Any subject of discourse or argument. The Scriptures furnish an unlimited number of topics for the preacher, and topics infinitely interesting.

In rhetoric, a probable argument drawn from the several circumstances and places of a fact. Aristotle wrote a book of topics. Cicero defines topics to be the art of finding arguments.

Principle of persuasion. Contumacious persons whom no topics can work upon.

In medicine, an external remedy; a remedy to be applied outwardly to a particular part of the body, as a plaster, a poultice, a blister and the like.

Pertaining to a place, limited; local; as a topical remedy.

Pertaining to a topic or subject of discourse, or to a general head.