[ad. L. sublīmitas, -tātem, f. sublīmis SUBLIME: See -ITY. Cf. F. sublimité, etc.] The state or quality of being sublime.
† 1. High or lofty position, height. Obs.
1563. Homilies, II. Agst. Peril Idol., II. H h iv. When Images are placed in Temples, and set in honorable sublimitie, and begin once to be worshipped.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. xvi. I. 11. The other cause of their [sc. the planets] sublimities is, for that [etc.].
1665. Sir T. Herbert, Trav. (1677), 192. The subtility of the air and the sublimity of those Hills, which he says surpass the Alps.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. iii. 137/2. Geometrical Terms for their Plots, Figures, [etc.]. Sublimities, the heights or highness of things.
† 2. High dignity of office, vocation, or the like.
1594. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., I. iv. 56. Being held with admiration of their own sublimitie and honor.
a. 1656. Ussher, Power of Princes, I. (1661), 43. The Regal sublimity is constituted by God.
a. 1700. Evelyn, Diary, 12 June 1650. He magnified the sublimity of the calling.
a. 1727. Newton, Chronol. Amended, ii. (1728), 226. Jupiter upon an Eagle to signify the sublimity of his dominion.
† b. A highly placed person. Obs.
1610. Boys, Exp. Domin. Ep. & Gosp., Wks. (1629), 163. Soueraigne Sublimities on earth are Gods among men.
† c. A high or dignified status. Obs.
1643. Prynne, Sov. Power Parl., I. 41. If we be profitable servants, why doe we envy the eternall gaines of our Lord for our temporall sublimities or Prerogatives?
d. The status of one whose title is ‘Sublime’; used with poss. pron. as a title of honor; in recent use chiefly applied to the Sultan of Turkey or to the Sublime Porte.
So med.L. sublimitas.
1553. T. Wilson, Rhet. (1580), 165. I beyng a Scholasticall panion, obtestate your sublimitie, to extoll myne infirmitie.
1589. [? Nashe], Almond for Parrat, Ded. 1. Which if your sublimitie accept in good part,… I am yours.
1820. Byron, Juan, IV. xci. In the Dardanelles, Waiting for his Sublimity’s firman.
1892. Sat. Rev., 22 Oct., 466/1. Its Sublimity was unable to perceive any violation of the Treaty of Berlin it its receiving the Prime Minister of a vassal State.
3. Loftiness or grandeur of nature, character, conduct or action; high excellence.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 208 b. The length, the brede, the deepnes, and the sublimite or hye excellence of the crosse of Chryst. [See Eph. iii. 18, Vulg.].
1597. Hooker, Eccl. Pol., V. lxvii. 181. Those things, which for height and sublimitie of matter … wee are not able to reach vnto.
1614. Raleigh, Hist. World, I. i. 11. In respect of Gods incomprehensible sublimitie, and puritie.
1655. M. Carter, Honor Rediv. (1660), 17. [Painting] hath been for its sublimity reckoned … among the liberall Sciences.
1756–7. trans. Keysler’s Trav. (1760), I. 343. That, for truth and sublimity of doctrine, no book or system in the whole world came up to the holy scriptures.
a. 1812. Buckminster, Serm. (1827), 36. Is there any thing to be learned … from the sublimity of the character, which is so much a subject of taste?
1851. Mariotti, Italy, 29. In 1846, France had not reached the acme of republican sublimity.
1870. Mozley, Univ. Serm., iii. (1876), 67. In the Christian doctrine of a future state … the real belief in the doctrine goes together with the moral sublimity of the state.
1874. L. Stephen, Hours in Libr. (1892), I. v. 192. The genuine old Puritan spirit ceases to be picturesque only because of its sublimity.
b. An instance of this; a sublime thing or being.
1642. Milton, Apol. Smect., 17. Knowledge and vertue, with such abstracted sublimities as these.
a. 1715. Burnet, Own Time (1766), I. 86. They … seemed to carry their devotions to a greater sublimity than others did. Ibid., 189. He loved to talk of great sublimities in religion.
1818. Byron, Ch. Har., IV. liv. The particle of those sublimities Which have relapsed to chaos.
1829. I. Taylor, Enthus., ii. (1867), 27. Those false sublimities of an enthusiastic pietism.
1837. Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. I. x. When such exhibition could appear a propriety, next door to a sublimity.
4. Loftiness of conception, sentiment, language, style or treatment.
1624. Gataker, Transubst., 103. That subtilty and sublimitie of wit, that Jerome commandeth in Ephrems workes.
1676. Hobbes, Iliad, Pref. (1686), 5. The Sublimity of a Poet, which is that Poetical Fury which the Readers for the most part call for.
1685. Baxter, Paraphr. N. T., 1 Cor. ii. 6. Sublimity and accurateness of Speech.
1781. Cowper, Table-T., 644. In him … Sublimity and Attic taste, combin’d.
1790. Paley, Horæ Paul., i. 7. Bursts of rapture and of unparalleled sublimity.
1841. W. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., I. 158. Polycletus,… a fellow-pupil of Phidias,… did not reach the sublimity of his rival in the representation of divinity.
1896. Dk. Argyll, Philos. Belief, 280. It is impossible to deny the sublimity of this conception.
5. That quality in external objects that awakens feelings of awe, reverence, lofty emotion, a sense of power, or the like.
1779. Johnson, L. P., Cowley (1868), 9. Sublimity is produced by aggregation, and littleness by dispersion.
1787. Polwhele, Engl. Orator, III. 512. His Voice Commanding … stern His Aspect and terrific … Sublimity his every Nod Attended.
1849. Ruskin, Seven Lamps, iii. § 9. 72. This expedient of continued series forms the sublimity of arcades and aisles.
1876. Miss Braddon, J. Haggard’s Dau., x. Earth’s loveliness or heaven’s sublimity.
b. A sublime feature; a sublime expanse.
1819. in Corr. Lady Lyttelton (1912), 214. The sublimities of the Alps.
a. 1853. Robertson, Lect., i. (1858), 19. His character had been moulded by the sublimities of the forms of the outward nature.
a. 1869. Lowell, Rhoecus, 157. The sky, With all its bright sublimity of stars.
6. The state of emotion produced by the perception or contemplation of the sublime.
1739. Hume, Hum. Nat., II. 282. Any great elevation of place communicates a kind of pride or sublimity of imagination.
c. 1791. Encycl. Brit. (1797), VIII. 107/2. The emotions of grandeur and sublimity are nearly allied.
1887. A. Bain, On Teaching Engl., vi. 100. The Emotion termed Sublimity is connected with vastness of Power.
7. A high degree or standard, a height; with the, the highest degree, height, summit, acme.
1637. Earl Monm., trans. Malvezzi’s Romulus & Tarquin, 241. Bounding upon madnesse, it [sc. Melancholy] brings men to a sublimity, out of which one cannot passe.
a. 1667. Jer. Taylor, Antiquitates Christianæ (1675), 114 (Ogilvie, 1882). The sublimity of Wisdom, to do those things living, which are to be desired and chosen by dying persons.
1812. Coleridge, Friend (1818), III. 34. There belong to it sublimities of virtues which all may attain, and which no man can transcend.
1823. Lamb, Guy Faux, in Eliana (1867), 20. I must make more haste; I shall not else climb the sublimity of this impiety. Ibid., 21. Such a sublimity of malice.
1883. trans. Stepniak’s Undergr. Russia, Introd. 42. He combines in himself the two sublimities of human grandeur: the martyr and the hero.
† b. A supreme or extreme phrase. Obs.
1651. N. Bacon, Disc. Govt. Eng., II. viii. (1739), 47. A qualified Legiance, without those sublimities of absolute, indefinite, immutable, &c.
Hence Sublimityship, as a mock title.
1839. North Wales Chron., 9 July, 2/7. His Egyptian Viceroy, who in turn seems nothing loth to meet his Sublimity-ship in this struggle for dominion.
1858. Lytton, What will He do? I. xvii. Her Serene Sublimityship, Lady Selina Vipont.
