Unlike other Sophists, such as Protagoras, Gorgias did not profess to teach "arete" (excellence, or, virtue). He believed that there was no absolute form of "arete", but that it was relative to each situation. For example, virtue in a slave was not the same as virtue in a statesman. He believed that rhetoric, the art of persuasion, was the king of all sciences, since he saw it as a techné with which one could persuade an audience toward any course of action. While rhetoric existed in the curriculum of every Sophist, Gorgias placed more prominence upon it than any of the others.