The most significant passage in Aristotle'srhetoric, or how function may make moral philosophers of us all

Abstract

At the beginning of his Rhetoric, Aristotle reviews the state of current thinking and finds it lacking because it has not dealt with rhetoric's essential feature, proof. In the Rhetoric, Aristotle's professed mission is to correct this fault, to found rhetoric as an art through an examination of its essence. This concern for the essence of rhetoric-that which makes it to be what it is and not something else leads me to a familiar passage which I nominate as among the most fundamental in its significance for the way in which we read the Rhetoric. I refer to Aristotle's definition, offered in Book I. He states: Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion. This is not a function of any other art. Every other art can instruct or persuade about its own particular subject-matter . . . But rhetoric we look upon as the power of observing the means of persuasion on almost any subject presented to us. . . 1 The part of this passage which the literature overlooks, for the most part, is Aristotle's indication that his definition refers to rhetoric's unique function. It is function, ergon, which I wish to discuss as holding enormous potential for our understanding of Aristotle's work, for understanding what he considered to be rhetoric' s essence. As you know, Aristotle abandoned Plato's theory of Forms. But in so doing Aristotle did not wish to relinquish the idea that one could get at definitions which would explain the essence of a thing.2 His notion of scientific knowledge turns, in fact, on being able to explain a thing's essence. Essence will be reflected in a true definition. Thus, since essence is so important, Aristotle wishes to make clear what it means and how we would discover it. Essence is not some additional component in a thing separate from material components. Nor can he say it is a material component either. So he rejects the tack of explaining essence in relationship to matter. Instead, he treats essence as the structure of a thing and links it with causality. Usually this linkage is with formal cause, and sometimes with efficient cause. For instance, the reason why some flesh and bone is cat is because it is structured by the form of cat. It is a cat because it is organized in a way that it can perform the function of cat-can realize its end-and so is influenced by its teleological striving for perfection.4 Similarly, a particular hunk of matter is human because it is organized or structured to achieve the end of humans-rational activity. As we are familiar, this is man's end. Why is it man's end? Because this is the function unique to man. Thus it is that Aristotle's discussion of the essence of anything gets tied to the crucial notion of function. And, by implication, the discussion of a thing' s function is simultaneously indicative of its essence.