Definition of "miscreant"

Thou art a Traitor, and a Miſcreant;Too good to be ſo, and too bad to liue,Since the more faire and chriſtall is the skie,The vglier ſeeme the cloudes that in it flye:

1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The life and death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene i], page 23, columns 1–2

A meagre Catchpole hurries me to fail; No Miscreant, so remorseless, ever toreThy Journals, Fog, or knock'd at Franklin's door

a. 1719, Joseph Addison, A Riddle of Dean Swift's verfified

Now wil the Chriſtian miſcreants be glad,Ringing with ioy their ſuperſtitious belles:And making bonfires for my ouerthrow.But ere I die thoſe foule IdolatersShall make me bonfires with their filthy bones, […]

c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, Act III, scene iii

Arise thou cursed Miscreaunt,That hast with knightlesse guile and trecherous trainFaire knighthood fowly shamed

1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, stanza 41

Before thine eyes, thou mild and blessed one, said he, half aloud, are these miscreants daring to hold their market, and trafficking in their hellish drugs

1825, Thomas De Quincey, “The Love-charm”, in Quarterly Magazine, Knight