Rhetoric

​Thus, concerning their capacity, and how they stand in relation to one another, enough has been said. But of those [modes of persuasion] that occur through demonstrating or seeming to demonstrate, just as in dialectic one is induction, another syllogism, and another apparent syllogism, so it is here likewise; for the example is an induction, the enthymeme a syllogism, and the apparent enthymeme an apparent syllogism. And I call an enthymeme a rhetorical syllogism, and an example a rhetorical induction. Indeed, everyone produces persuasion through demonstrating either by speaking of examples or of enthymemes, and besides these there is nothing else. So that, if indeed it is absolutely necessary to demonstrate anything whatever either by syllogizing or by inducing (and this is clear to us from the Analytics), it is necessary that each of the former be the same as each of the latter.

​Now, what the difference is between an example and an enthymeme is clear from the Topics (for there, syllogism and induction have been spoken of earlier), namely, that demonstrating on the basis of many similar cases that something is so, is induction there, but example here; whereas when certain things being the case, something else turns out to be so besides them because of their being so, either universally or for the most part, this is called a syllogism there, but an enthymeme here.

​It is also clear that each of the two possesses a good form of rhetoric; for just as has been said in the methodological treatises, so it is in these cases likewise; for some rhetorics are of the example-using kind, and others of the enthymeme-using kind, and similarly, some speakers are example-users and others are enthymeme-users. Now, speeches using examples are no less persuasive, but those using enthymemes receive more applause;

​but the cause of this, and how one must use each, we shall state later; for now, let us define these same things more clearly. For since the persuasive is persuasive to someone, and one thing is persuasive and credible immediately through itself, while another because of seeming to be demonstrated through things of that sort, and since no art examines the particular—for instance, medicine does not examine what is healthy for Socrates or for Callias, but what is so for a person of such a kind or for people of such kinds (for this belongs to art, whereas the particular is infinite and not an object of science)—so neither will rhetoric observe the particular reputable opinion—for instance, for Socrates or for Hippias—but that which is so for people of such a kind, just as dialectic does. For dialectic too does not syllogize from any chance materials (since even to those who rave, some things appear to be so), but rather from things that stand in need of discussion, whereas rhetoric syllogizes from things about which we are already accustomed to deliberate.

Its function, indeed, is concerned with such subjects about which we deliberate and do not possess arts, and among such listeners who are unable to see through many stages or to reason from a long way back. And we deliberate about those things that appear to admit of being otherwise; for about things that are impossible to have happened, to be going to happen, or to be in any other way, no one deliberates, if they suppose them to be so; for there is nothing further to be gained.