nt in
more recent times. English churchmen have introduced words from Hebrew,
Greek, and Latin, through Bible and prayer-book, sermon and tract. From
all this it results that there is scarcely a language ever spoken among
men that has not some representative in English speech. The spirit of
the Anglo-Saxon race, masterful in language as in war and commerce, has
subjugated all these various elements to one idiom, making not a
patchwork, but a composite language. Anglo-Saxon thrift, finding often
several words that originally expressed the same idea, has detailed them
to different parts of the common territory or to different service, so
that we have an almost unexampled variety of words, kindred in meaning
but distinct in usage, for expressing almost every shade of human
thought.

Scarcely any two of such words, commonly known as synonyms, are
identical at once in signification and in use. They have certain common
ground within which they are interchangeable; but outside of that each
has its own special province, within which any other word comes as an
intruder. From these two qualities arises the great value of synonyms as
contributing to beauty and effectiveness of expression. As
interchangeable, they make possible that freedom and variety by which
the diction of an accomplished writer or speaker differs from the wooden
uniformity of a legal document. As distinct and specific, they enable a
master of style to choose in every instance the one term that is the
most perfect mirror of his thought. To write or speak to the best
purpose, one should know in the first place all the words from which he
may choose, and then the exact reason why in any case any particular
word should be chosen. To give such knowledge in these two directions is
the office of a book of synonyms.

Of Milton's diction Macaulay writes:

"His poetry acts like an incantation. Its merit lies less in its
obvious meaning than in its occult power. There would seem, at first
sight, to be no more in his words than in other words. But they are
words of enchantment. No sooner are they pronounced, than the past
is present and the distant near. New forms of beauty start at once
into existence, and all the burial places of the memory give up
their dead. Change the structure of the sentence; _substitute one
synonym for another_, and the whole effect is destroyed. The spell
loses its power; and he who should then hope to conjur