exercit ives

parti pris

Constative'

n short, it may very well be the case that the rhetoricaltriangle is about as useful as a joystick in eXistenZ—in other words, it mayoffer us the sense that we are in control of the game, but we will miss outon all the action as a result

an opening of alterity

when this question is put to us, it's entirely understandable that we mighthesitate. Maybe we aren't quite sure which idiom is offering us the question (isthe question curious or obligatory, dismissive or confused?). Or maybe we justhaven't come up with an answer that is pithy enough yet

or the purposes of lhis treatis

Rhetoric, then, (for we shall henceforth use this term without dread of sarcastic objections) will be best divided, in my opinion, in such a manner that we may speak first of the art, next of the artist, and then of the work. The art will be that which ought to be attained by study and is the knowledge how to speak well. The artificer is he who has thoroughly acquired the art, that is, the orator, whose business is to speak well. The work is what is achieved by the artificer, that is, good speaking. All these are to be considered under special heads, but of the particulars that are to follow, I shall speak in their several places; at present I shall proceed to consider what is to be said on the first general head.

or oratoria will be taken in the same sense as elocutoria, oratrix as elocutrix, but the word rhētorikē, of which we are speaking, is the same sort of word as eloquentia, and it is doubtless used in two senses by the Greeks. 3. In one acceptation, it is an adjective, ars rhetorica, as navis piratica: in the other a substantive, like philosophia or amicitia.

The most common definition therefore is that oratory is the power of persuading. What I call a power, some call a faculty and others a talent, but that this discrepancy may be attended with no ambiguity, I mean by "power" δύναμις (dynamis). 4. This opinion had its origin from Isocrates, if the treatise on the art which is in circulation under his name is really his. That rhetorician, though he had none of the feelings of those who defame the business of the orator, gives too rash a definition of the art when he says, "That rhetoric is the "worker of persuasion," πειθοῦς δημιουργός (peithous dēmiourgos), for I shall not allow myself to use the peculiar term that Ennius applies to Marcus Cethegus, suadae medulla, "marrow of persuasion." 5. In Plato too, Gorgias, in the dialogue inscribed with his name, says almost the same thing, but Plato wishes it to be received as the opinion of Gorgias, not as his own. Cicero, in several passages of his writings, has said that the duty of an orator is to speak in a way adapted to persuade. 6. In his books on rhetoric also, but with which, doubtless, he was not satisfied, he makes the end of eloquence to be persuasion.

Definition of rhetoric as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.

GORGIAS: No: the definition seems to me very fair, Socrates; for persuasion is the chief end of rhetoric.

Then hear me, Gorgias, for I am quite sure that if there ever was a man who entered on the discussion of a matter from a pure love of knowing the truth

SOCRATES: Now I think, Gorgias, that you have very accurately explained what you conceive to be the art of rhetoric; and you mean to say, if I am not mistaken, that rhetoric is the artificer of persuasion, having this and no other business, and that this is her crown and end.

that rhetoric is the artificer of persuasion