Shakespeare, Twain, Orwell, and all other writers, since the beginning of literature, have been using rhetoric-- which is, as Russell Smith describes, the obvious loaded with unspoken meaning-- to efficiently guide readers toward feeling or understanding the tones or the ideas that they want to deliver in their works. Sometimes two writers use similar rhetorical strategies to express different attitudes, which is in the case of the story “Two Ways of Seeing a River” by Mark Twain and the story “Silk Parachute” by John McPhee. Analogy and diction are effective tools to describe and express writers’ ideas and attitudes. They are frequently used in the two stories. Twain uses analogy by describing doctors that “simple view [a beauty] professionally” and only understand a beauty’s “lovely flush” and “visible charms” as “’break’ that ripples above some deadly damage” and “signs and symbols of hidden decay” to argue the theme that people lose something precious as they gain something new; similarly, McPhee uses analogy by describing a parachute toy that “never fail[s]” to “[float] back to [McPhee]” even if it is “abused” by him to argue the theme that mother’s love to her child is always consistent. The two stories that use analogy similarly also use diction similarly. Twain chooses words like “gone” and “pitied” to express he pities the fact that people loses something from the past as they get something new; McPhee chooses words like “beautifully” and “gracefully” to describe motion of parachute so that he can express his adoration and gratefulness to the parachute- and therefore to his mother’s love. The use of rhetoric, evolving over and over time by time, for the past thousands of years, repeatedly matures itself. The number of techniques grew; the strategies of rhetoric got varied; but the fundamental purpose of rhetoric-- to manipulate audiences by making them perceive what writers want them to perceive-- never changed. Twain and McPhee both use analogy to represent the themes of their stories and diction to reflect the tones, however, similar rhetorical strategies do not always represent similar attitudes, as Twain expresses his pities while McPhee expresses his gratefulness. As rhetorical strategies effectively help developing themes and tones, they are so precise that even one word of difference may distort the attitude of the writer to the story.