To guard against these errors of refuting unimportant details and of "answering one's self," it is always well to reduce an opponent's argument to the form of a brief. If the argument is in print, this task is comparatively simple; if the argument is oral, the task will be harder but will still present no serious difficulties to one who is used to drawing briefs. When all the ideas have been arranged in the form of headings and subheadings, and the relation between the ideas has been indicated by means of numbers and letters, then the arguer can quickly decide what points he ought to refute and what ones he can refute.
It goes without saying that the headings marked with the Roman numerals contain the most important ideas, and should, therefore, be overthrown as far as possible. There are three ways of disposing of them: one way is to state that the headings are false and then bring on new proof to show their falsity; the second way is to call attention to the subheadings with which the opponent has bolstered up the main headings, and then, by proving these subheads false, allow the main heads to fall to the ground; the third way is to admit that the subheads are true and then show that the inferences drawn from them are unwarranted.
To illustrate: A part of an argument on the affirmative side of the proposition, "Resolved, That students in American colleges should be excused from final examinations in all subjects in which they have attained a daily grade of at least eighty-five per cent.," might be reduced to the following brief form:—
I. This rule would be of great intellectual benefit to college students, for
A. They would master their work more thoroughly, because
1. They would study harder during the term.
The first method of overthrowing the heading indicated by (I) would be to attack it directly. This attack might consist of opinions of prominent educators who, on theoretical grounds, do not believe an intellectual benefit would result from the adoption of such a rule; of the opinions of educators who have tried the rule and declare that it is an intellectual detriment; and of a course of reasoning which would show that this system would rob the students exempted of the great intellectual benefit that is derived from the preparation for an examination and from the taking of an examination.
The second method would be to show that (1) is not true; therefore (A) would be false, and (I) would be left entirely unsupported.
Under the third method the arguer would admit the truth of (1), but would deny that the truth of (A) is established by it; therefore (I) would be unsupported.
Whenever a subheading is attacked, it is always very essential to show that the attack is made simply because this subheading serves as a foundation for the main heading. In this particular argument, refutation according to the second and third methods might read about as follows: "The contention of the affirmative that the eighty-five per cent. rule should be adopted because it would result in an intellectual improvement among college students, rests on the supposition that students would study harder during the term, and for that reason would more thoroughly master their subjects. This reasoning is erroneous because, in the first place, as I will show, but very few students, if any, would study harder during the term; and, in the second place, even if they did, those exempted would not have mastered their work so completely at the end of the year as they would have if they had taken an examination."