It will not be disputed, that some words bear a much higher importance than others. The names of familiar objects are of little consequence, because we can examine them by our senses, and thereby obtain just perceptions of their character and properties: but general or abstract terms, which are not the objects of sense, but the abbreviations of subjects of reflection, are of the highest interest to our advancement in knowledge and moral conduct. To exemplify the views that have been taken on this subject, three words have been selected:--_to feel_, _to ransack_, and the adjective, _naked_. Of the first, Dr. Johnson, the best authority we now possess, has given six different senses or acceptations as a verb active, and four, as a verb neuter, and has cited the different authorities. He says it is derived from the Anglo-Saxon, _felan_, without explaining what _felan_ means; it however means to feel: but the adduction of a word in another language, of similar sound and identical signification, does not impart meaning. Yet when we find that in the Anglo-Saxon _fell_ means _skin_, which is the seat of feeling, we directly understand the word and all its dependencies; as _fell_ of hair, _felt_ hat, _fell_-monger, _film_, which is a thin fine skin or pellicle. Thus we become enabled to understand and reconcile variety and extension of meaning, from the preservation of integrity of figure. The verb _to ransack_, is another example. Of this word Dr. Johnson has given three senses. According to him, it is derived from _ran_, Anglo-Saxon, and _saka_, Swedish, to search or seize; but we are not informed what _ran_ in Anglo-Saxon signifies, and it so happens that there is no such Swedish word as _saka_, to search. The word _ransack_, for which the Anglo-Saxons had _ransaka_, is derived to us from the Gothic, in which _razn_ (pronounced _ran_) signifies a house, and _sokjan_ to search; so that, _to ransack_, implies to search the house. To the adjective _naked_ Dr. Johnson has given four different meanings. Its etymology, he says, is from the Anglo-Saxon, _nacod_, which in that language was of similar signification: but this imparts no meaning. It is a compound word: _na_, in Anglo-Saxon, signifies _new_, and _cenned_, _born_, so that the condition of the _new-born_ child affords an appropriate interpretation of the term _naked_. To ordinary minds, that which is said to be authority is decisive[10]; a particular author of celebrity is cited, and thus the business concludes. The reasons, which induced him to employ the word in such particular sense, it is in most cases fruitless to enquire; as during their lives, authors have seldom been appreciated: so that the silence of death seems indispensable to procure the consent of authority.