books of every nation, which perplexes or destroys analogy, and produces
anomalous formations, that being once incorporated, can never be
afterwards dismissed or reformed.

Of this kind are the derivatives _length_ from _long_, _strength_ from
_strong_, _darling_ from _dear_, _breadth_ from _broad_, from _dry_,
_drought_, and from _high_, _height_, which Milton, in zeal for analogy,
writes _highth_: "Quid te exempta juvat spinis de pluribus una?" to
change all would be too much, and to change one is nothing.

This uncertainty is most frequent in the vowels, which are so
capriciously pronounced, and so differently modified, by accident or
affectation, not only in every province, but in every mouth, that to
them, as is well known to etymologists, little regard is to be shown in
the deduction of one language from another.

Such defects are not errours in orthography, but spots of barbarity
impressed so deep in the English language, that criticism can never wash
them away: these, therefore, must be permitted to remain untouched: but
many words have likewise been altered by accident, or depraved by
ignorance, as the pronunciation of the vulgar has been weakly followed;
and some still continue to be variously written, as authors differ in
their care or skill: of these it was proper to inquire the true
orthography, which I have always considered as depending on their
derivation, and have, therefore, referred them to their original
languages: thus I write _enchant_, _enchantment_, _enchanter_, after the
French, and _incantation_ after the Latin; thus _entire_ is chosen
rather than _intire_, because it passed to us not from the Latin
_integer_, but from the French _entier_.