Definition of "seraphic"

Who forthwith from the glittering Staff unfurld / Th’ imperial Enſign, which full high advanc’t / Shon like a Meteor ſtreaming to the Wind / With Gemms and Golden luſtre rich imblaz’d, / Seraphic arms and Trophies : all the while / Sonorous metal blowing Martial ſounds […]

1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], […]; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, lines 536–539

Ye Hoſts that to his Courts belong, / Cherubic Quires, Seraphic Flames, / Awake the everlaſting Song.

1739, John Wesley, “God’s Greatness”, in Hymns and Sacred Poems, 4th edition, Bristol: Felix Farley (1743), page 108

A thousand times he was like to have denyed all, but durst not defame the most sacred Idol of his Soul: Sometimes he thought his Uncle would be generous, and think it fit to give him Silvia; but that Thought was too Seraphick to remain a Moment in his Heart.

1684, Aphra Behn, Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister‎, London: Randal Taylor, pages 90–91

Their passion seems to have been of the seraphic kind. She devoted herself to religion, and persuaded him to do the same.

1782, Thomas Pennant, The Journey from Chester to London‎, London: B. White, Part 2, p. 407

Too white, for the flower of life is red; Her flesh was the soft, seraphic screen Of a soul that is meant (her parents said) To just see earth, and hardly be seen, And blossom in Heaven instead.

1864, Robert Browning, “Gold Hair”, in Dramatis Personæ‎, London: Chapman & Hall, page 27

She had a seraphic smile on her face.

1958, T. H. White, chapter 5, in The Once and Future King, London: Collins, published 1959

So instead of Tesfaye’s seraphic warble, Hanley offers earthier, gruffer tones: you get the impression, considering the casual sexism and more conventional machismo on display here, that the rarefied, stylised and feminised would be unacceptable in his world.

2012 January 25, Paul Lester, “Schoolboy Q (No 1,193)”, in The Guardian‎