A Guide to Forming and Conducting Lyceums, Debating Societies, &c

RULES OF CONTROVERSY.

Rule 1. The terms to which the question in debate is expressed, and the precise point at issue, should be so clearly defined that there could be no misunderstanding respecting them. This alone will frequently terminate the controversy at once. The want of it is often the sole origin from which controversy and all the unpleasant circumstances attending it arises.

Rule 2. The parties should mutually consider each other as standing on a footing of equality in respect to the subject in debate; and that it is possible that he may be wrong and his adversary in the right.

Rule 3. All expressions which are unmeaning, and not of direct relevancy to the subject in debate, should be avoided.

Rule 4. Personal reflection, that is where a name or a character is expressly connected with a name, should in no instance be indulged.

Rule 5. No one has a right to accuse his adver. sary of indirect motives.

Rule 6. The consequences of any proposition are not to be charged on an adversary, except they are not only injurious to morals and to society, but also logically deducible from that proposition.

Rule 7. As truth is the professed object of controversy, whatever proofs may be advanced on either side should be examined with fairness and

candour; and any attempt to ensnare an adversary by the arts of sophistry, or to lessen the force of his reasoning by wit, cavilling, or ridicule, is a violation of the rules of honourable controversy.

Rule 8. Beware of wandering from the subject of debate, but confine your remarks to the point; then, like the rays of the sun brought to a focus, they will be effective.

In preparing this epitome of logic, Parker's Logic and Abercrombie on the Intellectual Powers, are the principal works from which extracts have been made, both valuable books, and ought to be possessed by every young man in the United States.