Rhetoric

​Since praise is from actions, and the characteristic of a virtuous person is to act according to deliberate choice, we must try to show that the subject is acting according to deliberate choice, and it is useful that they appear to have done so many times; therefore even accidental occurrences and those from chance must be taken as if done according to deliberate choice; for if many similar occurrences are brought forward, it will seem to be a sign of virtue and deliberate choice.

​Praise is a statement displaying the greatness of virtue. We must therefore display actions as being of this kind. On the other hand, encomium is of achievements (and surrounding circumstances, such as noble birth and education, are for the sake of confirmation; for it is natural that good individuals come from good parents, and that one brought up in such a way should be of such a kind), which is why we praise in encomia those who have acted. But achievements are signs of the disposition, since we would praise even one who has not acted, if we believed him to be of such a kind.

​And felicitation and congratulation on fortune are identical to each other, but not identical to these, but just as happiness contains virtue, so felicitation contains these.

​And praise and counsels have a common form. For those things which you would suggest in counseling, these when changed in their expression become encomia.

Since, then, we have what we ought to do and what kind of person we ought to be, we must, while speaking of these things as suggestions, change and turn them in expression; for instance, that “one ought not to be proud of things due to chance, but of those due to oneself.” Expressed in this way it has the force of a suggestion, but in this way that of praise: “being proud not of things belonging to him due to chance, but of those due to himself.” So whenever you wish to praise, look at what suggestion you would make; and when you wish to suggest, look at what you would praise.

​And the expression will of necessity be opposite, whenever the one forbidding and the other not forbidding are transposed.

And we must use many of the means of amplification, for instance, if he has done something alone, or first, or with few, or most of all; for all these things are honorable. And also those from times and opportunities; and in this case, if it is contrary to what is expected. And if he has succeeded in the same thing many times; for it would seem to be great and not from chance, but due to himself. And if incentives and honors have been devised and established because of him, and if the first encomium was made for him, as for Hippolochus, and the setting up of a statue in the agora for Harmodius and Aristogeiton; and similarly also in the case of the opposites. And if you are not well provided on his own account, you must compare him with others, which Isocrates used to do because of his unfamiliarity with speaking in court. And we must compare him with famous people; for it is amplifying and honorable if he is better than virtuous people.

​And amplification falls naturally into praises; for praise is concerned with superiority, and superiority is among honorable things; therefore, even if not against famous people, we must compare him with others, since superiority seems to indicate virtue.

​And in general, of the forms common to all speeches, amplification is most suitable for epideictic speeches (for they take the actions as agreed upon, so that it remains to invest them with greatness and beauty); and examples are for deliberative speeches (for we judge by predicting the future from past events); and enthymemes are for judicial speeches (for what has happened, because of its obscurity, especially admits of cause and proof).

​From what sources, then, praises and blames are spoken, almost all of them, and looking toward what things we ought to praise and blame, and from what sources encomia and reproaches arise, these are they; for if these are grasped, their opposites are obvious; for blame is from the opposites.