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Use rhetoric in a sentence

Rhetoric Definition

  • using language effectively to please or persuade
  • high-flown style; excessive use of verbal ornamentation;
  • loud and confused and empty talk
  • study of the technique and rules for using language effectively (especially in public speaking)

Sentence Examples

This is not rhetorical exaggeration.

[From Rebuilding Britain: A Survey of Problems of Reconstruction After the World War by Hopkinson, Alfred, Sir]

Ancient culture was rhetorical.

[From Three Philosophical Poets: Lucretius, Dante, and Goethe by Santayana, George]

It has imagination and rhetoric.

[From The Virgin in Judgment by Phillpotts, Eden]

Gesture and tone were rhetorical.

[From Mr. Wayt's Wife's Sister by Harland, Marion]

Reality is stranger than rhetoric.

[From Painted Veils by Huneker, James]

All rhetoric is more or less windy.

[From The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric by Cody, Sherwin]

His rhetoric makes their heads swim.

It is rhetorical rather than poetic.

This is not rhetoric, but economics.

[From Eugenics and Other Evils by Chesterton, G. K. (Gilbert Keith)]

I might become a teacher of rhetoric.

[From Lords of the World: A story of the fall of Carthage and Corinth by Peacock, Ralph]

All my wonderful rhetoric had fled me.

[From Eastern Standard Tribe by Doctorow, Cory]

The question was obviously rhetorical.

Their rhetoric it is that seduces him.

[From Painted Veils by Huneker, James]

Her questions were entirely rhetorical.

[From The Love Chase by Grendon, Felix]

She presided over singing and rhetoric.

[From Carleton's Condensed Classical Dictionary by Carleton, George Washington]

He can be rhetorical, but not eloquent.

[From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, \"Jacobites\" to \"Japan\" (part) Volume 15, Slice 2 by Various]

He is clear and lively, but rhetorical.

[From The Old Roman World : the Grandeur and Failure of Its Civilization. by Lord, John]

Rhetoric is allied to the grammatic art.

[From An encyclopedist of the dark ages: Isidore of Seville by Brehaut, Ernest]

But this language is at best rhetorical.

[From Renaissance in Italy, Volume 5 (of 7) Italian Literature, Part 2 by Symonds, John Addington]

Only rhetoric and scepticism flourished.

[From The Expositor's Bible: The Epistle to the Ephesians by Nicoll, W. Robertson (William Robertson), Sir]

Do not try to be eloquent or rhetorical.

[From The Orange Girl by Davis, Warren B.]

His speech was a fine piece of rhetoric.

[From Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith by Meredith, George]

There he showed proficiency in rhetoric.

[From Gaza: A City of Many Battles (from the Family of Noah to the Present Day) by Dowling, Theodore Edward]

Another letter in a more rhetorical mood.

[From The Aran Islands by Synge, J. M. (John Millington)]

His was loose, vague, frothy, rhetorical.

[From The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vol. VI. (of 9) Being His Autobiography, Correspondence, Reports, Messages, Addresses, and Other Writings, Official and Private by Jefferson, Thomas]

I paused rhetorically, expecting a reply.

[From The Red Planet by Locke, William John]


To her it was idle rhetoric and verbiage.

[From The Life of Froude by Paul, Herbert W. (Herbert Woodfield)]

Deep effect of his rhetorical earnestness.

[From Problems in Greek history by Mahaffy, J. P. (John Pentland)]

He did not waste many words upon rhetoric.

[From Narrative and Miscellaneous Papers by De Quincey, Thomas]

He disregarded the adornments of rhetoric.

[From Something of Men I Have Known With Some Papers of a General Nature, Political, Historical, and Retrospective by Stevenson, Adlai E. (Adlai Ewing)]

We are not indulging in forms of rhetoric.

[From Danger; Or, Wounded in the House of a Friend by Arthur, T. S. (Timothy Shay)]

Do not dismiss that as mere pulpit rhetoric.

[From Expositions of Holy Scripture Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John by Maclaren, Alexander]

It is not the time for argument or rhetoric.

[From History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III by Gage, Matilda Joslyn]

Make me understand that fine rag of rhetoric!

[From Recently Recovered \"Lost\" Tudor Plays with some others by Farmer, John Stephen]

he answered at last, after a rhetorical pause.

[From What's Bred in the Bone by Allen, Grant]

Blaze was addicted to rhetorical extravagance.

[From Heart of the Sunset by Beach, Rex]

He was familiar with every device of rhetoric.

[From The Life of Froude by Paul, Herbert W. (Herbert Woodfield)]

He was not to be convinced by all her rhetoric.

[From The Indian Bangle by Hume, Fergus]

Dundee interrupted the pompous flow of rhetoric.

[From Murder at Bridge by Austin, Anne]

Literary criticism was learned through rhetoric.

[From Our Legal Heritage: The First Thousand Years: 600 - 1600 King Aethelbert - Queen Elizabeth by Reilly, S. A.]

My eyes ran on over pages of plaintive rhetoric.

[From The Descent of Man and Other Stories by Wharton, Edith]

There is no muddy rhetoric or befuddled clauses.

[From Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 03 Little Journeys to the Homes of American Statesmen by Hubbard, Elbert]

I do not believe that is rhetorical exaggeration.

[From Expositions of Holy Scripture Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John by Maclaren, Alexander]

It was a time of rhetorical patriotism in Athens.

[From Parallel Paths: A Study in Biology, Ethics, and Art by Rolleston, T. W. (Thomas William)]

There were other practical treatises on rhetoric.

[From Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 9 by Mabie, Hamilton Wright]

The Bard is a masterpiece of imaginative rhetoric.

[From The Art of Letters by Lynd, Robert]

He had no demagoguery, no mob-oratory, no rhetoric.

[From The Invisible Censor by Hackett, Francis]

I cannot see him listening to modernistic rhetoric.

[From Suspended Judgments: Essays on Books and Sensations by Powys, John Cowper]

Logic asserts herself and rhetoric loses its force.

[From The Popes and Science The History of the Papal Relations to Science During the Middle Ages and Down to Our Own Time by Walsh, James J. (James Joseph)]

Epistolography and rhetoric assumed the Roman habit.

[From Renaissance in Italy, Volume 5 (of 7) Italian Literature, Part 2 by Symonds, John Addington]

She may fail in rhetoric, and succeed in mathematics.

[From The College, the Market, and the Court or, Woman's relation to education, labor and law by Dall, Caroline Wells Healey]

The method of thought produces the form of rhetoric.?

[From The Essays of \"George Eliot\" Complete by Sheppard, Nathan]


This sounds like exaggerated and rhetorical language.

[From Mornings in the College Chapel Short Addresses to Young Men on Personal Religion by Peabody, Francis Greenwood]

We fancy it rhetoric when we speak of eminent virtue.

[From Essays � First Series by Emerson, Ralph Waldo]

Her eyes left me and my rhetoric dwindled into a sigh.

[From Fantazius Mallare: A Mysterious Oath by Smith, Wallace]

In rhetoric, allegory is often but a continued simile.

[From The New Gresham Encyclopedia. A to Amide Vol. 1 Part 1 by Various]

The question was rhetorical, but it stung?as intended.

[From Project Cyclops by Hoover, Thomas]

Into what rhetorical forms is poetic speech classified?

[From The Chautauquan, Vol. 05, November 1884, No. 2 by Literary, The Chautauquan]

Napoleon vented his feelings in the customary rhetoric.

[From Talleyrand: A Biographical Study by McCabe, Joseph]

The phrase in question is merely a rhetorical flourish.

[From Bolshevism The Enemy of Political and Industrial Democracy by Spargo, John]

The question was no longer rhetorical, it was implicit.

[From Terminal Compromise by Schwartau, Winn]

I am extremely anxious to avoid rhetorical exaggerations.

[From Literary Taste: How to Form It With Detailed Instructions for Collecting a Complete Library of English Literature by Bennett, Arnold]

It is more a trick of rhetoric than an argument of logic.

[From History of Free Thought in Reference to The Christian Religion by Farrar, Adam Storey]

Homeric simplicity has given way to rhetorical elaboration.

[From Essays on the Greek Romances by Haight, Elizabeth Hazelton]

Neither the rhetorical nor the elegiac had any hold on him.

[From Life and Writings of Maurice Maeterlinck by Bithell, Jethro]

Rhetoric, Plato says, is the art of ruling the minds of men.

[From Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry by Pike, Albert]

I found her better conversant with Rhetoric than with Logic.

[From The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine (June 1913) Vol. LXXXVI. New Series: Vol. LXIV. May to October, 1913 by Various]

The Mayor proceeded, bringing his finest rhetoric into play.

[From A Change of Air by Hope, Anthony]

They want logic, and will not be content with mere rhetoric.

[From Ireland as It Is, and as It Would Be Under Home Rule by Buckley, Robert John]

He is also charged with being too rhetorical in his language.

[From The Satires of Juvenal, Persius, Sulpicia, and Lucilius by Juvenal, Decimus Junius]

It is not graceful; it is pompous, and distinctly rhetorical.

[From Studies in Early Victorian Literature by Harrison, Frederic]

The rhetorical chambers existed in the most obscure villages.

[From The Rise of the Dutch Republic � Complete (1555-66) by Motley, John Lothrop]

There should be no rhetorical pyrotechnics at these meetings.

[From The Dangerous Classes of New York, and Twenty Years' Work Among Them by Brace, Charles Loring]

Logic, rhetoric and metaphor are all alike to the setting hen.

[From Remarks by Nye, Bill]

There was always a point when the rhetoric broke into gesture.

[From The Research Magnificent by Wells, H. G. (Herbert George)]

To the Greeks and Romans rhetoric meant the theory of oratory.

[From Rhetoric and Poetry in the Renaissance A Study of Rhetorical Terms in English Renaissance Literary Criticism by Clark, Donald Lemen]

In rhetoric, a direct and formal comparison is called a simile.

[From The Verbalist A Manual Devoted to Brief Discussions of the Right and the Wrong Use of Words and to Some Other Matters of Interest to Those Who Would Speak and Write with Propriety. by Ayres, Alfred]

Aristotle, in his Sophist, says that he was the inventor of dialectics, as Empedocles was of rhetoric.

[From The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers by 1812]


The public has already tired of the lilt of Ingersoll's redundant rhetoric, pleasing as was its music.

[From The Young Man and the World by Beveridge, Albert J. (Albert Jeremiah)]

Rhetoric and Poetic are for him special cases of Aesthetic, which is a general science, embracing both.

[From Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic by Ainslie, Douglas]

Mathematics can be shown to sustain a certain relation to rhetoric and may aid in determining its laws.

[From Memorabilia Mathematica; or, the Philomath's Quotation-Book by Moritz, Robert �douard]

Mythology, that to a childish mind is the only possible poetry, sounds like bad rhetoric in comparison.

[From Three Philosophical Poets: Lucretius, Dante, and Goethe by Santayana, George]

I wish always to discuss the question without all painting, pathos, rhetoric, or flourish of every kind.

[From Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams During the Revolution with a Memoir of Mrs. Adams by Adams, Abigail]

While waving his arm in a moment of rhetorical excitement, he let his book fall upon an old woman's head.

[From Two Summers in Guyenne: A Chronicle of the Wayside and Waterside by Barker, Edward Harrison]

He paused for rhetorical effect, and the aged chief began to feel the influence of his audacious presence.

[From Red Belts by Pendexter, Hugh]

I imagine this morning they are going to depend on rhetoric, and allow their swords to remain in scabbard.

[From The Sword Maker by Barr, Robert]

It is free from technical language and rhetorical frills, but it tells how things work, and why they work.

[From The Study of Elementary Electricity and Magnetism by Experiment Containing Two Hundred Experiments Performed with Simple, Home-made Apparatus by St. John, Thomas M. (Thomas Matthew)]

Paul's question is not one of ignorance, but it is a rhetorical way of rebuking, and of expressing wonder.

[From Expositions of Holy Scripture Second Corinthians, Galatians, and Philippians Chapters I to End. Colossians, Thessalonians, and First Timothy. by Maclaren, Alexander]

But a serious and reasonable argument, not yet obsolete, pervaded Pitt's violent rhetoric on this occasion.

[From Lord Chatham, His Early Life and Connections by Rosebery, Archibald Philip Primrose, Earl of]

Rhetorical exhortations to keep down expenditure marked the high-water level of ministerial endeavor there.

[From The Inside Story of the Peace Conference by Dillon, Emile Joseph]

The rhetoric comedies were not admirable in an aesthetic point of view, but they were wrathful and sincere.

[From The Rise of the Dutch Republic � Complete (1555-84) by Motley, John Lothrop]

What is needed now is not more rhetoric but more reality of conviction; not more facts, but deeper purpose.

[From The Call of the World; or, Every Man's Supreme Opportunity by Doughty, William E. (William Ellison)]

Rhetoric cannot be shut up in a book.

[From Revisiting the Earth by Hill, James Langdon]