Thispaperaddressesaverygeneralproblem—therelationshipbetweenimplicitandexplicitformsofmeaning–thatisasoldasscholarlyattentiontolanguageinuse.Itfirsttriestodefinetheproblem.Thenitpresentssomeelementaryaspectsofthewayinwhichtheproblemhasbeendealtwithinthepragmaticliterature.Thisisfollowedbyanexcursionintotheworldofrelatednatural-languageconcepts,asreflectedintheEnglishmetapragmaticlexicon.Finally,thepapertriestomakeacontributiontoasolutionbyproposingathreedimensionalmatrixtoaccountforwhatmightlooklikeaone-dimensionalgradablescalefromimplicittoexplicit.Anattemptismadetoillustratethepotentialusefulnessofthesuggestions.Conclusionsmainlytaketheformofperspectivesforfutureresearch.
