a. [ad. Gr. κοσμικ-ός of the world or universe, f. κόσμος order, the world. Cf. F. cosmique.]
† 1. Of this world, worldly. Obs.
1649. J. Ellistone, trans. Behmen’s Epist., vii. § 13. 96. He must turne from his Imagining in the Cosmick Spirit [in spiritu mundi] wherewith the soule is covered and disguised.
2. Of or belonging to the universe considered as an ordered system or totality; relating to the sum or universal system of things.
1846. Grote, Greece (1862), I. xvi. 305. The one unchangeable cosmic substance.
1874. Blackie, Self-Cult., 11. Metaphysics is the knowledge of the absolute or cosmic reason so far as it is knowable by our limited individualised reason.
1875. Whitney, Life Lang., vii. 109. The great cosmic law of gravitation.
1877. Clifford, Lect. & Ess. (1886), 394 (title), Cosmic emotion. By a cosmic emotion—the phrase is Mr. Henry Sidgwick’s—I mean an emotion which is felt in regard to the universe or sum of things, viewed as a cosmos or order.
b. Relating to or dealing with the cosmos; Cosmic philosophy = COSMISM.
1874. J. Fiske, Cosmic Philos., I. 98. The Cosmic Philosophy, which aims only to organize into a universal body of truth the sum of general conclusions obtained by science, adopts as the only trustworthy guide for its inquiries the method of science.
1879. Rydberg, Magic Mid. Ages, iv. 181. Supernatural ideas in cosmic philosophy will destroy reason, morality, human feeling.
3. Belonging to the material universe as distinguished from the earth; extra-terrestrial.
1871. Tyndall, Fragm. Sc. (1879), II. Whether … the … molten condition of our planet was … due to the collision of cosmic masses or not.
1881. Carpenter, Microsc. & Rev., § 706. The presence of extremely minute particles … which there is strong reason for regarding as cosmic dust.
b. Characteristic of the vast scale of the universe and its changes; applied to the distances between the heavenly bodies, the periods of time occupied in their cycles, the velocity with which they move, and the like.
1874. Tyndall, Fragm. Sc. (1889), II. 195. The play between organism and environment through cosmic ranges of time.
Mod. What is the speed of an express train to the cosmic speed of a planet in its orbit?
4. Orderly, in good order; the opposite of chaotic. rare. Cf. COSMOS.
1858. Carlyle, Fredk. Gt. (1865), I. I. i. 9. Alas, the Books are not cosmic, they are chaotic. Ibid. (1867), Remin. (1881), II. 134. Rough nature I knew well already, but here it was reduced to cosmic.
† 5. ‘Cosmic disease, a synonym of Syphilis, from the universality of its prevalence’ (Syd. Soc. Lex.).
