The Politics of Aristotle

by Aristotle

  Metaphors must be drawn, as has been said already, from things that are [10] related to the original thing, and yet not obviously so related—just as in philosophy also an acute mind will perceive resemblances even in things far apart. Thus Archytas said that an arbitrator and an altar were the same, since the injured fly to both for refuge. Or you might say that an anchor and an overhead hook were the same, since both are in a way the same, only the one secures things from below and [15] the other from above. And to speak of states as ‘levelled’ is to identify two widely different things, the equality of a physical surface and the equality of political powers.

  Liveliness is specially conveyed by metaphor, and by the further power of surprising the hearer; because the hearer expected something different, his acquisition of the new idea impresses him all the more. His mind seems to say, ‘Yes, [20] to be sure; I never thought of that’. The liveliness of epigrammatic remarks is due to the meaning not being just what the words say: as in the saying of Stesichorus that ‘the cicadas will chirp to themselves on the ground’. Well-constructed riddles are attractive for the same reason; a new idea is conveyed, and there is metaphorical [25] expression. So with the ‘novelties’ of Theodorus. In these the thought is startling, and, as Theodorus puts it, does not fit in with the ideas you already have. They are like the burlesque words that one finds in the comic writers. The effect is produced even by jokes depending upon changes of the letters of a word; this too is a surprise. You find this in verse as well as in prose. The word which comes is not what the hearer imagined: thus

  [30] Onward he came, and his feet were shod with his—chilblains,

  where one imagined the word would be ‘sandals’. But the point should be clear the moment the words are uttered. Jokes made by altering the letters of a word consist in meaning, not just what you say, but something that gives a twist to the word used; e.g. the remark of Theodorus about Nicon the harpist, θρἁττει σε. where he pretends to mean θρἁττει σε.21 and surprises us when we find he means something else. So you [1412b1] enjoy the point when you see it, though the remark will fall flat unless you are aware that Nicon is a Thracian. Or again: βoὑλει αὐτὀν πέρσαι. In both these cases the saying must fit the facts. This is also true of such lively remarks as the one to the effect that to the Athenians their empire (ἀρχἡ) of the sea was not the beginning [5] (ἀρχἡ) of their troubles, since they gained by it. Or the opposite one of Isocrates, that their empire (ἀρχἡ) was the beginning (ἀρχἡ) of their troubles. Either way, the speaker says something unexpected, the soundness of which is thereupon recognized. There would be nothing clever in saying empire is empire. Isocrates means more than that, and uses the word with a new meaning. So too with the former [10] saying, which denies that ἀρχἡ in one sense was ἀρχἡ in another sense. In all these jokes, whether a word is used in a second sense or metaphorically, the joke is good if it fits the facts. For instance, ’Aνἁσχετoς (proper name) oὐκ ἀνασχετός: where you say that what is so-and-so in one sense is not so-and-so in another; well, if the man is unpleasant, the joke fits the facts. Again, ‘You should not be more a stranger than a [15] stranger’—or more than you should be. That is the same as: ‘The stranger should not always be a stranger’. Here again is the use of one word in different senses. Of the same kind also is the much-praised verse of Anaxandrides:

  Death is most fit before you do

  Deeds that would make death fit for you.

  This amounts to saying ‘it is a fit thing to die when you are not fit to die’, or ‘it is a fit thing to die when death is not fit for you’, i.e. when death is not the fit return for [20] what you are doing. The type of language employed is the same in all these examples; but the more briefly and antithetically such sayings can be expressed, the more taking they are, for antithesis impresses the new idea more firmly and brevity more quickly. They should always have either some personal application or some [25] merit of expression, if they are to be true without being common-place—two requirements not always satisfied simultaneously. Thus ‘a man should die having done no wrong’ is true but dull: ‘the right man should marry the right woman’ is also true but dull. No, there must be both good qualities together, as in ‘it is fitting to die when you are not fit for death’. The more a saying has these qualities, the livelier it [30] appears: if, for instance, its wording is metaphorical, metaphorical in the right way, antithetical, and balanced, and at the same time it gives an idea of activity.

  Successful similes also, as has been said above, are in a sense metaphors, since they always involve two relations like the proportional metaphor. Thus: a shield, we say, is the ‘drinking-bowl of Ares’, and a bow is the ‘chordless lyre’. This way of [1413a1] putting a metaphor is not ‘simple’, as it would be if we called the bow a lyre or the shield a drinking-bowl. There are ‘simple’ similes also: we may say that a flute-player is like a monkey, or that a short-sighted man’s eyes are like a lamp-flame with water dropping on it, since both eyes and flame keep winking. A simile succeeds best when it is a converted metaphor, for it is possible to say that a [5] shield is like the drinking-bowl of Ares, or that a ruin is like a house in rags, and to say that Niceratus is like a Philoctetes stung by Pratys—the simile made by Thrasymachus when he saw Niceratus, who had been beaten by Pratys in a recitation competition, still going about unkempt and unwashed. It is in these respects that poets fail worst when they fail, and succeed best when they [10] succeed,

  Those legs of his curl just like parsley leaves;

  and

  Just like Philammon struggling with his punch-ball.

  These are all similes; and that similes are metaphors has been stated often already.

  Proverbs, again, are metaphors from one species to another. Suppose, for [15] instance, a man to start some undertaking in hope of gain and then to lose by it later on, ‘Here we have once more the man of Carpathus and his hare’, says he. For both alike went through the said experience.

  It has now been explained fairly completely how liveliness is secured and why it has the effect it has. Successful hyperboles are also metaphors, e.g. the one about [20] the man with a black eye, ‘you would have thought he was a basket of mulberries’; here the ‘black eye’ is compared to a mulberry because of its colour, the exaggeration lying in the quantity of mulberries suggested. The phrase ‘like so-and-so’ may introduce a hyperbole under the form of a simile. Thus

  Just like Philammon struggling with his punch-ball

  is equivalent to ‘you would have thought he was Philammon struggling with his [25] punch-ball’; and

  Those legs of his curl just like parsley leaves

  is equivalent to ‘his legs are so curly that you would have thought they were not legs but parsley leaves’. Hyperboles are for young men to use; they show vehemence of character; [[and this is why angry people use them more than other people. [30]

  Not though he gave me as much as the dust or the sands of the sea . . .

  But her, the daughter of Atreus’ son, I never will marry,

  Nay, not though she were fairer than Aphrodite the Golden,

  Defter of hand than Athene . . .22]]23

  [1413b1] [The Attic orators are particularly fond of this method of speech.]24 Consequently it does not suit an elderly speaker.

  12 · It should be observed that each kind of rhetoric has its own appropriate style. The style of written prose is not that of spoken oratory, nor are those of [5] political and forensic speaking the same. Both written and spoken have to be known. To know the latter is to know how to speak good Greek. To know the former means that you are not obliged, as otherwise you are, to hold your tongue when you wish to communicate something to the general public.

  The written style is the more finished: the spoken better admits of dramatic [10] delivery—alike the kind of oratory that reflects character and the kind that reflects emotion. Hence actors look out for plays written in the latter style, and poets for actors co
mpetent to act in such plays. Yet poets whose plays are meant to be read are read and circulated. Chaeremon, for instance, who is as finished as a professional speech-writer; and Licymnius among the dithyrambic poets. Compared [15] with those of others, the speeches of professional writers sound thin in actual contests. Those of the orators, on the other hand, look amateurish enough when they pass into the hands of a reader. This is just because they are so well suited for an actual tussle, and therefore contain many dramatic touches, which, being robbed of all dramatic rendering, fail to do their own proper work, and consequently look silly. Thus strings of unconnected words, and constant repetitions of words and phrases, [20] are very properly condemned in written speeches: but not in spoken speeches—speakers use them freely, for they have a dramatic effect. In this repetition there must be variety of tone, paving the way, as it were, to dramatic effect; e.g. ‘This is the villain among you who deceived you, who cheated you, who meant to betray you [25] completely’. This is the sort of thing that Philemon the actor used to do in the Old Men‘s Madness of Anaxandrides, whenever he spoke the words ‘Rhadamanthus and Palamedes’, and also in the prologue to the Saints whenever he pronounced the pronoun ‘I’. If one does not deliver such things cleverly, it becomes a case of ‘the man who swallowed a poker’. So too with strings of unconnected words, e.g. ‘I came [30] to him; I met him; I besought him’. Such passages must be acted, not delivered with the same quality and pitch of voice, as though they had only one idea in them. They have the further peculiarity of suggesting that a number of separate statements have been made in the time usually occupied by one. Just as the use of conjunctions makes many statements into a single one, so the omission of conjunctions acts in the reverse way and makes a single one into many. It thus makes everything more important: e.g. ‘I came to him; I talked to him; I entreated him’—what a lot of facts! [1414a1] the hearer thinks—‘he paid no attention to anything I said’. This is the effect which Homer seeks when he writes, ‘Nireus likewise from Syme, Nireus, the son of Aglaia, Nireus, the comeliest man’.25 If many things are said about a man, his name must be mentioned many times; and therefore people think that, if his name is mentioned many times, many things have been said about him. So that Homer, by [5] means of this illusion, has made a great deal of Nireus, though he has mentioned him only in this one passage, and has preserved his memory, though he nowhere says a word about him afterwards.

  Now the style of oratory addressed to public assemblies is really just like scene-painting. The bigger the throng, the more distant is the point of view: so that, in the one and the other, high finish in detail is superfluous and looks bad. The [10] forensic style is more highly finished; still more so is the style of language addressed to a single judge, with whom there is very little room for rhetorical artifices, since he can take the whole thing in better, and judge of what is to the point and what is not; the struggle is less intense and so the judgement is undisturbed. This is why the same speakers do not distinguish themselves in all these branches at once; high finish is wanted least where dramatic delivery is wanted most, and here the speaker [15] must have a good voice, and above all, a strong one. It is epideictic oratory that is most literary, for it is meant to be read; and next to it forensic oratory.

  To analyse style still further, and add that it must be agreeable or magnificent, is useless; for why should it have these traits any more than restraint, liberality, or [20] any other excellence of character? Obviously agreeableness will be produced by the qualities already mentioned, if our definition of excellence of style has been correct. For what other reason should style be clear, and not mean but appropriate? If it is prolix, it is not clear; nor yet if it is curt. Plainly the middle way suits best. Again, [25] style will be made agreeable by the elements mentioned, namely by a good blending of ordinary and unusual words, by the rhythm, and by the persuasiveness that springs from appropriateness.

  This concludes our discussion of style, both in its general aspects and in its special applications to the various branches of rhetoric. We have now to deal with arrangement.

  13 · A speech has two parts. You must state your case, and you must prove [30] it. You cannot either state your case and omit to prove it, or prove it without having first stated it; since any proof must be a proof of something, and the only use of a preliminary statement is the proof that follows it. Of these two parts the first part is called the statement of the case, the second part the argument, just as we [35] distinguish between problem and demonstration. The current division is absurd. For narration surely is part of a forensic speech only: how in a political speech or a speech of display can there be narration in the technical sense? or a reply to a forensic opponent? or an epilogue in closely-reasoned speeches? Again, introduction, [1414b1] comparison of conflicting arguments, and recapitulation are only found in political speeches when there is a struggle between two policies. They may occur then; so may even accusation and defence, often enough; but they form no essential [5] part of a political speech. Even forensic speeches do not always need epilogues; not, for instance, a short speech, nor one in which the facts are easy to remember, the effect of an epilogue being always a reduction in the apparent length. It follows, then, that the only necessary parts of a speech are the statement and the argument. These are the essential features of a speech; and it cannot in any case have more than introduction, statement, argument, and epilogue. Refutation of the opponent is part of the arguments: so is comparison of the opponent’s case with your own, for [10] that process is a magnifying of your own case and therefore a part of the arguments, since one who does this proves something. The introduction does nothing like this; nor does the epilogue—it merely reminds us of what has been said already. If we make such distinctions we shall end, like Theodorus and his followers, by distinguishing narration proper from ‘post-narration’ and ‘pre-narration’, and [15] refutation from ‘final refutation’. But we ought only to bring in a new name if it indicates a real species with distinct specific qualities; otherwise, the practice is pointless and silly, like the way Licymnius invented names in his Art of Rhetoric— ‘secundation’, ‘divagation’, ‘ramification’.

  14 · The introduction is the beginning of a speech, corresponding to the [20] prologue in poetry and the prelude in flute-music; they are all beginnings, paving the way, as it were, for what is to follow. The musical prelude resembles the introduction to speeches of display; as flute-players play first some brilliant passage they know well and then fit it on to the opening notes of the piece itself, so in [25] speeches of display the writer should proceed in the same way; he should begin with what best takes his fancy, and then strike up his theme and lead into it; which is indeed what is always done. (Take as an example the introduction to the Helen of Isocrates—there is nothing in common between the eristics and Helen.) And here, even if you travel far from your subject, it is fitting, rather than that there should be sameness in the entire speech.

  [30] The usual subject for the introductions to speeches of display is some piece of praise or censure. Thus Gorgias writes in his Olympic Speech, ‘You deserve widespread admiration, men of Greece’, praising thus those who started the festival gatherings. Isocrates, on the other hand, censures them for awarding distinctions to [35] fine athletes but giving no prize for intellectual ability. Or one may begin with a piece of advice, thus: ‘We ought to honour good men and so I myself am praising Aristeides’ or ‘We ought to honour those who are unpopular but not bad men, men whose good qualities have never been noticed, like Alexander son of Priam’. Here [1415a1] the orator gives advice. Or we may begin as speakers do in the law-courts; that is to say, with appeals to the audience to excuse us if our speech is about something paradoxical, difficult, or hackneyed; like Choerilus in the lines—

  But now when allotment of all has been made …

  Introductions to speeches of display, then, may be composed of some piece of [5] praise or censure, of advice to do or not to do something, or of appeals to the aud
ience; and you must choose between making these preliminary passages connected or disconnected with the speech itself.

  Introductions to forensic speeches, it must be observed, have the same value as the prologues of dramas and the introductions to epic poems; the dithyrambic [10] prelude resembling the introduction to a speech of display, as

  For thee, and thy gifts, …26

  In prologues, and in epic poetry, a foretaste of the theme is given, intended to inform the hearers of it in advance instead of keeping their minds in suspense. Anything vague puzzles them: so give them a grasp of the beginning, and they can hold fast to [15] it and follow the argument. So we find—

  Sing, O goddess of song, of the Wrath …

  Tell me, O Muse, of the hero …27

  Lead me to tell a new tale, how there came great warfare to Europe

  Out of the Asian land …

  The tragic poets, too, let us know the pivot of their play; if not at the outset like Euripides, at least somewhere in the prologue like Sophocles; [20]

  [[Polybus was my father … ;]]28

  and so in comedy. This, then, is the most essential function and distinctive property of the introduction, to show what the aim of the speech is; and therefore no introduction ought to be employed where the subject is not long or intricate.

  The other kinds of introduction employed are remedial in purpose, and may be [25] used in any type of speech. They are concerned with the speaker, the hearer, the subject, or the speaker’s opponent. Those concerned with the speaker himself or with his opponent are directed to removing or exciting prejudice. But whereas the defendant will begin by dealing with this sort of thing, the prosecutor will take quite another line and deal with such matters in the closing part of his speech. The reason for this is not far to seek. The defendant, when he is going to bring himself on the [30] stage, must clear away any obstacles, and therefore must begin by removing any prejudice felt against him. But if you are to excite prejudice, you must do so at the close, so that the judges may more easily remember what you have said.