NOVATIAN 



NOVELS 



541 



New Brunswick was created in 17*1 out of Nova 

 Scotian territory. 



See Halibur ton's Nova Scotia (1829), Murdoch's 

 Hittory of Nni-a Scotia (18C7), Hannay's Nora Scotia 

 (1879), Kingsford's History of Canada (188J), and the 

 government handbooks. 



\ovatiun. a priest of the Roman Cliurch in tlie 

 3d century, and tlie leader of a sect called after his 

 name. The place and time of his birth are not 

 known with certainty. Novatian is said to have 

 been a stoic philosopher, but after his arrival in 

 Koine was converted to Christianity, and, being 

 seized with sudden illness while still a catechumen, 

 received what was called clinical baptism i.e. hap- 

 tisni administered on a sick-bed and without the 

 solemn ceremonial. Such baptism was in ordinary 

 circumstances un Impediment to holy orders. Not- 

 withstanding this irregular baptism, Novatian was 

 promoted to orders by Fabian the Roman bishop, 

 and soon acquired great reputation by his learning 

 and eloquence. .Soon after the Decian persecution 

 a great controversy arose about the manner of deal- 

 ing with the lapsed i.e. those who fell away during 

 persecution. Novatian at first inclined to the milder 

 side, but on the election of Cornelius to the Roman 

 bishopric ( March 2.31 ), and on Cornelius taking the 

 indulgent course towards the lapsed, Novatian, 

 together with Xovatus ami some other discontented 

 priests of Carthage, opposed his authority, ami 

 eventually Novatian was chosen by a small party 

 and actually ordained bishop in opposition to 

 Cornelius. "The party who espoused his cause was 

 called by his name. They were confined mainly, 

 in the first instance, to Koine and to Carthage, 

 where a similar conflict had arisen. They held 

 that in the grievous sin of idolatry through fear 

 of persecution the church had no jiower to absolve 

 the penitent ; and therefore, although it does not 

 appear that they excluded such sinners from all 

 hope of heaven, yet they denied the lawfulness of 

 readmitting them to the communion of the church. 

 This doctrine they extended at a later period to all 

 grievous sins of whatever character. In this view 

 the church was merely a community of saints whose 

 very existence is endangered by the presence of 

 one sinner. Cyprian ( n. v. ), at first rigorous against 

 the lapsed, gradually abated his severity. 



Novatian may thus lie regarded as the first anti- 

 pope. The churches throughout Italy, Africa, and 

 the East adhered to Cornelius ; but the Novatian 

 party set up bishops and established churches not 

 only at Carthage, but at Constantinople, Alex- 

 andria, Nicomedia, in I'hrygia, Gaul, Spain, and 

 elsewhere. They claimed for themselves a character 

 of especial purity, and assumed the appellation of 

 Cathari (Puritans). The time and manner of the 

 death of Novatian is uncertain. According to 

 Socrates he died a martyr in the persecution of 

 Valerian, but this is Improbable. His sect sur- 

 vived long after his death. An unsuccessful effort 

 was made in the Council of Nice to reunite them 

 to the church ; and traces of them are still discov- 

 erable in the East down to the end of the 6th 

 century. See the Letters of Cyprian, Eusebius ; 

 also Ualch's Ketzerhistorie (vol. it.). 



Nova /< in Ma ( Russ. Xoivtja ZemJja, ' New 

 Land'), an Arctic island lying 'lietween the Kara 

 Sea and Barents Sea, and separated at its southern 

 extremity from the Island of Vaigatcli by Kara 

 Strait, 30 miles wide. Long and narrow, it meas- 

 ures 600 miles from north to south and 60 in 

 average width, and is cut in two nearly midway up 

 by a narrow winding sea-passage, the Matochkin 

 Shar. The western side is broken by several bays, 

 often studded with islands. The southern portion 

 is apparently little authentic is known about the 

 Ulterior a plateau of moderate height ; the centre 



and north are mountainous, rising to 4000 feet and 

 perhaps higher, and are covered with snow and ice. 

 The continuation of the Gulf Stream reaches the 

 western shores and prevents them from being always 

 icelwund. Although not permanently inhabited, 

 it is visited by Russian and Norwegian seamen 

 and huntei-s for the capture of the numerous sea- 

 fowl, whales, walrus, seals, and dolphins which 

 frequent its coasts. It was known to the hunters 

 of Novgorod in the llth century, but was redis- 

 covered by Sir Hugh Willonghby in 1553, and has 

 been frequently visited since then, much scientific 

 information about its animal and plant life having 

 l*en collected since 1868. See Markham, Polar 

 liei'onnaissance ( 1881 ). 



Novelise. See JUSTINIAN. 



Novello, VINCENT, musical composer and pub- 

 lisher, was bom in London, of an Italian father 

 and English mother, on 6th September 1781. He 

 officiated as organist in various chapels in London, 

 and was one of the founders of the Philharmonic 

 and similar musical societies. His musical com- 

 positions, chiefly sacred, are considered to have 

 contributed much to the improvement of cathedral 

 music. Hut it is as a painstaking editor of un- 

 published works of eminent musicians that he 

 deserves chiefly to lie remembered. He died at 

 Nice, 9th August 1861. His daughter, CLARA 

 ANASTASIA, a distinguished vocalist, was liorn in 

 London in 1818 ; won great triumphs in the chief 

 cities of Europe ; but having in 1S43 married Count 

 Gigliucci, she quitted the stage in 18BO. 



Novels. ' Novel,' as the name of a thing, came 

 to us with the thing itself from Italy early in the 

 reign of Eli/abeth. Boccaccio, from whom Painter 

 took the 'excellent nouelles' in his Palace of 

 Pleasure, applies 'novella' somewhat indiscrimi- 

 nately, and in his preface speaks of 'novels or fables 

 or parables or stories' as if they meant pretty 

 much the same thing; but in 'Provencal, and 

 according to the Cento Norelle A nticlie, ' noella ' or 

 'novella seems to have meant originally some 

 new drollery, jest, or lion-mot something, as 

 Borghini explains, that pleased by its freshness, 

 and the ' noellaire ' or ' novellatore to have been a 

 kind of jester who collected and retailed such 

 things. Most of the Cento Korclle and a large 

 niinil>erof Boccaccio's, notably those of the sixth, 

 seventh, and eighth days, are' of this sort, and in 

 the collections of Sacchetti and Ser Giovanni the 

 proportion is still greater. In fact the primitive 

 novella was something much more akin to the 

 facetiieol Poggio, the Cent XoureUes noiirelles, the 

 stories of the Heptameron , the Hvmlred Mery Talys, 

 and even their humble relatives, the jests attributed 

 to Joe Miller, than to the long, grave, and often 

 tragic narratives that appeared under the title 

 when it had grown elastic in the 16th century. 

 But if ' novel ' has departed from its original signi- 

 fication, 'romance' has wandered still farther. 

 The word originally had nothing whatever to do 

 with any form or species of composition. It was 

 simply the name given in the middle ages to the 

 spoken language of the commonalty, particularly 

 in France and Spain, in contradistinction to the 

 Latin or Letra, the language of the learned classes 

 and the language used in documents and writings 

 of all kinds. In time, however, it came to mean 

 not only the vehicle but also the thing conveyed ; 

 anything in Romance was called romance, and 

 naturally the term was extensively applied to the 

 rreat source of popular recreation, the songs of the 

 minstrels and troiiverea, by which it was in the 

 end almost monopolised. Hence the two meanings 

 >f ' romance' in Spanish (1) the vernacular ('en 

 men Romance ' is the precise equivalent of our 

 >hrase ' in plain English ) ; (2) a piece of popular 



