printing it, which I was not willing to neglect, for, with all its faults, I really do think it may be eminently useful to the publick, in correcting and fetting right the taste of young writers, and of young gentlemen at the academy and university, who are so naturally led astray by the false glitter of Mr. F-n's profe, and the fublime nonfenfe of Mr. A---de's verse. For there is good reason to believe, that were the Ramblers and Pleasures of Imagination on the one hand, and the Spectators and Dryden's Fables on the other, the one the most faulty and affected, the other the best and purest of all works of their kind, to be ballotted for as school-books, in an affembly of all the masters and school-boys of the nation, there is good reason to believe, I jay, that the former would carry it against the latter, by a majority of at least ten to one.

There has beenmuch talk about correcting, improvingand afcertaining a living tongue, as well in our own country, as among the French and Italians. Many great writers, and if I mistake not, Doctor Swift among the reft, have thought a Grammar and Dictionary neceffary for that purpose, and have therefore

lamented the want of them. I have declared

my

my opinion of these in the Dialogue, but fhall bere do it more at large. 'Tis certain that a Grammar or Dictionary, if good for any thing, must be compiled or extracted from good authors; but that these again should become necessary, and even indispensible to form, or rather to create good authors, appears to me, I confefs, something like a circle in logick, or the perpetual motion in mechanicks; the one a vicious mode of reasoning, and the other a downright impossibility. 'Tis true, they may be useful to ladies or country squires, to avoid an error in spelling, and now and then a grofs blunder or impropriety in speech. And farther I conceive their utility, however boasted of, does not extend; unless, indeed, in a dead language, or to a foreigner who studies a living one, in the same manner we are obliged to Study Greek or Latin. But an author or an orator, who takes upon him to write or speak to the people in their own tongue, ought to be above consulting them.

Besides, if we have recourse to experience and matter of fact, the furest criterion in all Such affairs, we shall perceive, that as the want of them has been no loss, so when procured, they have done as little service. Ho

mer

mer and Virgil, Demosthenes and Cicero, Thucydides and Livy, all wrote without Grammar or Dictionary, and most of them without so much as knowing what they were. So have all the best writers of Italy, France and England. Nor do I hear that the Dictionaries of the two former, though compiled by bodies of men, the most illustrious for their learning, have done any mighty feats fince their appearance; that they have fixed or established their respective languages, or made the writers in either a whit more elegant and correct than they would have been without them. We too, in imitation of them, must also have our Dictionary. But by whom is it compiled? By Lexiphanes himself, thegreat corrupter of our taste and language. I own I have never had opportunity to confult either the French or Italian Dictionaries; but Mr. Fn's, I am certain, falls infinitely short of what I conceive it ought to be, to answer any purpose it is pretended to serve. It ought to contain, in a manner, a distinct treatise on every word that is, or ever has been in use, branched out into a thousand particulars very difficult to enumerate, but almost impofssible to execute. And what man or body of men are equal

equal to fuch a task? Besides, wereit executed, who could use it, or reap any benefit from it? It would be in itself a library, infinitely more voluminous than the abridgment of our laws in twenty Volumes Folio, or even than our. laws themselves at large. In short, we may pronounce a perfect Dictionary to be like the Philosopher's Stone, once a great Defideratum among some people, impossible to obtain, and which, perhaps, we are better without.

The celebrated Doctor Swift, in his Proposal forcorrecting, improving, and ascertaining the English Tongue, strenuously recommends the institution of a fociety composed of such persons, as are generally allowed to be best qualified for such a work, namely, the fixing, correcting, and enlarging our language, without any regard to quality, party, or profession, and who, to a certain number at least, should assemble at some appointed time and place, and fix on rules by which they designed to proceed. That such a fociety instituted at that time, and composed of persons, appointed by Swift himself, or by the great man to whom the proposal is addressed; might have been eminently useful for the purposes there mentioned, I shall not, by any

means,

4

means, bring into question. But then, who wouldwarrant the immortality of those persons, or that their fuccessors should be poffefsed of the Same abilities, and animated with the fame fpirit? In that supposition, indeed, it is poffible fuch Lexiphanick fustian, as we have lately been pestered with, might never have bad existence, at least, never been heard of. But in the fituation things now are, I think I may venture to affert, without any danger of raskness, that if such a fociety had been inftituted a few years ago, and I know not but it would be the same at present, our great Lexicographer, the excellent Rambler, would have been elected Secretary, and, perhaps, the British Lucretius, of whom more hereafter, appointed Register of it. Then, indeed, matters would have been much worse, and really paft redemption. For who would have been fo hardy as to attack, and on the score of their language too, the Secretary and Register of an Academy erected for correcting, improving and ascertaining that very language; and at the head of which, most certainly would have been every the most illustrious name and character in the nation. Even as the cafe now stands, this attempt is, by fome, I know, thought too daring