Marcus Lullius Cicero (3 January 106 -- 7 December 43 BC)
It is difficult to over-estimate Cicero's importance to the history of rhetoric. He was a prolific scholar. According to the Wiki article, "he wrote more than three-quarters of surviving Latin literature from the period of his adult life, and it has been said that subsequent prose was either a reaction against or a return to his style, not only in Latin but in European languages up to the 19th century." (link). Ponder that assertion for a moment. Seventy-five percent of what we know about Latin literature is directly attributed to Cicero.
Part of what makes him so helpful to people interested in this time is that in addition to his many books and published speeches -- he practically invented PR -- he wrote hundreds of letters detailing all aspects of his personal and political life and a great many of those letters have survived.Cicero had a front row seat as the Roman Republic transitioned into the Roman Empire; he tried valiantly (if we are to believe him) to keep it from happening, but he did not have a hand in Caesar's assassination. After Caesar's death, Cicero and Mark Antony vied for political dominance. Cicero wrote and delivered a series of speeches denouncing Mark Antony, which he called the Philippics after Demosthenes's attacks on Phillip of Macedon at the twilight of Athens' prominence three centuries before. Eloquent as his efforts were, Antony was able to survive them and when he joined forces with Octavian (Caesar's nephew and ultimatley the first emperor or Rome), Cicero found his name among those proscribed, on the list of people whose head Octavian and Anthony would pay for. Tradition has it that when the soldiers caught up with him, Cicero said, "There is nothing proper about what you are doing, soldier, but do try to kill me properly." He than bared his neck and accepted his fate with dignity and grace (a chriea, for certain. We have nothing but testamentary evidence to support the truth of how it happened.) No doubt, however, many people saw his head and hands displayed in the Forum. As Wiki relates, "According to Cassius Dio (in a story often mistakenly attributed to Plutarch),[109] Antony's wife Fulvia took Cicero's head, pulled out his tongue, and jabbed it repeatedly with her hairpin in final revenge against Cicero's power of speech.[110] " State craft as stage craft at its most vivid.
The Parts of a
Speech According to Cicero (Adapted from On Invention 1)
Exordium
Three goals, (Arist. phronesis,
eunoia, arete)
- make audience well disposed
- attentive
- receptive
Five kinds of cases
- honorable (audience approves of what you will argue or who you will
defend)
- difficult, (audience is unsympathetic to what you will argue or who
you will defend)
- mean (audience thinks point or person unworthy of
attention)
- ambiguous (audience is unclear what is at issue, what must be
done)
- doubtful (partly honorable, partly discreditable)
Two methods
- direct (get straight to the point)
- indirect (insinuation, prepare the audience, calm or excite them)
Avoid exordia which are
- obvious displays of artistry
- general (boiler plate, one that could introduce anything)
- common (equally applicable to both sides of the case)
- interchangeable (with slight changes could be used by opponent)
- tedious (too long)
- unconnected (removed from the case at hand)
- out of place (fails to consider audience)
Narrative
The goal is to say
what happened or will happen in a memorable and pointed fashion, so that your
audience believes what you say and is moved or unmoved to the degree your case
requires. Be brief, concise, and clear. Have the people in your narrative speak
the way your audience expects such people to speak, rely on the habits of
ordinary people and the beliefs of your audience to guide what you say
(verisimilitude, realism). Use chronological order for events, logical order or
accepted hierarchy for ideas. If you have to use an uncommon structure, explain
what it is in advance. Avoid obscurity (saying too little) and repetition. Do
not narrate base or disgusting events--Arist: use circumlocution if the name is
base, use the name if the thing is base.
Partition
Here you state the issue (from stasis theory). What question must be answered and what two
contradictory answers must the audience choose between. Here you may also want
to account for the difference of opinion by explaining the motivation of those
who oppose you, or by promising information which those who oppose you do not
have. One form of partition is to indicate what is agreed to and what is
disputed. Another is to divide the issue into its elements, laying out each
claim which must be proven. Then you simply handle each claim in the order in
which you just set them out (see page 69 for examples). Whatever arrangement you
decide on, be complete, precise, and brief.
Confirmation
Those "parts of an oration which by marshaling arguments lends credit, authority, and support to our case" (69). Consider the topics relevant to characters and actions: manner
if life, education, professions, home life, fortune, reputation, public office,
habits, arts, knowledge, feelings, interests, motives, goals. The topics for
actions: place, time, manner, occasion, facilities, opportunity, proximity,
duration, order of events, manner of action, results, similar instances,
contrastive examples, frequency, rarity, honor, advantage. Consider also
arguments from probabilities based on maxims, analogies, signs, previous
judgments, religious sanctions, common practices. When you construct an
enthymeme out of this material, consider whether the premise requires proof or
can be asserted without additional proof (see epichireme
101-12)
Refutation
"It uses the same sources of invention that confirmation does, because any proposition can be
attacked by the same methods of reasoning by which it can be supported" (123). Look to the opponent's enthymemes. Deny the link between the premise and the conclusion. Deny the assumption on which the enthymeme is based. Deny the conclusion. Supply counter examples. Remember that evidence almost always cuts both ways. What seems like obvious proof to you can be swiftly turned against
you.
Peroration
Three parts
- summation (briefly restate the issue and the proof)
- indignation (fifteen topics, see below)
- pity (sixteen topics, see below)
Fifteen topics of indignation--ways to amplify the enormity of the situation. Not all of these
will always be applicable. Some of them are not carefully thought out. Make of
these what you will.
- Indicate importance of
the case by showing how great people in the past have cared about it and
matters like it.
- Indicate with specific
and considerable detail who has been affected or will be affected. Bring on
the victims.
- Ask, "What if everyone
acted this way?"
- Warn against setting a
dangerous precedent.
- Indicate that this
decision is permanently binding.
- Intentional
villainy.
- Express indignation
"saying that a foul, cruel, nefarious and tyrannical deed has been done by
force and violence or by the influence of riches, and that such an act is
utterly at variance with the law and equity" (155).
- Uniqueness of the crime
or situation.
- Compare to other crimes
or bills.
- Reiterate the narrative
in graphic detail.
- Show that the act was
committed by one who least of all should have done it
(betrayal).
- Take the case
personally.
- Insult to
injury.
- Create empathy, put the
audience in the victim's shoes.
- Lament.
Sixteen topics for evoking pity. Again, proceed with caution. If you get caught trying to amplify the emotions involved, you will lose all credibility and you will acieve the reverse
effect.
- Show what prosperity they
once enjoyed.
- Show what troubles are
now indured.
- Enumerate and amplify and
deplore each separate misfortune.
- "Recount shameful, mean,
and ignoble acts and what they have suffered or are likely to suffer that is
unworthy of their age, race, former fortune, position" (159).
- Present all the
misfortunes to view, one by one and in great detail--raged shoes and runny
noses.
- Contrast their
expectations with their current conditions.
- Ask the audience to see
in you our your client their parents, or children or loved ones.
- Something that should not
have happened did, or should have that did not.
- Apostrophe, address an
inanimate object--to show how distracted you are by the villainy--if these
walls could speak, what would they tell us about the horror so innocent a
child was forced to witness.
- Reveal one's helplessness
and loneliness and weakness.
- Commend to the audience
the task of burying your parents (sic).
- Talk about how being torn
away from your family will cause great sorrow--Leona Helmsly used
this.
- Complain about being
badly treated.
- "Implore the audience in
humble and submissive language to have mercy" (161).
- Show motivation to be
altruistic.
- "Show that our should is
full of mercy for others, but still is noble, lofty, and patient of misfortune
and will be so whatever may befall.
But remember: "Nothing dries
more quickly than tears" (163).