What lasting honours on their names await, When nations struggle in defence of right, In martial state while her fam'd bulwarks frown, Its fairest rays consenting glory throws In dazzling splendour round her chieftain's brows. 220 230 240 His conquering myriads from their prey recalls. The patriot prince, by veteran hosts ador'd, With arm unshackled draws the avenging sword : 250 To die or conquer on the battle day. To crush reviving Austria, advance The conquering legions of imperial France. Shrouded in sulphurous clouds the armies close, Dark rolling Danube! by thy blood-stain'd wave Ver. 219." Nolumus leges Angliae mutari," 260 The Austrian shouts victorious fill the skies, Thou setting sun, whose rays serenely bright, O may that Power, in whose supreme dispose Enthusiasm mark'd amid the patriot host How must thy soul have felt the pang severe, So may'st thou shield them as their foes increase, THE BOSTON REVIEW, FOR OCTOBER, 1809. Librum tuum legi, et quam diligentissime potui annotavi, quae commutanda, quae eximenda, arbitrarer. Nam ego dicere verum assuevi. Neque ulli patientius reprehenduntur, quam qui maxime laudari me rentur. PLIN. ART. 11. "A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language. In which five thousand words are added to the number found in the best English compends; the Orthography is, in some instances, corrected; the Pronunciation marked by an accent or other suitable direction; and the definitions of many words amended and improved. To which are added for the benefit of the merchant, the student and the traveller. I. Tables of the moneys of most of the commercial nations in the world, with the value expressed in sterling and cents. II. Tables of weights and measures, ancient and modern, with the proportion between the several weights used in the principal cities of Europe. III. The divisions of time among the Jews, Greeks and Romans, with a table exhibiting the Roman manner of dating. IV. An official list of the post-offices in the United States, with the states and counties in which they are respectively situated, and the distance of each from the seat of government. V. The number of inhabitants in the United States, with the amount of exports. VI. New and interesting chronological tables of remarkable events and discoveries. By Noah Webster, esq. From Sidney's press. For Hudson and Goodwin, Book-sellers, Hartford, and Increase Cook & Co. Book-sellers, New-Haven, 1806." pp. 408. 12mo. WE have heretofore devoted so large a portion of our Review to the etymological labours of Mr. Webster, that the publick will never accuse us of neglecting him. At the time of writing the remarks on his "Letter to Dr. Ramsay," and on his Grammar we had not seen the Dictionary at present before us; and we might now pass over its merits without examination, as it is only a specimen of what is to come, were we not desirous that Mr. Webster should review some of his principles and many of his examples, and fearful that the opus magnum of philology, with which our language is threatened, unless materially altered from the present work, may confound our unsuspecting fellow citizens by the influence of great physical weight, as a giant is always respected by pigmies. The bulk of Ajax terrified the whole host of Troy. Τρωας θε τρόμος αινος ὑπηλυθε γυια ἑκατὸν, IL. VII. 215. All Troy stood trembling at the mighty man : What simple reader therefore can be expected to withstand the authority of a folio? The periodical sittings of a learned society are, it is said, devoted to the pages of Mr. Webster's expected work, but the principles of it, we presume, may be found in the duodecimo under review. The English language is not indeed to be corrupted by a single writer, or undermined by a whole fraternity. It will continue in its present state as long as the rock-rooted seat of our forefathers is venerable for genius, learning, arts, liberty, religion and law, and until these are forgotten by their descendants. But a temporary departure from the standard may be produced in a small part of our country by men, whose justification of the vulgar will procure them adherents, and whose pride will be engaged to extol their exertions, since they have so long digged in the rubbish of antiquity, that every thing discovered is thought to be a treasure. In fifty, or perhaps a hundred of our village schools this Compendious Dictionary of Mr. Webster is insinuating suspicions of the definitions of Johnson, justifying ridiculous violations of grammar, and spreading hurtful innovations in orthography. The preface of twenty three pages contains a full exposition of Mr. Webster's principles. We shall therefore give it most of our attention, since the publick cannot be surprised at our confession, that we have not compared every word, or every fiftieth word in this book with the same in Johnson. We first find some remarks on the improper definitions and grammatical distribution of certain words by Johnson and Lowth, arising from their ignorance of the Saxon, on some of which we made comments in our review of the "Grammar." Mr. Webster's researches will hardly tend to make our syntax more simple. He quarrels with the usual explication of one of our most frequent forms of speech in this way: "Says Lowth, "the prepositions to and for are often understood, chiefly before the pronoun, as give me the book; get me some paper, "that is, to me, for me." But in truth these expressions contain the true dative case of the Saxon; me is in the dative, like the latin mihi, and no preposition was ever used before the pronoun in these and the like phrases." Yet Mr. W. in his "Grammar" allows our language but two cases, the nominative and possessive. We do not need a dative, either Saxon or English. Our transitive verb has an object, and its object is one. If there be an adjunct in the same sentence, it must be governed by something else. In the phrases, give him, the book, get me the paper, the objects of the verbs are evident enough; and why should a new case be introduced to explain the relations of the pronouns? By changing their place in the sentence, the propriety of Dr. Lowth's principle becomes as striking as its simplicity, give the book to him, get the paper for me. The dative vanishes, and the preposition succeeds. In the next paragraph our language is enriched with a genitive and an accusative case, which we can do very well without. In the course of these grammatical remarks, Mr. Webster exclaims, sneering at an observation of Dr. Johnson, "How would the elegant Addison, that pre-eminent writer of unadulterated English, smile, were he to rise from the grave, and see this genuine idiom in the Spectator, stigmatized, by a hypercritical Editor, as bad grammar, and printed in italics!" But in one year, a little year after this well-deserved compliment to Addison, he seems to have lost all his credit with the philologist of Connecticut, who, in his "Letter to Dr. Ramsay," affirms, that "in the course of thirty years reading, he has not found a single author who appears to have been accurately acquainted with the true import and force of terms in his own language." Vide Anthology, vol. 4. p. 673. After explaining the corruptions which have sprung from the best of our grammars, composed by men who have not qualified themselves by previous investigation of the original of the English language, Mr. W. gives us a very pleasant note. "From the censure implied in this remark, I am not myself wholly free, having relied too much on certain modern authorities of eminent literary attainments. Since I have explored the more remote sources of our language, so many mistakes in our present systems of grammar have been detected, that I have declined to alienate the copy right of my own grammar, and shall not consent to a republication of it, until revised and amended.The grammars of our language, now taught in our seminaries of learning, are rapidly banishing from books, some of its best established and most legitimate idioms." O that there had never been a grammar of our language! cries Mr. Webster, and many a little urchin, who smarts daily for his stupidity or his indolence, will echo the exclamation. Next we come to a criticism on some words, of which the meaning was totally misunderstood by Johnson, whose errours have been usually followed by subsequent compilers. Mr. Webster detects such errours with acuteness; but these are chiefly technical words, to learn the precise meaning of which no lexicon will ever be relied on. A legal antiquarian will hardly give him much praise for his correction of the definition of murder, whilst he neglects to explain recreant ; and the mistake of Johnson in misnomer will be more tenderly treated by our author, when he compares defend in his dictionary with the language of |