Aristotle RHETORIC Complete

Translated by W. Roberts.

Aristotle Bilingual Anthology  Studies  Aristotle in Print

128 pages - You are on Page 111

"And was there none to loathe thy mother's crime? "

to which question Alcmaeon in reply says,

"Why, there are two things to examine here. "

And when Alphesiboea asks what he means, he rejoins:

"They judged her fit to die, not me to slay her. "

Again there is the lawsuit about Demosthenes and the men who killed Nicanor; as they were judged to have killed him justly, it was thought that he was killed justly. And in the case of the man who was killed at Thebes, the judges were requested to decide whether it was unjust that he should be killed, since if it was not, it was argued that it could not have been unjust to kill him.

4. Another line of proof is the 'a fortiori'. Thus it may be argued that if even the gods are not omniscient, certainly human beings are not. The principle here is that, if a quality does not in fact exist where it is more likely to exist, it clearly does not exist where it is less likely. Again, the argument that a man who strikes his father also strikes his neighbours follows from the principle that, if the less likely thing is true, the more likely thing is true also; for a man is less likely to strike his father than to strike his neighbours. The argument, then, may run thus. Or it may be urged that, if a thing is not true where it is more likely, it is not true where it is less likely; or that, if it is true where it is less likely, it is true where it is more likely: according as we have to show that a thing is or is not true. This argument might also be used in a case of parity, as in the lines:

"Thou hast pity for thy sire, who has lost his sons:

"Hast none for Oeneus, whose brave son is dead? "

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