JOHNSON's preface proceeds" Of the terms of art I have received fuch as could be found either "in books of science or technical dictionaries." This portion of the work was executed very irregularly indeed; and in what relates to terms of the law most ignorantly. The whole of this part has been here attempted to be rectified; and the fpecifications only fo far extended, as feemed to be moft fuitable to a general Dictionary.

Compounded or double words I have feldom noted, except when they obtain a fignification "different from that which the components have in their simple state." Whoever would avail himself of the cited declaration as a fubterfuge for omiffions, gives up the very idea of forming a complete vocabulary. Moft compounded words, occurring in eminent authors, ought to be recorded -provided they will bear a general explication; for many of the compound kind have been created (especially in dialogue) on the fpur of an occafion, and would abfolutely lofe their meaning by being separated from the context. There is indeed a fort of bastard compound, which to allow a place of its own in a Dictionary, would tend to the confufion of language. A defcription of the words here alluded to is thus given by Lowth-"The fubftantive becomes an adjective, or supplies its place, being prefixed to another substantive, or linked to it by a mark of conjunction-as, fea-water, land-tortoife, &c." This mark of conjunction is added for the reader's ease, and should never be underftood as if it created new compounded words; though fome old ones, so formed, (as land-mark) are authorised by cuftom.

"Adverbs in ly... fubftantives in ness have been lefs diligently fought." JOHNSON's want of diligence would not be difputed, even without this confeffion of it; yet few will allow it to be a fufficient reason for leaving out what he himself acknowledges to be genuine English. Purposely to make what should be a register of our allowable words only a partial collection of them, is defrauding the public.

"The verbal nouns in ing . . . are always neglected, or placed only to illuftrate the fenfe of the " verb." This mode of proceeding the compiler regards as unfatisfactory, and therefore declines following it. He has however fo far acquiefced in the humour of his predeceffor, as not to bring forward by way of omiffion any fuch verbal noun, which he has found exemplified among the illustrations of its parent verb.

The compiler has been exceedingly cautious of condemning any word whatsoever for obfolete. It is almoft beyond the power of an individual to pronounce authoritatively on this subject. JOHNSON, in doing fo, has often only manifefted the narrowness of his intelligence..

"I have fixed Sidney's work for the boundary, beyond which I make few excurfions." Sidney's work (if the Arcadia be meant by it) is not supposed to have been written fo early as 1579, which was the year when Spenfer's Shepherd's Kalendar appeared; fo that JOHNSON feems here a little out in his literary chronology. Be this as it may, Spenser's works were certainly meant to be included; and the fixing upon them for the commencing period of modern language, neceffarily induces a kind of irregularity-Spenfer's diction being far more antiquated, than the prevailing fpeech of his time. This incongruity too has been further heightened by JOHNSON's prepofterous choice of Spenfer's words, for he has omitted the fewest among thofe that occur in the Shepherd's Kalendar, which of all that author's writings affects antiquity moft. In the prefent compilation none of Spenfer's English uncompounded words are omitted, except-fuch as have an infignificant y prefixed to them: ymet, ytorne, &c.—such as are manifeft abbreviations: fcried for defcried, &c.-fuch as have only a vowel altered for rhyme's fake: fest for feaft, &c.—and fuch as are evidently meant for barbarifms: bidder and fhidder for he and she. Any of thefe kinds are then only thought worthy of notice, when the variation of orthography tends to create ambiguity in their meaning.

How ill JOHNSON obferved this rule of his own, and how ungrammatical he was into the bargain, may be feen in his article ABANDONING, which he ftyles a verbal noun, and exemplifies from Clarendon where it cannot be any thing but a participle,

The

The fame deference, as to Spenfer, is also here paid to every other eminent author. But not equally regarded is the authority of any fingle writer of less estimation, unless the word itself, in his usage, appear worthy of reception. Little advantage would accrue to our tongue, to have every creation of every whimsical penman incorporated into it. Some fabrications even of claffical writers are in the fame predicament. Thus Lord Chesterfield, in a private letter to his fon, ufes the phrafe parfonically preaching; yet never would have admitted parfonically into a work he had deftined to the prefs, any more than pulpitically, which he ufes in another letter, and which is there diftinguished by italics. These should be confidered as nothing else, than as familiarity's abortions.

The Compiler of this Supplement does not undertake to correct all the mistakes in JOHNSON. That lexicographer's etymologies are defervedly reckoned the most erroneous part of his Dictionary; yet this portion of it has not here undergone a thorough examination. Learning of fuch kind is rather matter of curiofity, than of common utility; nor has the prefent writer fufficient knowledge of the various early languages, to enable him to carry etymological criticism to its greatest poffible extent. There are alfo many of JOHNSON's other obfervations highly ridiculous, which it has not been thought requifite to animadvert upon, as they are fufficiently glaring to expose themselves.

The fupplial of omiffions, now attempted, is not confined merely to the words, or fenfes of words, unnoted by JOHNSON, but takes in alfo the exemplification of thofe, that ftand unexemplified in the principal Dictionary. Much fhorter of completion, in the eye of the writer, is the latter of these attempts than the former. To execute it fully appears almost impoffible. Where should one look for examples of fuch pedantic inharmonieties, as deterioration, or odontalgic? And when (as is frequently the case) different meanings affigned to the fame word are plainly tautologous, what additional illustration can they require?

JOHNSON was well aware in his life-time of the general diffatisfaction, which his negligence or deficience had created; but he thought it enough to fay in reply (at the clofe of his advertisement to the fourth edition) "I have left that inaccurate which never was made exact, and that imperfect which never was complete." Readers might look for reformation; but this magifterial fentence was the whole to be deigned them.

Some may conceive a compilation of the present fort to be the lefs wanted, because of Ash's Dictionary, published fubfequently to fome editions of JOHNSON. But the plan of this pofterior work (though advocates it has) does not include the best part of the former-exemplifying by extracts. As a vocabulary it is infinitely the more copious of the two; yet very slightly fo indeed in that particular, wherein the predeceffor was moft materially defective; that is, in the number of pure and genuine articles. The greater copioufnefs of ASH confifts-of every verbal noun in ing, that might be formed by analogy, whether at any time actually used or not-of regular comparatives and superlatives, and a variety of other excrefcent articles, whether fimple or compounded-of proper names, denoting perfons and places of all countries, and of all periods of law French and law Latin terms, now antiquated even among the lawyers-and of common Latin words never anglicifed. Should a purchaser of Ash's vocabulary open it on medicus, medulla, and menfa, he might think that the bookfeller had put into his hands fome Latin dictionary for an English one; till, by nearer inspection of this heterogeneous mafs wire-drawn out in one fingle alphabetical feries, he would find himself only implicated in a labyrinth of gibberish. Such an aim at univerfality occafions of course great deficiency in all its particulars: for inftance, the author evidently appears never to have confulted Spenfer himself, but implicitly to have confided in a very defective gloffary prefixt to that poet's works in Hughes's edition of them.*

*As a fpecimen of Afh's attention to his authorities, take the following. In Johnson's Dictionary is this article: "CURMUDGEON. n. [It is a vitious way of pronouncing cœur mechant, Fr. An unknown correfpondent.]" Would not any person of common fenfe understand Johnson to fay, that an unknown correspondent gave him this hint? But fee how AsH adopts it, from the French cœur, unknown, and mechant, a correspondent.

ASH

ASH alfo by the help of gloffaries carries his language back to the writings of Chaucer, and even of Wicliffe and Mandeville; but for want of the like affiftance to the writings of the two fubfequent centuries, has entirely fkipped over them. Part of his plan is, to give every variation of English orthography for the whole period which he profeffes to comprife. Those who are in the least converfant with our old black-letter books, well know, that the fame words are ofteneft fpelt divers ways in the fame publication, and not unfrequently in the fame page. The difcontinuance of this loofe practice advanced very flowly during the greater part of the seventeenth century; nor is the defect perfectly cured even at the prefent day, fince we ftill fee choofe and chufe ufed indifcriminately in very modern productions of the prefs. Our general orthography undergoes no fmall number of changes in almost every twenty years; and many a publisher (merely to render himself confpicuous) has invented peculiar fpellings of his own. How is it poffible to fet forth this infinite diverfity in a single Vocabulary?-Quo teneam vultus mutantem Protea nodo?

POSTSCRIPT.

On the 12th day of this laft November 1800, among the books of the late worthy author of the Curialia (Mr. Samuel Pegge) was fold a pamphlet, printed (but avowedly not published) in March 1788, concerning a new Dictionary by the Rev. Herbert Crofts. This pamphlet the Compiler of the prefent Supplement (though he had already written the foregoing Preface, and printed two thirds of his vocabulary) thought it his business to purchase. The writer of the pamphlet, who expatiates* much on the defects of JOHNSON's work, feems to think that there were but two ways of remedying the evil; either by giving a new corrected edition of JOHNSON's, or by writing a new Dictionary; and the latter of these he propofed doing. The Compiler however ftill thinks, that there are many reasons for preferring this third method of leaving JOHNSON'S Dictionary unmolested, and helping instead of rendering it useless. This third method brings the attempt within the degree of practicability by a single perfon, which writing a complete new Dictionary feems hardly to be: it raises not a tenth part of the tax upon the public: and lastly, its moderate extent leaves the matter more easily open to future improvement.

So much for the general defign. But there are also fome other things laid down in this pamphlet, which the Compiler of the Supplement thinks incumbent on himself to fay a few words about. Had the pamphlet been published, many more things in it might have been here particularly confidered; but as it was only printed privately, nothing is meant to be animadverted on, except what may immediately concern the prefent work.

JOHNSON'S method of quoting only bare names is reprehended, where he ought to have given a reference to the volume and page, not omitting the edition.' References to particular editions require the reader to be poffeffed of the identical edition specified, in order to be benefited by them. This therefore is not the most unexceptionable way of answering the purpose.

The prefent Compiler has been much more particular than JOHNSON in his references, wherever he conceived there could be the leaft occafion for recurring to the author of a quoted paffage. It

* As to what the Rev. Author fays (fuppofing him to be ferious) by way of palliation for Johnson's ill-treatment of the public, on account of the indigence of his circumftances at the time of his compiling the Dictionary, this can in no degree reach to the wilful continuance of thofe imperfections in fubfequent editions, when that indigence was removed.

would

PREFACE.

would have been no great trouble to him to have done this more generally, had he thought it material, when he made his extracts. But fuch a labour had been little to the purpose, unless he had extended it alfo to JOHNSON's Dictionary-which the pamphlet-writer himself feems to regard as an unfurmountable difficulty. It occurred alfo to the Compiler, that works of small fize want the lefs specification of reference; as do likewise authors commonly read; and that fome larger works (as Blackstone's Commentaries) have copious indexes, and others (as Paradise Loft) even verbal ones. Broken fentences, which the Compiler fometimes gives to avoid tedious prolixity, are generally marked by a full reference. Indeed the Rev. Author objects altogether to adducing broken fentences. But words must be exemplified from those that use them: and he that would rejoice in an opportunity to diffuse at large every sentiment of a BRYANT, would as gladly abridge to the utmost maxims of a HOBBES or a BOLINGBROKE. Nor is the credit of all compilers' affertions to be placed on a level with that man's, whom the Rev. Author (calling him at the fame time his great friend and master) ftigmatifes as utterly unworthy to be relied on.

In the New Dictionary every grammatical error of a quotation was to be rectified; not by expunging it, but by printing the rectification on the fide of it. This idea appears, like fome others of the family of Reform, dulcis inexpertis; but which, on a more intimate acquaintance, its most paffionately enamoured admirers grow disgusted with even to abandonment. To fay nothing of the leffer grammatical irregularities in most of our early writers, we well know, that numberless words cannot properly be exemplified without confiderable extracts from Spenfer. We know too, that Spenfer's language is frequently irregular, not barely in a phrafe, but in the whole construction of a sentence. What strange work would it make to rectify such paffages of the poet in the manner proposed! May the ingredients · of DICTIONARY and GRAMMAR remain feparate and distinct, and not be pounded together into one infcrutable intermixture!

The new plan was to have comprised words of all forts on any fingle authority whatsoever. This is not the fyftem adopted in the Supplement; and the reafons for varying from it are already given in the preface. Those reasons will fufficiently account for the Compiler's still rejecting difruddered and mifpence (though specified in the pamphlet) as whimfical creations;' but he would have inferted morigerant on Bacon's authority, had he known where to find it.

anew.

The Compiler has difclaimed in his preface any intention of meddling with fuch paffages of JOHNSON, as are only ridiculous. To rectify all these would be almost undertaking to write that Dictionary Therefore the explanation of network, though particularly named in the pamphlet, is taken no notice of here—not on that account the lefs to be numbered among those most extraordinary specimens of pedantic verbofity,' which the literary Epitaph on JOHNSON alludes to in the Glossary to HOCCLEVE. December 1800.

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