INDEPENDENTS, in religion, a name used in the 17th century for those holding to the autonomy of each several church or congregation, hence otherwise known as Congregationalists. Down to the end of the 18th century the former title prevailed in England, though not in America; while since then "Congregationalist" has obtained generally in both. (See CONGREGATIONALISM.) INDEX, a word that may be understood either specially as a table of references to a book or, more generally, as an indicator of the position of required information on any given subject. According to classical usage, the Latin word _index_ denoted a discoverer, discloser or informer; a catalogue or list; an inscription; the title of a book; and the fore or index-finger. Cicero also used the word to express the table of contents to a book, and explained his meaning by the Greek form _syllabus_. Shakespeare uses the word with the general meaning of a table of contents or preface--thus Nestor says (_Troilus and Cressida_, i. 3):-- "And in such indexes, although small pricks To their subsequent volumes, there is seen The baby figure of the giant mass." Table was the usual English word, and index was not thoroughly naturalized until the beginning of the 17th century, and even then it was usual to explain it as "index or table." By the present English usage, according to which the word "table" is reserved for the summary of the contents as they occur in a book, and the word "index" for the arranged analysis of the contents for the purpose of detailed reference, we obtain an advantage not enjoyed in other languages; for the French _table_ is used for both kinds, as is _indice_ in Italian and Spanish. There is a group of words each of which has its distinct meaning but finds its respective place under the general heading of index work; these are calendar, catalogue, digest, inventory, register, summary, syllabus and table.[1] The value of indexes was recognized in the earliest times, and many old books have full and admirably constructed ones. A good index has sometimes kept a dull book alive by reason of the value or amusing character of its contents. Carlyle referred to Prynne's _Histrio-Mastix_ as "a book still extant, but never more to be read by mortal"; but the index must have given amusement to many from the curious character of its entries, and Attorney-General Noy particularly alluded to it in his speech at Prynne's trial. Indexes have sometimes been used as vehicles of satire, and the witty Dr William King was the first to use them as a weapon of attack. His earliest essay in this field was the index added to the second edition of the Hon. Charles Boyle's attack upon Bentley's _Dissertation on the Epistles of Phalaris_ (1698).