Synonyms and Antonyms

An excerpt from the Preface: The nature and use of this work are meant to be rather practical than scientific. The Author has accordingly not propounded any theory of verbal analogy on the one hand, or verbal opposition on the other, as the basis of his Synonyms and Antonyms; though he believes that the time has arrived when both ought to be supplied, and the co-ordination and opposition of words reduced to strict exactness and scientific rule, beyond what has...
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An excerpt from the Preface:

The nature and use of this work are meant to be rather practical than scientific.

The Author has accordingly not propounded any theory of verbal analogy on the one hand, or verbal opposition on the other, as the basis of his Synonyms and Antonyms; though he believes that the time has arrived when both ought to be supplied, and the co-ordination and opposition of words reduced to strict exactness and scientific rule, beyond what has hitherto been indirectly recognized by Logic.

Words which agree in expressing one or more characteristic ideas in common he has regarded as Synonyms, those which negative one or more s

uch ideas he has called Antonyms. Principles or Degrees of Similarity, and Principles or Degrees of Opposition, have not been laid down, though they have been recognized in his own mind. He has rather endeavoured to place himself in the position, alternately, of two opposed thinkers, or debaters, so furnishing each with a short catena of Synonyms to express or aid the current of his thoughts, tendering at the same time to each such negatives as might be employed in the opposite argument. The etymology of the words has been prefixed, as aiding ordinary readers in the apprehension and use of them, and prominent points of usage have been also noticed. One word of apology he feels to be due for the employment of a word which he has ventured, not to coin but to re-issue.

The word Antonym, unlike some others which have been admitted into English on the plea of a practical want, is at least correctly formed from the Greek, and is, indeed, a Greek word.

If it should be said that, as a word of grammar, it would have the meaning of pronoun, the answer might be that it is net here used as a grammatical term. The names of the grammatical parts of speech have been already made current in English under Latin stamps ; and it would be a waste of the resources of our language to employ a word of Greek formation to express over again what is already expressed by the Latin derivative "pronoun." Yet the word Antonym seems to be wanted.