a. Also 5 teped, 6 tepit. [ad. L. tepid-us lukewarm, f. tepēre to be warm. So obs. or dial. F. tépide (16th c. in Godef.).] Moderately or slightly warm; lukewarm.
a. lit. (Usually in reference to liquids.)
c. 1400. Lanfranc’s Cirurgie, 137. He worchiþ riȝtfulliche þat vsiþ teped oilis.
1626. Bacon, Sylva, § 346. For as a great heat keepeth bodies from putrefaction, but a tepid heat inclineth them to putrefaction.
1664. Evelyn, Kal. Hort. (1729), 201. Let the Water stand in the Sun till it grow tepid.
1744. Berkeley, Siris, § 78. A blister on the spot, and plenty of tepid tar-water.
1884. F. M. Chawford, Rom. Singer, ii. A cold sirocco, bringing showers of tepid rain from the south.
b. fig. = LUKEWARM 2.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, XI. Prol. 60. Gyf Crystis faithfull knychtis lyst ws be,… Than man we … Nowder be abasit, tepit, nor ȝit blunt.
1641. Gauden, Love of Truth, 30. A tepid and Laodicean love.
1740. Cheyne, Regimen, 333. Of the two Evils, Infidelity and Tepidity is … the worst … in regard of the Infidels and Tepid themselves.
1873. H. Spencer, Stud. Sociol., viii. (1874), 179. Remind them of certain precepts … in the creed they profess, and the most you get is a tepid assent.
Hence Tepidly adv., in a tepid or lukewarm manner; Tepidness = TEPIDITY. So † Tepidous a. Obs., tepid, lukewarm.
1696. Phillips (ed. 5), *Tepidly, lukewarm.
1873. H. Spencer, Stud. Sociol., viii. (1874), 179. The precepts tepidly assented to.
1821. Byron, Diary, Poet. Wks. (1846), 510/2. Some *tepid-ness on the part of Kean, or warmth on that of the author.
1903. Ld. Rosebery, in Westm. Gaz., 13 Oct., 8/2. This may explain a slight tepidness on the part of Australia.
1607. J. Carpenter, Plaine Mans Plough, 186. Those Angells … which were sometime *tepidous and backeward.
