Aristotle Rhetoric 2.24

John Henry Freese (Translator)

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Rhetoric. Aristotle. John Henry Freese (Translator). London. 1926.

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Current edition Perseus

The "Art" of Rhetoric (English) (Aristotle. The "Art" of Rhetoric. Freese, John Henry, translator. London: William Heinemann, Ltd.; Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1926 (printing).)

Editions (1)
Ῥητορική Perseus (Aristotle. Aristotelis Ars Rhetorica. Ross, William David, editor. Oxford: Clarendon Press,1959 (printing).) — 2.24 focus
Translations (1)
Aristotle's Treatise on Rhetoric (Theodore Alois Buckley) (OCR draft) Experimental (Theodore Alois Buckley's English translation, first published in 1850 and represented from the Henry G. Bohn 1857 printing; corrected against a second OCR of the same printing.) — 2 focus

Notes on the current edition

Rhetoric

1. Isoc. 9.65-69 .
2. Or equivocation, in which a single term has a double meaning.
3. Deriving μυστήρια ( μύειν, to close the lips) from μῦς (mouse).
4. A fragment from the Parthenia (songs sung by maidens to the accompaniment of the flute). Pan is called the dog of Cybele, the great nature-goddess of the Greeks, as being always in attendance on her, being himself a nature-god. The fact that Pindar calls Pan dog is taken as a glorification of that animal.
5. κοινὸς Ἑρμῆς is an expression meaning halves! When anyone had a stroke of luck, such as finding a purse full of money in the street, anyone with him expected to go halves. Hermes was the god of luck, and such a find was called ἑρμαῖον. κοινωνικός is taken to mean (1) liberal to others, or (2) sociable.
6. λόγος: (1) speech; (2) account, esteem.
7. Very obscure and no explanation is satisfactory. The parallel passage in Aristot. Sophist. Elenchi 20.6 is: Do you being in Sicily now know that there are triremes in the Piraeus ? The ambiguity lies in the position of now, whether it is to be taken with in Sicily or with in the Piraeus . At the moment when a man is in Sicily he cannot know that there are at this time triremes in the Piraeus ; but being in Sicily he can certainly know of the ships in the Piraeus , which should be there, but are now in Sicily (Kirchmann). St. Hilaire suggests that the two clauses are: Do you now, being in Sicily , see the triremes which are in the Piraeus ? and, Did you when in Sicily , see the triremes which are now in the Piraeus ? The fallacy consists in the two facts (being in the Piraeus and the existence of triremes in Sicily ), true separately, being untrue combined.
8. Thrasybulus deposed the thirty individuals and put down the single tyranny which they composed; he then claimed a thirtyfold reward, as having put down thirty tyrannies.
9. Frag. 5 ( T.G.F.).
10. Hdt. 2.141 . The story was that, when Sennacherib invaded Egypt , a host of field-mice devoured all the quivers, bowstrings and leather shield-holders of the Assyrians. Apollo was called Smintheus ( σμίνθος, mouse) and was represented on coins with a mouse in his hand, either as the mouse-slayer and protector of crops, or because the animal was sacred to him. The story, alluded to elsewhere, was of Greek, not of Egyptian origin. Similar panegyrics on ridiculous things or animals included pots, counters, salt, flies, bees, and such subjects as death, sleep, and food.
11. Sophocles, The Gathering of the Greeks ( T.G.F. p. 161), a satyric drama. His not being invited was a mere accident of the disrespect.
12. Assuming a proposition to be convertible, when it is not; it does not follow, assuming that all the high-minded dwell by themselves, that all who dwell by themselves are highminded.
13. The poor want to get money; the rich dance and sing to amuse themselves, or to show that they can do as they like. Exiles can certainly live where they like in a foreign land, but would prefer to live in their own country; the rich, who are not exiles, travel to amuse themselves.
14. The first is means has a real, absolute existence; the second is merely expresses the identity of the terms of the proposition, and is particular; but the sophistical reasoner takes it in the same sense as the first. The same applies to the argument about the unknown.
15. This utterance of Protagoras gave particular offense as apparently implying that the weaker cause was really identical with the worse, so that to support it was to support injustice. But, considering the high moral character ascribed to Protagoras, it seems more probable to take the formula as a statement of the aim of all ancient orators—how to overcome stronger arguments by arguments weaker in themselves.