De Doctrina Christiana 11/14

Augustine speaks of rhetoric as being taught in public schools, by him as well as other teachers. I viewed his initial description of rhetoric to be the same as Ancient Greece. He states, ” truth and falsehood are pleaded” (456). This is similar to the ancient greeks because they did the same exact thing in the court room. A difference between Greece and Rome was that Rome focused more on eloquence than anything else. Romans believed that eloquence was learned by, “reading and hearing the eloquent” (457). This makes sense because you need to be able to practice something in order to fully grasp its meaning and be able to use it. You can not just list its rules and expect people to be eloquent. The church had, “supreme authority” (457) which is a complete change from the ancient greeks. The final difference is that Rome is a democracy while ancient Greece was a republic. There was definitely more opportunities for those in Ancient Greece to partake in the usage of rhetoric, however in Rome, it was believed that only those of a higher class could participate in taking classes and learning eloquence.