Julius Caesar Persuasive Essay Example
Julius Caesar defeated Pompey! He returns to Rome - the question is will he become King? In the play Julius Caesar returns to Rome after defeating Pompey. Some Romans want to make him king, but others think he will become too powerful, and they kill him. After the killing of Caesar, they have to justify their motives to the people of Rome. Marcus Antony and Marcus Brutus both give a speech at Caesar’s funeral, they both try to persuade the audience to agree with them using rhetorical appeals (ethos, logos, pathos) however; Marcus Anthony’s speech was more effective in moving the audience to action. In order to be a successful persuasive speaker you need to use the rhetorical appeal, logos. Logos uses inductive or deductive reasoning by citing statistics, facts, experts and evidence. The claim or thesis of each speaker of Brutus was that Caesar deserved to be killed while Antony’s claim was that Caesar was a respectable person and didn’t deserve to be killed. An example of Brutus using logos to persuade his audience is: “The question of his death is enrolled in the Capitol; his glory not extenuated, wherein he was worthy…” (108 line 33-34) A better example of a speaker using logos came from Antony’s speech: “I thrice presented him a kingly crown, which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition?” (112 line 91-92) Antony overall uses the rhetorical appeal, logos, better. Another tool used by a good speaker is called patos, which is another rhetorical appeal. This is when you appeal to the emotions of your audience by describing in detail the effect of a particular situation (try to arouse a strong sense of feelings in your audience such as fear, or sympathy). Brutus arouses the audience’s anger and fear which pushes them to think that Caesar would have been a bad king, so its a good thing he was killed. One line that Brutus used to try to persuade his audience was: “Had you rather Caesar were living, and die all slaves, than that Caesar were