Professional Documents
Culture Documents
REFERENCES
Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/40237129?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/
info/about/policies/terms.jsp
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content
in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.
For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Penn State University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Philosophy & Rhetoric.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
An Aristotelian Trilogy: Ethics, Rhetoric, Politics, and
the Search for Moral Truth
Philosophy and Rhetoric, Vol. 13, No. 1. Winter 1980. Published by The Pennsyl-
vania State University Press, University Park and London.
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
2 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 3
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
4 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 5
II
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
6 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 7
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
8 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 9
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
10 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 11
one and the same art to discern the real and the apparent means
of persuasion, just as it is the function of dialectic to discern the
real and the apparent syllogism. What makes a man a 'sophist' is
not his faculty but his moral purpose. In rhetoric ... the term
'rhetorician' may describe either the speaker's knowledge of the
art, or his moral purpose."38
To say, therefore, that a piece of discourse is "rhetorically
sound" is to say that it is truly persuasive; that is, that it effec-
tively prsents such arguments allowed by the available facts of a
case as will enable an auditor to make a reasoned and informed
dcision. And insofar as the disposition and capacity to make
such dcisions are constituents of moral virtue, good rhetoric
fonctions to encourage the formation and exercise of virtue.
Speech that is sound rhetorically, then, is also sound morally.
The standards of moral virtue and rhetorical excellence are, in-
deed, the same.
What does all this lead to? It enables us to conclude first that,
rather than being immoral or even amoral, Aristotle's theory of
rhetoric is grounded in and guided by the ethical principles devel-
oped in his moral theory. The proper practice of rhetoric is in-
trinsically ethical because the nature and function of th art are
conceived against the background of Aristotle's ethical theory.
He links the two arts intimately.
More significantly, we must conclude that the activity of the
practical intellect is essentially rhetorical in nature, and that
practical wisdom and rhetorical expertise are in some respects
identical. Recali that Aristotle defines the particular excellence
of the practical intellect as the ability to deliberate well about
action. Practical wisdom, which dtermines in any particular in-
stance the standard by which conduci is to be appraised and
chosen, is a capacity to deliberate well and a disposition to
choose according to the conclusion attendant upon such dlib-
ration. Now rhetoric, as we hve seen, is a practical faculty/
and it is concerned with such matters as we deliberate upon.
Furthermore, since rhetoric aims properly at facilitating rea-
soned judgment about such matters, we can say that it aims at
excellence in practical dlibration. In seeking to lead auditors
to intelligent decision-making, rhetoric also seeks implicitly to
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
12 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 13
III
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
14 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 15
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
16 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHERLYLE JOHNSTONE 17
NOTES
Whitney J. Oates, Aristotle and the Problem of Value (Princeton, N.J.: Prince-
ton University Press, 1963), p. 335. He adds that for Aristotle, "rhetoric . . .
becomes nakedly the study of that which will practically produce persuasion.
'Anything goes,' if only persuasion merges" (p. 341).
2See J. Robert Olian, "The Intended Uses of Aristotle's Rhetoric" Speech
Monographs 35 (1968), 137-48. Olian summarizes many of the ethical criticisms of
the Rhetoric. See also . A. G. Fller, History of Greek Thought: Aristotle (New
York: Holt, 1931). Fller remarks (p. 294) that "rhetoric [according to Aristotle]
is good or bad according as it wins its case." Likewise Parke Burgess, in "A
Concept of Social Responsibility in Rhetoric," (Doctoral Dissertation, Northwest-
ern University, 1965), p. 128: ". . . [rhetoric] is considered by Aristotle as
amoral, as an art. . . ."
3See, for example, Lawrence J. Flynn, "The Aristotelian Basis for the Ethics of
Speaking," The Speech Teacher 6 (September 1957), 179-87; William M. A. Gri-
maldi, Studies in the Philosophy of Aristotle's Rhetoric (Wiesbaden, Germany:
Franz Steiner Verlag, 1972); Richard McKeon, "Aristotle's Conception of Lan-
guage and the Arts of Language," Classical Philology 41 (1946), 193-206 and 42
(1947), 21-50; and Lois S. Self, "Rhetoric and Phronesis: The Aristotelian Ideal,"
Philosophy and Rhetoric 12 (1979), 130-45.
4Readers of Philosophy and Rhetoric will recali the rcent essay by Self (see n. 3)
in which similar daims were made concerning the relationship between ethics and
rhetoric in Aristotle's philosophy. The prsent essay seeks to broaden the concep-
tual linkages illuminated by Self, and to extend them so as to clarify the rle of
politicai activity in Aristotle's ethical theory. In arguing for the "trilogy" thesis,
the prsent essay goes beyond Selfs narrower inquiry. This writer finds that,
though her argument is interesting and compelling, Self does not explicate with
sufficient clarity the theoretical framework within which the Ethics, Rhetoric, and
Politics must be viewed and understood.
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
18 AN ARISTOTELIAN TRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 19
9Ibid., 1139a 33-1 139b 5: "Choice cannot exist without reason and intellect or
without a moral state. . . . Hence choice is either desiderative reason or ratiocina-
tive desire, and such an origin of action is a man."
W. W. Fortenbaugh, in his analysis of Aristotle's conception of moral virtue,
argues a similar point, but with a somewhat diffrent interprtation. Of Aris-
totle's view he writes that "moral virtue ensures a correct goal, while practical
wisdom as a perfection of man's logicai side is responsible for correct means-end
dlibrations." Fortenbaugh, Aristotle on Emotion (New York: Harper & Row,
1975), p. 77. Similarly, (p. 75), "while moral virtue makes th goal correct,
practical wisdom makes the means correct." Fortenbaugh construes Aristotle to
mean that "moral virtue" is a correctness of desire that exists apart from the rule
of practical wisdom. Moral virtue is "a perfection of man's emotional side" (p.
75), and thus can be exercised even in the absence of reasoning (see pp. 73-74).
Although it is beyond th scope of this essay to dispute Fortenbaugh's interprta-
tion, I will note that it seems to be at variance with what Aristotle says at Etnica
1144b 24-28, and 1144b 30-1 145a 2.
'"Aristotle, Magna Moralia, 1206b 10-15. Armstrong, in his introduction to this
work, puts it in similar terms (p. 429): ". . . . it [eudaimonia] is an 'Activity of the
Soul in accordance with its own Virtue or Excellence.' Now the Soul is partly
rational, partly irrational; and each part has its proper virtues. . . . The Moral
Virtues . . . consist in the control of irrational feelings or passions by a rational
Rule or Standard (logos)."
"Ross, Aristotle, p. 221. Likewise, Hardie (p. 311) finds that, on Aristotle's view,
"rationality is what makes a man ideally good." He concludes (pp. 320-21) that
Aristotle's ethical theory connects "the concept of moral worth with the fact that
man is not just the plaything of circumstances and his own irrational nature but
also the responsible planner of his own life." Likewise, McKeon concludes
("Aristotle's Conception of Language," p. 196) that "moral action dpends on
the rule of right reason (orthos logos). ..."
McKeon summarizes Aristotle's view well: "Directly or indirectly, reason is
essential to the virtuous life. Happiness implies reason and cannot be without
reason (logos); and moral virtue is defined as a mean determined in accordance
with a rational principle (logos) or as a prudent man would determine it. There-
fore, to live as one should is to live according to reason, for the standard of virtue
is right reason, and the excesses of incontinence and of vice are both contrary to
right reason." McKeon, "Aristotle's Conception of Language and the Arts of
Laneuaee," Part I, 205.
I2Aristotle, Rhetorica, W. Rhys Roberts, trans., in McKeon, ed., Basic Works,
1363b 14-16. Ail subsquent rfrences to the Rhetoric will be taken from this
dition, unless otherwise noted.
13Aristotle, Topica, W. A. Pickard-Cambridge, trans., in McKeon, 104b 1-35.
The problems to which dialectic is properly applied seem to be of this sort. They
are problems "on which either people hold no opinion either way, or the masses
hold a contrary opinion to the philosophers, or the philosophers to the masses, or
each of them among themselves." They are not questions concerning particular
courses of action to be pursued in particular situations, as are the questions to
which dlibration and rhetoric are applicable.
l4In the Rhetoric (1359b 10-15), Aristotle tells us that "rhetoric is a combination
of the science of logic and of the ethical branch of politics; and it is partly like
dialectic, partlv like sophistical reasonine."
l5The function of this faculty, says Aristotle (Rhetorica, 1357a 1-8), "is to deal
with such matters as we deliberate upon without arts or Systems to guide us, in the
hearing of persons who cannot take in at a glance a complicated argument, or
follow a long chain of reasoning. The subjects of our dlibration are such as
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
20 AN ARISTOTELIAN TRILOGY
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 21
24"Themoment Aristotle decided that the art of rhetoric directs its major effort
upon the world of contingent reality and th area of the probable," Grimaldi
concludes (p. 25), "and calls into play dlibration and judgment he places it
under the domain of what he calls the practical intellect rather than th specula-
tive intellect. . . . The speculative intellect moves toward Being, or ultimate real-
ity, in itself whereas the practical intellect moves toward Being, or reality, insofar
as this Being is to issue in human action. Owing to this diffrence one might say
that th role of th appetitive . . . is comparatively negligible in ... the activity
of th speculative intellect compared with its role in the action of the practical
intellect. . . . The practical intellect . . . demands th appetitive lment in the
Dsvehe as an essential comnonen for its activitv. ..."
^Grimaldi writes (p. 24) that "for Aristotle, the very essence of the rhetorical art
is constituted by an intimate fusion of the intellectual and appetitive lments in
the soul." He states elsewhere (p. 16) that "Aristotle . . . displays a sharp awre-
ness that reason alone does not necessarily speak to the other, something which
discourse in its effort to communicate must do. Reason does not possess the
power of persuasion. Thus Aristotle introduces into the syllogism, the instrument
of reason, his The enthymeme as the main instru-
psychology of human action.
ment of rhetorical argument incorportes the interplay of reason and motion in
discourse."
Similarly, Fortenbaugh observes that, for Aristotle, the emotional dimension
of the human psych is accessible by reasoned argument. He remarks (p. 30),
"Emotion, that is to say the alogical behaviour of human beings, involves judg-
ment and therefore is open to reasoned persuasion and is properly classified
amone cognitive Dhenomena."
26Aristotle, Rhetorica, 1354a 24-26.
^Grimaldi discusses this interprtation of the Rhetoric in the first chapter of his
work.
^Aristotle, Rhetorica, 1377b 20-28. Lane Cooper translates this passage in a like
way when he finds Aristotle saying that the speech must "bring the judge or
audience into the right state of feeling." Lane Cooper, The Rhetoric of Aristotle
(New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1932), p. xlii. Again (p. 91), the speech
aims at "producing the right attitude in the hearer."
In a rcent critique of Cooper's translation of the Rhetoric, Thomas M. Conley
seems to dispute the conclusion that the speech must influence the dispositions of
the auditore. He daims that "Aristotle is simply taking note of the fact that
persuasion takes place only when, among other things, an audience 'has felt a
certain way.' " "The Greekless Reader and Aristotle's Rhetoric" Quarterly Jour-
nal of Speech, 65 (February 1979), 77. Still, it must be the speech itself that
induces the audience to feel as it does, as is suggested by J. H. Freese's transla-
tion in th Loeb Library dition of the Rhetoric (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press: 1926), p. 345: "for in ail cases persuasion is the resuit either of the judges
themselves being affected in a certain manner, or because they consider the
speaker to be of a certain character." My italics. Conley himself observes that this
translation is "more accurate" than Cooper's (p. 77).
^Aristotle, Rhetorica, 137a 20-21. And since one is always in some "frame of
mind," one's motions are always a factor in iudging and choosing.
^bid., 1354b 18-21.
31Such an interprtation, Grimaldi argues (pp. 20-21), misconstrues Aristotle 's
purpose in the opening chapter: "When Aristotle presumably refuses to situate
the art of rhetoric within anything remotely resembling a non-logical environment
he is engaged in an obvious polemic. The polemic character of the chapters has
never been denied. In his first chapter, he takes preceding technographers to task
for th fact that they are totally unconcerned with logicai dmonstration of the
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
22 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
subject under discussion.. . . Against this position Aristotle urges the need for
th logicai dmonstrationof the subject-matterand connectsthis dmonstration
with th syllogism of rhetoric which he calls th enthymeme. In so doing he
conveysthe impressionthat the art of rhetoricfor him pertainsexclusivelyto the
intellect and concerns itself quite simply with merely th logicai proof of the
subject under discussion. Any polemic tends toward emphaticstatement, but
particularlydoes it do so when the subjectconcernsa stronglyfelt issue. Conse-
quentlywhen immediatelyfollowingupon the firstchapterAristotleadmitsethos
andpathos as lments co-equalwith reason in art of rhetoricit wouldseem that
we would more reasonablyinquire whether or not this position is possible for
him.
"To accuse him of contradictinghimself and thus compromisinghis presumed
intentionto prsenta theoryof rhetoricgroundedexclusivelyin the intellectand
reason is to give too much weight to a brief passage of arms in the opening
chapterand to ignore the rest of his study. The opening remarksare obviously
directedagainstthe existingsituation.Of far more importanceis the factthat they
mustbe viewed withinthe context of the whole Rhetoric."
32Cope,TheRhetoric f Aristotle,III, 2.
33Ibid.,II, 175.
" Aristotle understoodthis," writes Grimaldi
(p. 5), "andto cali his Rhetorica
'rhetoricof persuasion'with the understandingof 'persuasionat any cost' is
wrong. He was aware of the fact that personspeaksto the person, to the 'other'
in whom rsides the tension between self-possessionand its possible loss which
may be incurredin any dcisionmadetowardfurthergrowthin understanding.In
this matterof 'persuasion'Aristotle'sthesisis simplythatgood rhetoriceffectively
places before the other person ail the means necessaryfor such dcisionmaking.
At this point the person must exercise his own freedom."
35Aristotle, Rhetorica,1355a21-23.
^Ibid., 1355a29-34. Italicsadded.
Ibid., 1355b9-12. This passageis admittedlysomewhatambiguous,but if "per-
suasionat any cost" were indeed the objectiveof Aristotelianrhetoric,then there
would seem to be no need to work withinwhat is allowedby "the circumstances
of each particularcase." If one is going to employ false vidence and specious
reasoning,then one will not be confinedby particularcircumstances.ThatAristo-
tle recognizesthe constraintsof the situationsuggeststhat one mustemployonly
those meansof persuasiongenuinelypermittedby the particularcase.
^Ibid., 1355b 14-20. In his interprtationof this passage, McKeon says that
" 'rhetoric'. . .
may refer not only to the knowledge of an art but also, like
'sophistic,'to the moral purpose with which the art is used" (McKeon, Part I,
196-97).
9Aristotle,in the Ethica, describesdlibrationas a kind of inquiryor search,
involvingcalculationand reasoning.See 1112b20-23:"Forthe personwho dlib-
rtes seems to investigateand analyse. . . ." Also 1142a31-32: "... dlibra-
tion is inquiryinto a particularkind of thing."And 1142b8-13: "... excellence
in dlibration. . . is correctnessof thinking"about actionsviewed as means to
desiredends. There is no rigorousanalysisin the Ethicaof practicaldlibration,
even though Aristotle promises one (1142b 17-18). Nonetheless, we can infer
(from 1142b 22-26) that it is a process of reasoningcorrectlyfrom probable
premisesto conclusionsabout the best (meaningmostexpdient,honorable,tem-
perate- in short, virtuous)means to desiredends.
Self, in her analysisof the relationshipbetween practicalwisdomand rhetoric,
notes "the importanceof practicalwisdom to the rhetorician"(137). My point
hre is just the reverse:we findin Aristotle'swritingsthe implicationthat rhetoric
is pre-eminentlyimportantin the exerciseof practicalwisdomand reasoning.
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
CHRISTOPHER LYLE JOHNSTONE 23
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
24 AN ARISTOTELIANTRILOGY
special sort of Prudence but a special applicationof it, for though the term
'Prudence'is in ordinary usage confined to practicalwisdom in one's private
affairs, it really extends to the affairsof one's family and of the community."
Aristotle, NichomacheanEthics, trans.H. Rackham(Cambridge,Mass.:Harvard
UniversityPress, 1934), p. 346.
Again, Self notes the overlap of the Ethicsand Politics, but fails to note the
essentiallymoralfunctionof politicaiactivity(135-36).
5iEthica,1179b20-30.
52Ibid.,1180a 14-24, 1181a25. In the formerpassage, Aristotlenotes that law is
"a rule proceedingfrom a sort of practicalwisdomand reason."
53Aristotle, Politica, 1299a2. Aristotle's discussionof the natureand functionsof
th deliberativeassemblyfollows upon a discussionof the variouskindsof consti-
tution that states might hve (Politica, III, 6-18), then of the variationsof thse
(IV, 1-10), and finally of the "best politicai community,"which is a mean be-
tween oligarchyand undisciplineddemocracy,and in which the middle class is
supreme (IV, 11). As th supreme lment in th ideai state, the deliberative
assemblyis tasked to applypracticalwisdomto legislativeand other publicques-
tions. Since "the form of governmentis best in whichevery man, whoeverhe is,
can act best and live happily"(Politica, 1324a24-25), we can concludethat the
ideal communityand its deliberativelmentare foundeduponethicalprinciples.
MIbid.,1298a4-6.
55Ibid.,1280b39-40.
%InEthica, 1141b 33-34, Aristotle subdivides"politics,"which is identifiedas a
"kind"of practicalwisdom, into th "deliberative"and the "judicial."These
subdivisions,of course, correspondto two of the threedivisionsof rhetoricidenti-
fied in Rhetoricaat 1358b 6-8. In Book I, Chapter5 of Rhetorica,Aristotle
considers the sorts of premises from which th politicai orator proceeds, and
continues to discuss this division of oratory prominentlythroughoutthe work.
This content downloaded from 141.209.100.60 on Sun, 27 Dec 2015 22:12:10 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions