Wilder, Neural Terms. 331 



his readers, if not regard for their good opinion, should lead him 

 to make his selection in advance and to adhere thereto through- 

 out a given publication.^ 



§259. Abbreviational Methods.- — The following rules are 

 recommended. 



a. The abbreviation should indicate the Latin (interna- 

 tional) name. With all mononyms this will also indicate equally 

 well the national paronym; but with English and German polyo- 

 nyms (§47), the usual transposition of the adjective and substan- 

 tive renders the recognition less easy.^ 



b. Abbreviations should be formed regularly, and vowels 

 excluded excepting when the initial letter is such, or when their 

 absence might occasion ambiguity. 



c. In the explanation of a figure abbreviations should be 

 set in alphabetic order. So natural, reasonable and just is this 

 rule that its disregard can only be attributed to the selfish assump- 

 tion upon the part of a writer that the time its observance would 

 have cost him is of more value to the world than the time its 

 non-observance costs all of his readers together, not to mention 

 the ill-effects of righteous indignation. 



§260. Importance of Moderation. — As with biologic gen- 

 eralizations, there are few philologic rules without exceptions. 

 Yet the reformer, especially if young and enthusiastic, either 

 ignorant of history or undismayed thereby, "too often imagines 



1 As stated in ^^5, the principle and method were adopted by me in 1880. 

 At that time Henle's works were not known to me. But in 1884 I was so im- 

 pressed with his systematic employment of a single set of names that the first 

 step in the collaboration toward Foster's Medical Dictionary (^58) consisted in 

 photographing the " Index " of his " Nervenlehre " and distributing copies for 

 discussion. 



^ From my point of view this constitutes an argument for the conversion of 

 certain polyonyms into mononyms. For example, if the dionym cornmissiira an- 

 terior be retained, the Latin and French abbreviation would be c. a., the English 

 a. c, and the German v. c. But of the mononym, praecommissura, pre. would 

 probably serve in each case. 



