ABSTRACT
VACANCY, VACUITY, INANITY. Vacancy and vacuity both denote the space unoccupied, or the abstract quality of being unoccupied. Inanity, from the Latin inanis, denotes the abstract quality of emptiness or of not containing anything: hence the former terms vacancy and vacuity are used in an indifferent sense; inanity always in a bad sense: there may be a vacancy in the mind, or a vacancy in life, which we may or may not fill up as we please; but inanity of character denotes the want of the essentials that constitute a character.
