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little , such as . arithmetic and geometry , and many others , some of wliicli have about an equal share of action and of discourse , but the greater part have scarcely anything except discourse , and effect all their purposes by means of it : and I understand you to say that rhetoric is one of these . ' G . ' True . ' S > . ' But you do not call any of the arts which I have mentioned , rhetoric ? although in words you said as much , Baying that rhetoric is the art of winch the whole power consists in
discourse ; and if any one wished to cavil , he might ask , Do you , then , call arithmetic rhetoric ? But I do not believe that you call either arithmetic or geometry by that name / G . * You think rightly . ' S . * Then finish the answer to my question . Since rhetoric is one of the arts which chiefly employ discourse , and since there are others which do the same , explain to me on what subject it is that rhetoric employs discourse . Thus , if anyone asked me , What is arithmetic ? I might answer as you did , It is one of the arts whose force consists in
discourse . And if he should further inquire , On what subject ? I should reply , On the subject of numbers . Since , then , rhetoric is one of the arts which effect their end wholly by means of discourse , what is the subject of the discourse which rhetoric employs V G , ' The greatest and best of the concerns oi man /
• But this answer , ' observed Socrates , * is disputable and ambiguous . I suppose you have heard at entertainments the old song , Health is the best of all things , beauty the second best , and the third is to be rich without guilt / G . 4 I have : but to what purpose is this V S . 4 Because the providers of the three things which are praised in the old song , viz . the physician , the teacher of gymnastics , and the man of business , might start up , and , first , the physician might say , Gorgias deceives you , Socrates : it is not his art , but mine , which relates to the greatest and best concerns of man . And if I asked , Who are you who speak in this manner , he would answer , A physician . And if I rejoined , How do you prove the object of your art to be the greatest good ? How can it be otherwise ? he would reply : What greater good is there to man than health ? In like manner the gymnast , and the man of business , would each set up the claim of his art to be the art which is conversant with the greatest good . I should answer , But Gorgias contends that his art produces a greater good to man than yours . They would then reply , And what is this good ? Let Gorgias answer . Consider yourself , then , to be interrogated both by them and by me , and answer , what is this which you consider the greatest good to man , and of which you profess to be the artist V It is , ' replied Gorgias , * that which is really the greatest good , and which both enables men to be themselves free , and enables each , in Ins own state , to govern the rest / S . ' And what is this V G . ' The ability to persuade , by discourse , either judges in a tribunal , or senators in a council-house , or voters in a meeting of the people , and in every other political assembly . If you have tnis power , you will have the physician for your slave , the gymnast for your slave , and the man of business will transact business for the profit , not of himself , but of you who are able to speak and persuade the multitude / Now , ' replied Socrates , you appear to me to come neir to an explanation what art you consider rhetoric to be . If J unde' ^ tand yo j rhetoric is that which works persuasion ; ami its whole agency is summed
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694 Plato ' s Dialogues ; the Gorgias .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Oct. 2, 1834, page 694, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2638/page/18/
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