The Dictionary defines a great many Latinate words that Johnson found in old books, but that few of his contemporaries had ever encountered. T. E. Lawrence (of Arabia) knew that an Oxford economist friend was fond of such words. When Lawrence was returning from London one day, the friend asked him, “Was it very caliginous in the metropolis?” Lawrence replied, “Somewhat caliginous, but not altogether inspissated.”

Leo Damrosch, The Club: Johnson, Boswell, and the Friends Who Shaped an Age (2019)