The Gettysburg Address Rhetorical Devices

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One rhetorical device that Abraham Lincoln uses in "The Gettysburg Address" to argue for a continued war is anaphora. Anaphora is the repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of consecutive clauses or sentences. Lincoln uses anaphora in the phrase "we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground" to emphasize the importance of the ground on which the battle of Gettysburg was fought. By repeating the word "we cannot," Lincoln emphasizes the impossibility of honoring the ground in the traditional sense, instead suggesting that the only way to truly honor the fallen is to continue the fight for the ideals for which they died.
Another rhetorical device that Lincoln employs in the speech is parallelism. Parallelism is the use of similar grammatical structures in a series of phrases or clauses. In the phrase "that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth," Lincoln employs parallelism. By using parallelism in this phrase, Lincoln emphasizes the importance of the ideals of freedom and government held by the people, and the need to ensure that they are not lost. This parallelism helps to drive home the point that the …show more content…

An allusion is a reference to something that is not explicitly mentioned but is implied by the context. Lincoln alludes to the Declaration of Independence when he states that the war was fought "to test whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure." By referencing the Declaration of Independence, Lincoln implies that the war is not just about preserving the Union but about preserving the ideals of freedom and equality that the nation was founded upon. This allusion serves to remind the audience that the war is not just about political power but about preserving the very principles that make America

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