Special instruction in the use of synonyms is necessary, for the reason that few students possess the analytical power and habit of mind required to hold a succession of separate definitions in thought at once, compare them with each other, and determine just where and how they part company; and the persons least able to do this are the very ones most in need of the information. The distinctions between words similar in meaning are often so fine and elusive as to tax the ingenuity of the accomplished scholar; yet when clearly apprehended they are as important for the purposes of language as the minute differences between similar substances are for the purposes of chemistry. Often definition itself is best secured by the comparison of kindred terms and the pointing out where each differs from the other. We perceive more clearly and remember better what each word is, by perceiving where each divides from another of kindred meaning; just as we see and remember better the situation and contour of adjacent countries, by considering them as boundaries of each other, rather than by an exact statement of the latitude and longitude of each as a separate portion of the earth's surface.
The great mass of untrained speakers and writers need to be reminded, in the first place, _that there are synonyms_--a suggestion which they would not gain from any precision of separate definitions in a dictionary. The deplorable repetition with which many slightly educated persons use such words as "elegant," "splendid," "clever," "awful," "horrid," etc., to indicate (for they can not be said to express) almost any shade of certain approved or objectionable qualities, shows a limited vocabulary, a poverty of language, which it is of the first importance to correct. Many who are not given to such gross misuse would yet be surprised to learn how often they employ a very limited number of words in the attempt to give utterance to thoughts and feelings so unlike, that what is the right word on one occasion must of necessity be the wrong word at many other times. Such persons are simply unconscious of the fact that there are other words of kindred meaning from which they might choose; as the United States surveyors of Alaska found "the shuddering tenant of the frigid zone" wrapping himself in furs and cowering over a fire of sticks with untouched coal-mines beneath his feet.