Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a Quaker.

[1661		‘A Puritan’ in Ebsworth Choyce Drollery (1876) 196: He [i.e. a puritan] swore by yea and nay / He would have no denial].
1684–5		‘The West-Country Counsellor’ in Ebsworth Bagford Ballads (1878) II 494: Now it happen’d one Day, that Friend Yea and Nay / Came to court me.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Yea and Nay-Men Quakers.
1703		Apollo’s Feast 25: There is no harm, only, yea, and nay, hath throw G — damme down stairs.
[1705–07		N. Ward Hudibras Redivivus II:4 24: We also had, to gratify us, / A Quaking Song from Ananias, / Who sung it as a Man may say, / His Chorus being Yea and Nay].
1714		T. Lucas Lives of the Gamesters (1930) 242: The pretended Yea and Nay laying close siege to his pockets, took out [...] 20 guineas.
c.1720		‘The Miraculous Hen’ in Holloway & Black I (1975) 180: She went to the house of the great Yea and Nay.
1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: Yea and Nay-Men Quakers.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		Satirist (London) 27 Jan. 451/3: Petitions are ready [...] conveying the hopes and wishes of the broad brim community, that one drab coat at least may be allowed to put in a ‘yea’ and ‘nay’.

2. attrib. use of sense 1.

1700		N. Ward London Spy XVI 386: His Yea and Nay Adversary ask’d him, What he thought a Quaker to be?
1768		Foote Devil Upon Two Sticks in Works (1799) II 271: Paw! brother Doctors, don’t let him [i.e. ‘Dr Melchisedech Broadbrim’] bother us, with his yea and nay nonsense!

3. (also yay-nay) a simpleton, capable of answering only ‘yes’ or ‘no’; thus a poor conversationalist, a monosyllabic person.

1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: yea-and-nay-men [...] any simple Fellows.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. 249: yay-nay ‘a poor yay-nay’ fellow, one who has no conversational power, and can only answer yea or nay to a question.
1862		E. de la Bédollière Londres et les Anglais 319/2: yea and nay man, un homme laconique, qui ne répond que par oui ou non.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1882		Sydney Sl. Dict. (2 edn) 11: Yay-nay - A poor ‘yes’ and ‘no’ person.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 98: Yay, Nay, an unconversational person, who only answers‘yay’ or‘nay’ to questions.