Vico's version of rhetoric is product of his humanistic and pedagogic concerns. In the 1708 commencement speech "De Nostri Temporis Studiorum Ratione" ("On the Order of the Scholarly Disciplines of Our Times"), Vico said that whoever "intends a career in public life, whether in the courts, the senate, or the pulpit" should be taught to "master the art of topics and defend both sides of a controversy, be it on Nature, Man, or politics, in a freer and brighter style of expression, so he can learn to draw on those arguments which are most probable and have the greatest degree of verisimilitude"; yet, in "Scienza Nuova", Vico denounced defending both sides in controversies as "false eloquence".