a. [ad. L. comprehensīv-us, f. comprehens- ppl. stem of comprehendĕre: see COMPREHEND) and -IVE. Cf. mod. F. compréhensif, -ive.]
1. gen. Characterized by comprehension; having the attribute of comprising or including much; of large content or scope.
1614. Selden, Titles Hon., Pref. Then is the Ciuilians definition of it enough comprehensiue.
1628. T. Spencer, Logick, 213. The comprehensiue whole, is parted between the things comprehended therein.
1655–60. Stanley, Hist. Philos. (1701), 3. His Aim is more Comprehensive.
1709. Berkeley, Th. Vision, Ded. The most noble, pleasant, and comprehensive of all the senses.
1809–10. Coleridge, Friend (1865), 21. Happiness (or, to use a … more comprehensive term, solid well-being).
1849. Ruskin, Sev. Lamps, 1. The reply was as concise as it was comprehensive—‘know what you have to do, and do it.’
1875. Jowett, Plato (ed. 2), IV. 124. A comprehensive survey of the philosophy of Plato.
b. Inclusive of; embracing.
a. 1657. R. Loveday, Lett. (1663), 244. [A] Tongue … comprehensive of such rich and rational expressions.
1691. Ray, Creation, I. (1704), 190. Plant thee Orchards … in such order as may be … most comprehensive of Plants.
1720. Gordon & Trenchard, Indep. Whig, No. 22 (1728), 206. Charity it self, which is comprehensive of all the Vertues.
1839. Bailey, Festus (1854), 132. O Heaven … comprehensive of all life.
c. Sometimes with the enlarged sense: Containing much in small compass, compendious.
1652. Pepys, Diary, 17 Aug. The Lord’s Prayer … In Whose comprehensive words we sum up all our imperfect desires.
1684. Earl Roscomm., Ess. Transl. Verse, 52. But who did ever in French Authors see The comprehensive English Energy?
2. Characterized by mental comprehension: a. that grasps or understands (a thing) fully.
1628. Donne, Serm., 1 Cor. xiii. 12. A comprehensive knowledge of God it [our knowledge] cannot be.
a. 1641. Bp. Mountagu, Acts & Mon. (1642), 27. Comprehensive knowledge … is no part of our Indowments.
1677. Gale, Crt. Gentiles, II. IV. 294. Comprehensive knowledge is that whereby the whole of an object, so far as it is intelligible, is knowen.
1784. Cowper, Task, V. 251. A comprehensive faculty that grasps Great purposes with ease.
b. Embracing many things, broad in mental grasp, sympathies, or the like.
1700. Dryden, Pref. to Fables, Wks. (Globe), 501. He [Chaucer] must have been a man of a most wonderful comprehensive nature.
1721. Lett. fr. Mist’s Jrnl. (1722), II. 126. These very philosophical comprehensive Men.
1818. Jas. Mill, Brit. India, Pref. 17, note. The superiority of the comprehensive student over the partial observer.
a. 1843. Southey, Inscript., xxxii. One comprehensive mind All overseeing and pervading all.
3. Logic. Intensive.
1725. Watts, Logic, I. vi. § 9 (heading). Of a comprehensive Conception of Things, and of Abstraction.
1785. Reid, Intell. Powers, V. i. Wks. 390/2. It is an axiom in logic—that the more extensive any general term is, it is the less comprehensive.
1850. T. S. Baynes, New Anal. Logical Forms, 72, note. It [the reasoning] is comprehensive or intensive, for it proceeds from the concrete to the abstract, from a greater totality of attribute to a less.
