Platos Gorgias
SOCRATES: Then rhetoric does not treat of all kinds of SOCRATES: And does not gymnastic also treat of discourse discourse?
concerning the good or evil condition of the body?
GORGIAS: Certainly not.
GORGIAS: Very true.
SOCRATES: And yet rhetoric makes men able to speak?
SOCRATES: And the same, Gorgias, is true of the other arts:all of them treat of discourse concerning the subjects GORGIAS: Yes.
with which they severally have to do.
SOCRATES: And to understand that about which they GORGIAS: Clearly.
speak?
SOCRATES: Then why, if you call rhetoric the art which GORGIAS: Of course.
treats of discourse, and all the other arts treat of discourse, do you not call them arts of rhetoric?
SOCRATES: But does not the art of medicine, which we were just now mentioning, also make men able to under-GORGIAS: Because, Socrates, the knowledge of the other stand and speak about the sick?
arts has only to do with some sort of external action, as of the hand; but there is no such action of the hand in rhetoric GORGIAS: Certainly.
which works and takes effect only through the medium of discourse. And therefore I am justified in saying that rheto-SOCRATES: Then medicine also treats of discourse?
ric treats of discourse.
GORGIAS: Yes.
SOCRATES: I am not sure whether I entirely understand you, but I dare say I shall soon know better; please to an-SOCRATES: Of discourse concerning diseases?
swer me a question:you would allow that there are arts?
GORGIAS: Just so.
GORGIAS: Yes.