ARISTOTLE - The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica)

The Works of Aristotle:  Rhetoric (Rhetorica)

Quotes for Discussion

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.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9, pg 593

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.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9, pg 593

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 out 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 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.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9, pg 594

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.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9, pg 594

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.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 2, Great Books Volume 9, pg 597

It may be said that every individual man and all men in common aim at a certain end which determines what they choose and what they avoid. This end, to sum it up briefly, is happiness and its constituents.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 5, Great Books Volume 9, pg.600

Good also are the things by which we shall gratify our friends or annoy our enemies; and the things chosen by those whom we admire; and the things for which we are fitted by nature or experience, since we think we shall succeed more easily in these: and those in which no worthless man can succeed, for such thins bring greater praise; and those which we do in fact desire, for what we desire is taken to be not only pleasant but also better.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 6, Great Books Volume 9, pg.604

Noble also are those actions whose advantage may be enjoyed after death, as opposed to those whose advantage is enjoyed during one’s lifetime; for the latter are more likely to be for one’s own sake only. Also, all actions done for the sake of others, since less than other actions are done for one’s own sake; and all successes which benefit others and not oneself, and services done to one’s benefactors, for this is just; and good deed generally, since they are not directed to one’s own profit.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 9, Great Books Volume 9, pg.609

So are the distinctive qualities of a particular people, and the symbols of what it specially admires, like long hair in Sparta, where this is a mark of a free man, as it is not easy to perform any menial task when one’s hair is long. Again it is noble not to practice any sordid craft, since it is the mark of a free man not to live at another’s beck and call.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 9, Great Books Volume 9, pg.610

… good fathers are likely to have good sons, and good training is likely to produce good character. Hence it is only when a man has already done something that we bestow encomiums upon him. Yet the actual deeds are evidence of the doer’s character; even if a man has not actually done a given good things, we shall bestow praise on him, if we are sure that he is the sort of man who would do it.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 9, Great Books Volume 9, pg.610

You may feel that even if you are found out you can stave off a trial, or have it postponed, or corrupt your judges; or that even if you are sentences you can avoid paying damages, or can at least postpone doing so for a long time; or that you are so badly off that you will have nothing to lose. You may feel that the gain to be got by wrong-doing is great or certain or immediate, and that the penalty is small or uncertain or distant. It may be that the advantage to be gained is greater than any possible retribution; as in the case of despotic power, according to the popular view.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 12, Great Books Volume 9, pg.616

In order to be wrongs, a man must (1) suffer actual harm, (2) suffer it against his will. The various possible forms of harm are clearly explained by our previous separate discussion of goods and evils

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 13, Great Books Volume 9, pg.618

Now it often happens that the man will admit an act, but will not admit the prosecutor’s label for the act nor the facts which that label implies. He will admit that he took a thing but not that he “stole” it;

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book I, chapter 13, Great Books Volume 9, pg.618

There are three kinds of slighting – contempt, spite, and insolence (1) contempt is one kind of slighting; you feel contempt for what you consider unimportant, and it is just such things that you slight, (2) Spite is another kind; it is thwarting another man’s wishes, not to get something yourself but to prevent his getting it. The slight arises just from the fact that you do not aim at something for yourself; clearly you do not think that he can do you harm, for then you would be afraid of him instead of slighting him, not yet that he can do you any good worth mentioning, for then you would be anxious to make friends with him. (3) Insolence is also a form of slighting, since it consists in doing and saying things that cause shame to the victim, not in order that anything may happen to yourself, or because anything has happened to yourself, but simply for the pleasure involved (Retaliationin not insolence, but vengeance.)

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 2, chapter 2, Great Books Volume 9, pg.623

Here we have a Maxim; add the reason or explanation, and the whole thing is an Enthymem; thus

It makes them idle; and therewith they earn Ill-will and jealously throughout the city.

Again,

There is no man in all things prosperous,

And

There is no man among us all is free,

Are maxims; but the latter, taken with what follows it, is an Enthymeme –

For all are slaves of money or of chance.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 2, chapter 21, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.642

…if a man happens to have had neighbours or bad children, he will agree with any one who tells hi, “Nothing is more annoying than having neighbours” or “nothing is more foolish than to be the parent of children.” The e orator has therefore to guess the subjects on which his hearers really hold views already, and what those views are, and then must express as general truths, these same views on these same subjects. This is one advantage of using maxims. There is another which is more important – in invests a speech with moral character. There is a moral character in every speech in which the moral purpose is conspicuous; and maxims always produce this effect, because the utterance of them amounts to a general declaration of moral principles; so that if the maxim are sound, they display the speaker as a man of sound moral character, So much for the Maxim – its nature, varieties, proper use, and advantages.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 2, chapter 21, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.643

The special facts here needed are those that are true of Achilles along; such facts as that he slew Hector, the bravest of the Trojans, and Cycnus the invulnerable, who prevented all the Greeks from landing, and again that he was the youngest man who joined the expedition, and was not bound by oath to join it, and so on.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 2, chapter 22, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.644

Another is the argument from consequence. In the Alexander, for instance, it is argued that Paris must have had a lofty disposition, since he despised society and lived by himself on Mount Ida: because lofty people do this kind of thing, therefore Paris too, we are to suppose, had a lofty soul. Of, if a man dresses fashionable and roams around at night he is a rake, since that is the way rakes behave.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 2, chapter 24, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.650

In making a speech one must study three points; first, the means of producing persuasion; second, the style, or language, to be used; third, the proper arrangement of the various parts of the speech.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.653

Our next subject will be the style of expression. For it is not enough to know what we ought to say; we must also say it as we ought; much help is thus afforded towards producing the right impression of speech.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.653

The right thing in speaking really is that we should be satisfied not to annoy our hearers, without trying to delight them; we ought in fairness to fight our case with no help beyond the bare facts; nothing, therefore, should matter except the proof of those facts. Still, as has been already said, other things affect the result considerably, owing to the defects of our hearers.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.654

The arts of language cannot help having a small but real importance, whatever it is we have to expound to others; the way in which a thing is said does affect its intelligibility. Not, however, so much importance as people think. All such arts are fanciful and meant to charm the hearer. Nobody uses fine language when teaching geometry.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 1, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.654

(Take as an example the introduction to the Helen of Isocrates - there is nothing in common between the 'eristics' and Helen.) And here, even if you travel far from your subject, it is fitting rather than that there should be sameness in the entire speech.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 14, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.668

The appeal to the hearer aims at securing his goodwill or at arousing his resentment, or sometimes at gaining his serious attention to the case or even at distracting it - for gaining it is not always an advantage and speakers will often for that reason try to make him laugh.
You may use any means you choose to make your hearer receptive; among others giving him a good impression of your character which always helps to secure his attention. He will be ready to attend to anything that touches himself and to anything that is important surprising or agreeable; and you should accordingly convey to him the impression that what you have to say is of this nature. If you wish to distract his attention you should imply that the subject does not affect him or is trivial or disagreeable. But observe, all this has nothing to do with the speech itself. It merely has to do with the weak-minded tendency of the hearer to listen to what is beside the point. When this tendency is absent no introduction is wanted beyond a summary statement of your subject to put a sort of head on the main body of your speech.

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Book 3, chapter 14, Great Books Volume 9,  pg.669

Vocabulary – Rhetoric

The Works of Aristotle, Rhetoric (Rhetorica), Great Books Volume 9

divarication, pg 648, a difference of opinion, a divergence of opinion

enthymeme, pg 596

An enthymeme (Greek:ἐνθύμημα, enthumēma), in its modern sense, is an informally stated syllogism (a three-part deductive argument) with an unstatedassumption that must be true for the premises to lead to the conclusion.

An informally stated syllogism with an implied premise.

syllogism, pg 596

a form of argument that contains a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion.

A form of deductive reasoning consisting of a major premise, a minor premise, and a conclusion.

The Major Premise of a syllogism contains the predicate of the conclusion and the middle term.