Quotes About Rhetoric

Nous aimons l'éloquence pour l'éloquence et non pour la vérité qu'elle peut énoncer ou l'héroïsme qu'elle peut inspirer.

We love eloquence for its own sake, and not for any truth which it may utter, or any heroism it may inspire.

Having at length finished his laboured harangue, with which the audience, though it had greatly raised their attention and admiration, were not much edified, as they really understood not a single

Laméntase a menudo que los demagogos logren mayor asenso al exponer públicamente sus despropósitos económicos que los hombres de bien al denunciar sus fallos.

A politician normally prospers under democracy in proportion . . . as he excels in the invention of imaginary perils and imaginary defenses against them.

We have adopted the policy of Sorel of propaganda of the deed. The best rhetoric comes from building and testing models and running experiments. Let philosophers weave webs of words; such webs break easily.

One-dimensional thought is systematically promoted by the makers of politics and their purveyors of mass information. Their universe of discourse is populated by self-validating hypotheses which, incessantly and monopolistically repeated, become hyponotic definitions of dictations.

I spent my first two years at a small all-male college in Virginia called Hampden-Sydney. That was like going to college 120 years ago. The languages, a year of rhetoric, all of the great books, Western Man courses, stuff like that.

Between yellow ribbon magnets, patriotic anthems at sports games and corporate marketing campaigns, the rhetoric that those in uniform are protecting freedom is hammered into the psyche of Americans at every turn.

'Yes' is a far more potent word than 'no' in American politics. By adopting the positions which animate the political agenda for the other side, one can disarm them and leave them sputtering with nothing to say.

If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send one hundred and fifty lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, and talk by the hour?

Nixon is the kind of politician who would cut down a redwood tree, then mount the stump for a speech on conservation.

A good speech is like a miniskirt--long enough to over all the vital parts, short enough to entice and captivate listeners.

Democracy consists of choosing your dictators, after they've told you what you think it is you want to hear.

Creationist critics often charge that evolution cannot be tested, and therefore cannot be viewed as a properly scientific subject at all. This claim is rhetorical nonsense.

In spite of his Cold War credentials, Kennedy still believed in the power of words.

When a child, my dreams rode on your wishes, I was your son, high on your horse, My mind a top whipped by the lashes Of your rhetoric, windy of course.

Words are the true weapons of mass destruction

Some people have a way with words, and other people...oh, uh, not have way.

Relate your facts compellingly and your argument will tend to take care of itself.

The more you turn up the heat rhetorically, the more you weaken your arguments.

International politics attracts politicians who talk a good game, but whose achievements are often slender.

It's very easy to have slogans and rhetoric that people will follow, but eventually the slogans fall away.

Compromise disappoints those who buy into the most ambitious and simplistic populist slogans.