The introduction is exceedingly learned and the causes of change in language are discussed with much ingenuity. Many examples of Saxon antiquities are given, one of which, the Lord's prayer, written about A. D. 900, by Alfred, Bishop of Durham, we may quote, from which "it doth appear," says Bailey, "that the English Saxon Language, of which the Normans despoiled us in great Part, had its beauties, was significant and emphatical, and preferable to what they imposed upon us." Here is the prayer: "Our Father which art in Heavens, be hallowed thine name; come thine Kingdom; be thy will so as in Heavens and in Earth. Our Loaf supersubstantial give us to-day, and forgive us Debts our so we forgive Debts ours, and do not lead us into Temptation, but deliver us from Evil." The introduction is in Latin. Greek, Hebrew, and Saxon characters are used in the definitions. Bailey defines the meanings of proverbs with far more particularity than is necessary, perhaps, and yet a small volume could be made up of these curious "common or old pithy sayings," as he defines them, many of which are obsolete or unknown to the readers of the present day. Instance: "As sure as God's in Gloucestershire." This proverb is said to have its rise, on account that there were more rich and mitred abbeys in that than in any two shires of England beside; but some, from William of Malmsbury, refer it to the fruitfulness of it in religion, in that it is said to have returned the seed of the gospel with the increase of an hundred fold. And "Good wine needs no bush." This proverb intimates that virtue is valuable for itself, and that internal goodness stands in need of no external flourishes or ornaments; and so we say "A good face needs no band." One other, a short one: "All goes down gutter lane." This is applied to those who spend all in drunkenness and gluttony, alluding to the Latin word gutter, which signifies the throat. Not a few of these proverbs, with their explanations, occupy whole pages of the dictionary, and where they are traced to the Greeks or the Hebrews the original characters are brought into use as incontestable evidence of their authenticity. Definitions are numerous of words which, while perfectly legitimate and of Saxon origin and of common usage in the age of Elizabeth, are omitted at the present day from lexicons in deference to the prevalence of a more delicate taste. The book contains about one thousand pages, is printed in a style little dissimilar to present unabridged dictionaries, and must have been of prodigious assistance to the author's successors. He does not deprecate the labors of his predecessors, whom he acknowledges to have saved him much trouble, but he claims to have omitted their redundancies in order to make room to supply their deficiencies to the extent of several thousand words, "in no English dictionary before extant," and that he is the first who attempted an etymological part.