In Baldessar Castiglione's Book of the Courtier, there is a discussion of meaning, in which one disputant imputes it to words, and the other questions him in the Socratic manner:
I would know then, quoth the Count, whether this stile and measure which you speake of, arise of the sentences or of the wordes?
Of the wordes, answered Sir Frederick.
Do you not think then, quoth the Count, that the wordes of Silius and Cornelius Tacitus are the very same that Virgil and Cicero use? and taken in the same signification?
Sir Fridericke aunswered: They are the very same in dede, but some yl applyed and dyverslye taken.
The Count aunswered: In case a manne should pyke out of a booke of Cornelius and of Silius, al the woordes placed in other signification then is in Virgil and Cicero, (whiche should bee verye fewe) woulde you not then saye that Cornelius in the tounge were equall with Cicero, and Silius with Virgil?
Then the L. Emilia: Me thinke (quoth shee) thys youre dysputation hathe lasted to longe, and hathe been verye tedyouse, therefore it shall bee best to deferre it untill an other tyme.
Dang, Emilia. Just when we were about to get somewhere.
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