The P R E F A C E.
In comparing this with other dictionaries of the same kind it will be found to have several advantages.
I. It contains many words not to be found in any other.
II. Many barbarous terms and phrases by which other dictionaries may vitiate the style are rejected from this.
III. The words are more correctly spelled, partly by attention to their etymology, and partly by observation of the practice cf the best authors.
IV. The etymologies and derivations, whether from foreign languages or from native roots, are more diligently traced, and more distinctly noted.
V. The senses of each word are more copiously enumerated, and more clearly explained.
VI. Many words occurring in the elder authors, such as Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton, which had been hitherto omitted, are here carefully inserted; so that this book may serve as a glossary or expository index to the poetical writers.
VII. To the words, and to the different senses of each word, are subjoined from the large dictionary the names of those writers by whom they have been used; so that the reader who knows the different periods of the language, and the time of its authors, may judge of the elegance or prevalence of any word, or meaning of a word; and without recurring to other books, may know what are antiquated, what are unusual, and what are recommended by the best authority.
The words of this dictionary, as opposed to others, are more diligently collected, more accurately spelled, more faithfully explained, and more authentically ascertained. Of an abstract it is not necessary to say more; and I hope, it will not be found that truth requires me to say less.
