The result of the new survey was a distribution of material under a far larger number of headings than had been included in the Ninth Edition—some 40,000 instead of some 17,000; and the method of simultaneous Method and results. construction enabled the co-ordination which is of such peculiar importance in a work of reference to be applied systematically by the editorial staff. The authority which attaches to the names of individual contributors remains, as before, an important feature of the Eleventh Edition, but by these means, it is hoped, the authority which attaches to the Encyclopædia Britannica itself is more firmly established. When Robertson Smith finally wrote his preface to the Index volume of the Ninth Edition, he said:—“The use of initials (as signatures to articles) was not designed to lighten the responsibility of the editors. No editor can possess the knowledge The two sources of authority. which would enable him to control the work of his contributors in all the subjects treated of in the Encyclopædia, but no effort has been spared on the part of the editorial staff to secure the accuracy and sufficiency of every contribution, and to prevent those repetitions and inconcinnities which necessarily occur where each contributor is absolutely and solely responsible for the articles which bear his name.” The principle here enunciated, which represents the tradition of the Encyclopædia Britannica in the matter of the correct relationship between editors and contributors, and the responsibility attaching to individual signatures, has been adopted in the Eleventh Edition, but with all the advantages resulting alike from simultaneous production and from the fact that the Editor-in-Chief was assisted by a much larger staff, working under conditions which enabled the editorial control to be effective to a degree unattainable under the earlier system. In concert with the numerous eminent writers whose signatures give individual interest Increased value for reference. and weight to their contributions, the whole work—and not only the unsigned articles, many of which indeed have equally high authority behind them—passed through the detailed scrutiny of the editorial staff, whose duty it was to see that it provided what those who used any part of the book could reasonably expect to find, to remedy those “inconcinnities” to which Robertson Smith alluded, and to secure the accuracy in the use of names, the inclusion of dates, and similar minutiæ, which is essential in a work of reference.
A great deal of the older fabric was obviously incompatible with the new scheme of treatment; but, where possible, those earlier contributions have been preserved which are of the nature of classics in the Use of older material. world of letters. By a selective process which, it is believed, gives new value to the old material—by the revision, at the hands of their own authors or of later authorities, of such articles or portions of articles as were found to fit accurately into their several places—or by the inclusion under other headings of a consideration of controverted questions on which the writers may have taken a strong personal view, itself of historical interest—their retention has been effected so as to conform to the ideal of making the work as a whole representative of the best thought of a later day.
Questions of Formal Arrangement.
Both in the addition of new words for new subjects, and in the employment of different words for old subjects, the progress of the world demands a reconsideration from time to time of the Natural headings. headings under which its accumulated experiences can best be presented in a work which employs the dictionary plan as a key to its contents. No little trouble was therefore expended, in planning the Eleventh Edition, on the attempt to suit the word to the subject in the way most likely to be generally useful for reference. While the selection has at times been, of necessity, somewhat arbitrary, it has been guided from first to last by an endeavour to follow the natural mental processes of the average educated reader. But it was impossible to interpret what Correctness and common sense. is “natural” in this connexion without consideration for the advances which have been made in terminological accuracy, alike in the technicalities of science and in the forms of language adopted by precise writers, whose usage has become or is rapidly becoming part of the common stock. The practice of modern schools and the vocabulary of a modern curriculum, as well as the predominating example of expert
