But this is not all. If the practice of a few men in the capital is to be the standard, a knowlege of this must be communicated to the whole nation. Who shall do this? An able compiler perhaps attempts to give this practice in a dictionary; but it is probable that the pronunciation, even at court, or on the stage, is not uniform. The compiler therefore must follow his particular friends and patrons; in which case he is sure to be opposed and the authority of his standard called in question; or he must give two pronunciations as the standard, which leaves the student in the same uncertainty as it found him. Both these events have actually taken place in England, with respect to the most approved standards; and of course no one is universally followed. Besides, if language must vary, like fashions, at the caprice of a court, we must have our standard dictionaries republished, with the fashionable pronunciation, at least once in five years; otherwise a gentleman in the country will become intolerably vulgar, by not being in a situation to adopt the fashion of the day. The _new_ editions of them will supersede the _old_, and we shall have our pronunciation to relearn, with the polite alterations, which are generally corruptions. Such are the consequences of attempting to make a _local_ practice the _standard_ of language in a _nation_. The attempt must keep the language in perpetual fluctuation, and the learner in uncertainty. If a standard therefore cannot be fixed on local and variable custom, on what shall it be fixed? If the most eminent speakers are not to direct our practice, where shall we look for a guide? The answer is extremely easy; the _rules of the language itself_, and the _general practice of the nation_, constitute propriety in speaking. If we examin the structure of any language, we shall find a certain principle of analogy running through the whole. We shall find in English that similar combinations of letters have usually the same pronunciation; and that words, having the same terminating syllable, generally have the accent at the same distance from that termination. These principles of analogy were not the result of design--they must have been the effect of accident, or that tendency which all men feel towards uniformity.[3] But the principles, when established, are productive of great convenience, and become an authority superior to the arbitrary decisions of any man or class of men. There is one exception only to this remark: When a deviation from analogy has become the universal practice of a nation, it then takes place of all rules and becomes the standard of propriety. The two points therefore, which I conceive to be the basis of a standard in speaking, are these; _universal undisputed practice_, and the _principle of analogy_. _Universal practice_ is generally, perhaps always, a rule of propriety; and in disputed points, where people differ in opinion and practice, _analogy_ should always decide the controversy.