| Summary: | Starting from Thomas More’s taste for paradoxes, our purpose consists in analysing paradoxes as a way of expressing a basic methodological principle whose aim is not to mislead the reader but to show him the truth. In this perspective, our first part will be devoted to Thomas More’s paradoxical discourse which will give us the opportunity to highlight its apparent contradictions, i.e. on the one hand an apology for the truth and on the other hand a rhetoric of artifice, fiction and lying. Then, we shall focus on Thomas More’s purpose. This second step will emphasize that the juxtaposition of theses and antitheses does not lead to immediate knowledge of the truth but that it reveals the process to be used and the questions to be asked before reaching the truth. Far from being a rhetorical convention, using paradoxes enables the truth to be revealed as it contributes to creating an objective distance, a spiritual game and the intermingling of tragic and comic perspectives. Finally, we shall be interested in the sources which inspired Thomas More. This third step will lead us to situate his writings in the literary and academic tradition of his time and to assess his originality and the pertinence of his discourse. Indeed, studying the nature of the Morean paradox and its function in the discourse will give us the possibility to differentiate between the stylistic composition and the methodological principle and to show the fecundity of this discourse.
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