golfing

[English golf; -ing.] The act or science of playing at golf. *Gol-go-tha, s . [Gr. Golgotha , from Aramæan Gulgalta ; Heb. Gulgoleth = a skull (Luke xxiii. 3), or the place of a skull (Matt. xxvii. 33, Mark xv. 22. John xix. 17).] A charnel-house. Go-li-ard, *gol-i-ar-deis, *gol-y-ar-deys, s. [GOLIAS.] Ch. Hist.: One of the authors of the poems bearing the name of Golias (q. v.), hence generally a writer of satirical poetry; a satirist. "The Goliards became a kind of monkish rhapsodists, the companions and rivals of the jongleurs (the reciters of the merry and licentious fableaux)."- Milman : Latin Christianity, ix. 189. Gō-li-ard-er-ý, s. [GOLIAS.] Ch. Hist.: The name given to the series of satirical Latin poems directed against the abuses of the Roman Church in the thirteenth century. Wright considers them to have been the immediate predece ors, and in some sense the cause, of the Crede of Piers the Ploughman and of the writings of Wycliffe, and thus to have contributed to the Reformation. From a cla ical standpoint, the majority of them are generally below criticism; from a moral point of view they are vigorous and healthy, though in studying them nineteenth-century readers must bear in mind the great jealousy of monastic orders which has in all ages existed among the secular clergy, and the tendency in minds ec. clesiastical to exaggerate into grave sins what ord i nary men would be inclined to consider as mere peccadilloes. With this preface, a few lines from the Invective of Golias against the Cistercians may be quoted: "Nil nisi præsentia sitiunt aut quærunt; Farciunt marsupia, metunt quæ non serunt; Pauperum penuria sese ditaverunt Satanæ mancipia sunt et semper erunt." Occasionally Golias seems to have relinquished his moral mi ion, and to have degenerated into a convivial rhymester; of this style examples may be found in Long fellow's Golden Legend (iv.), where Lucifer, disguised as a friar, finds admi ion to the refectory. These verses are genuine products of the late Middle Ages. A le -known example from the Confe io Goliæ runs thus: "Mihi nunquam spiritus poetriæ datur Nisi tunc cum fuerit venter bene satur Cum in arce cerebri Bacchus dominatur In me Phœbus irruit et miranda fatur." These poems are rhymed, but now and again there crops up evidence that the writer was capable of better things. For example, in the Prædicatio Golicæ one meets with lines like these: "Et ne forte cogita 'Vivam decem ann is Tunc me vilioribus castigabo pannis, Cum induar vestibus Pauli vel Joannis;" and then, by a marvelous compensation, a dainty cla ic gem: "Sic expect at rustic us, sed defluat amnis," which, by its brilliance, almost compensates for the tawdrine of the setting. Gō-11-ăs, s . (For etym. see def.] Ch. Hist.: The name under which certain satirical poems on ecclesiastical subjects were given to sin, aş; expect, Xenophon, exist. ph = f. Goliath the world in the thirteenth century. Many of them have been attributed to Walter de Mapes, though there is little ground for this opinion. Wright considers Golias to be a pseudonym, "apparently from gula , and having nothing in common with the French gaillard ." ( Latin Poems attributed to Wal ter de Mapes , xii.) Du Cange, in support of the opinion that Golias was a real personage, quotes Silvester Giraldus: qui Gulias "Paras it us quidam Golias nomine melius, qui a gulæ et crapulæ per omnia deditus, dici potuit." Speculum Ecclesiæ , lib. iv., cap. xvi. The balance of testimony, however, inclines to the view advanced by Wright: "Golinas, the burlesque répresentative of the clerical order, the instrument through which their vices were satirized."- Wright : Latin Poems attributed to Walter de Mapes, xii. Go-li-ath, s. [Hebrew Goleath the celebrated giant of Gath whom David slew (1 Sam. xv. 1-54).] (For def. see compound.) IMG:content-0614.png:[blocks in formation]