Julius Caesar's Funeral Speech Essay

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The death of Julius Caesar was an arguable topic, especially at the time of his funeral when senators were trying to benefit from his death by getting the Roman citizens to be on their side. At Caesar’s funeral, two senators gave their own speech in hopes to get the roman people on their side. Between the two speeches, Marc Antony portrayed a more effective and persuasive speech because of his use of rhetorical appeals, biases, and being true to himself. The appeals used in Antony’s speech were persuasively superior over Brutus’s speech. Antony used all three appeals in his speech in order to provide a well built argument. An example of how Antony uses logos effectively would be when he mentioned, “He hath brought many captives home to …show more content…

Antony’s claim that Brutus is not an honorable man is supported by Brutus’s lying and backstabbing acts, his biggest one being him killing his “friend” Caesar and trying to claim that he did it for the good of the people. In short, Marc Antony stays true in his argument while Brutus lies as an attempt to get the roman citizens on his side. Along with the other superiorities, Marc Antony also brings to the table more rhetorical variety. He uses verbal irony, personal anecdotes, counterarguments and many other rhetorical devices. An example of personal anecdotes used by Antony would be, “I thrice presented him a kingly crown, Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?” This is Antony’s personal experience with Caesar that Antony uses to prove once again, that Caesar was not ambitious and did not deserve death. He also uses counterarguments in his speech/argument, Antony states, “The noble Brutus hath told you Caesar was ambitious: If it were so, it was a grievous fault, and Caesar hath grievously answered it.” This is Antony countering Brutus’s claim which makes it a counter argument incorporated