turned my view, there was perplexity to be dis- | anomalous formations, which, being once incorentangled and confusion to be regulated; choice porated, can never be afterwards dismissed or was to be made out of boundless variety, with- reformed. out any established principle of selection; adul- Of this kind are the derivatives length from terations were to be detected, without a settled long, strength, from strong, darling from dear, test of purity; and modes of expression to be breadth from broad, from dry, drought, and from rejected or received, without the suffrages of high, height, which Milton, in zeal for analogy, any writers of classical reputation or acknow-writes highth: Quid te exempta juvat spinis de ledged authority. pluribus una? to change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing.

This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown in the deduction of one language from another.

Such defects are not errors in orthography, but spots of barbarity impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can never wash them away; these, therefore, must be permitted to remain untouched; but many words have likewise been altered by accident, or depraved by ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been weakly followed; and some still continue to be variously written, as authors differ in their care or skill: of these it was proper to inquire the true orthography, which I have always considered as depending on their derivation, and have therefore referred them to their original languages; thus I write enchant, enchantment, enchanter, after the French, and incantation after the Latin: thus entire is chosen rather than intire, because it passed to us not from the Latin integer, but from the French entier.

Having therefore no assistance but from general grammar, I applied myself to the perusal of our writers; and noting whatever might be of use to ascertain or illustrate any word or phrase, accumulated in time the materials of a dictionary, which, by degrees, I reduced to method, establishing to myself, in the progress of the work, such rules as experience and analogy suggested to me; experience, which practice and observation were continually increasing; and analogy, which, though in some words obscure, was evident in others.

In adjusting the Orthography, which has been to this time unsettled and fortuitous, I found it necessary to distinguish those irregularities that are inherent in our tongue, and perhaps coeval with it, from others which the ignorance or negligence of later writers has produced. Every language has its anomalies, which though inconvenient, and in themselves once unnecessary, must be tolerated among the imperfections of human things, and which require only to be registered, that they may not be increased, and ascertained that they may not be confounded; but every language has likewise its improprieties and absurdities, which it is the duty of the lexicographer to correct or proscribe.

Of many words it is difficult to say whether they were immediately received from the Latin or the French, since at the time when we had dominions in France, we had Latin service in our churches. It is, however, my opinion, that the French generally supplied us; for we have few Latin words, among the terms of domestic use, which are not French; but many French, which are very remote from Latin.

Even in words of which the derivation is apparent, I have been often obliged to sacrifice uniformity to custom; thus I write, in compliance with a numberless majority, convey and

As language was at its beginning merely oral, all words of necessary or common use were spoken before they were written; and while they were unfixed by any visible signs, must have been spoken with great diversity, as we now observe those who cannot read to catch sounds imperfectly, and utter them negligently. When this wild and barbarous jargon was first reduced to an alphabet, every penman endeavoured to express, as he could, the sounds which he was accustomed to pronounce or to receive, and vitiated in writing such words as were already vitiated in speech. The powers of the letters, when they were applied to a new lan-inveigh, deceit and receipt, fancy and phantom ; guage, must have been vague and unsettled, and therefore different hands would exhibit the same sound by different combinations.

sometimes the derivative varies from the primitive, as explain and explanation, repeat and repeti

tion.

Some combinations of letters having the same power, are used indifferently without any discoverable reason of choice, as in choak, choke ;

From this uncertain pronunciation arise in a great part the various dialects of the same country, which will always be observed to grow fewer, and less different, as books are multi-soap, sope; fewel, fuel, and many others; which plied; and from this arbitrary representation of sounds by lettere proceeds that diversity of spelling, observable in the Saxon remains, and I suppose in the first books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, and produces

I have sometimes inserted twice, that those who search for them under either form, may not search in vain.

In examining the orthography of any doubtful word, the mode of spelling by which it is

that the accent is placed by the author quoted, on a different syllable from that marked in the alphabetical series; it is then to be understood, that custom has varied, or that the author has, in my opinion, pronounced wrong. Short directions are sometimes given where the sound of letters is irregular; and if they are sometimes omitted, defect in such minute observations will be more easily excused, than superfluity.

inserted in the series of the dictionary, is to be considered as that to which I give, perhaps not often rashly, the preference. I have left, in the examples, to every author his own practice unmolested, that the reader may balance suffrages, and judge between us; but this question is not always to be determined by reputed or by real learning; some men, intent upon greater things, have thought little on sounds and derivations; some, knowing in the ancient tongues, have neglected those in which our words are commonly to be sought. Thus Hammond writes fcibleness for feasibleness, because I suppose he imagined it derived immediately from the Latin; and some words, such as dependant, dependent; dependance, dependence, vary their final syllable, as one or other language is present to the

In the investigation both of the orthography and signification of words, their Etymology was necessarily to be considered, and they were therefore to be divided into primitives and derivatives. A primitive word, is that which can be traced no further to any English root; thus circumspect, circumvent, circumstance, delude, concave, and complicate, though compounds in the Latin, are to us primitives. Derivatives, are all those that can be referred to any word in English of greater simplicity.

writer.

In this part the work, where caprice has long wantoned without control, and vanity The derivatives I have referred to their prisought praise by petty reformation, I have enmitives, with an accuracy sometimes needless; deavoured to proceed with a scholar's reverence for antiquity, and a grammarian's regard for who does not see that remoteness comes from to the genius of our tongue. I have attempted remote, lovely from love, concavity from concave, few alterations, and among those few, perhaps and demonstrative from demonstrate? But this the greater part is from the modern to the an- grammatical exuberance the scheme of my work It is of great imcient practice; and I hope I may be allowed to did not allow me to repress. recommend to those, whose thoughts have been portance, in examining the general fabric of a perhaps employed too anxiously on verbal sin-language, to trace one word from another, by gularities, not to disturb, upon narrow views, noting the usual modes of derivation and inflecor for minute propriety, the orthography of their tion; and uniformity must be preserved in sysfathers. It has been asserted, that for the law tematical works; though sometimes at the exto be known, is of more importance than to be pense of particular propriety. right. "Change," says Hooker," is not made without inconvenience, even from worse to better." There is in constancy and stability a general and lasting advantage, which will always overbalance the slow improvements of gradual correction. Much less ought our written language to comply with the corruptions of oral utterance, or copy that which variaevery tion of time or place makes different from itself, and imitate those changes, which will again be changed, while imitation is employed in observing them.

Among other derivatives I have been careful to insert and elucidate the anomalous plurals of nouns and preterites of verbs, which in the are very frequent, and, Teutonic dialects though familiar to those who have always used them, interrupt and embarrass the learners of our language.

The two languages from which our primitives have been derived are the Roman and Teutonic: under the Roman I comprehend the French and provincial tongues; and under the Teutonic range the Saxon, German, and all their kindred dialects. Most of our polysyllables are Roman, and our words of one syllable are very often Teutonic.

This recommendation of steadiness and uniformity does not proceed from an opinion that particular combinations of letters have much influence on human happiness; or that truth may not be successfully taught by modes of spelling fanciful and erroneous; I am not yet so lost in lexicography as to forget that words are the daughters of earth, and that things are the sons of heaven. Language is only the instrument of science, and words are but the signs of ideas; I wish, however, that the instrument might be less apt to decay, and that signs might be permanent, like the things which they denote.

In settling the orthography, I have not wholly neglected the pronunciation, which I have directed, by printing an accent upon the acute or elevated syllable. It will sometimes be found

In assigning the Roman original, it has perhaps sometimes happened that I have mentioned only the Latin, when the word was borrowed from the French; and considering myself as employed only in the illustration of my own language, I have not been very careful to observe whether the Latin word be pure or barbarous, or the French elegant or obsolete.

For the Teutonic etymologies, I am commonly indebted to Junius and Skinner, the only names which I have forborne to quote when I copied their books; not that I might appropriate their labours or usurp their honours, but that I might spare a perpetual repetition by one gene

ral acknowledgment. Of these, whom I ought not to mention but with the reverence due to instructors and benefactors, Junius appears to have excelled in extent of learning, and Skinner in rectitude of understanding. Junius was accurately skilled in all the northern languages, Skinner probably examined the ancient and remoter dialects only by occasional inspection into The words which are represented as thus redictionaries; but the learning of Junius is often lated by descent or cognation, do not always of no other use than to show him a track by agree in sense; for it is incident to words, as to which he may deviate from his purpose, to their authors, to degenerate from their ancestors, which Skinner always presses forward by the and to change their manners when they change shortest way. Skinner is often ignorant, but their country. It is sufficient, in etymological never ridiculous: Junius is always full of inquiries, if the senses of kindred words be knowledge; but his variety distracts his judg- found such as may easily pass into each other, ment, and his learning is very frequently dis-or such as may both be referred to one genera. graced by his absurdities. idea.

The etymology, so far as it is yet known, was easily found in the volumes, where it is particularly and professedly delivered; and, by proper

The votaries of the northern muses will not perhaps easily restrain their indignation, when they find the name of Junius thus degraded by a disadvantageous comparison; but whatever attention to the rules of derivation, the orthoreverence is due to his diligence, or his attain-graphy was soon adjusted. But to collect the ments, it can be no criminal degree of censori- Words of our language, was a task of greater ousness to charge that etymologist with want of difficulty: the deficiency of dictionaries, was judgment, who can seriously derive dream from immediately apparent; and when they were exdrama, because life is a drama, and a drama is a hausted, what was yet wanting must be sought dream; and who declares with a tone of defi- by fortuitous and unguided excursions into ance, that no man can fail to derive moan from books, and gleaned as industry should find, or uevos, monos, single or solitary, who considers, chance should offer it, in the boundless chaos of that grief naturally loves to be alone.* a living speech. My search, however, has been either skilful or lucky; for I have much augmented the vocabulary.

As my design was a dictionary, common or appellative, I have omitted all words which have relation to proper names; such as Arian, Socinian, Calvinist, Benedictine, Mahometan; but have retained those of a more general nature, as Heathen, Pagan.

Of the terms of art I have received such as could be found either in books of science or technical dictionaries; and have often inserted, from philosophical writers, words which are supported perhaps only by a single authority, and which being not admitted into general use, stand yet as candidates or probationers, and must depend for their adoption on the suffrage of futurity.

That I may not appear to have spoken too irrev. erently of Junius, I have here subjoined a few specimens of his etymological extravagance.

BANISH, religare, ex banno vel territorio exigere, in exilium agere. G. bannir. It. bandire, bandeg giare. H. bandir. B. bannen. Ævi medii scriptores bannire dicebant. V. Spelm. in Bannum et in Banleuga. Quoniam verò regionem urbiumq; limites arduis plerumq; montibus, altis fluminibus, longis deniq; flexuosisq; angustissimarum viarum amfractibus includebantur, fieri potest id genus limites ban dici ab eo quod Bavváras et Bávarça Tarentinis olim, sicuti tradit Hesychius, vocabantur «i hoi xain ¡buruus ideì, "obliquæ ac minimè in rectum tendentes viæ." Ac fortasse quoque huc facit quod Bavor, eodem Hesychio teste, dicebant ögn ergayyan, montes

arduos.

EMPTY, emtie, vacuus, inanis. A. S. Æmtig. Nescio an sint ab iuía vel intraía. Vomo, evomo, vomitu evacuo. Videtur interim etymologiam hanc non obscure firmare codex Rush. Mat. xii. 44. ubi antiquè scriptum invenimus, A. S. gemoeted hit emetig. "Invenit eam vacantem."

HILL, mons, collis. A. S. hyll. Quod videri pot est abscissum ex zoλówn vel xoλwvós. Collis, tumulus, locus in plano editior. Hom. I. 8. v. 811. ïori dí v προπάροιθε πόλεως αίπεία κολώνη. Ubi authori brevium scholiorum κολώνη exp. τόπος εἰς ύψος ἀνήκων γεώλοφος ἐξοχή.

NAP, to take a nap. Dormire, condormiscere. Cym, heppian. A. S. hnappan. Quod postremum videri potest desumptum ex xvifes, obscuritas, tenebræ : nihil enim æque solet conciliare somnum, quàm caliginosa profundæ noctis obscuritas.

Our knowledge of the northern literature is so scanty, that of words undoubtedly Teutonic, the original is not always to be found in any ancient language; and I have therefore inserted Dutch or German substitutes, which I consider not as radical, but parallel, not as the parents, but sisters of the English.

The words which our authors have introduced by their knowledge of foreign languages, or ignorance of their own, by vanity or wantonness, by compliance with fashion or lust of innovation, I have registered as they occurred, though commonly only to censure them, and warn others against the folly of naturalizing useless foreigners to the injury of the natives.

STAMMERER, balbus, blæsus. Goth. STAMMS. A. S. stamer stamur. D. stam. B. stameler. Su. stamma. Isl. stamr. Sunt a crop vel orwμúkkur, nimiâ loquacitate alios offendere; quod impedite loquentes libentissimè garrire soleant; vel quòd aliis nimii semper videantur, etiam parcissimè loquentes.

I have not rejected any by design, merely be- | words as occasion requires, or is imagined to cause they were unnecessary or exuberant; but require them. have received those which by different writers There is another kind of composition more have been differently formed, as viscid, and vis-frequent in our language than perhaps in any cidity, viscous, and viscosity. other, from which arises to foreigners the greatest difficulty. We modify the signification of many verbs by a particle subjoined; as to come off, to escape by a fetch; to fall on, to attack; to

Compounded or double words I have seldom noted, except when they obtain a signification different from that which the components have in their simple state. Thus highwayman, wood-fall off, to apostatize; to break off, to stop abruptly; to bear out, to justify; to fall in, to comply; to give over, to cease; to set off, to embellish; to set in, to begin a continual tenour; to set out, to begin a course or journey; to take off, to copy; with innumerable expressions of the same kind, of which some appear wildly irregular, being so far distant from the sense of the simple words, that no sagacity will be able to trace the steps by which they arrived at the present use. These I have noted with great care; and though I cannot flatter myself that the collection is complete, I believe I have so far assisted the students of our language that this kind of phraseology will be no longer insuperable; and the combinations of verbs and particles, by chance omitted, will be easily explained by comparison with those that may be found.

man, and horsecourser, require an explanation; but of thieflike, or coachdriver, no notice was needed, because the primitives contain the meaning of the compounds.

Words arbitrarily formed by a constant and settled analogy, like diminutive adjectives in ish, as greenish, bluish; adverbs in ly, as dully, openly; substantives in ness, as vileness, faultiness; were less diligently sought, and many sometimes have been omitted, when I had no authority that invited me to insert them; not that they are not genuine and regular offsprings of English roots, but because their relation to the primitive being always the same, their signification cannot be mistaken.

The verbal nouns in ing, such as the keeping of the castle, the leading of the army, are always neglected, or placed only to illustrate the sense of the verb, except when they signify things as well as actions, and have therefore a plural number, as dwelling, living; or have an absolute and abstract signification, as colouring, painting, learning.

Many words yet stand supported only by the name of Bailey, Ainsworth, Philips, or the contracted Dict. for Dictionaries, subjoined; of these I am not always certain that they are read in any book but the works of lexicographers. The participles are likewise omitted, unless, Of such I have omitted many, because I had by signifying rather habit or quality than ac- never read them; and many I have inserted, tion, they take the nature of adjectives, as a because they may perhaps exist, though they thinking man, a man of prudence; a pacing have escaped my notice: they are, however, to horse, a horse that can pace: these I have ven- be yet considered as resting only upon the credit tured to call participial adjectives. But neither of former dictionaries. Others, which I conare these always inserted, because they are com-sidered as useful, or know to be proper, though monly to be understood without any danger of I could not at present support them by authorimistake, by consulting the verb. ties, I have suffered to stand upon my own attestation, claiming the same privilege with my predecessors, of being sometimes credited without proof.

Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve revival.

As composition is one of the chief characteristics of a language, I have endeavoured to make some reparation for the universal negligence of my predecessors, by inserting great numbers of compounded words, as may be found under after, fore, new, night, fair, and many more. These, numerous as they are, might be multi-dation of our language, and hitherto neglected plied, but that use and curiosity are here satisor forgotten by English grammarians. fied, and the frame of our language and modes of our combination amply discovered.

The words, thus selected and disposed, are grammatically considered; they are referred to the different parts of speech; traced when they are irregularly inflected, through their various terminations; and illustrated by observations, not indeed of great or striking importance, separately considered, but necessary to the eluci

Of some forms of composition, such as that by which re is prefixed to note repetition, and un to signify contrariety or privation, all the examples cannot be accumulated, because the use of these particles, if not wholly arbitrary, is so little limited, that they are hourly affixed to new

That part of my work, on which I expect malignity most frequently to fasten, is the erplanation; in which I cannot hope to satisfy those, who are perhaps not inclined to be pleased, since I have not always been able to satisfy myself. To interpret a language by itself, is very difficult; many words cannot be explained by synonimes, because the idea signified by them has

The rigour of interpretative lexicography requires that the explanation and the word explained should be always reciprocal; this I have

not more than one appellation; nor by para- | when Tully owns himself ignorant whether phrase, because simple ideas cannot be described. lessus, in the twelve tables, means a funeral When the nature of things is unknown, or the song or mourning garment; and Aristotle doubts notion unsettled and indefinite, and various in whether oügus in the Iliad signifies a mule or various minds, the words by which such no- muleteer, I may surely, without shame, leave tions are conveyed, or such things denoted, will some obscurities to happier industry, or future be ambiguous and perplexed. And such is the information. fate of hapless lexicography, that not only darkness, but light, impedes and distresses it; things may be not only too little, but too much known, to be happily illustrated. To explain, requires | always endeavoured, but could not always atthe use of terms less abstruse than that which tain. Words are seldom exactly synonimous ; is to be explained, and such terms cannot always a new term was not introduced, but because be found; for as nothing can be proved but by the former was thought inadequate; names, supposing something intuitively known, and therefore, have often many ideas, but few ideas evident without proof, so nothing can be defined have many names. It was then necessary to but by the use of words too plain to admit a de- use the proximate word, for the deficiency of finition. single terms can very seldom be supplied by circumlocution; nor is the inconvenience great of such mutilated interpretations, because the sense may easily be collected entire from the examples.

Other words there are, of which the sense is too subtle and evanescent to be fixed in a paraphrase; such are all those which are by the grammarians termed expletives, and in dead languages are suffered to pass for empty sounds, of no other use than to fill a verse, or to modulate a period, but which are easily perceived in living tongues to have power and emphasis, though it be sometimes such as no other form of expression can convey.

My labour has likewise been much increased by a class of verbs too frequent in the English language, of which the signification is so loose and general, the use so vague and indeterminate, and the senses detorted so widely from the first idea, that it is hard to trace them through the maze of variation, to catch them on the brink of utter inanity, to circumscribe them by any limitations, or interpret them by any words of distinct and settled meaning; such are bear, break, come, cast, full, get, give, do, put, set, go, run, make, take, turn, throw. If of these the whole power is not accurately delivered, it must be remembered, that while our language is yet living, and variable by the caprice of every one that speaks it, these words are hourly shifting their relations, and can no more be ascertained in a dictionary, than a grove, in the agitation of a storm, can be accurately delineated from its picture in the water.

The particles are among all nations applied with so great latitude, that they are not easily reducible under any regular scheme of explication; this difficulty is not less, nor perhaps greater in English, than in other languages. I have laboured them with diligence, I hope with success; such at least as can be expected in a task, which no man, however learned or sagacious, has yet been able to perform.

Some words there are which I cannot explain, because I do not understand them; these might have been omitted very often with little inconvenience, but I would not so far indulge my vanity as to decline this confession; for

In every word of extensive use, it was requisite to mark the progress of its meaning, and show by what gradations of intermediate sense it has passed from its primitive to its remote and accidental signification; so that every foregoing explanation should tend to that which follows, and the series be regularly concatenated from the first notion to the last.

This is specious, but not always practicable; kindred senses may be so interwoven, that the perplexity cannot be disentangled, nor any reason be assigned why one should be ranged before the other. When the radical idea branches out into parallel ramifications, how can a consecutive series be formed of senses in their nature collateral? The shades of meaning sometimes pass imperceptibly into each other, so that though on one side they apparently differ, yet it is impossible to mark the point of contact. Ideas of the same race, though not exactly alike, are sometimes so little different, that no words can express the dissimilitude, though the mind easily perceives it when they are exhibited together; and sometimes there is such a confusion of acceptations, that discernment is wearied, and distinction puzzled, and perseverance herself hurries to an end, by crowding together what she cannot separate.

These complaints of difficulty will, by those that have never considered words beyond their popular use, be thought only the jargon of a man willing to magnify his labours, and procure veneration to his studies by involution and obscurity. But every art is obscure to those that have not learned it; this uncertainty of terms, and commixture of ideas, is well known to those who have joined philosophy with grammar; and if I have not expressed them very clearly, it must be remembered that I am speaking of that which words are insufficient to explain.