]
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