| 释义 |
sweet singer Hist.
1. The phr. sweet singer (see sweet a. 4), more fully sweet singer of Israel (app. with reminiscence of 2 Sam. xxiii. 1, where David is called ‘the sweet psalmist of Israel’), designating a sect or sects which flourished in the latter years of the 17th cent.: see quots.
1680H. More Let. in R. Ward Life (1710) 356, I partly have some Knowledge of the Sweet Singers of Israel. But to say or sing sweetly is little to the Purpose, while there is a False Principle at the Heart... What a Discord in Your Sweet Singer was the Admiration of that roaring Wretch you described, that lately hanged himself! 1681Act of Counc. in Wodrow Hist. Suff. Ch. Scot. (1722) II. 221 Edinburgh, August 2, 1681. His Royal Highness and Lords of Privy Council, having considered the Condition of these Prisoners, called the sweet Singers, David Jamison, John Gib,..and some Women, give Order to the Magistrates to liberate them. 1687Miége Gt. Fr. Dict., Eng.-Fr. s.v., Tis a late blasphemous Sect, which call themselves the Sweet Singers of Israel. Whereof one John Taylor was Head, who had a Congregation of them at Guildford in Surrey. 1692Life of John Bunyan 22 A Sect of loose prophane Wretches, afterward called Ranters and sweet Singers. 1704Swift Mech. Operat. Spir. in T. Tub, etc. 319. 1711 Mem. Visct. Dundee p. ix, At this Time, about thirty of these deluded People left their Families and Business, and went to the Hills, where they lived in Rocks and Caves for some Weeks... They called themselves The Sweet Singers of Israel, eat nothing that there was Salt in, or paid Tax to the King, blotted the Name of King out of their Bibles, and cohabited all together. 1732P. Walker Life of Cargill in Biogr. Presbyt. (1827) II. 16 These People..were commonly called Sweet-singers, from their frequently meeting together, and singing these tearful Psalms over the mournful Case of the Church, Psal. 74, 79, 80, 83, 137.
2. a. A religious poet.
1560, etc. [see singer1 2]. 1892J. Julian Dict. Hymnol. 1284/2 William Williams, of Pantycelyn, was the Sweet Singer of Wales. 1933Sign July 92/2 The sweet singer, Christina Rossetti.
b. A popular, esp. sentimental, writer or singer.
[1878J. A. Moore (title) Sweet singer of Michigan.] 1936New Statesman 25 Jan. 113/2 Kipling..was a sweet singer to the last. He could bring home the colours and savours of many distant places... But he was not a faultless writer. 1958Listener 4 Dec. 913/1 The latest hit of one of the sweet singers of Hong Kong, Li Li Hua or Yao Lee. |