Rhetoric

Book excerpt: RHETORIC 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.