The Complete Aristotle (eng.)

fact, what angered him was the insult
involved; it was a mere accident that this was the particular form
that the insult took.
    6. Another is the argument from consequence. In the Alexander,
for instance, it is argued that Paris must have had a lofty
disposition, since he despised society and lived by himself on
Mount Ida: because lofty people do this kind of thing, therefore
Paris too, we are to suppose, had a lofty soul. Or, if a man
dresses fashionably and roams around at night, he is a rake, since
that is the way rakes behave. Another similar argument points out
that beggars sing and dance in temples, and that exiles can live
wherever they please, and that such privileges are at the disposal
of those we account happy and therefore every one might be regarded
as happy if only he has those privileges. What matters, however, is
the circumstances under which the privileges are enjoyed. Hence
this line too falls under the head of fallacies by omission.
    7. Another line consists in representing as causes things which
are not causes, on the ground that they happened along with or
before the event in question. They assume that, because B happens
after A, it happens because of A. Politicians are especially fond
of taking this line. Thus Demades said that the policy of
Demosthenes was the cause of all the mischief, ‘for after it the
war occurred’.
    8. Another line consists in leaving out any mention of time and
circumstances. E.g. the argument that Paris was justified in taking
Helen, since her father left her free to choose: here the freedom
was presumably not perpetual; it could only refer to her first
choice, beyond which her father’s authority could not go. Or again,
one might say that to strike a free man is an act of wanton
outrage; but it is not so in every case-only when it is
unprovoked.
    9. Again, a spurious syllogism may, as in ‘eristical’
discussions, be based on the confusion of the absolute with that
which is not absolute but particular. As, in dialectic, for
instance, it may be argued that what-is-not is, on the ground that
what-is-not is what-is-not: or that the unknown can be known, on
the ground that it can be known to he unknown: so also in rhetoric
a spurious enthymeme may be based on the confusion of some
particular probability with absolute probability. Now no particular
probability is universally probable: as Agathon says,
One might perchance say that was probable-
That things improbable oft will hap to men.
    For what is improbable does happen, and therefore it is probable
that improbable things will happen. Granted this, one might argue
that ‘what is improbable is probable’. But this is not true
absolutely. As, in eristic, the imposture comes from not adding any
clause specifying relationship or reference or manner; so here it
arises because the probability in question is not general but
specific. It is of this line of argument that Corax’s Art of
Rhetoric is composed. If the accused is not open to the charge-for
instance if a weakling be tried for violent assault-the defence is
that he was not likely to do such a thing. But if he is open to the
charge-i.e. if he is a strong man-the defence is still that he was
not likely to do such a thing, since he could be sure that people
would think he was likely to do it. And so with any other charge:
the accused must be either open or not open to it: there is in
either case an appearance of probable innocence, but whereas in the
latter case the probability is genuine, in the former it can only
be asserted in the special sense mentioned. This sort of argument
illustrates what is meant by making the worse argument seem the
better. Hence people were right in objecting to the training
Protagoras undertook to give them. It was a fraud; the probability
it handled was not genuine but spurious, and has a place in no art
except Rhetoric and Eristic.
25
    Enthymemes, genuine and apparent, have now been described; the
next subject is their Refutation.
    An argument may be refuted either by a counter-syllogism or by
bringing an objection. It is clear that counter-syllogisms can be
built up from the same lines of arguments as the original
syllogisms: for the materials of syllogisms are the ordinary
opinions of men, and such opinions often contradict each other.
Objections, as appears in the Topics, may be raised in four
ways-either by directly attacking your opponent’s own statement, or
by putting forward another statement like it, or by putting forward
a