 If the proposals constituting some version of verificationism are adopted, then in the language thus constituted it will be analytically true that there are no synthetic sentences that are both unverifiable and meaningful. The notion of meaning here is not some new technical invention. Rather, ‘meaning’ is used in something like the ordinary sense. No grammatically well-formed sentence of this new language violates the verifiability principle. And the principle itself is completely safe. Thought of in this way the verifiability principle does not describe natural language; it is not intended to. It is intended to reform language to make it a more useful tool for the purposes of science. Carnap is under no illusion that natural languages are free from what seem to be metaphysical commitments. Nor is he under the illusion that defenders of the sort of metaphysics he targets will readily step up to the challenge of presenting precise rules of grammar and inference. There is no weakening of his defense of empiricism, but it is put on a somewhat different footing.