From Insults to Descriptions


I was listening yesterday to Maccullough’s BBC Christian History documentary, in which he said that early Methodists had a very methodical way of going about the task of their salvation, and were called Methodists in mockery, a name which stuck.


I thought of other insults, which through the decades have been adopted as names, and later became compliments. Impressionists, Pre-Raphaelites, Fauvists (wild beasts!), Quakers, Shakers, Dominicans (from Domini Cannes, God’s dogs, because of their role in the Inquisition). Even the term Prime Minister was initially ironic!


Many a true word spoken in jest!!