Introduction -- A Thesaurus, says the dictionary, is "a treasury or storehouse; hence a repository, especially of words, as a dictionary." But, in a sense, this book is the opposite of a dictionary. You turn to a dictionary when you have a word but are not sure enough about what it means -- how it has been used and what it may be expected to do. You turn to the Thesaurus when you have your meaning already but don't yet have the word. It may be on the tip of your tongue, or in the back of your mind or the hollow of your thought, but what it is you don't yet know. It is like the missing piece of a puzzle. You know well enough that the other words you try out won't do. They are not the right shape. They say too much or too little. They are too flat or too showy, too kind or too cruel. But the word which just fills the bill won't come, so you reach for the Thesaurus.

A Thesaurus, says the dictionary, is "a treasury or storehouse; hence a repository, especially of words, as a dictionary."