Book of Collections on the Art of Preaching

If our own points can be proven more easily (and those of our adversaries refuted), let us begin with the confirmation. But if the opposing arguments can be more easily and readily refuted, let us begin with the refutation, relating everything back to it.
M. jz Marginal note in red ink.

Adversaries are demons, vices, perverse men, and whatever is not friendly to God, as Christ testifies in the twelfth chapter of Matthew: "He who is not with me is against me."

These are the same things by which we both confirm and refute our cause, because, as Aristotle says in the sixth book of the Topica Topics, the discipline for contraries is the same. For in confirming, we wish to prove our own side; in refuting, we wish to disprove the contrary, as Marcus Tullius Cicero says in his book of Partitiones Divisions.

In every subject, whether ethical, political, or theological, three types of causes can occur: Demonstrative, Deliberative, and Judicial.

DEMONSTRATIVE is that which bestows praise or blame upon someone.

DELIBERATIVE is that which contains persuasion or dissuasion within itself.

JUDICIAL is that which, being placed in controversy, contains accusation or petition along with defense.

Although the preacher’s speech is not held in the middle of a forum where consultation is sought from individuals, nor before a tribunal where the roles of actor, defendant, and judge are required, nevertheless, from the single person of the preacher, all these types must be enacted, just as if he were the actor, the people the defendant, and their conscience the judge. Or again, the preacher himself fulfills the votes of all the testimonies.

The entire hope of winning and the method of persuading are placed in confirmation and refutation.