On Some Deficiencies in Our English Dictionaries: Being the Substance of Two Papers Read Before the Philological Society, Nov. 5, and Nov. 19, 1857 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
adduced Ammianus Marcellinus Anatomy of Melancholy Archbishop Williams aureola authors Bacon Bishop Burton called Centones citations contributors deficiencies desire Divine Drayton Du Bartas earlier employed England English Dictionary English tongue epithetons epithets Essay etymology evidence example existence find place FULLER give Godliness Greek Hacket hath Henry HERBERT COLERIDGE HOLLAND honour Index instance Jeremy Taylor Johnson labour language Latin latitant lexicographer lexicon literature live Livy matter meaning merely Mystery of Iniquity Naaman the Syrian nature nearly never notice observe Obsolete words occurs omission omitted once Opticks Ovid's Metamorphosis passages passed Philological Society philtrum Pierce's Supererogation Piers Ploughman Pisgah Sight Pliny plural Plutarch Preface present provincial quotations Richard Baxter RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH Richardson Robert of Gloucester ROGERS scheme sense Serm SERMONS PREACHED Sight of Palestine single Soul suppose SYLVESTER thing thou tion tionaries Todd vast number verb whole word's writers
Popular passages
Page 10 - But neither are these always inserted, because they are commonly to be understood without any danger of mistake, by consulting the verb. Obsolete words are admitted when they are found in authors not obsolete, or when they have any force or beauty that may deserve revival.
Page 51 - In Italy they carry umbrels or things like a little canopy over their heads ; but a learned physician told me that the use of them was dangerous, because they gather the heat into a pyramidal form, and then cast it down perpendicularly on the head.
Page 51 - ... the pedestals, crown, and statues about it, form a thing of that art, vastness, and magnificence, as is beyond all that man's industry has produced of the kind ; it is the work of Bernini, a Florentine sculptor, architect, painter, and poet, who, a little before my coming to the city, gave a public opera (for so they call shows of that kind), wherein he painted the scenes, cut the statues, invented the engines, composed the music, writ the comedy, and built the theatre.
Page 53 - ... undertakings. For, to omit the commodiousness of the place, into which he had long before conceived the means to draw his enemies to battle, he marshalled his army in such convenient order, that all hands were brought to fight where every one might do best service. His darters and slingers of the Baleares he sent off before him to encounter with the Roman Velites. These were loose troops, answerable in a manner to those which we call now by a French name, enfans per due s ; but when we use our...
Page 52 - Boyle, whose whole style is full of such Latin words. But when the Examiner is possessed with a fit of rage against me, he lays about him without consideration or distinction, never minding whom he hits, whether his own relation or even himself. The words in my book, which he excepts against, are commentitious, repudiate, concede, aliene, vernacular, timid, negoce, putid, and idiom, every one of which were in print before 1 used them ; and most of them before I was born.
Page 4 - A Dictionary, then, according to that idea of it which seems to me alone capable of being logically maintained, is an inventory of the language : much more indeed, but this primarily, and with this only at present we will deal. It is no task of the maker of it to select the good words of a language. If he fancies that it is so, and begins to pick and choose, to leave this and to take that, he will at once go astray.
Page 6 - Where he counts words to be needless. affected. pedantic. ill put together. contrary to the genius of the language. there is no objection to his saying so: on the contrary. he may do real service in this way: but let their claim to belong to our book-language be the humblest. and he is bound to record them. to throw wide with an impartial hospitality his doors to them. as to all other. A Dictionary is an historical monument. the history of a nation contemplated from one point of view: and the wrong...
Page 35 - ... nay, to so unbelieved a point he proceeded, as that no earthly thing bred such wonder to a prince as to be a good horseman; skill of government was but a "pedanteria
Page 72 - Passow was the first to enunciate clearly and put in practice successfully — viz., "that every word should be made to tell its own story" — the story of its birth and life, and in many cases of its death, and even occasionally of its resuscitation.