acquaintance with the analogies of the Language, sufficiently show how imperfect[1] I think his Dictionary is upon the whole, and what ample room was left for attempting another that might better answer the purpose of a Guide to Pronunciation.
The last writer on this subject is Mr. Nares, who, in his Elements of Orthöepy, has shewn a clearness of method and an extent of observation which deserve the highest encomiums. His Preface alone proves him an elegant writer, as well as a philosophical observer of Language; and his Alphabetical Index, referring near five thousand words to the rules for pronouncing them, is a new and useful method of treating the subject; but he seems, on many occasions, to have mistaken the best usage, and to have paid too little attention to the first principles of pronunciation.
Thus I have ventured to give my opinion of my rivals and competitors, and I hope without envy or self-conceit. Perhaps it would have been policy in me to have been silent on this head, for fear of putting the Public in mind that others have written on the subject as well as myself: but this is a narrow policy, which, under the colour of tenderness to others, is calculated to raise ourselves at their expence. A writer who is conscious he deserves the attention of the Public, (and unless he is thus conscious he ought not to write) must not only wish to be compared with those who have gone before him, but will promote the comparison, by informing his readers what others have done, and on what he founds his pretensions to a preference; and if this be done with fairness and without acrimony, it can be no more inconsistent with modesty, than it is with honesty and plain dealing.
The work I have offered on the subject has, I hope, added something to the public stock: it not only exhibits the principles of pronunciation on a more extensive plan than others have done, divides the words into syllables, and marks the sounds of the vowels like Dr. Kenrick, spells the words as they are pronounced like Mr. Sheridan, and directs the inspector to the rule by the word like Mr. Nares; but, where words are subject to different pronunciations, it shows the reasons from analogy for each, produces authorities for one side and the other, and points out the pronunciation which is preferable. In short, I have endeavoured to unite the science of Mr. Elphinston, the method of Mr. Nares, and the general utility of Mr. Sheridan; and, to add to these advantages, have given critical observations on such words as are subject to a diversity of pronunciation, and have invited the inspector to decide according to analogy and the best usage.
But to all works of this kind there lies a formidable objection; which is, that the pronunciation of a Language is necessarily indefinite and fugitive, and that all endeavours to delineate or settle it are in vain. Dr. Johnson, in his Grammar, prefixed to his Dictionary, says: "Most of the writers of English Grammar have given long tables of words pronounced otherwise than they are written; and seem not sufficiently to have considered, that, of English, as of all living
