Pl. vacua and vacuums. [L. vacuum, neut. of vacuus empty: cf. VACUOUS a. So F. vacuum, It., Sp., Pg. vacuo.]
1. Emptiness of space; space unoccupied by matter. Now rare or Obs.
1550. Cranmer, Lord’s Supper, 21. Naturall reason abhorreth vacuum, that is to say, that there shoulde be any emptye place, wherin no substance shoulde be.
1570. Dee, Math. Pref., 35. This Arte is very proffitable: to proue, that Vacuum, or Emptines is not in the world.
1626. Bacon, Sylva, § 83. The more gross of the Tangible Parts do contract and serve themselves together … to avoid Vacuum.
1657. Trapp, Ezra ix. 6. For beyond the moveable Heavens, Aristotle … saith there is neither body, nor time, nor place, nor vacuum.
1676. Poor Robin’s Intell., 30 May–6 June, 1/1. Having his head as ful of Vacuum as his small proportion of brains was capable of.
1795. W. Blake, Bk. Los, i. Round the flames roll,… mounting on high Into Vacuum, into nonentity, Where nothing was.
1843. Penny Cycl., XXVI. 76/1. The astronomical argument, therefore, in favour of absolute vacuum has fallen.
2. A space entirely empty of matter.
1607. A. Brewer, Lingua, IV. i. H i b. First shall the whole Machin of the world … returne to … Chaos, then the least vacuvm be found in the vniuerse.
1638. Wilkins, New World, I. (1684), 23. To dispute against Democritus, who thought, that the World was made by the casual concourse of Atoms in a great Vacuum.
1714. Let. from Layman (ed. 2), 7. A Government can’t rightfully restrain a Man’s professing the Belief of a Vacuum, or a Plenum.
1763. Johnson, in Boswell, 21 July. There are objections against a plenum, and objections against a vacuum; yet one of them must … be true.
1865. J. Grote, Plato, I. i. 80. Proceeding upon his hypothesis of atoms and vacua as the only objective existences.
1884. F. Temple, Relat. Relig. & Sci., i. (1885), 8. The reasons why … Nature abhors a vacuum were discovered.
b. A space empty of air, esp. one from which the air has been artificially withdrawn.
sing. 1652. French, Yorksh. Spa, ii. 7. So much air being spent, there would of necessity follow a vacuum.
1660. Boyle, New Exp. Phys. Mech., Proem 2. The Interest of the Ayr, in hindring the descent of the Quick-silver, in the famous Experiment touching a Vacuum.
1713. Derham, Phys.-Theol., 8, note. The Ear-wig … and some other Insects would seem unconcerned at the Vacuum a good while, and lie as dead; but revive in the Air.
1758. Reid, trans. Macquer’s Chym., I. 299. The air contained therein is condensed, and leaves a vacuum, which the external air … tends to occupy.
1829. Nat. Philos., Heat, I. ii. 2. (L.U.K.). Count Rumford proved the passage of heat through a Torricellian vacuum, that is, the space left at the top of a barometer by the mercury falling.
1860. Maury, Phys. Geog., i. § 6. At the height of 80 or 90 miles there is a vacuum far more complete than any which we can produce by any air-pump.
1872. J. P. Cooke, New Chem., 17. Alcohol expands more slowly into the aqueous vapor than it would into a vacuum.
pl. 1777. Phil. Trans., LXVII. 679. That the vacua be as nearly as possible compleat.
1832. Brewster, Nat. Magic, x. 262. The plates, being raised or depressed by the voluntary muscles, form so many vacua.
3. An empty space; a portion of space (left) unoccupied or unfilled with the usual or natural contents.
1589. Nashe, in Greene’s Menaphon (Arb.), 12. The Scythians, who … swaddle themselues streighter, to the intent no vacuum beeing left in their intrayles [etc.].
a. 1635. T. Randolph, Poems, Parley with his Empty Purse (1640), 113. Unnatural vacuum, can your emptinesse Answer to some slight questions?
1700. T. Brown, trans. Fresny’s Amusem., viii. He made a Dive into my Pocket, but encountring a Disappointment, Rub’d off, Cursing the Vacuum.
1758. J. S., Le Dran’s Observ. Surg. (1771), 141. I discovered a Vacuum upon the intercostal Muscles, from whence about a Spoonful of … Matter was discharged.
1791. H. Walpole, in Miss Berry’s Jrnl., I. 328. I shall fill my vacuum with some lines that General Conway has sent me.
a. 1838. C. Morris, Lyra Urban. (1840), II. 97. The Dandy’s head, A vacuum dead, Ne’er tries for thought to seek!
b. In various fig. uses.
1617. Middleton, Fair Quar., II. D iij b. I cannot see that vacuum in your bloud.
1630. Lennard, trans. Charron’s Wisd., vii. 33. It were a vacuum, a defect, a deformitie too absurd in nature … that betwixt two extreames … there should be no middle.
a. 1670. Hacket, Abp. Williams, I. (1692), 10. Commonly they misspent that triennial probation, and left upon that place a vacuum of doing little or nothing.
1710. Palmer, Proverbs, 384. ’Tis infinitely pleasing to observe there has been no Vacuum in our Life.
1772. Phil. Trans., LXII. 317. It should therefore seem that the larks from the more adjacent parts croud in to supply the vacuum occasioned by the London Epicures.
1829. Marryat, F. Mildmay, ix. The vacuum occasioned by my mother’s death.
1846. Grote, Greece (1862), I. xvi. 294. They filled up the vacuum of the unrecorded past.
1879. R. H. Elliot, Written on Foreheads, I. 140. So Martin Kerr … was left with a sheer, hopeless vacuum to fill up as best he could.
4. attrib. and Comb., as vacuum-brake, cleaner, cleanser, disk, distillation, engine, -made, -pan, -pump, -vessel.
Also vacuum-apparatus, -cylinder, -filter, -gauge, -shunt, -valve (Knight, 1875–84).
1875. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2686/1. *Vacuum-brake, a form of steam-operated car-brake.
1889. G. Findlay, Eng. Railway, 168. The train is fitted throughout with vacuum brakes.
1903. Hardwareman, 23 May, 395. A decision of … serious import as regards the operations of the *Vacuum Cleaner Co.
1903. Westm. Gaz., 30 May, 5/3. There is a machine at work, called the *‘vacuum cleanser,’ which gives them all, in turn, a thorough ‘spring cleaning.’
1860. Tyndall, Glac., I. xxiii. 163. Sometimes the *vacuum disks were parallel to the veins [of the glacier].
1899. trans. R. von Jaksch’s Clin. Diag., v. (ed. 4), 170. Still better for this purpose is the method of *vacuum distillation.
1825. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 670. The application of Mr. Brown’s pneumatic, or *vacuum engine.
1853. Ure, Dict. Arts (ed. 4), II. 879. *Vacuum-made liqueurs. Ibid. (1839), 1208. An apparatus inserted air-tight into the cover of the *vacuum-pan.
1857. Miller, Elem. Chem., Org., 66. The syrup … is boiled down again in the vacuum pan, and is obtained in the form of … crushed sugar.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, *Vacuum-pump, a pump attached to a marine steam-engine.
1899. Edin. Rev., April, 323. Professor Dewar’s coils and *vacuum-vessels.
