CHAUCER, _The Miller’s Tale_.
The poet Homer speaketh of no garlands and chaplets but due to
the celestial and heavenly _wights_.--HOLLAND, _Pliny_, vol. i.
p. 456.
A black horse cometh, and his rider hath a balance, and a voice
telleth among the four _wights_ that corn shall be dear [_Rev._
vi. 6].--BROUGHTON, _Of Consent upon Apocalypse_.
When the four _wights_ are said to have given glory, honour,
and thanks to Him that sate upon the throne [_Rev._ v. 14],
what was their ditty but this?--MEDE, _Sermons_.
=WILFUL=, }
WILFULLY. }
‘Wilful’ and ‘willing,’ ‘wilfully’ and ‘willingly,’ have been
conveniently desynonymized by later usage in our language; so that
in ‘wilful’ and ‘wilfully’ there now lies ever the sense of will
capriciously exerted, deriving its motives merely from itself; while
the examples which follow show there was once no such implication of
_self_-will in the words.
Alle the sones of Israel halewiden _wilful_ thingis to the
Lord.--_Exod._ xxxv. 29. WICLIF.
A proud priest may be known when he denieth to follow Christ
and his apostles in _wilful_ poverty and other virtues.--FOXE,
_Book of Martyrs; Examination of William Thorpe_.
Fede ye the flok of God, that is among you, and purvey ye, not
as constreyned, but _wilfulli_.--_1 Pet._ v. 2. WICLIF.
And so, through his pitiful nailing, Christ shed out _wilfully_
for man’s life the blood that was in his veins.--FOXE, _Book of
Martyrs; Examination of William Thorpe_.
=WINCE.= Now to shrink or start away as in pain from a stroke or touch;
but, as far as I know, used always by our earlier authors in the sense
of to kick.
Poul, whom the Lord hadde chosun, long tyme _wynside_ agen the
pricke.--WICLIF, _Prolog on the Dedis of Apostlis_.
For this flower of age, having no forecast of thrift, but set
altogether upon spending, and given to delights and pleasures,
_winseth_ and flingeth out like a skittish and frampold
horse in such sort that it had need of a sharp bit and short
curb.--HOLLAND, _Plutarch’s Morals_, p. 14.
=WIT=, }
WITTY. }
The present meaning of ‘wit’ as compared with the past, and the period
when it was in the act of transition from one to the other, cannot
be better marked than in the quotation from Bishop Reynolds which is
given below. It is a protest, an impotent one, as such invariably
are, against a change in the word’s meaning, going on before his
eyes. Cowley’s Ode, _Of Wit_, is another very important document,
illustrating the history of the word.
Who knew the _wit_ of the Lord, or who was his
counselour?--_Rom._ xi. 34. WICLIF.
I take not _wit_ in that common acceptation, whereby men
understand some sudden flashes of conceit whether in style
or conference, which, like rotten wood in the dark, have
more shine than substance, whose use and ornament are,
like themselves, swift and vanishing, at once both admired
and forgotten. But I understand a settled, constant, and
habitual sufficiency of the understanding, whereby it is
enabled in any kind of learning, theory, or practice, both to
sharpness in search, subtilty in expression, and despatch in
execution.--REYNOLDS, _Passions and Faculties of the Soul_, c.
xxxix.
For the world laghes on man and smyles,
Bot at the last it him bygyles;
Tharfor I hald that man noght _witty_
That about the world is over bysy.
RICHARD ROLLE DE HAMPOLE, _Pricke of Conscience_, 1092.
I confess notwithstanding, with the _wittiest_ of the school
divines, that if we speak of strict justice God could no way
have been bound to requite man’s labours in so large and ample
manner.--HOOKER, _Ecclesiastical Polity_, b. i. c. 11.
=WITCH.= This was not restrained formerly, as it now is, to the
_female_ exerciser of unlawful magical arts, but would have been as
freely applied to Balaam or Simon Magus as to her whom we call ‘the
Witch of Endor.’ ‘She-witch’ was not uncommon in our Elizabethan
literature, when such was intended. In the dialect of Northumbria
‘witches’ are of both sexes still (Atkinson).
There was a man in that citee whos name was Symount, a
_witche_.--_Acts_ viii. 9. WICLIF.
Item, he is a _witch_, asking counsel at soothsayers.--FOXE,
_Book of Martyrs; Appeal against Boniface_.
Then the king commanded to call together all the soothsayers,
charmers, _witches_, and Caldees, for to shew the king his
dream.--_Dan._ ii. 2. COVERDALE.
Who can deny him a wisard or _witch_, who in the reign of
Richard the Usurper foretold that upon the same stone where he
dashed his spur riding toward Bosworth field he should dash his
head in his return?--COTTA, _The Trial of Witchcraft_, p. 49.
=WIZARD.= A title not necessarily used in times past with any
dishonourable subaudition of _perverted_ wisdom on his part to whom it
was given, as is now the case.
Then Herod, calling the _wisards_ privily, did narrowly search
of them the time of the star’s appearing.--_Matt._ ii. 7. Sir
J. CHEKE.
When Jeremy his lamentation writ,
They thought the _wizard_ quite out of his wit.
DRAYTON, _Elegies, To Mr. G. Sandys_.
See how from far upon the eastern road
The star-led _wizards_ haste with odours sweet.
MILTON, _On the Nativity_.
=WOMB.= This is now only the ὑστέρα, but once could be ascribed to both
sexes, having as wide a meaning as the κοιλία of the Greeks.
And he coveitide to fille his _wombe_ of the coddis that the
hoggis eeten, and no man gaf hym.--_Luke_ xv. 16. WICLIF.
Of this matere, o Paul, wel canstow trete;
Mete unto _wombe_, and _wombe_ eek unto mete.
CHAUCER, _Pardoneres Tale_ (Clar. Press).
_Falstaff._ An I had but a belly of any indifferency, I were
simply the most active fellow in Europe. My _womb_, my _womb_,
my _womb_ undoes me.--SHAKESPEARE, _2 Henry IV._, act iv. sc. 3.
=WORM.= This, which designates at present only smaller and innoxious
kinds of creeping and crawling things, once, as the German ‘wurm,’ was
employed of all the serpent kind; and indeed in some of our northern
dialects all snakes and serpents are ‘worms’ to the present day. In
‘blind_worm_,’ ‘slow_worm_,’ ‘hag_worm_,’ we have tokens of the earlier
use.
There came a _viper_ out of the heat and leapt on his hand.
When the men of the country saw the _worm_ hang on his hand,
they said, This man must needs be a murderer.--_Acts_ xxviii.
3, 4. TYNDALE.
’Tis slander,
Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue
Outvenoms all the _worms_ of Nile.
SHAKESPEARE, _Cymbeline_, act iii. sc. 4.
O Eve, in evil hour thou didst give ear
To that false _worm_, of whomsoever taught
To counterfeit man’s voice.
MILTON, _Paradise Lost_, ix. 1067.
=WORSHIP.= At present we ‘worship’ none but God; there was a time when
the word was employed in so much more general a sense that it was not
profane to say that God ‘worshipped,’ that is honoured, man. This, of
course, is the sense of the word in the Marriage Service, ‘with my body
I thee _worship_.’
If ony man serve me, my fadir schal _worschipe_ hym.--_John_
xii. 26. WICLIF.
But I yow pray and charge upon your lyf,
That what wyf that I take, ye me assure
To _worschippe_ whil that hir lif may endure.
CHAUCER, _The Clerkes Tale_, 108.
Man, that was made after the image and likeness of God, is full
worshipful in his kind; yea, this holy image that is man God
_worshippeth_.--FOXE, _Book of Martyrs; Examination of William
Thorpe_.
=WRETCHED.= What has been observed on ‘Unhappy’ explains and accounts
also for the use of ‘wretched’ as = wicked. ‘Wretch’ still continues
to cover the two meanings of one miserable and one wicked, though
‘wretched’ does so no more.
Nero regned after this Claudius, of alle men _wrechidhest_,
redy to alle maner vices.--CAPGRAVE, _Chronicle of England_, p.
62.
To do evil gratis, to do evil for good, is the _wretchedest_
wickedness that can be.--ANDREWES, _Of the Conspiracy of the
Gowries_, serm. 4.
=YOUNKER.= Now, as far as it is used at all, equivalent to ‘youngster;’
but the ‘younker’ of our Elizabethan and earlier literature was much
more nearly the German ‘junker,’ or Jung Herr, the young lord,--or
perhaps ‘squire’ would be nearer the mark,--or youthful gallant. [We
borrowed the word from the Dutch ‘jonker’ or ‘jonkheer’ (= ‘jong’ young
+ ‘heer’ gentleman). See Skeat’s _Dictionary_.]
Yf some of them can get a fox tale or two, or that he may have
a capons feder or a goose feder, or any long feder on his
cap, than he is called a _yonker_.--BOORDE, _The Boke of the
Introduction of Knowledge_, 1547.
How like a _younker_ or a prodigal
The scarfèd bark puts from her native bay,
Hugged and embracèd by the strumpet wind.
SHAKESPEARE, _Merchant of Venice_, act ii. sc. 6.
See how the morning opes her golden gates,
And takes her farewell of the glorious sun!
How well resembles it the prime of youth,
Trimmed like a _younker_, prancing to his love.
Id., _3 Henry VI._, act ii. sc. 1.
Venus loved the _younker_ Adonis better than the warrior
Mars.--DODOEN, _History of Plants_, p. 656.
As Rehoboam’s _yonkers_ carried that weighty business of his
kingdom and overthrew it, so do the unruly and rebellious
humours of most youth miscarry this.--ROGERS, _Matrimonial
Honour_, p. 31.
PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
LONDON