adv. [f. SUPERFICIAL + -LY2.]
1. On or at the surface; Anat. just beneath the surface. Const. to: On or at the surface of.
1570. Foxe, A. & M. (ed. 2), 2121/1. They … began to refricate and rippe vp the old sore, the skarre wherof, had bene but superficially cured.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 229. This change and transmutation of the said polype or pour-cuttle fish, entreth not deeply in, but appeareth superficially in the skin.
1646. Sir T. Browne, Pseud. Ep., II. i. 52. Ice … will … neither float above like lighter bodies, but being neare, or in equality of weight, lye superficially or almost horizontally unto it.
1737. Bracken, Farriery Impr. (1757), II. 215. I could easily see the Vein pass superficially upon the Out-side of the Tumour.
1767. Gooch, Treat. Wounds, I. 361. The tent is to be left out, and the wound dressed superficially.
1853. Lyell, Princ. Geol., xvii. (ed. 9), 257. Beds of turf … precisely similar to those now formed superficially on the extreme borders of the Adriatic.
1870. Rolleston, Anim. Life, 3. Another vein, which, from its being placed superficially to the sterno mastoid muscle, we know to be the homologue of the external jugular of anthropotomy.
b. in fig. context.
1638. R. Baker, trans. Balzac’s Lett., II. 196. Things that wounded me heretofore at the very heart, doe not now so much as superficially touch me.
1647. H. More, Poems, 195. Our soul’s not superficially colourd by phantasms.
1735. Bolingbroke, On Parties, iv. 36. When the same Opinions revived at the Restoration, They did not sink deep even then into the Minds of Men; but floated so superficially there, that [etc.].
2. Without depth or thoroughness of knowledge, observation, treatment, etc.; not profoundly or thoroughly.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 61. Dayly to thynke on these v thynges folowynge, not superficially, that is lyghtly passyng ouer them, but with grauite, inwardly.
1576. Fleming, Panopl. Epist., 155. Your grace … will take a viewe of the cause, & wey the same, not superficially, but with due consideration.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., II. ii. 165. You haue both said well: And on the cause and question now in hand, Haue gloz’d, but superficially.
1667. Milton, P. L., VI. 476. Whose Eye so superficially surveyes These things, as not to mind from whence they grow.
1712. Steele, Spect., No. 432, ¶ 8. By such early Corrections of Vanity, while Boys are growing into Men, they will gradually learn not to censure superficially.
1821. Lamb, Elia, Ser. I. Old & New Schoolm. The modern schoolmaster … must be superficially, if I may so say, omniscient.
1867. Freeman, Norm. Conq., I. iv. 273. Looked at superficially, there is a certain likeness between the two.
1875. Miss Braddon, Strange World, I. i. 18. I have studied the subject but superficially in the pages of our friend Cicero.
3. As to outward appearance or form; externally, on the surface.
1570. R. Hichcock, Quintess. Wit (1590), 20. Nobilitie and gravitie, wherof men superficially make such estimation.
1571. Golding, Calvin on Ps. lxxi. 22. He will not give thanks unto God feynedly, nor superficially, but … with an earnest zelousnes.
1878. H. S. Wilson, Alpine Ascents, iii. 103. Melchior … looks superficially like an Italian.
1890. Spectator, 31 May, 753/1. It is the old story over again, always repeated whenever a Christian province of Turkey asks for emancipation, always superficially true, and always substantially false.
1893. Bookman, June, 86/1. Her [Madame de Krüdener’s] ambitions superficially so different at different times, and yet substantially the same.
