They [the prelates] are so far from hindering dissension, that they have made unprofitable, and even noisome, the chiefest remedy we have to keep Christendom at one, which is, by Councils.—Milton, Reason of Church Government, b. i. c. 6.
Sad in his time was the condition of the Israelites, oppressed by the Midianites, who swarmed like grasshoppers for number and noisomeness, devouring all which the other had sown.—Fuller, A Pisgah Sight of Palestine, part i. b. ii. c. 8.
| Novel, | } |
| Novelist. |
‘Novels’ once were simply news, ‘nouvelles;’ and the ‘novelist’ not a writer of new tales, but an innovator, a bringer in of new fashions into the Church or State.
She brynges in her bille som novels new;
Behold! it is of an olif tree
A branch, thynkes me.
Townley Mysteries.
But, see and say what you will, novelists had rather be talked of, that they began a fashion and set a copy for others, than to keep within the imitation of the most excellent precedents.—Hacket, Life of Archbishop Williams, part ii. p. 36.
Every novelist with a whirligig in his brain must broach new opinions, and those made canons, nay sanctions, as sure as if a General Council had confirmed them.—Adams, The Devil’s Banquet, 1614, p. 52.