ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING 179 



something common with reason. But here lies the difference, 

 that the affections principally regard a present good, whilst rea- 

 son, seeing far before it, chooses also the future and capital 

 good. And therefore, as present things strike the imagination 

 strongest, reason is generally subdued; but when eloquence 

 and the power of persuasion raise up remote and future objects 

 and set them to view as if they were present ; then imagination 

 goes over to the side of reason, and renders it victorious. 



Hence we conclude, that rhetoric can no more be accused of 

 coloring the worst part, than logic of teaching sophistry. For 

 we know that the doctrines of contraries are the same, though 

 their use be opposite; and logic does not only differ from 

 rhetoric, according to the vulgar notion, as the first is like the 

 hand clenched, and the other like the hand open ; but much 

 more in this, that logic considers reason in its natural state, 

 and rhetoric as it stands in vulgar opinion ; whence Aristotle 

 prudently places rhetoric between logic and ethics, along with 

 politics, as partaking of them both. For the proofs and demon- 

 strations of logic are common to all mankind, but the proof and 

 persuasion of rhetoric must be varied according to the audi- 

 ence, like a musician suiting himself to different ears. 



"Orpheus in sylvis, inter Delphinas A rion." Virgil. e 



And this application and variation of speech should, if we de- 

 sire its perfection, extend so far, that if the same things were to 

 be delivered to different persons, yet a different set of words 

 should be used to each. Though it is certain that the greatest 

 orators, generally, have not this political and sociable eloquence 

 in private discourse ; for whilst they endeavor at ornament and 

 elegant forms of speech, they fall not upon that ready applica- 

 tion and familiar style of discourse which they might with more 

 advantage use to particulars. And it were certainly proper to 

 begin a new inquiry into this subject ; we therefore place it 

 among the deficiencies under the title of prudential conversa- 

 tion, which the more attentively a man considers, the higher 

 value he will set upon it ; but whether this be placed under 

 rhetoric or politics is of no great significance. 



We have already observed that the desiderata in this art are 

 rather appendages than parts of the art itself; and all of them 

 belong to the repository thereof, for the furnishing of speech 

 and invention. To proceed in this view ; first, we find no writer 



