If people are regarded only as machines guided by logic, as they were by some "scientistic" thinkers, rhetoric is likely to be held in low regard; for the most obvious truth about rhetoric is that it speaks to the whole person. It presents its arguments first to the person as a rational being. Logical argument is the plot, as it were, of any speech or essay that is respectfully intended to persuade people. Yet it is a characterizing feature of rhetoric that it goes beyond this and appeals to the parts of our nature that are involved in feeling, desiring, acting, and suffering. It recalls relevant instances of the emotional reactions of people to circumstances-real or fictional-that are similar to our own circumstances.