Argumentation is fundamentally exhortative: arguments can be understood as invitations to emulate the lives of those who make the arguments. The human exemplar of an argument's substance, e.g. Jesus Christ as exemplar of Christianity, is the paradigm for this theory in which the arguer's identity is seen both as equal in importance to and inseparable from the argument's contents. Just as Ludwig Wittgenstein contends that linguistic activity occurs within a form of life, the exhortative theory shows that argumentation is an activity inextricably bound to human conduct. Paradigms such as storytelling, jurisprudence, and scientific method have been used to describe argument, but these attempts to universalize do not allow for the diversity of forms of argument. The exhortative theory does not supplant current theories of argumentation but adds to them. (Forty-five references are attached.) (MHC)