The Trivium: Rhetoric

“I fear that in every elected office, members will obtain an influence by noise not sense. By meanness, not greatness. By ignorance, not learning. By contracted hearts, not large souls . . There must be decency and respect.” - John Adams

The Art of Rhetoric, the final liberal art of our series on the Trivium, and the one that is perhaps most keenly felt in the post modern day. This art is closely related to the art of logic, or dialectic. The tragic decline of mutual respect and decency seem to be ubiquitous throughout both sides of the political spectrum. Both sides justifiably complain about the lack of these virtues and yet neither side seems willing to demonstrate it or demand of their figure heads their honest emulation. A return to sense, greatness, learning, and large souled dialogue is what is required to pull our generation from its languishing state.

Rhetoric in its purest sense, is a civic art. Cicero described it poignantly as the art to instruct, move, and delight our listeners and Aristotle wrote an entire treatise on the three means through which we can instruct, move, and delight our audience. We will examine these three approaches: ethos, pathos, and logos and their role as espoused in Aristotle’s Rhetoric. Again, this is not intended to be a comprehensive analysis, but merely an invitation to further study and research.

Ethos

This is also known as persuasion through the character of the speaker. A speaker, to be seen as truly credible by his audience, must possess three critical attributes. Firstly, he must possess practical knowledge, intelligence, and competence. This is the first critical litmus test of his or her character. We must know and to some degree be an authority on the subject about which we are speaking. Generally, human beings are quite good at perceiving incompetence. Secondly, a speaker must possess a virtuous or a goodly character. We are quite intuitive when we receive information from someone outside our trusted circles. While there are many examples of successful con artists, it is difficult to deny how much easier it is for us to trust the words of someone we see as an inherently honorable or virtuous individual. Finally, a speaker must possess a spirit of good will towards his audience. It is critical that he is not perceiving his audience as a means to an end, but that he respects them as an end of themselves. He must genuinely desire to instruct, move, and delight his audience. If a speaker displays none of these traits, it undermines their credibility to a truly critical and perceptive audience.

Pathos

This is better known as the art of persuasion through the emotions of the hearer. It is self-evident that our emotional states and the emotional states of the audience have the power to modify or alter our judgements. This can be seen in the police officer that finds themselves in a friendly mood on a traffic stop; to them the culprit seems to have committed no crime, or at the very least, a crime of a lesser order. The inverse is also true, the police officer that finds themselves in an angry or vengeful mood will find no clemency for even the smallest of infractions. This same principle is applied to modifying the judgement of the speaker’s listeners. It is clear that the speaker must inspire emotions that are the most conducive to convincing his hearers. This is perhaps the most perfidious aspect of Aristotle’s Rhetoric, and the aspect that is most prone to misuse. This must be guarded against through the appropriate application of ethos and logos.

Logos

Logos can be thought of simply as the art of convincing through the argument itself. This mostly pertains to the subject of the speech and the ability of the speaker to present their information as proven, or at the very least, seemingly proven. This component of persuasion is the most akin to dialectic, or logic. The speaker must artfully and effectively use his premises and pursuant conclusions to convince the hearer of the truth of what they are saying. The speaker must clearly establish his claims and then provide equally clear proofs that establish the validity of his claim. This is where both presentation and content are critical to the success of any speech. This is the domain that is so often lacking in modern political speeches. Sense has given way to noise, and meanness to greatness.

Aristotle posited that these are the three means of persuasion that we have at our disposal. While controversial in the modern day they still form a wonderful framework for our analysis and use in our discussions, both large and small. These are tools in the toolkit that allow us to better persuade and perceive when these means of persuasion are being used on us, whether for good or ill.