What is Sophistry?
Sophistry is the art and science of convincing argument. Because it is chiefly useful to those who would persue politics, its chief divisions are logic, rhetoric, and political science. The two prior are of course those sciences which are most useful in convincing, while for the last, the politician must know such propositions of political science as are irrefutable.
Logic
Logic consists of forming arguments in such a way that what follows is seen to be a result of what has preceeded. has for its divisions formal logic and informal logic; Informal logic consists in identifying the formal errors that can creep into an argument, and in the analysis — or use — of “dirty tricks”.
Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the art of using words which evoke particular feelings, tending to increase the favor of the audience towards the rhetoritician, or else decrease that favor towards his opponents.
Political Science
Political science consists chiefly in a knowledge of those statements regarding politics which are irrefutable; for the politcal sophist, this knowledge is really of both the ends he ought to persue and the means he ought to take to attain them.