Note 150 — Chapter VII · THE SPACIOUSNESS OF OLD RHETORIC

See Norman J. DeWitt, “The Humanist Should Look to the Law,” Journal of General Education, IV (January, 1950), 149. Although it is not our concern here, it probably could be shown that the essential requirements of oratory themselves depend upon a certain organization of society, such as an aristocratic republicanism. When Burke declares that a true natural aristocracy “is formed out of a class of legitimate presumptions, which, taken as generalities, must be admitted for actual truths” (Works [London, 1853-64], III, 85-86) my impression is that he has in mind something resembling our “uncontested term.” The “legitimate presumptions” are the settled things which afford the plane of maneuver.