ABSTRACT
Words, the primary tools that human beings use to communicate with one another, are incredibly powerful, but are also potentially problematic and difficult. Nearly half a century ago, the historian Carl Becker wrote:
Now, when I meet with a word with which I am entirely unfamiliar, I find it a good plan to look it up in the dictionary and find out what someone thinks it means. But when I have frequently to use words with which everyone is perfectly familiar-words like “cause” and “liberty” and “progress” and “government”—when I have to use words of this sort which everyone knows perfectly well, the wise thing to do is to take a week off and think about them.1
