Rhetorica

Lucia Calboli Montefusco c Omnis autem argumentatio...aut probabilis aut necessaria esse debebit (Cic. lnv. 1.44) icero's most technical treatment of argumentatio is to be found in the first book of De inventione.' This treatment is divided into three sections. First, Cicero lists the adtributa personis and the adtributa negotiis, that is those loci argumentorum from which the orator has to draw his argumenta, second, he distinguishes between necessaria or probabilis argumentatio, and third, he considers induction and deduction as forms of arguments. In accordance with the dialectical method, each section begins with a dichotomy: (1) lnv. 1.34 omnes res argumentando confirmantur aut ex eo, quod personis aut ex eo quod negotiis est adtributum ("all propositions are supported in argument by attributes of persons or of actions") (2) lnv. 1.44 omnis autem argumentatio, quae ex iis locis, quos commemoravimus sumetur, aut probabilis aut necessaria esse debebit ("all argumentation drawn from 1 As Cicero himself announces (lnv. 1.34; cf. 1.49), he first wants to give a general overview of the tools of argumentation, shifting to the second book the treatment of the topics for the singula genera causarum. In his later works we do not find such a detailed discussion of the logical means of persuasion, although Antonius in the long passage of De oratore concerned with rational persuasion (docere) takes on the task of providing precepts for argumentation (De Orat. 2.11575 ). Cicero's interest, however, is there focused on the topics and particularly on the distinction, which, apparently recalling Aristotle's distinction between ttlgtcis cvtcxvoi and iriaTcis aTexvoi, contrasts those loci which non excogitantur ab oratore with those which, on the contrary, are tota in disputatione et in argumentatione oratoris. Only a few sections later, still in the second book of De oratore, Cicero briefly hints at the deductive mode of inference (De orat. 2.215 'aut demonstrandum id, quod concludere illi velint, non effici ex propositis nec esse consequens'); for similar allusions cf. also Brut. 152, Orat. 122, Part. 46,139. 2 English translations of Cicero's De inventione are taken from the edition of H. M. Hubbell in the Loeb Classical Library. ________ __ ____________________© The International Society for the History of Rhetoric, Rhetorica, Volume XVI, Number 1 (Winter 1998) 1 RHETORICA 2 these topics which we have mentioned will have to be either probable or irrefutable") (3) Inv. 1.51 omnis igitur argumentatio aut per inductionem tractanda est aut per ratiocinationem ("all argumentation, then, is to be carried on either by induction or by deduction") Leaving aside the first section on the topics, I would like to focus on sections (2) and (3) to underline some similarities, but also many differences, between the text of De inventions and Aristotle's Rhetoric. The relationship between these works is difficult indeed, because of the heavy Stoic influence on Cicero and because Hellenistic rhetorical handbooks served as sources for this youthful work of Cicero. Cicero says that he wants to limit himself to the rhetorical aspects of argumentatio because its philosophical rationes, which go beyond the needs of the orator, "are intricate and involved, and a precise system has been formulated" (Inv. 1.77; cf. 1.86). This statement is important because it shows that Cicero could also draw material from philosophical sources. And in a way he did so when he supplied precepts for both inductio and ratiocinatio, because this subject, "necessary to the highest degree", had been, he says, "greatly neglected by writers on the art of rhetoric" (Inv. 1.50). But we should be cautious about the truth of this claim. Referring to ratiocinatio, Cicero actually says that it was a form of argument which was "most largely used by Aristotle ... and Theophrastus, and then was taken up by the teachers of rhetoric who have been regarded as most precise and accomplished in their art" (Inv. 1.61). Who are these accomplished and skilful teachers of rhetoric (rhetores elegantissimi atque artificiosissimi)? They are likely to be the Hellenistic masters, probably the same ones who, some sections later, appear to have been no less interested in rhetorical argumentation than Cicero himself, although he claims to have written down its precepts more...