As the foregoing shows, there are many models, and many different kinds of models; and so the most important factor in the modeling approach is flexibility. No one model is appropriate all the time, but every good model will be useful at some time. The failure to be flexible is one of the main problems of the traditional system of Rhetoric. Granted, such classical figures as the Tropes and Schemas (which we shall discuss directly) are useful; and the Canon of Rhetoric—Invention, Arrangement, Style, Memory, and Delivery—will surely come into play. But saying that this is the only approach is just far too restrictive. Now, the basic idea in models is isomorphism, which is just a rigorous way of saying "sameness of form", where the key word is sameness. If a model can be shown to be the same as reality or as some other model, then the first model can be used to discover or prove something about reality, or about the second model. This is the power of Analogy, one of the most useful tools of the rhetor. Analogy, then, is a model. So, when trying to persuade an audience as to some position, draw an analogy with something they already believe, and your case will be all that easier to make. This alone shows the power of models.

A painting, with but a bit of a stretch in the meaning, may be said to be an analogy (though this is perhaps most true of Realism), and for the rhetor this includes photographs and diagrams. Like a photograph, a realistic painting of a landscape could even be used as a kind of map, which is of course itself another kind of analogy. In fact depictions in general; like maps and paintings or sculptures and allegories and figurative art of all kinds, are analogistic. So Keats was right: Beauty really is Truth, at least, the Truth of the Correspondence Theory. Of course, when, as a Rhetor, I say "figurative art of all kinds" what I really have in mind are what are known as the Figures of Speech, important tools of Rhetoric. And although not all the figures are analogies, to say the least, the more important ones, the most often used—like metaphor and simile—certainly are analogistic models. And many others are not far off this mark. Let us look, then, at some of the Figures of Speech, in order to see how they embody the modeling concept.