Before going into Johnson's intentions, however, it is important to give a little background first, in order to place Johnson's achievement in its proper historical perspective. The first work designed specifically for the use of English-speaking people to find listings and definitions of English words was Robert Cawdrey's A Table Alphabetical (1604). This work was formulated for the purpose of defining only difficult words in the language and was by no means intended to be comprehensive (Fadiman, 1992).
Others were to follow, including Bullokar's An English Expositour (1616), Cockerams's English Dictionarie (1623), Blount's Glossographia (1656), Phillip's New World of English Words (1658), Cocker's English Dictionary (1704), and, finally, Nathan Bailey's two offerings, the Universal Etymological English Dictionary (1721) and the Dictionarium Britannicum (1730). The latter, containing some 48,000 entries, was to be Johnson's basis for his own dictionary. (While Johnson's Dictionary contains only 40,000 words, one might well wonder what became of the other 8,000 contained in Bailey; Johnson addresses these omissions in the preface to the Dictionary, going to great lengths to enumerate the various types of words he considered inappropriate, including technical terms, foreign words, and, the bane of his linguistic existence, "cant words.")
Johnson's evolving intentions for his Dictionary, his methods of execution, his innovative use of quotations, his working relationship with his crew of amanuenses, and his theory of etymology, as well as clearing up a few popular misconceptions, it remains for us to ask the final question: Was it worth it? The answer is a resounding and unequivocal YES. Samuel Johnson's Dictionary remained the authoritative work in its field for a century after its publication and set the standard by which subsequent dictionaries would be judged. Its importance cannot be understated (Fadiman, 1992).
To the dilettante, the occasional, much-quoted joke definitions found sprinkled throughout the work, together with the more eccentric characterizations provided by Boswell, might make the Dictionary, as well as its author, seem silly and inconsequential; it is only through depth of examination that we begin to see the real merit of such a phenomenal achievement, and appreciate Johnson for the intellectual giant that he was.
