ABSTRACT
George Campbell opens his treatise by defining eloquence as “that art or talent by which discourse is adapted to its end,”5 a definition which certainly leaves room for expository discourse to be a part of rhetoric. He goes on to observe: “All the ends of speaking are reducible to four; every speech intended to enlighten the understanding, to please the imagination, to move the passions, or to influence the will.” The subject matter of rhetorical criticism, then, is usually taken to be discourse that aims to influence men. And what of its practice? The methods of rhetorical criticism, although they are embodied in an ever-growing literature, are neither so numerous nor so variegated as to be beyond reckoning. The rhetorical critique employing a psychological approach has received no formal methodological statement, but this approach is well illustrated by Maloney’s essay on Clarence Darrow.
