ured panels, and (below) two angels drawing back a curtain (all in
marble) so as to expose the open grating of the confessio. The
magnificent cloisters of S. Paolo fuori le Mura, built about 1285 by
Giovanni, the youngest of the Cosmati, are one of the most beautiful
works of this school. The baldacchino of the same basilica is a signed
work of the Florentine Arnolfo del Cambio, 1285, "cum suo socio Petro,"
probably a pupil of the Cosmati. Other works of Arnolfo, such as the
Braye tomb at Orvieto (q.v.), show an intimate artistic alliance between
him and the Cosmati. The equally magnificent cloisters of the Lateran,
of about the same date, are very similar in design; both these triumphs
of the sculptor-architect's and mosaicist's work have slender marble
columns, twisted or straight, richly inlaid with bands of glass mosaic
in delicate and brilliant patterns. The shrine of the Confessor at
Westminster is a work of this school, executed about 1268. The general
style of works of the Cosmati school is Gothic in its main lines,
especially in the elaborate altar-canopies, with their pierced
geometrical tracery. In detail, however, they differ widely from the
purer Gothic of northern countries. The richness of effect which the
English or French architect obtained by elaborate and carefully worked
mouldings was produced in Italy by the beauty of polished marbles and
jewel-like mosaics--the details being mostly rather coarse and often
carelessly executed.

An excellent account of the Cosmati is given by Boito, _Architettura
del media evo_ (Milan, 1880), pp. 117-182.

COSMIC (from Gr. [Greek: kosmos], order or universe), pertaining to the
universe, universal or orderly. In ancient astronomy, the word
"cosmical" means occurring at sunrise, and designates especially the
rising or setting of the stars at that time. "Cosmical physics" is a
term broadly applied to the totality of those branches of science which
treat of cosmical phenomena and their explanation by the laws of
physics. It includes terrestrial magnetism, the tides, meteorology as
related to cosmical causes, the aurora, meteoric phenomena, and the
physical constitution of the heavenly bodies generally. It differs from
astrophysics only in dealing principally with phenomena in their wider
aspects, and as the products of physical causes, while astrophysics is
more concerned with minute details of observation.

COSMOGONY (from Gr. [Greek: kosmos], world an