Previous
Motifs
Definition of Pathos
Pathos, along with logos and ethos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective speaking or writing). Pathos is an argument that appeals to... read full definition
Pathos, along with logos and ethos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective speaking or writing). Pathos is... read full definition
Pathos, along with logos and ethos, is one of the three "modes of persuasion" in rhetoric (the art of effective... read full definition
Act 1, Scene 4
Explanation and Analysis—Sorrow, Sighs, Tears:
Horatio uses pathos when narrating the death of Andrea to Bel-Imperia, Andrea’s lover and the niece of the King of Spain. When she asks him to tell her the full story of Andrea's death in battle, Horatio states:
I took him up and wound him in mine arms,
And wielding him unto my private tent,
There laid him down, and dewed him with my tears,
And sighed and sorrowed as became a friend.
But neither friendly sorrow, sighs, nor tears
Could win pale Death from his usurped right.
Yet this I did, and less I could not do:
I saw him honored with due funeral;
This scarf I plucked from off his lifeless arm,
And wear it in remembrance of my friend.
In this speech, Horatio expresses his grief and attempts to console Bel-Imperia while also seeking to woo her. His emotional language invokes a strong sense of pathos that renders his story more effective. In Horatio’s account, he “dewed” Andrea with tears, hyperbolically suggesting that Andrea was soaked with tears as thick as morning dew. He further notes that he “sighed and sorrowed” in a manner befitting a close friend of the deceased, taking Andrea’s scarf with him as a “remembrance.”
Horatio wields pathos effectively in this speech, cementing his status in Bel-Imperia’s eyes as the only appropriate suitor following the death of Andrea. Still, he also acknowledges the limits of pathos, concluding that neither “friendly sorrow, sighs, nor tears” would be able to “win pale Death from his usurped right.” In other words, Horatio recognizes that death cannot be argued with, either logically or emotionally.
Related Themes:
