there should be very special evidence in any special case; and thus
the caution of Dr. Henry Bradley's remarks in note on page 19.

I remember how I first came to recognize this law; it was from hearing
a friend advocating the freer use of certain old words which, though
they were called obsolete and are now rarely heard, yet survive in
local dialects. I was surprised to find how many of them were unfit
for resuscitation because of their homophonic ambiguity, and when
I spoke of my discovery to a philological friend, I found that he
regarded it as a familiar and unquestioned rule.

But to prove this rule is difficult; and as it is an impossible task
to collect all the obsolete words and classify them, I am proposing to
take two independent indications; first to separate out the homophones
from the other obsolete words in a Shakespearian glossary, and
secondly, to put together a few words that seem to be actually going
out of use in the present day, that is, strictly obsolescent words
caught in the act of flitting.

[Sidenote: Obsolescence defined.]

Obsolescence in this connexion must be understood only of common
educated speech, that is, the average speaker's vocabulary.
Obsolescent words are old words which, when heard in talk, will sound
literary or unusual: in literature they can seem at home, and will
often give freshness without affectation; indeed, any word that has an
honourable place in Shakespeare or the Bible can never quite die, and
may perhaps some day recover its old vitality.

[Sidenote: Evidence of obsolescence.]