Meaning of argumentum ad passiones | Babel Free

Definitions

An appeal or argument intended to convince the listener(s) by agitating the emotions, rather than by appealing to sober judgment.

rhetoric

Equivalents

Examples

“When an argument is borrowed from any topics which are ſuited to engage the inclinations and paſſions of the hearers on the ſide of the ſpeaker, rather than to convince the judgment, this is argumentum ad paſſiones, an addreſs to the paſſions; or if it be made publicly, it is called ad populum, or an appeal to the people.”

“Divide your sentence into three distinct members, each member commencing with the same words, but terminating with words conveying different ideas. […] Sometimes three or more kindred words may have the same happy effect, in which case we should have a view […] to alliteration. […] This mode may be denominated argumentum ad passiones.”

“The argumentum ad passiones, or the argumentum ad populum, is an argument similarly irrelevant with the type of argumentum ad hominem we have just been considering. Here it is not the judgment that is convinced, but the inclinations and passions.”

“The speaker uses the argumentum ad hominem by comparing his race with the Chosen People, an argumentum ad fidem in exploiting for the purposes of his similitude their belief in the miraculous origin of the tables of the law, and an argumentum ad passiones in his description of the browbeating of a small inspired race by the arrogant spokesman of a mighty empire.”

CEFR level