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.

that oratory is the art of speaking well, since when the best definition is found, he who seeks for another must seek for a worse

With this character of it, the definition that oratory is the science of speaking well agrees excellently, for it embraces all the virtues of oratory at once and includes also the character of the true orator, as he cannot speak well unless he be a good man

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.

We must not, therefore, start from any and every accepted opinion, but only from those we have defined -- those accepted by our judges or by those whose authority they recognize

(b) they invest a speech with moral character.

make his audience feel

A maxim is a general statement about questions of practical conduct. It is an incomplete enthymeme. Four kinds of maxims. Maxims should be used (a) by elderly men, and (b) to controvert popular sayings. Advantages of maxims: (a) they enable a speaker to gratify his commonplace hearers by expressing as a universal truth the opinions which they themselves hold about particular cases; (b) they invest a speech with moral character.

Four faults of prose style, with illustrative examples: (1) misuse of compound words; (2) employment of strange words; (3) long, unseasonable, or frequent epithets; (4) inappropriate metaphors.

the right thing in speaking really is that we should fight our case with no help beyong the bare facts; and yet the arts of language cannot help having a small but real importance, whatever it is we have to expound to others

powers of persuasion most of all enhanced by a knowledge

Fear may be defined as a pain or disturbance due to a mental picture of some destructive or painful evil in the future. Of destructive or painful evils only; for there are some evils, e.g. wickedness or stupidity, the prospect of which does not frighten us: I mean only such as amount to great pains or losses.

Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.

We may define a good thing as that which ought to be chosen for its own sake; or as that for the sake of which we choose something else; or as that which is sought after by all things, or by all things that have sensation or reason, or which will be sought after by any things that acquire reason; or as that which must be prescribed for a given individual by reason generally, or is prescribed for him by his individual reason, this being his individual good; or as that whose presence brings anything into a satisfactory and self-sufficing condition; or as self-sufficiency; or as what produces, maintains, or entails characteristics of this kind, while preventing and destroying their opposites.

We may define happiness as prosperity combined with virtue; or as independence of life; or as the secure enjoyment of the maximum of pleasure; or as a good condition of property and body, together with the power of guarding one's property and body and making use of them. That happiness is one or more of these things, pretty well everybody agrees.

It is clear, then, that rhetorical study, in its strict sense, is concerned with the modes of persuasion.

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.

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.

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.

enthymeme

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

we are in no respect superior to other living creatures; nay, we are inferior to many in swiftness and in strength and in other resources; but, because there has been implanted in us the power to persuade each other and to make clear to each other whatever we desire, not only have we escaped the life of wild beasts, but we have come together and founded cities and made laws and invented arts; and, generally speaking, there is no institution devised by man which the power of speech has not helped us to establish.

who devote themselves to disputation,(2) since they pretend to search for truth, but straightway at the beginning of their professions attempt to deceive us with lies?

Rhetoric, according to my view, is the ghost or counterfeit of a part of politics.

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.

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. Do you know any other effect of rhetoric over and above that of producing persuasion

it is not an art at all, in my opinion

Rhetoric, according to my view, is the ghost or counterfeit of a part of politics.

that rhetoric is the artificer of persuasion

Then rhetoric, as would appear, is the artificer of a persuasion which creates belief about the just and unjust, but gives no instruction about them?

rhetoric is the artificer of persuasion

rhetoric is the art of persuasion in courts of law and other assemblies, as I was just now saying, and about the just and unjust

libido