ABSTRACT
An error which Richards believed was frequently made was the mistaking of adefinition for an assertion. This, as we have seen, is a reason why he inc1uded in his multiple definitions of a word many theories about that which the word stood for. He dealt with this source of error in detail in Interpretation in Teaching, c1aiming that Campbell, in criticising Swift's statements about grammar, was in fact using the word 'grammar' in a new and different sense. This meant that Campbell's denials of Swift's assertions, as weIl as his own assertions about grammar, were in fact analytic. They were tautologous re-phrasings of his definition of 'grammar', masquerading as statements of fact because they were put in that linguistic form. Richards put it crudely by saying that what Camp bell was doing was comparable to asserting: "It is not the business of circ1es, as geometrie figures, to quarre1 with one another'',l on which Richards' comment was, "True, but irrelevant to the question whether literary circ1es don't fall out as part of their trade."
