Speakers and writers often fail to discriminate in the use of these words. A defect implies a deficiency, a lack, a falling short, while a fault signifies that there is something wrong.
“Men still had faults, and men will have them still,
He that hath none, and lives as angels do
Must be an angel.”
“It is in general more profitable to reckon up our defects than to boast of our attainments.”
Few, Little
These words and their comparatives, fewer, less, are often confounded. Few relates to number, or to what may be counted; little refers to quantity, or to what may be measured. A man may have few books and little money; he may have fewer friends and less influence than his neighbor. But do not say “The man has less friends than his neighbor.”
Each other, One another
While some excellent authorities use these expressions interchangeably, most grammarians and authors employ each other in referring to two persons or things, and one another when more than two are considered; as, “Both contestants speak kindly of each other.” “Gentlemen are always polite to one another.”
Those who prefer to have wide latitude in speech will be glad to know that Murray, in one of the rules in his grammar, says, “Two negatives in English destroy one another.”
Shakespeare says, “It is a good divine that follows his own instructions. I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.” This is as true of expression as of morals.
Either, Neither