François Fénelon

1651-1715 · French · Sacred Rhetoric, Homiletics, Educational Theory

True eloquence has nothing of the inflated or the ambitious.

Topics François Fénelon addresses

• the three ends of preaching
• to prove and to portray and to move
• the plain style
• ornament in the pulpit
• the conceit
• moving the passions
• persuasion and proof
• Scripture as a model of eloquence
• the Fathers as preachers
• Cicero and Demosthenes as models
• the preacher who recites
• simplicity in speech
• true eloquence
• the education of a prince
• Mentor as teacher
• the ruin brought by conquest
• luxury and the corruption of a court
• flattery in the household of a king
• the prosperity of the fields as the measure of a reign
• the reforms at Salentum
• the shepherd as an image of rule
• a king exists for his subjects
• the education of girls
• teaching by pleasure rather than fear

Converse with François Fénelon on Symposium. Every reply is grounded in François Fénelon's own writing and cites the page it came from. The corpus is public-domain text.