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Protrepsis And Paraenesis
In rhetoric, protrepsis () and paraenesis (παραίνεσις) are two closely related styles of exhortation that are employed by moral philosophers. While there is a widely accepted distinction between the two that is employed by modern writers, classical philosophers did not make a clear distinction between the two, and even used them interchangeably. Differences In antiquity Clement of Alexandria differentiated between protrepsis and paraenesis in his ''Paedagogus''. Other writers, however, both before and after him, conflated the two. Pseudo-Justin's protrepsis is entitled an '' Paraenetic Address to the Greeks'' and Magnus Felix Ennodius' ''Paraenesis didascalia'' is actually in the style of protrepsis. In modernity The modern distinction between the two ideas, as generally used in modern scholarship, is explained by Stanley Stowers thus: In other words, the distinction often employed by modern writers is that protrepsis is conversion literature, where a philosopher ...
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Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. It is one of the three ancient arts of discourse ( trivium) along with grammar and logic/ dialectic. As an academic discipline within the humanities, rhetoric aims to study the techniques that speakers or writers use to inform, persuade, and motivate their audiences. Rhetoric also provides heuristics for understanding, discovering, and developing arguments for particular situations. Aristotle defined rhetoric as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion", and since mastery of the art was necessary for victory in a case at law, for passage of proposals in the assembly, or for fame as a speaker in civic ceremonies, he called it "a combination of the science of logic and of the ethical branch of politics". Aristotle also identified three persuasive audience appeals: logos, pathos, and ethos. The five canons of rhetoric, or phases of developing a persuasive speech, were first codified in classical Rome: i ...
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Persaeus
Persaeus (; 307/6–243 BC) of Citium, son of Demetrius, was a Greek Stoic philosopher, and a friend and favourite student of Zeno of Citium. Life He lived in the same house as Zeno. Later writers wrote that Persaeus had been Zeno's slave, who had perhaps originally been an amanuensis sent to Zeno by King Antigonus II Gonatas; however, the source of this story seems to be due to a sarcastic remark made about Persaeus by Bion of Borysthenes who, upon seeing a statue of Persaeus inscribed: "Persaeus the pupil of Zeno", sneered that it ought to have been: "Persaeus the Servant of Zeno". It is known that Antigonus II Gonatas invited Zeno to his court at Pella around 276 BC. Zeno refused because of his old age and sent his students Persaeus and Philonides of Thebes instead. While Persaeus was at Antigonus' court, Antigonus once, wishing to make trial of him, caused some false news to be brought to him that his estate had been ravaged by the enemy, and as his countenance fell, "Do yo ...
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Hortensius (Cicero)
''Hortensius'' () or ''On Philosophy'' is a lost dialogue written by Marcus Tullius Cicero in the year 45 BC. The dialoguewhich is named after Cicero's friendly rival and associate, the speaker and politician Quintus Hortensius Hortalustook the form of a protreptic. In the work, Cicero, Hortensius, Quintus Lutatius Catulus, and Lucius Licinius Lucullus discuss the best use of one's leisure time. At the conclusion of the work, Cicero argues that the pursuit of philosophy is the most important endeavor. While the dialogue was extremely popular in Classical Antiquity, the dialogue only survived into the sixth century AD before it was lost. Today, it is extant in the fragments preserved by the prose writer Martianus Capella, the grammarians Maurus Servius Honoratus and Nonius Marcellus, the early Christian author Lactantius, and the Church Father Augustine of Hippo (the latter of whom explicitly credits the ''Hortensius'' with encouraging him to study the tenets of philosophy). ...
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Protrepticus (Clement)
The ''Protrepticus'' (: "Exhortation to the Greeks") is the first of the three surviving works of Clement of Alexandria, a Christian theologian of the 2nd century. Description The work is, as its title suggests, an exhortation to the pagans of Greece to adopt Christianity, and within it Clement demonstrates his extensive knowledge of pagan mythology and theology. It is chiefly important due to Clement's exposition of religion as an anthropological phenomenon.Droge (1989), p. 138 After a short philosophical discussion, it opens with a history of Greek religion in seven stages. Clement suggests that at first, men mistakenly believed the Sun, the Moon and other heavenly bodies to be gods. The next development was the worship of the products of agriculture, from which he contends the cults of Demeter and Dionysus arose.Droge (1989), p. 131 Man then paid reverence to revenge, and deified human feelings of eros, love and Phobos (mythology), fear, among others. In the following stage, t ...
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Protrepticus (Aristotle)
''Protrepticus'' () or, "Exhortation to Philosophy" () is a lost philosophical work written by Aristotle in the mid-4th century BCE. The work was intended to encourage the reader to study philosophy. Although the Protrepticus was one of Aristotle's most famous works in antiquity, it did not survive except in fragments and ancient reports from later authors, particularly from Iamblichus, who appears to quote large extracts from it, without attribution, alongside extracts from extant works of Plato, in the second book of his work on Pythagoreanism. Format Like many of Aristotle's lost works, Protrepticus was likely written as a Socratic dialogue, in a similar format to the works of Plato. There is good evidence that several of the nineteen works that stand at the head of Diogenes' and Hesychius' lists were dialogues; it may be inferred with high probability, though not with certainty, that the others were so too, but Stobaeus, pp. 59, 61 infra, and Athenaeus, p. 61 infra, con ...
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Themistius
Themistius ( ; 317 – c. 388 AD), nicknamed Euphrades (, "''eloquent''"), was a statesman, rhetorician and philosopher. He flourished in the reigns of Constantius II, Julian, Jovian, Valens, Gratian and Theodosius I, and he enjoyed the favour of all those emperors, notwithstanding their many differences and the fact that he himself was not a Christian. He was admitted to the senate by Constantius in 355, and he was prefect of Constantinople in 384 on the nomination of Theodosius. Of his many works, thirty-three orations of his have come down to us, as well as various commentaries and epitomes of the works of Aristotle. Early life Themistius was born in Paphlagonia and taught at the Colchian Academy in Phasis. Several of his orations mention his father Eugenius, a distinguished philosopher from whom he received supplemental training. Themistius devoted himself chiefly to Aristotle, though he also studied Pythagoreanism and Platonism. His early commentaries on Aristotle w ...
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Lesbonax
Lesbonax of Mytilene (), a Greek sophist and rhetorician, flourished in the time of Roman emperor Augustus. According to Photius I of Constantinople he was the author of sixteen political speeches, of which two are extant, a hortatory speech after the style of Thucydides, and a speech on the Corinthian War. In the first he exhorts the Athenians against the Spartans, in the second (the title of which is misleading) against the Thebans (edition by F. Kiehr, ''Lesbonactis sophistae quae supersunt'' (Leipzig 1906). Some erotic letters are also attributed to him. His son Potamo was also a notable rhetorician. The Lesbonax described in the Suda The ''Suda'' or ''Souda'' (; ; ) is a large 10th-century Byzantine Empire, Byzantine encyclopedia of the History of the Mediterranean region, ancient Mediterranean world, formerly attributed to an author called Soudas () or Souidas (). It is an ... as the author of a large number of philosophical works is probably of much earlier date;Suda ...
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Galen
Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus (; September 129 – AD), often Anglicization, anglicized as Galen () or Galen of Pergamon, was a Ancient Rome, Roman and Greeks, Greek physician, surgeon, and Philosophy, philosopher. Considered to be one of the most accomplished of all medical researchers of Ancient history, antiquity, Galen influenced the development of various scientific disciplines, including anatomy, physiology, pathology, pharmacology, and neurology, as well as philosophy and logic. The son of Aelius Nicon, a wealthy Greek architect with scholarly interests, Galen received a comprehensive education that prepared him for a successful career as a physician and philosopher. Born in the ancient city of Pergamon (present-day Bergama, Turkey), Galen traveled extensively, exposing himself to a wide variety of medical theories and discoveries before settling in Ancient Rome, Rome, where he served prominent members of Roman society and eventually was given the position of perso ...
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Musonius Rufus
Gaius Musonius Rufus (; ) was a Roman Stoicism, Stoic philosopher of the 1st century AD. He taught philosophy in Rome during the reign of Nero and so was sent into exile in 65 AD, returning to Rome only under Galba. He was allowed to stay in Rome when Vespasian banished all other philosophers from the city in 71 AD although he was eventually banished anyway, returning only after Vespasian's death. A collection of extracts from his lectures still survives. He is also remembered for being the teacher of Epictetus and Dio Chrysostom. Life The son of a Roman Eques (ancient Rome), eques of the name of Capito, Musonius Rufus was born in Volsinii, Etruria about 20–30 AD. By the time of Nero, he was already famous in Rome, where he taught Stoicism, Stoic philosophy. He was associated with the Stoic Opposition against the perceived tyranny of Nero. He followed Rubellius Plautus into exile when Plautus was banished by Nero (60 AD). He returned to Rome after Plautus' death (62 AD), but as ...
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Seneca The Elder
Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Elder ( ; – c. AD 39), also known as Seneca the Rhetorician, was a Roman writer, born of a wealthy equestrian family of Corduba, Hispania. He wrote a collection of reminiscences about the Roman schools of rhetoric, six books of which are extant in a more or less complete state and five others in epitome only. His principal work, a history of Roman affairs from the beginning of the Civil Wars until the last years of his life, is almost entirely lost to posterity. Seneca lived through the reigns of three significant emperors; Augustus (ruled 27 BC – 14 AD), Tiberius (ruled 14–37 AD) and Caligula (ruled 37–41 AD). He was the father of Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeanus, best known as a Proconsul of Achaia; his second son was the dramatist and Stoic philosopher Seneca the Younger (''Lucius''), who was tutor of Nero, and his third son, Marcus Annaeus Mela, became the father of the poet Lucan. Biography Seneca the Elder is the first of the gens ...
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Augustus
Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian (), was the founder of the Roman Empire, who reigned as the first Roman emperor from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. The reign of Augustus initiated an Roman imperial cult, imperial cult and an era of regional hegemony, imperial peace (the or ) in which the Roman world was largely free of armed conflict. The Principate system of government was established during his reign and lasted until the Crisis of the Third Century. Octavian was born into an equites, equestrian branch of the plebeian Octavia gens, Octavia. Following his maternal great-uncle Julius Caesar's assassination of Julius Caesar, assassination in 44 BC, Octavian was named in Caesar's will as his Adoption in ancient Rome, adopted son and heir, and inherited Caesar's name, estate, and the loyalty of his legions. He, Mark Antony, and Marcus Lepidus formed the Second Triumvirat ...
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Posidonius
Posidonius (; , "of Poseidon") "of Apameia" (ὁ Ἀπαμεύς) or "of Rhodes" (ὁ Ῥόδιος) (), was a Greeks, Greek politician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, historian, mathematician, and teacher native to Apamea (Syria), Apamea, Syria. He was considered the most learned man of his time and, possibly, of the entire Stoicism, Stoic school. After a period learning Stoicism, Stoic philosophy from Panaetius in Athens, he spent many years in travel and scientific researches in Spain, Africa, Italy, Gaul, Liguria, Sicily and on the eastern shores of the Adriatic. He settled as a teacher at Rhodes where his fame attracted numerous scholars. Next to Panaetius he did most, by writings and personal lectures, to spread Stoicism to the Roman world, and he became well known to many leading men, including Pompey and Cicero. His works are now lost, but they proved a mine of information to later writers. The titles and subjects of more than twenty of them are known. In common w ...
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