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Show W o B -atio ; we hav tongues, like governments, have a natural tendency to degeneration ; W tution, let us make fome ftruggles for our language lon g preferved our confy f pivine lonoevity to that which its own nature forbids to be immortal, I have devoted thi In IERH to the honour of my country, that we may no Jlonge yiel th pal o philol book, the labourBof years cople arlei & without a conteft, to the nations of the continent, ‘The chief glory o .evel}ff_ g gfb thors: whether I fhall add any thing by my own writings to the rept}ftat;on 0 hngil left to time : much of my life has been lof under the preffures of dl‘ eafe ; much : abUt : flw,ll and much has always been {pent in provifion for the day that was pafling overd prfie my employment ufelefs or ignoble, if by my affiftance foreign nations, an diftant ages, gai the propagator of knowledge and wnderftan the teachers of truth; if my labour &au- C{_nu_.‘ b e a:]?y o9 hin accefs afford light to th repolitotics of fcience, and add celebrity to Bacon, to Hosker, to Milton, and to Boyle When T.am animated by this wifh, I look with pleafure on my book, however defective, and delive it to the world with the {pirit of a ma popular T have not promifed to myfelf that has endeavoured well Thatr it will unmedla?ely becom a few wild blunders, and rifible abfurditics, from which no wor of fuch multiplicity was ever free, may for a time furnith folly with laughter, and harden ignorance i contempt; but wieful diligence will at laft prevail, and there never can be wantin fome v_vhq d_xftmguu tive readinefs, and which will come uncalled into his thoughts to-morrow S SNy e, R 2s performed; and though no book was ever fpared out of tendernefs to the a thor, and the world i little folicitous to know whence proceeded the faults of that which it condemns ; yet i m g a i c r ofity to inform it, that the Englifh Diffionary was written with little a iftance of the learned, and withou any patronage of the great; not in the foft obfcurities of retirement, or u d t f e t o a a e i ‘bowers, but amidft inconvenience and diftraftion, in ficknefs an in forrow. It may reprefs the triump ©of malignant criticifm to obferve, that if our language is not here fully difpl y d h v o l f i e i a attempt which no human powers have hitherto completed. If the lex c n o a c e t n u s n . mmutably fixed, and comprized in a few volumes, be yet after the toil of fucceflive ages, inadequate an delufive ; if the aggregated knowledge, and co-operating dil gence of the Jtalian academicians, did no fecure ‘them from the wenfure of Bews ; if ‘the embodie criticks of France, when fifty years had 'bee {pent upon their work, were obliged to change its ceconomy, an give their fecond edifion another form, I ‘may furely be contented without the praife of perfection,which i c u o t i i t i g o of folitude, what would it avail me? I have protracted my wor ti m f o t o w f ed to pleaf have funk into the grave, and fuccefs and mifcarriage are empt f u d t e e o d f ifs it with frigi gsanquiliity, having litde to fear or hope from cenfure or ‘fr m praife is omitted, let it not be forgotten that much likewif In this work, when it thall be found that muc fyntax and etymology, and that even a whole life would not be fufficient ; that he, whofe defign .includ_e' whatever language can exprefs, muft often fpeak of what he does not underftand ; that a writer wil fometimes be hurried by eagernefs to the end, and fometimes faint with wearinefs under a tafk, whic Scaliger compares to the labours of the anvil and the mine; that what is obvious is not always known and what is known is not always prefent; that fudden fits of inadvertency will furprize vigilance, fligh avocations will feduce attention, and cafual eclipfes of the mind will darken learning ; and tha the writer thall ‘often in wain trace this memory at the moment of need, for that which yefterday he knew wi h intui = defert; who will confider that no dictionary of a living tongue ever can be perfeét, fince while it is haftening to publication, fome words are budding, and fome falling away ; that a whole life cannot be {pent upo |