Aristotle Rhetoric 2.9

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).) — 2.9 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. νεμεσᾶν: the nobler brother of envy (Nietzsche).
2. There is justice both in the punishment of the parricide and in the deserved good fortune of others. The conclusion must refer to the latter; if his like is fortunate, he hopes he may be.
3. Because it is a man's own fault, and pity is only felt for what is undeserved.
4. The first part of the sentence is clear: men are indignant when what good men deserve is possessed by those who are not good. The literal translation o the text as it stands is: Men are indignant . . . at all the advantages of which good men and those who possess natural advantages are worthy; but this cannot be right, since there is nothing in natural advantages to arouse moral indignation, there is no question of their being deserved or undeserved. Something may have fallen out like but they will not be indignant with those who possess natural advantages. Roemer ( Rhein. Mus. 39 p. 504) suggests οὐδ’ εἰ τὰ φύσει ἔχουσιν ἀγαθά (understanding νεμεσήσει τούτοις).
5. δοκεῖν is a stronger word than φαίνεσθαι, indicating an intellectual operation as opposed to an impression received through the senses. The idea is that where anything has been so long in a person's possession, it has come to he regarded as his by right.
6. Hom. Il. 11.542 . Only the first verse is given in the received text of Homer; the second is not found in any of the mss. The reference is to Cebriones, a son of Priam slain by Patroclus.
7. It has been suggested to insert μὴ before τυγχάνωσι: if, although virtuous and worthy, they do not happen to possess such advantages.
8. Or, of which others happen to be unworthy.