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HYDRAULICS AND MECHANICS.

dinary reader, who is anxious to acquire useful knowledge, as well as to the theoretical and practical connoiseur in hydraulics. A Descriptive and Historical Account of Hydraulic and other Hundreds of impressive biographical and historical anecdotes, genMachines for raising Water, ancient and modern; with obser-erally unknown, might be quoted as proofs of the multifarious in, vations on various subjects connected with the Mechanic Arts,elligence which Mr. Ewbank has amassed for the edification of those who may study his richly entertaining volume. We know including the Progressive Development of the team-Engine.ot a compilation specifically designed to exhibit that mechanical Descriptions of every variety of Bellows, Piston, and Rotary Pumps, Fire Engines, Water Rams, Pressure Engines, Air-Machines, Eolipiles, &c: Remarks on Ancient Wells, Air Beds. Cog-Wheels, Blowpipes, Bellows of various People, Magic Giob lets, Steam Idols, and other Machinery of Ancient Temples. To which are added Experiments of Blowing and Spouting Tubes, and other original Devices. Nature's Modes and Machinery for raising Water. Historical Notices respecting Si phons, Fountains, Water Organs, Clepsydræ, Pipes, Valves, Cocks, &c.

TH

In Five Books.

BY THOMAS EWBANK. ILLUSTRATED BY 300 ENGRAVINGS. HIS volume on the various machinery connected with the raising of water is a very interesting production; not only to the Experimental Philosopher, the Mechanician, the Operative. Tradesman, who are engaged in the researches and work com. bined with the objects specified in the Treatise, but also to every ordinary reader who is solicitous to enlarge his general information, and who wishes to combine amusement with the topics which attract his attention.

philosophy which appertains to common, domestic, and social life with the public weal, to which the ttention of youth can be direc ted with equal amusement and beneficial illumination as to Mr. Ewbank's acceptable disquisitions. Therefore we earnestly recommend his volume to their study in preference to the perusal of those fantastic and pernicious fictions which pervert the imagina tion, and deteriorate the mind, and corrupt the morals of the thoughtless myriads who "feed on those ashes."--National Intelligencer. It throws more light upon the progress of mankind from the earliest ages, in the useful arts, than any volume we have ever seen.— Alexander's Messenger.

The only volume ever published embracing an account of all the contrivances employed in different ages by different people for raising water. It is really one of the most remarkable publications connected with mechanical philosophy that has ever fallen under our observation. Merchant's Magazine.

We have long known that Mr. Ewbank was preparing this work for the press, and have lookod for its publication with a conviction that we shouldd erive much valuable information from its perusal; an expectation that has been fully justified by the result.His work is not ene which can fall still born from the press, as it is not one of those ephemeral productions that must sell at the moment or never. lou: ral of the Franklin Institute.

It is impossible in this concise notice, to detail a minute sylla An interesting work of science, The title will furnish the rea bus of a book, the mere topical index of the contents of whichder a good general notion of the matter of the book, but not of the occupies nearly eight pages, numbering about one thousand distinct clearness, method, precision, and ease of the manner of it. We articles; but a general view is presented, from which the nature believe there is no work extant which treats of the specific topics and value of the dissertation can easily and correctly be estimated. which he has chosen- none we are certa n which describes it The first book, which is subdivided into eighteen chapters, com with more fullness of argument and illustration.--Democratic prises a narative of the various "Primitive and Ancient Devices Review. for Raising Water," which are exemplified by sixty seven engraved specimens of their diversified contrivances. This is not merely dry philosophical comment, for there are many episodes commingled with it of a peculiarly interesting character, of which the preliminary remarks on the historical accounts of warriors, and the section in chapter sixteen, on the " Flaty of Despots by Men of Science," may distinctly be mentioned.

The seco book, which includes seven chapters, describes the Machines for Rai ing Water by the Pressure of the Atmosphere," With this part are incorporated thirty engravings, delineating the chief inventions which have been used in that department.

The third book, contain.ng nine chapters, develops the "Me chanics for Raising Water by Compressure, independently of At tmospheric Influence," with sixty nine pictorial representations of bellows, pumps, and fire engines. The discussion respecting wa ter works and fire engines are full of instruction, and combine more information upon those important topics than can be found it is lieved, in any other work that ever has been published. The fourth book is extended to nine chapters, and displays the "Machines for Raising Water, chiefly of Modern Origin, including Early Application of Steam for that Purpose," with thirty-ote engravings. This portion of the volume is very racy, especially the details concerning the Altars and Heron's Spiritalia, with the, introductory paragraphs to chapter three, from page 381 to 391 and the notice of the Eolipilic Idols.

The fifth book, which also comprises nine chapters, with eighty four engravings, unfolds the " Novel Devices for Raising Water, with an account of Siphons, Cocks, Valves, Clepsydræ," &c., the the seventh chapter of which, on Fountains, condenses a large quantum of information upon that cooling and refreshing topic, which is followed by an attractive elucidation of hydraulic organs.

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Aii classes, as well the farmer and professional man as the artist and engineer, will rise from a careful perusal of Mr Ewbank's book wiser and better.-U. S. Monthly Review.

It contains more valuable, curious, and interesting information than can be found in any volume ever published on the subject, and is a work which commands the attention, and should be plac ed upon the shelf of every gentleman's library,and in every college and academy.-N. Y. Sun.

A splendid book. We are inclined to believe that it will be one of the most curious and interesting works that have issued from the American press for many years.-N. Y. Tribune.

It possesses a great interest, not only for mechanicians, engineers, and men of science, but for intelligent readers generally.—Phila

dephia Envuirer & National (azette.

A rich mine for exploration by the practical or theoreticalengineer, as well as by those who like to make themselves acquainted with the developments of mechanical ingenuity.-N. Y. Com mercial Advertiser

This large and beautifully printed octavo is probably the most valuable volume that the publishers have presented to the public during the past year.-N. Y. Courier & Enquirer.

It is a scientific work, but commends itself not to the scholar only but to the mechanic and general reader, for it is perfectly free from pedantry and learned affectation-Boston Daily Times

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An Encyclopedia of mechanics. It is rich'y illustrated, full of curious information, and every way worthy by its copious knowl edge and its incentives to curiosity, not only to a place in every gentleman's library, but what is more, to one on the shelves of every district school library in the state A thick volume of nearly 600 pages; but let no reader be disJordan L, Mott, Esq., yesterday presented each of the Schomaved by its size, for the author says with a good deal of truth, Libraries in the West Farms District of Westchester county, with a set of Ewbank's instructive and interesting work on Water and other Mechines. If such works as this were generally introduced into our School Libraries, there would be no danger of the Library system in our State falling into disrepute. One half, yes, two. thirds of the books placed in the Public School Libraries of New York State are books not only devoid of character, but they are essentially insipid and useless.-N. Y. Tribune.

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.

This is a highly valuable production, replete with novelty and interest, and adapted to gralify equally the historian, the philosopher and the mechanican, being the result of a protracted and extensive research, among the arcana of historical and scientific literature. Mr. Ewbank's work can not be too widely circulated. It is an elegant "Table-Book," suitable to all persons-to the or

Clerk of

that in the annals of mechanics are to be found incidents as agreea ble and exciting in their nature as any thing that can be realized by the imagination. We are not sure that a single corner of the world, or recess of history, has escaped his laborious reseniches.— N. Y. Evening Post.

Whoever rejects this book from the supposition that it is a dull detail of machinery and the various applications of the mechanic powers, will be guilty of great injustice to the author. It is one of the most entertaining books we have ever met with, on a scien tific subject. It is full of interesting historical and well written descriptive matter, interspersed with appropriate quotations from old writers, enough almost to give it the title of The Poetry of Mechanics.-Boston Courier.

The above valuable work is uow publishing in EIGHT PARTS, and sold at 25 cents each.

District.

GREELEY & MOELRATH, Tribune Buildings, Publishers.

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possibly tell the truth. Such men can no more distinguish between a martyred saint and an executed criminal, between one dying for the truth, and one dying by the truth, than a man without eyes or ears can distinguish between colors and sounds; and when

TERMS.-Single copies 50 cents; seven copies $3 00; twelve copies $5 00, twenty-five copies $10 60, payable always in advance. 1 All letters an! con utic tions intended for the District School Jour-ever they attempt to speak on such subjects, they can

mal, should be directed to the Editor, Syracuse, N. Y., Post Paid.

Printed on the Power Press of

BARNS, SMITH & COOPER,

At the Office of the Daily and Western State Journal.

EDUCATION.

BY HENRY NORMAN HUDSON.

not choose but lie. Those people who, in the pride and arrogance of modern illumination, are perpetually kicking up such a hubbub of logic, and constructing their Babel-tower of sillogisms, and packing men off to one place and another on railroads of moral, and political, and theological doxies and abstractions; we very much doubt whether they truly know anything, Considered as the subject of education, man is not If they had any true knowledge of things, would they made up of parts, to be addressed in succession; he be so desperately love-sick for certain abstract ide is an unity, a whole. The mind is not a mixture, or as? If they really saw anything but themselves, mechanism of spiritual susceptibilities, but an indi- would they have so much confidence in themselves? vidual concrescence; and the just development of any Do not the cob-webs, which they are ever spinning one susceptibility implies a corresponding develop-out of their minds, blur their vision, so as to prevent ment of all the others. Intellectual, moral, social, and their seeing anything, or at least, seeing into anything religious endowments, do not refer to different ele- that God or nature has made? Would not the least. ments of a compound substance, but to the same in- particle of true wisdom drive out of them that contempt dividual being, now viewed in relation to truth, now, and arrogance that so dilates and gigantifies them? If to duty, now, to society, and now, to them altogether. we do not wish to be befooled out of what little wit The chief worth of education undoubtedly consists in we have, had we not better make haste to cork our its forming or promoting the well-being of its subject; ears with our fingers, and take ourselves out of their and his well-being in every capacity is inseparable, way, whatever righteous judgements and holy indignaeven in idea, from his well-being in any capacity.—tions it may please their sweet voices to utter respecHe is not created, and is not to be regenerated,--is ing us? not lost, and is not to be saved, by parts and parcels, and therefore is not to be developed and cultivated by parts and parcels, any more than a bird or a plant. Even the head will never work to any good purpose, unless constantly supplied with warmth from the heart: educate the former into isolation, and it will freeze up. By a partial and one-sided culture, a man may, indeed, contribute to the economical well-being of society; but that his own well-being is, or can be, thus secured, is entirely out of the question. Mere economists and financiers doubtless have their value; and so have saw-mills and cotton-factories; but it is a shameful abuse of terms, to call them intelligent men. We often speak of reason and imagination, for example, as incompatible with each other. This we suspect, is a pretty sure sign that we lack them both; for in our present state of being, neither can exist and act without the other. Many people seem to think all knowledge consists in acquiring and using certain abstract ideas. But the truth is, this is no knowledge at all, for God and nature give us no such thing to study. They are but the spider's web of our own brain, and those who employ their minds in spin-nished them, then each organ will perform its office, ning them, generally stumble over them into perdition. The more we think, without humility, and reverence, and love, the further shall we go astray. It is like using our eyes without light, in which case, they only see phantoms, and thus make fools of us. Mere logicians and abstractionists, like Mr. Hume, may indeed become very popular authors, but they cannot

But we digress. It is idle, then to talk of an intellectual school, of a moral school, of a religious school, and of a corresponding division of the duties and funetions of a teacher. Each school must be all, and all schools must be each. Each study must be all, and all studies must be each. It is only in virtue of all these relations, that a teacher is to succeed in any one of them. It is only by addressing himself to every endowment at once, that he is to speak successfully to every endowment. Every thing is to be taught with our nature. Can the brain perform its functions with out the heart, or the heart, without the lungs, and the lungs without the brain? Does not the successful operation of each depend upon the constant co-operation of them all? Why do we not analyze our food before we eat it, and then take the constituent elements by themselves, at such times and in such portions as convenience or physical science may prescribe? The answer of course is, nature has so made our bodies, that each organ requires all the elements, and all the organs require each element of our food; and that, if all the constitutents be taken altogether as nature fur

and receive its share according to the laws of system. Nay, it requires the harmonious co-operation of all the organs, to digest and assimilate the food for each. If, then, we take materials to make flesh, and blood, and bones, separately and successively, of course neither will be made; and our skill in gastronomy will eventually stop our gastronomising.

er intelligent being, on grounds of common sympathy, and from feelings of mutual affection. Teaching is the exercise of benevolence in imparting from a sense of duty, or the discharge of duty in imparting knowl edge from a principle of love; we care not how you have it, but it must be all in each, and each in all, or it can be truly nothing.

As nature feeds and exercises all the organs of the body at once, so instruction should feed and exercise all the faculties of the mind at once; and if the food for either be decomposed into its constituent elements, it can only be taken as medicine, relished, perhaps, by a diseased taste, but loathed by a healthy one. It is for this reason, doubtless, that those minds which are most in love with nature as she is, often have the But there is, probably, no point in which this opinleast relish for her when analyzed into scientific ab-ion is better verified than in the obvious necessity of stractions. Such minds instinctively reject the anato- subordination and respectful submission to a teacher. mies of science, and cleave to the living forms of na- To load down a teacher with responsibilities, and yet ture, because of their very wholeness and healthiness withhold from him the authority requisite to their disTo be a true teacher, therefore, requires a whole man. charge, is almost as common as it is proposterous.— Clear visions, warm sympathies, noble passions, and The great strife, among us democrats, is, to secure lofty purposes; the whole mind, and heart, and soul, our rights, without doing our duties; to realize the and body; all, in short, that goes to make up the to- benefits of government, without being governed.— tality and integrity of a man and a gentleman, should Impatient of the least inequality, we demand all the be present and active in each and every part of the blessings of subordination; and are every where trywork: and the less he smell of the closet, or the office, or ing to substitute convictions of interest for sentiments the pulpit, or the school-room,-of anything indeed, but of loyalty and reverence. We are like Gonzalo in the heaven, and nature, and humanity, the more instinc-play, the latter end of whose common wealth forgets tive will be his instructions. He who brings only a book, the beginning; we will have no sovereignty, and yet a voice, a sceptre, and a piece of cerebral clock-work we will all be kings. Now, to be above or beyond into the school-room, can never truly teach anything, the control of a teacher, is, simply, to be above or bebecause he does not truly know anything. He may yond his instruction; for it is perfect'y natural that act upon the mind as an external force, but he cannot pupils should conceive themselves wiser than their act within it, so as to develop it; and all his instructions teacher, when they are encouraged or allowed to sit will but tend to crush and deform it into angularity. A in judgment on his requisitions. Docility implies subteacher should stand before his pupils, as at once the missiveness, and upon indocility all instruction is of subject and the object of all the feelings and faculties course powerless. The mind must be humbled bethat enter into the idea of manhood. He should be fore it can be elevated; the heart must be softened to them a breathing revelation of humanity, in the before it can be moulded. * People can never rise recognition of which they are themselves to grow up until they look up to something above them; while He becomes their instructor, not so much looking up to themselves, their course is always downby virtue of what he knows and says, as by virtue of ward. Angels, so far as we know, have never fallen what he is. Mere learning, mere competency as a but once, and that was in an attempt at self-governscholar, though indispensible, is by no means enough. ment. Democracy may be good in its place, but if Himself is the matter to be communicated; his learn- people be treated as democrats in boyhood, it is to be is but the means of communication, and indispensible expected that they will turn devils in manhood. only as means. He is not to use himself as an in- self-governing school is, simply, a self-damning school. strument to impart what he knows, but to use what he If men are ever to govern themselves, they must perknows as an instrument to impart himself. To com- force be first taught to obey. Obedience to ourselves municate life and inspiration to the mind, is the thing; is but the renunciation of all obedience. If people be the mere communication of diagrams, and theorems, made, co-ordinate with each other, they all become and syllogisms, is nothing. In short, all true instruc- teachers, not teacher and pupils; and bedlam springs tion is but forming and protecting a mutual acquain-up in the footsteps of our school-house democracy.tance; a process in which each tries to reproduce him- No one can teach us, unless he be set over us; if he self in the other, and reproduce the other in himself. set us over ourselves, we shall be sure to set ourselves Hence the necessity, that the teacher should be able over him. In short, we can never truly learn from a to touch the pupils mind on all sides at once; or teacher, till we obey him; we can never truly obey rather to touch the centre, and through this diffuse him, till we revere him; we can never truly revere his influence over the whole; as nature unfolds a flow- him, till we recognize his superiority; and if that ree: by acting in and through the entire plant at once, cognition cannot be awakened in our minds, it must and not by acting on each petal in succession. With-be awakened in our bodies. If we both obey and reout the respect and love of the pupil, he cannot get access to his mind; and without access to his mind he cannot get his respect and love; in a word, he must have access to the whole at once, or he can have access to none at all.

into men.

A

vere, we are his freemen; if we obey without revering, we are slaves to him; if we neither obey nor revere we are slaves to the devil.

Hence, too, in regard to the teacher, the manner and spirit with which he enforces his authority, are All our plans, then, of instruction are worthless, no less important than the act of enforcement itself. unless they aim, as far as they go, at the harmonious To regard himself, or be regarded by his pupils, mereand simultaneous development and culture of our ly as the repository of power, is utterly subversive of whole nature. The truth is, a human being is not to the very respect and loyalty which all true submission be raised out of the region of ignorance and debase- implies. His government must be known and felt to ment by fragments and sections; as far as he is raised be a government of right, not one of might, and of at all, his whole being must be raised at once; and might only in enforcement of right; of principle, not all attempts to raise him otherwise will but tend to of passion; of practical equity, too, not of abstract legalpull him asunder. In this matter, division is destruc-ity; and of living order, not of lifeless formalty. The tion; it is as if the brain, the heart, and the lungs naked enforcement of order by threats and penalties is should perform their several functions apart from each alike vicious and impotent. Thecapricious or gratuitous other; while it is only by the united action of all, exercise of power cannot be too severely censured, or that each continues to exist. To instruct, is to per too studiously avoided; it mars the sense of right withform the highest duty of one intelligent being to anoth-out producing the effect of order. If a teacher would

the natural condition of love, and thus precluding the natural motives to obedience.

be truly obeyed, he must be more ready to give liberties than to take them; to meet the obligations upon him, than to enforce the obligations to him; and above It is often said, indeed, that by inflicting corporal all, he must avoid any ostentation of conscience; for punishment, we break down a pupil's self-respect. there is probably nothing that youth are so quick to But if a pupil respects himself while obstinate and perceive, so slow to forget, so sure to dispise, as mor- disobedient, the more pity for him, and the more whip al coxcombery. The moralistic and pietistic cant of for him too. This is alogether a bastard self-respect the present day, is the last thing that ought to have -a self-respect that is incompatible with a respect any place in the world; and the school-room is the for law and authority; and the quicker it is broken last place in the world where it ought to be practised. down, the better. Genuine self-respect always inThe whole system, indeed, of administration should volves, or rather presupposes, a recognition and conbe pervaded by a spirit of humanity and conscien- fession of what is above us; is of a meek and subtiousness. Every act of enforcement must derive its missive spirit; and manifests itself in a generous sanction and its efficacy from an obviously paramount, loyalty, that fears, or rather scorns, to disobey. A stiff yet unostentatious sense of duty. He who strikes one neck is a sure proof of low thoughts; and low bows blow from a severe sense of duty, and then turns away are the truest signs of lofty conceptions. If pupils to hide his grief for the pain or disgrace he has been really respect themselves, they will not give a teachobliged to inflict, will scarcely need to strike again.- er occasion to mar their self-respect; for, in this case, On all scores, indeed, it is best to treat pupils as if we neither floggings, fondlings, nor syllogisms will be thought they had souls. It is true, they may not al-needed. The sentiment, so often wickedly miscalled ways have them; but by treating them as if they had, self-respect, which makes pupils self-willed and inwe may reasonably hope to develop souls in them; submissive, is the same in kind that once turned anwhile, by treating them as if they had none, we shall gels into devils. Let it be crushed!-Power, in short, be sure to kill all the germs of soul out of them.-is obviously a much better representative of power, Doubtless, the worst of all governments is that which than logic or love; and the sense or sensation of only acts upon them, not within them; which gives power is often the best, sometimes the only means to them all to dread, and nothing to venerate: and the awaken a proper respect for authority. next worst is that which disdains to act upon them, But the upshot of all these remarks touching disciin order to act within them; for, whether pupils have pline is, that a teacher must inspire reverence and souls or not, they certainly have bodies; and treating love, in order to impart knowledge; that he is to athem as if they had no bodies is nearly as bad as treat-waken these sentiments by being, himself, their object, ing them as if they had no souls. To reason with a pupil, is but to compromise with his self-will; the surest way to confirm the very disobedience which needs to be subdued. No one can possibly understand the worth of obedience until he obeys; and all attempts to reason him into it only tend to strengthen him against it. If it be said that people are rational beings, our answer is, they are not rational beings, until they obey; if they were, they would not need to be reasoned into submission. In the school-room, or the nursery, an ounce of birch is always worth a ton of logic. That there is danger in using the former, is admitted; and there is more danger in refusing it, a wise man once asserted, and a very wise age is now demonstrating. The truth is, people may as well be destroyed in their youth, as be educated into grown-up destructives; they may as well be burnt up in the egg, as hatched out into walking firebrands.

and not by discoursing about them; that the pupil's heart must be subdued before his head can be instructed; and that order is to be maintained, not by emotions of fear, nor convictions of the understanding; but by true moral, nay, religious feelings of submissiveness and by true social feelings of respectfulness. It is thus by addressing and interesting all the susceptibilities, moral, social, religious, and intellectual, at once, and by engaging them all upon himself as their object, that a teacher is to instruct; and he may be assured, that whatever susceptibilities he does not take along with him, will pull against him; that whatever powers he may awaken, unless he awaken them all, will be thwarted by those which he leaves asleep.

THE NEW EDITION OF WEBSTER'S DICTIONARY. [From the American Review.]

The modern notion, that, whether as pupils, or as citizens, we are to obey orders, as according with our The price of the previous editions of Webster's Dicsense of right, and not as coming from our lawful gov- tionary, that of 1828, in two volumes quarto, at twenernors, is alike false in theory, and fatal in practice.- ty dollars, and that of 1840, in two volumes, royal If such be the doctrine of democracy, then we, for one, cctavo, at fifteen dollars, was such as to keep it out have small care for democracy By thus inviting pu- of the possession of the majority of those who desired pils to sit in judgment on their duties, we foster a pride such a work. The present edition, comprising all the of understanding, a sort of intellectual self-sufficing-matter of the former ones, after a thorough revisal of ness, that is equally at war with growth in knowledge, the whole, and with large additions, appears in a sinand with growth in virtue. Government, from its very gle volume of fourteen hundred and forty-one pages, nature, involves something which the forms of logic can-crown quarto, in a type, though small, yet beautifully not convey, and the understanding cannot receive; distinct, presenting a page on which the eye can rest and of which the whip is a far better expression than all the syllogisms in creation.

with pleasure, and run with ease, at the price of six dollars, an unprecedented achievement in the art of book-making in this country.

And the notion, that a teacher, or a parent, should enforce his orders by love, is nearly as bad as the The reputation of Webster's Dictionary has been notion that he should enforce them by logic. The constantly gaining strength with the progress of time. truth is, it is time enough to show pupils our love, The result, in the first place, of more than twenty when they have obeyed; while disobedient, we had years of study and toil-in which we have an exambetter show them our authority. It may even beple, in a country like ours, most singular and to be questioned whether pupils, while in a state of disobe-admired, of persevering devotion, solitary and unapdience, are fit objects of love and whether such unplauded, to a labor purely literary, requiring extraortimely manifestations of it be not a positive injury to dinary ability, and capable of yielding no immediate them. It looks rather too much like dispensing with return of profit or honor-this work, surpassing every

thing in the same department from the mother coun- Calembourg; Canal-boat; Cam, (in mechanies;) Canonitry, with all her advantages, was an honor to our own city; Canterbury, (a stand for music, portfolios, &c.;) Canta land, of which we were quite too insensible. Slighted brigian; Casino; Cassava; Cast-iron; Catherine-wheel (in by some, and by the majority more or less underval-architecture;) Catafalco; to chair and chairing, [Eng.;] ned, from the very fact that it was a home production: root; Chiltern hundreds; Chinchilla; childe; Circulating Chaparral; Charte, [Fr.;] Chief-justice; Cheval glass; Chewhile others were repelled, and in a measure blinded medium; Cirrus; Cumulus, Stratus and Nimbus, and their to the real merits of the work, by orthographical compounds, with definitions by Professor Olmsted; Classis; changes, offensive, because unfamiliar; it has, how-Clinker; Clique; Close-corporation; Club-house, (fully exever, worked its way, and even gained for itself a reputation from the other side of the water:

These are but a few among others of the same sort. It will be seen that they are, for the most part, the very words for which a dictionary is most needed.

plained in the present English sense ;) Coffer-dam; Coldshoulder, (to give the ;) Collapse; Common-carrier, with his The work continued to receive emendations from sanitairs; Couleur de rose; Coup d'etat; Corn-law; Covenliabilities explained; Communist; Congreve-rocket; Cordon the author's hand, to the very close ot his life, which try, (to send to ;) Cream-cheese; Croton-oil; Coupon; Edgewas prolonged, with powers still vigorous, to the age rail; Eminent domain; Flying buttress; Gradient; Kyanize; of more than eighty-five years, and to a period of just Juste-milieu; Left-handed marriage; Maronite; Middleman, fifty years after he first conceived the design. (in Ireland;) Orotund; Quartern loaf; Quantitative and The preparation of the present edition was intrust-Qualitative, (in chemistry.) Rancho; Silhouette; Silicated; ed to Professor Goodrich, uf Yale College, who has Stand-point; Steeple-chase. devoted nearly three years to this task, for which he is well known to be excellently qualified by the studies which have been the labor of his life as a professor of rhetoric. Aware, however, that it is "impossible for any one mind to embrace all the departments of knowledge," the editor has secured the aid of other gentlemen, in particular branches of science, art and literature, who have become responsible for the classes of words relating to their several departments; revising the whole, remodelling or enlarging old definitions, and adding and defining new words. This has been done for the department of law, by the Hon. Elizur Goodrich; ecclesiastical history and ancient philosophy, by Dr. Murdock; chemistry, by Professor Silliman; botany, anatomy, physiology, medicine, and some branches of natural history, by Dr. Tully; Oriental literature, to some extent, by Professor Gibbs; astronomy, meteorology, and natural philosophy, by Professor Olmsted; mathematics, by Professor Stanley; geology, mineralogy, and other subjects, by James D. Dana, Esq.; etymology and practical astronomy, more or less, by Edward Herrick, Esq.; and painting and fine arts, by Nathaniel Jocelyn, Esq.; a general revision of the classes of words, through the first two letters of the alphabet, having been previously made by Dr. J. G. Percival. We have thus the best possible guarantee for the completeness and accuracy of a most important part of the work. In this way, and by the thorough use which has been made of encyclopedias and of dictionaries of particular arts and sciences, commercial, maritime, and military affairs, domestic economy, agriculture, architecture, &c., a new and valuable feature has been added to the work, distinguishing it from all other dictionaries of the language The first point to be considered in judging of a dictionary, respects the selection of words comprised in the vocabulary. It is not desirable to include all such words as may have been licentiously used by some eccentric writer, in a single instance, where of course they interpret themselves, or every possible word that can, by composition or inflection, be analogically formed; for their introduction would serve only to corrupt the language. Nor is such a work the place for those terms of art or science, which occur only in special treatises, where they are of course defined; while it is the first importance that such technical and scientific, or for any other reason unfamiliar terms, as the general reader may occasionally or frequently meet, should be embraced and clearly defined. In this work great pains have been taken, both to leave out the words which should be excluded, and to collect all which should be introduced; and when we learn that in this manner, some thousands of words have been added in this edition, this fact alone is evidence of a great enhancement of value. As specimens of their character, we select a few, mostly under letter C:

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It is in the definitions that the chief value of a dictionary lies. In this respect, the superiority of Dr. Webster's over other English dictionaries, has been settled beyond dispute. He who attempts this difficult task must set out with the true idea of the work; and even then he may show, that to have a correct theory is one thing, and to carry it out successfully in execution, quite another The meaning of words consists of a primary or radical signification, and of secondary senses proceeding from it, according to laws revealed in the philosophy of language. This primary signification is by no means alway the most general. Words pass from one particular sense, to another allied to the first by resemblance or anolagy; or from one object to another, the two being linked by some usual or constant connection. Also, instead of merely leaping from particular to particular,―or, we should rather say, by a continuance of this very process, they expand into a general and comprehensive signification. in other cases, however, the primary meaning is general, and the secondary are limitations of the same as applied to particular subjects. It is to be remarked that the first law, that of expansion, works chiefly in the early growth of languages; while the other, which may be called that of limitation or sub-division, prevails as they advance in cultivation. Not unfrequently, some ambitious secondary sets up for himself, declares independence, as it were, and sends off in a new direction a progency having no apparent connection with the original stock. For instance, the word digest, meaning primarily to distribute - and hence, first, to arrange methodically, as a body of law, and second, to dispose of food introduced into the stomach-from this point moves to the laboratory, and there signifies a certain process of dissolving or softening substances by a gentle heat; from the same point, again, it starts off in an other direction, and an affront is said to be digested, when it is brooked-and by the way, this word to brook, comes from a Saxon original, meaning to chew, eat, or digest-and by the same figure an insult may be swallowed or stomached. The growth of words is as regular, and at the same time as irregular and diversified, as that of trees and plants; not forgetting the suckers which shoot up from the old root, and the branches which sometimes strike down and take root anew.

It is the duty of the lexicographer to seize, if possible, the primary meaning of words. And, since no root shoots up and ramifies to absolute infinity, and as every general signification is bound by usage to determinate consequential meanings and specific applications, and not ordinarily allowed the full range of its capacity, the lexiographer is required to enumer

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