Response to George Campbell’s The Philosophy of Rhetoric
by Lee Crull
Other than a few spellings and some words ending in "th"s, George Campbell’s writing did not seem to be two hundred years old. Even the scientific references were not all totally obsolete. When he discussed the circumstances that most effected the passions, examples from recent headlines immediately came to mind with almost every paragraph. However today, many would consider him a fuddy-duddy who had no understanding of the truths of 2000.
Truth. Something that can be proven, something that conforms to reality: these are some common ideas about it. In reading from our text The Rhetorical Tradition, awareness was renewed of differing conceptions of truth that exist in our world. George Campbell addressed the concept of truth many times in The Philosophy of Rhetoric. He wrote about actual truth and the importance of the appearance of truth in human discourse. If the study of rhetoric is a way of elevating our discourse to the highest level of effectiveness, and Campbell said, "all the ends of speaking are reducible to four...to enlighten the understanding, to please the imagination, to move the passions, or to influence the will" then, he summed up truth as a goal when he said, "Good is the object of the will, truth is the object of the understanding."
So, Campbell considered truth to be a very important part of the rhetorical process and an ultimate goal of the process. As part of the process, truth was inherent in the discussion of testimony as moral evidence, the reliability of memory, and scientific evidence to name a few. Campbell asserted that there are primary truths, and these axioms are instinctively known -- "principles clearly discernable by their own light, which can derive no additional evidence from anything besides." He agreed with Dessein de l’Ouvrage when he quoted him as saying "If there be no first truths, there can be no second truths, nor third, nor indeed any truth at all." He gave examples of primary truths such as "there are material substances independent of the mind’s conceptions" and "whatever has a beginning has a cause," and Campbell said that a man knows these types of truths simply because of his consciousness and common sense. He presented mathematical axioms as a different sort of intuitive truth that could be proven by the use of intellection. Campbell made an interesting observation about how people learn when he said "in point of time, the discovery of the less general truths has the priority" because "the less general are sooner objects of perception to us, the natural progress of the mind, in the acquisition of its ideas, being from particular things to universal notions, and not inversely."
George Campbell was not necessarily discussing the passions but the effect eloquence has on logic when he stated that "in order to satisfy the mind, in most cases, truth, and in every case, what bears the semblance of truth, must be presented to it." This was one paragraph that brought several news events to mind, but the one I kept thinking about most was the Clinton/Lewinsky deal and the impeachment and then political rhetoric in general, and I wondered if Campbell was really correct in saying that we needed truth to satisfy our minds. It seems nowadays that politicians are often expected to lie – especially about extramarital affairs with White House interns. Perhaps in the new millennium lying will be so pervasive and expected among all people in our society that it will not carry a negative stigma at all. But before completely giving up on Campbell’s assertion, I backed up to an earlier part of the paragraph and thought that with just slight tweaking the Clinton/Lewinsky affair could still mesh with Campbell’s philosophy when he stated that "in those performances where truth, in regard to the individual…related, is neither sought nor expected, as in some sorts of poetry, and in" Bill Clinton romances, "truth…is an object…the mind" will suppress in hearers who feel guilty and would not want to be held accountable for their own falsehoods.
Other news items could have been used as examples for Campbell’s seven circumstances that are the chief operators on men’s passions. He stated that passion is what animates our ideas and then went on to list probability, plausibility, importance, proximity of time, connection of place, personal relationships, and interest in consequences as the things most useful in arousing powerful emotion or enthusiasm in listeners.
While reading Campbell’s discussion of probability and plausibility, the O. J. Simpson trial came to mind. His lawyers skillfully elicited the emotional response they were looking for with arguments revolving around plausibility and probability. Of course they also cast doubt on the credibility of the testimony of Detective Fuhrman, and though Campbell said "testimony is to be considered as strictly logical," Fuhrman’s credibility problem seemed to have an emotional effect on many television viewers if not on the actual jurors.
While reading Campbell’s paragraphs on Importance, I wondered about the objective/subjective nature of that word. Is importance entirely relative? Or are some things truly important whether people acknowledge them as important or not? Something that came to mind with Import6ance was all the list-making that went on a couple of months ago about such things as Most Important Events Of The Century, Most Important People Of The Millenium, etc. There was not universal agreement about any of the lists. ESPN did not agree with Sports Illustrated about the most important athletes. U. S. News & World Report did not agree with Time about who or what was most important. I heard people disagreeing with Good Housekeeping’s list of the most important household inventions of the century. When the news comes on tonight, the story I deem most important may not be the same as the one my husband selects. Which, if either of us, is right? (We will also correctly agree that some of the evening’s news items were definitely NOT important enough to have received airtime.) In the end I suppose, it is the job of the speaker or writer to convince us of the importance of what he is saying, and it is our job as listeners or readers to logically rather than emotionally analyze the importance for ourselves.
Events that have taken place in Oklahoma over the years are good examples of Campbell’s comments about close proximity of time or place adding to an occurrence’s emotional effect. In 1940, talk of the Dust Bowl probably aroused the passions of many Oklahomans who lived through it. Thirty or more years later, as a girl hearing about it from parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles, I imagine I saw just a glimmer of that passion. Although the place was still close, a lot of time had passed. Of course "Relation to the Persons concerned" comes into play here also. Those three qualities imbue talk of the Murrah Bombing or the May 3rd Tornadoes with much more passion here in Oklahoma City than that same talk would have in Taiwan, and conversely, talk of the earthquakes in Taiwan would arouse more passion there than here (unless -- let’s say -- it were being discussed with Taiwanese college students with homes and family members who were effected).
The final passion operator Campbell listed was Interest in the Consequences. He claimed that the successful orator would interest his hearer in future consequences by evoking such strong feelings of revenge or gratitude that the hearer would feel his self-preservation was in some way tied up in those consequences. This, of course, is another thing politicians of various political backgrounds like to do today when talking about issues like balancing the budget, Star Wars technology, Medicare cuts, EPA regulations, gun control, illegal immigration, defense cuts, and others. There is also discussion about the difficulty of this proposition -- about the apathy of many Americans toward issues that fall outside the scope of their day-to-day activities.
Apathy along with education, class, refinement and even grossness of audience members were to be taken into consideration by a preacher before a sermon was given to his congregation. Campbell focused the last sections of The Philosophy of Rhetoric on preachers and seemed somewhat discouraged when he discussed the enormity of the task of preaching to bring about "the reformation of mankind...reformation of life and manners." Campbell claimed that the change preachers were calling for in men was "of all things that which is the most difficult by any means whatever to effectuate...by the powers of rhetoric you may produce in mankind almost any change more easily than this." However, he concluded that is does not really require a lot of eloquence or rhetoric to change men’s hearts because of "how soothing it is to them not only to have their minds made easy under the indulged malignity of their disposition, but to have that very malignity sanctified with a good name!"
It was interesting to see George Campbell express his feelings as well as his ideas in his writing. His thoughts on appealing to the hearer’s imagination with allegory, metaphor, and simile were quite good ones. The one place in The Philosophy of Rhetoric where he used that technique himself was the most enjoyable to read, the easiest to understand, and the most memorable -- I am referring to the story of the "sister-graces" Probability and Plausibility. I probably would have found greater enjoyment in reading his text if he had been more fervent in appealing to my imagination.
History of Rhetoric II, Dr. Wayne Stein, 18 January 2000