Also 5 -ite, 6 -ytie, 7 -itie. [ad. late L. corporālitās (Tertullian), f. corporāl-is CORPORAL: see -ITY. Cf. mod.F. corporalité (Bossuet).]
1. The quality of consisting of matter; material or corporeal existence; materiality.
1398. Trevisa, Barth. De P. R., VIII. xxviii. (1495), 338. Sauynge the corporalite of eyther and contynuaunce of theyr substancyall partyes.
1614. Raleigh, Hist. World, I. 7. Aristotle findeth corporality in the beames of light.
1642. H. More, Song of Soul, II. II. iii. xxix. That fond grosse phansie … Of the souls corporal’tie.
1662. J. Chandler, Van Helmont’s Oriat., 150. A Mathematicall corporality or bodiliness.
1711. S. Clarke, Lett. to Dodwell, 71. The Corporality of the Soul.
1882–3. Schaff, Encycl. Relig. Knowl., 1464. Perhaps he … considered corporality and substantiality as identical ideas.
† b. as opposed to spirituality. Obs.
1627–77. Feltham, Resolves, I. xix. 34. Take her as she is in her self, not dimm’d and thickned with the mists of corporality; then is she a beauty.
1655. Fuller, Ch. Hist., III. vi. § 21. Whether the spirituality of them shall refine the rest … or the corporality, or earthliness of them, depress them.
† c. Alchemy. The gross and earthy part of anything, incapable of sublimation. Obs.
1660. trans. Paracelsus’ Archidoxis, I. IV. 52. In that Colour is the Quintessence contained, the residue is the Corporality.
1683. Salmon, Doron Med., I. 310. In this color are the Potestates contained, the residue is the ‘Corporality.’
2. The quality of being embodied; embodied existence or condition.
1642. H. More, Song of Soul, II. i. I. xii. [They] deeply doubt if corporalitie were stroy’d Whether that inward first vitalitie Could then subsist.
1691. E. Taylor, trans. Behmen’s Theos. Philos., 358. The Precious Gold of Heavenly Corporality.
1847. Blackw. Mag., LXI. 755. Until certified of his corporality, [we] shall set down the gentleman … as a member of an imaginary clan.
b. concr. Bodily substance or organism, body.
1841. Fraser’s Mag., XXIII. 217. I would much rather have repaired their minds with learning … than their corporalities with drugs.
† 3. Corporate quality or organization of a society, town, etc. Obs.
1556. Corpor. of Axbridge, in 3rd Rep. Comm. Hist. MSS. (1872), 303/2. The same yere oure Corporalytie was granted.
† b. concr. A body of men; a CORPORATION. Obs.
1603. [see CORPORALTY].
1641. Milton, Reform., 5. Citations … to be served by a corporality of griffonlike promoters and apparitors.
4. pl. Corporal or bodily matters: things pertaining to bodily wants, etc. Cf. temporalities.
1748. Richardson, Clarissa (1811), VIII. x. 52. Motives of convenience, or mere corporalities, as I may say.
