Now rare or Obs. Pl. vehicula; also 7 -aes. [L.: see VEHICLE sb.]
1. = VEHICLE sb. 1. Also fig. and transf.
1624. Bedell, Lett., x. 143. Here is … some truth mingled among, to giue the better grace, and to be as it were the Vehiculum of a lie.
1655. Culpepper, etc., Riverius, I. vii. 33. The Dose is one dram in any proper Liquor or Vehiculum to swallow it down with.
1678. Cudworth, Intell. Syst., I. i. § 8. 12. We doubt not but to make a Sovereign Antidote against Atheism, out of that very Philosophy, which so many have used as a Vehiculum to convey this Poyson of Atheism by.
1787. Maty, trans. Riesbeck’s Trav. Germ., III. 76. Burgundy is the standing vehiculum of green pease.
2. = VEHICLE sb. 6. In quots. fig.
1633. Prynne, 1st Pt. Histrio-m., 65. Unchast, Obscene, and Amorous wordes, are but so many vehiculaes, to carrie men on to Adulterous and Sinfull deedes.
1642. Howell, Instr. Forr. Trav. (Arb.), 59. Speech is the … Ambassador of the mind, and the Tongue the Vehiculum, the Chariot, which conveyeth … the notions of the Mind to Reasons Palace.
3. = VEHICLE sb. 2.
1652. Ashmole, Theat. Chem., Annot. 451. She is the Planet neerest the Earth, and appointed as it were the Vehiculum of all other heavenly Influences unto what is Sublunary.
1668. Howe, Bless. Righteous, 325. Are not the exceeding great and precious promises, the Vehicula, the conveighances of the Divine Nature?
4. = VEHICLE sb. 4.
1656. Stanley, Hist. Philos. (1687), 189/1. Having imposed each one his proper Star as a vehiculum. Ibid., 191/1. The rest of the body they appointed as a vehiculum to serve this.
1794. R. J. Sulivan, View Nat., IV. 15. Plato … supposes, that into the vehiculum of the soul … is infused … a particular formative virtue, distinct, according to that star.
5. = VEHICLE sb. 5.
1668. Culpepper & Cole, Barthol. Anat., I. xvii. 44. The wheyish … exceeds the two excrementitious Cholers, by reason of the Blood, whose vehiculum it was to be.
