Why was theory of cosmic aether discarded? Can cosmic aether be considered analogous to higgs field? Higgs field remains (almost) consistent throughout.
 A: The luminiferous aether was postulated to explain the propagation of electromagnetic waves. The nineteenth century physics knew wave equations in a medium and could not think that a medium was not necessary to propagate the electromagnetic ones. That was the function of the luminiferous aether.

The Michelson–Morley experiment was performed in 1887 by Albert A. Michelson and Edward W. Morley at what is now Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio.1 It attempted to detect the relative motion of matter through the stationary luminiferous aether ("aether wind"). The negative results are generally considered to be the first strong evidence against the then prevalent aether theory, and initiated a line of research that eventually led to special relativity, in which the stationary aether concept has no role. The experiment has been referred to as "the moving-off point for the theoretical aspects of the Second Scientific Revolution.

Special relativity does not admit of an inertial frame, that the aether was in the nineteenth century.
All quantum field theory fields permeating the vacuum do not have the characteristics of aether, i.e. an inertial frame at rest with everything else. The fields obey the covariance rules of special relativity; even though they permeate everything, they are not a different form  of the luminiferous aether.
A: There is the need of a new Einstein to say clearly that the speed of light c is the same as to have a aether. Because in the 20th last century it was not nice to talk about aether it comes out of use. But gravitation is some kind of aether and gravitation does influent light.
