The Century Vocabulary Builder Part 8

Even so with a word. Commonplace enough it may seem. But it has its peculiar characteristics, its activities undisclosed except to the curious, its subtle inclinations, its repugnances, its latent potentialities. There is no precise duplicate for it in all the wide domain of language. To know it intimately and thoroughly, to be on entirely free terms with it, to depend upon it just so far as dependence is safe, to have a sure understanding of what it can do and what it cannot, you must arduously cultivate it. Words, like people, yield themselves to the worthy. They hunger for friendship--and lack the last barrier of reserve which hedges all human communion. Thus, linguistically speaking, you must search out the individuals. You must step aside from your way for the sake of a new acquaintance; in conversations, in sermons, in addresses, in letters, in journalistic columns, in standard literature you must grasp the stranger by the hand and look him straight in the eye.

Nor must you treat cavalierly the words you know already. You must study them afresh; you must learn them over and learn them better; you must come to understand them, not only for what they are, but for what they will do.

What, then, is your first task? Somebody has laid down the injunction-- and, as always when anything is enjoined, others have given it currency-- that each day you should learn two new words. So be it,--but which two?

The first two in the dictionary, or hitherto left untouched in your systematic conquest of the dictionary? The first two you hear spoken? The first two that stare at you from casual, everyday print? The first two you can ferret from some technical jargon, some special department of human interest or endeavor? In any of these ways you may obey the behest of these mentors. But are not such ways arbitrary, haphazard? And suppose, after doing your daily stint, you should encounter a word it behooves you to know. What then? Are you to sulk, to withhold yourself from further exertion on the plea of a vocabulary-builder's eight-hour day?

To adopt any of the methods designated would be like resolving to invest in city lots and then buying properties as you encountered them, with no regard for expenditure, for value in general, or for special serviceability to you. Surely such procedure would be unbusinesslike. If you pay out good money, you meditate well whether that which you receive for it shall compensate you. Likewise if you devote time and effort to gaining ownership of words, you should exercise foresight in determining whether they will yield you commensurate returns.

What, then, is the principle upon which, at the outset, you should proceed? What better than to insure the possession of the words regarding which you know this already, that you need them and should make them yours?

The natural way, and the best, to begin is with an a.n.a.lysis of your own vocabulary. You are of course aware that of the enormous number of words contained in the dictionary relatively few are at your beck and bidding.

But probably you have made no attempt to ascertain the nature and extent of your actual linguistic resources. You should make an inventory of the stock on hand before sending in your order for additional goods.

You will speedily discover that your vocabulary embraces several distinct cla.s.ses of words. Of these the first consists of those words which you have at your tongue's end--which you can summon without effort and use in your daily speech. They are old verbal friends. Numbered with them, to be sure, there may be few with senses and connotations you are ignorant of-- friends of yours, let us say, with a reservation. Even these you may woo with a little care into uncurbed fraternal abandon. With the exception of these few, you know the words of the first cla.s.s so well that without thinking about it at all you may rely upon their giving you, the moment you need them, their untempered, uttermost service. You need be at no further pains about them. They are yours already.

A second cla.s.s of words is made up of those you speak on occasions either special or formal--occasions when you are trying, perhaps not to show off, but at least to put your best linguistic foot foremost. Some of them have a meaning you are not quite sure of; some of them seem too ostentatious for workaday purposes; some of them you might have been using but somehow have not. Words of this cla.s.s are not your bosom friends. They are your speaking acquaintance, or perhaps a little better than that. You must convert them into friends, into prompt and staunch supporters in time of need. That is to say, you must put them into cla.s.s one. In bringing about this change of footing, you yourself must make the advances. You must say, Go to, I will bear them in mind as I would a person I wished to cultivate.

When occasion rises, you must introduce them into your talk. You will feel a bit shy about it, for introductions are difficult to accomplish gracefully; you will steal a furtive glance at your hearer perchance, and another at the word itself, as you would when first labeling a man "my friend Mr. Blank." But the embarra.s.sment is momentary, and there is no other way. a.s.sume a friendship if you have it not, and presently the friendship will be real. You must be steadfast in intention; for the words that have held aloof from you are many, and to unloose all at once on a single victim would well-nigh brand you criminal. But you will make sure headway, and will be conscious besides that no other cla.s.s of words in the language will so well repay the mastering. For these are words you _do_ use, and need to use more, and more freely--words your own experience stamps as valuable, if not indeed vital, to you.

The third cla.s.s of words is made up of those you do not speak at all, but sometimes write. They are acquaintance one degree farther removed than those of the second cla.s.s. Your task is to bring them into cla.s.s two and thence into cla.s.s one--that is, to introduce them into your more formal speech, and from this gradually into your everyday speech.

The fourth cla.s.s of words is made up of those you recognize when you hear or read them, but yourself never employ. They are acquaintance of a very distant kind. You nod to them, let us say, and they to you; but there the intercourse ends. Obviously, they are not to be brought without considerable effort into a position of tried and trusted friendship. And shall we be absolutely honest?--some of them may not justify such a.s.siduous care as their complete subjugation would call for. But even these you should make your feudal retainers. You should constrain them to membership in cla.s.s three, and at your discretion in cla.s.s two.

Apart from the words in cla.s.s four, you will not to this point have made actual additions to your vocabulary. But you will have made your vocabulary infinitely more serviceable. You will be like a man with a host of friends where before, when his necessities were sorest, he found (along with some friends) many distant and timid acquaintance.

Outside the bounds of your present vocabulary altogether are the words you encounter but do not recognize, except (it may be) dimly and uncertainly.

Some counselors would have you look up all such words in a dictionary. But the task would be irksome. Moreover those who prescribe it are loath to perform it themselves. Your own candid judgment in the matter is the safest guide. If the word is incidental rather than vital to the meaning of the pa.s.sage that contains it, and if it gives promise of but rarely crossing your vision again, you should deign it no more than a civil glance. Plenty of ways will be left you to expend time wisely in the service of your vocabulary.

EXERCISE - a.n.a.lysis

1. Make a list of the words in cla.s.s two of your own vocabulary, and similar lists for cla.s.ses three and four. (To make a list for cla.s.s one would be but a waste of time.) Procure if you can for this purpose a loose-leaf notebook, and in the several lists reserve a full page for each letter of the alphabet as used initially. Do not scamp the lists, though their proper preparation consume many days, many weeks. Try to make them really exhaustive. Their value will be in proportion to their accuracy and fulness.

2. Con the words in each list carefully and repeatedly. Your task is to transfer these words into a more intimate list--those in cla.s.s four into cla.s.s three, those in three into two, those in two into one. You are then to promote again the words in the lower cla.s.ses, except that (if your judgment so dictates) you may leave the new cla.s.s three wholly or partially intact. To carry out this exercise properly you must keep these words in mind, make them part and parcel of your daily life. (For a special device for bringing them under subjection, see the next exercise.)

3. To write a word down helps you to remember it. That is why the normal way to transfer a word from cla.s.s four into cla.s.s two is to put it temporarily into the intermediary cla.s.s, three; you first _see_ or _hear_ the word, next _write_ it, afterwards _speak_ it.

The mere writing down of your lists has probably done much to bring the words written into the circuit of your memory, where you can more readily lay hold of them. Also it has fortified your confidence in using them; for to write a word out, letter by letter, makes you surer that you have its right form. With many of your words you will likely have no more trouble; they will be at hand, anxious for employment, and you may use them according to your need. But some of your words will still stubbornly withhold themselves from memory. Weed these out from your lists, make a special list of them, copy it frequently, construct short sentences into which the troublesome words fit. By dint of writing the words so often you will soon make them more tractable.

4. Make a fifth list of words--those you hear or see printed, do not understand the meaning of, but yet feel you should know. Obtain and confirm a grasp of them by the successive processes used with words in the preceding lists.

Another means of b.u.t.tressing your command of your present vocabulary is to define words you use or are familiar with.

Do not bewilder yourself with words (like _and, the_) which call for ingenuity in handling somewhat technical terms, or with words (like _thing, affair, condition_) which loosely cover a mult.i.tude of meanings. (You may, however, concentrate your efforts upon some one meaning of words in the latter group.) Select words with a fairly definite signification, and express this as precisely as you can. You may afterwards consult a dictionary for means of checking up on what you have done. But in consulting it think only of idea, not of form. You are not training yourself in dictionary definitions, but in the sharpness and clarity of your understanding of meanings.

About the only rule to be laid down regarding the definition of verbs, adjectives, and adverbs is that you must not define a word in terms of itself. Thus if you define _grudgingly_ as "in a grudging manner,"

you do not dissipate your hearer's uncertainty as to what the word means.

If you define it as "unwillingly" or "in a manner that shows reluctance to yield possession," you give your hearer a clear-cut idea in no wise dependent upon his ability to understand the word that puzzled him in the first place.

Normally, in defining a noun you should a.s.sign the thing named to a general cla.s.s, and to its special limits within that cla.s.s; in other words, you should designate its genus and species. You must take care to differentiate the species from all others comprised within the genus.

You will, in most instances, first indicate the genus and then the species, but at your convenience you may indicate the species first. Thus if you affirm, "A cigar is smoking-tobacco in the form of a roll of tobacco-leaves," you name the genus first and later the characteristics of the species. You have given a satisfactory definition. If on the other hand you affirm, "A cigar is a roll of tobacco-leaves meant for smoking,"

you first designate the species and then merely imply the genus. Again you have given a satisfactory definition; for you have permitted no doubt that the genus is smoking-tobacco, and have prescribed such limits for the species as exclude tobacco intended for a pipe or a cigarette.

In defining nouns by the genus-and-species method, restrict the genus to the narrowest possible bounds. You will thus save the need for exclusions later. Had you in your first definition of a cigar begun by saying that it is tobacco, rather than smoking-tobacco, you would have violated this principle; and you would have had to amplify the rest of your definition in order to exclude chewing-tobacco, snuff, and the like.

EXERCISE - Definition

1. Define words of your own choosing in accordance with the principles laid down in the preceding section of the text.

2. Define the following adjectives, adverbs, and verbs:

Miserable Rebuke Wise Angrily Rapidly Boundless Swim Paint Whiten Haughtily Surly Causelessly

3. So define the following nouns as to prevent any possible confusion with the nouns following them in parentheses:

Wages (salary) Ride (drive) Planet (star) Truck (automobile) Watch (clock) Reins (lines) Jail (penitentiary) Iron (steel) Vegetable (fruit) Timber (lumber) Flower (weed) Rope (string) Hail (sleet, snow) Stock (bond) Newspaper (magazine) Street car (railway coach) Cloud (fog) Revolver (rifle, pistol, etc.) Mountain (hill) Creek (river) Letter (postal card)

4. While remembering that the following words are of broad signification and mean different things to different people, define them according to their meaning to you:

Gentleman Courage Honesty Beauty Honor Good manners Generosity A good while Charity A little distance Modesty Long ago

So much for the words which are already yours, or which you can make yours through your own unaided efforts. For convenience we have grouped with them some words of a nature more baffling--words of which you know perhaps but a single aspect rather than the totality, or upon which you can obtain but a feeble and precarious grip. These slightly known words belong more to the cla.s.s now to be considered than to that just disposed of. For we have now to deal with words over which you can establish no genuine rulership unless you have outside help.

You must own a dictionary, have it by you, consult it carefully and often.

Do not select one for purchasing upon the basis of either mere bigness or cheapness. If you do, you may make yourself the owner of an out-of-date reprint from stereotyped plates. What to choose depends partly upon personal preference, partly upon whether your need is for comprehensiveness or compression.

If you are a scholar, _Murray's_ many-volumed _New English Dictionary_ may be the publication for you; but if you are an ordinary person, you will probably content yourself with something less expensive and exhaustive. You will find the _Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia_, in twelve volumes, or _Webster's New International Dictionary_ an admirable compilation. The _New Standard Dictionary_ will also prove useful. All in all, if you can afford it, you should provide yourself with one or the other of these three large and authoritative, but not too inclusive, works. Of the smaller lexicons _Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Webster's Secondary School Dictionary_, the _Practical Standard Dictionary_, and the _Desk Standard Dictionary_ answer most purposes well.

A dictionary is not for show. You must learn to use it. What ordinarily pa.s.ses for use is in fact abuse. Wherein? Let us say that you turn to your lexicon for the meaning of a word. Of the various definitions given, you disregard all save the one which enables the word to make sense in its present context, or which fits your preconception of what the word should stand for. Having engaged in this solemn mummery, you mentally record the fact that you have been squandering your time, and enter into a compact with yourself that no more will you so do. At best you have tided over a transitory need, or have verified a surmise. You have not truly _learned_ the word, brought it into a va.s.sal's relationship with you, so fixed it in memory that henceforth, night or day, you can take it up like a familiar tool.

This procedure is blundering, farcical, futile, incorrect. To suppose you have learned a word by so cursory a glance at its resources is like supposing you have learned a man through having had him render you some temporary and trivial service, as lending you a match or telling you the time of day. To acquaint yourself thoroughly with a word--or a man-- involves effort, application. You must go about the work seriously, intelligently.

One secret of consulting a dictionary properly lies in finding the primary, the original meaning of the word. You must go to the source. If the word is of recent formation, and is native rather than naturalized English, you have only to look through the definitions given. Such a word will not cause you much trouble. But if the word is derived from primitive English or from a foreign language, you must seek its origin, not in one of the numbered subheads of the definition, but in an etymological record you will perceive within brackets or parentheses. Here you will find the Anglo-Saxon (Old English), Latin, Greek, French, German, Italian, Scandinavian, or other word from which sprang the word you are studying, and along with this authentic original you may find cognate words in other languages. These you may examine if you care to observe their resemblance to your word, but the examination is not necessary. It could teach you only the earlier or other _forms_ of your word, whereas what you are after is the original _meaning_. This too is set down within the brackets; if your search is in earnest, you cannot possible miss it. And having discovered this original meaning, you must get it in mind; it is one of the really significant things about the word. Your next step is to find the present import of the word. Look, therefore, through the modern definitions. Of these there may be too many, with too delicate shadings in thought between them, for you to keep all clearly in mind. In fact you need not try. Consider them of course, but out of them seek mainly the drift, the central meaning. After a little practice you will be able to disengage it from the others.

You now know the original sense of the word and its central signification today. The two may be identical; they may be widely different; but through reflection or study of the entire definition you will establish some sort of connection between them. When you have done this, you have mastered the word. From the two meanings you can surmise the others, wherever and whenever encountered; for the others are but outgrowths and applications of them.

One warning will not be amiss. You must not suppose that the terms used in defining a word are its absolute synonyms, or may be subst.i.tuted for it indiscriminately. You must develop a feeling for _the limits_ of the word, so that you may perceive where its likeness to the other terms leaves off and its unlikeness begins. Thus if one of the terms employed in defining _command_ is _control_, you must not a.s.sume that the two words are interchangeable; you must not say, for instance, that the captain controlled his men to present arms.

Such, abstractly stated, is the way to look up a word in the dictionary.