[Ó¢-Ó¢] Crabb's English Synonyms
Ïà¹ØËÑË÷: English, arranged, published, subsequent, his
Crabb's English Synonyms
Revised and Enlarged Edition
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4581/4580

PREFACE

     OVER ONE HUNDRED YEARS ago George Crabb, an English philologist, then thirty-eight years old, published the first edition of his "English Synonyms Explained." This edition was arranged on the alphabetical plan. In a later one he adopted the classification plan, as being "more scientifick," but in a subsequent one he reverted to the alphabetical as being less perplexing to readers.
     It is an exceptional tribute to Crabb's scholarship that during an entire century his masterful work has continued to hold the regard of the English-speaking world, and that to-day it is consulted with probably more appreciation than ever before.
     Crabb found the study of words a fascinating diversion, and, familiar as any one may be with the general run of them, but little association is required to discover that they are very illusive creatures in a large family that is divided into four groups of progenies¡ªviz., synonyms, or words of similar meaning; antonyms, their opposites in meaning; homonyms, those alike in spelling but different in meaning; and homophonous ones, that differ in spelling and meaning but are alike in sound. Grabb confined himself to an exposition of the first group, and it was his purpose in explaining the most common members to indicate clearly the various meanings of words that bear a family resemblance by familiar comparisons, apposite historical allusions, and homely reflections.
     It has been claimed by eminent philologists that every language the world has ever known has contributed to the formation of what is to-day called the English language. Single roots, meaning specific things, through local application, have been changed into idioms meaning other, though somewhat related, things. Then both roots and idioms have been adopted into more widely diffused forms, such as Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, and thence again into. 
     As far back as the writing of the Book of Leviticus (and doubtless still farther back) were men enjoined to righteousness in measurements, whether of judgment, meteyard, or weight. "Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, a just hin shall ye have." Governments have by statute established, and by commissioners or bureaus maintained, standards for measuring the things we eat, drink, and wear, the land we live upon, and the light we burn. A false weight or meter is "an abomination," not only to the Lord but also to men in organized society.
     And so must false words be, especially in a democracy. We have fought for free speech. Having that, we have greater need of accurate speech¡ªspeech that will say what one means to say when one desires to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. For there be three classes of men who do not tell the truth, except by accident: first, those who do not know it; second, those who wish not to tell it; and third, those who do not know how to tell it. Those who do not know the meanings of words are in the third category even if they escape the other two. They have no accurate measure for giving or receiving those intangible things of the mind's exchange or the spirit's commerce. They are as one who has not gotten beyond the "avoirdupois" table, or as one who has but a peck measure in an apothecary shop.
     How many live in abject verbal poverty, when the riches of the race are within their reach! Many persons, especially women, have but one adjective of favorable appraisal and but one of unfavorable comment; and many a man's vocabulary is like that of Caliban, who boasted that, after all of Prospero's pains to teach him, the "profit on't" was that he knew "how to curse." This state of poverty or elemental profanity would not be so woeful or pitiable a state, if one living in it did not thereby fall into poverty of thought, for one is able to rise toward the ultimate truth only as one can define clearly to one's self at least what one has discerned; and can carry others toward it only as one has the words of accurate expression. To such the lexicographer offers his "mete- yards" and his "steelyards," and Crabb his "balances" that jump at a hair's difference.
     I find a protest rising here such as came to Dr. Samuel Johnson (whom Crabb in his conscientiousness would not consult, going rather to the originals), for I recall somewhere to have read that once he said, "I am not so lost in lexicography as to forget that words are the daughters of earth and things the sons of heaven."
     But my answer would remind the protesting that it is chiefly through the "daughters of earth" ¡ª words ¡ª that the "sons of heaven" ¡ª things ¡ª become human; for the word in one form or another is the flesh become spirit.
     There comes often to me the remark of the Captain in the crucifixion scene of "The Terrible Meek." The soldier looking up at the figure on the cross, barely discernible in the darkness, had said, "It's hard that one should come to this just for the usin' of a few words." And the Captain answered: "Words, words; there is great power in words. All the things that ever got done in the world, good or bad, are done by words."
     And inestimable bad is done not only by putting good words to a purposely bad use, but by using good words with a good purpose inaccurately, whether from ignorance, chronic slovenliness, or occasional carelessness.
     So I am constrained to join in this celebration of Crabb's centennial (though I cannot do so as a critical philologist), because of what he has done to help keep from debasement our old English coin as medium of intellectual exchange.
     There has recently come into my possession a very small pewter vessel known as a "stoup," officially stamped as a gill measure. It bears the marks of much service, and was no doubt of practical value a century or more ago. It is said to have belonged to Robert Burns, and is precious because of that assumed association. I have been thinking, however, that the words in which his thoughts were measured are infinitely more precious to the race than all the stoups he used as a gauger. And from this illustration I rise again to the thought that infinitely more valuable to our progress as individuals and as a people are the word measures by which we receive and give with accuracy what the race's experiences have deposited in language, spoken and written.
     Long life to Crabb and to that for which his name is as a synonym!
     John H. Finley.

Viandanze 2012.12.12