v. [f. L. levi-s light, after GRAVITATE v.]
1. intr. To rise by virtue of lightness; opposed to GRAVITATE 2 b. Now only with reference to ‘spiritualism.’
1673. Marvell, Reh. Transp., II. 186. A Lecture … upon the Centers of Knowledge and Ignorance, and how and when they Gravitate and Levitate.
1685. Boyle, Enq. Notion Nature, vi. 183. When ’tis there, it ceases either to gravitate, or, as some schoolmen speak, to levitate.
1879. Whitehall Rev., 13 Sept., 412/2. I have a stepson who levitates.
1887. Huxley, in 19th Cent., Feb., 201. It is asserted that a man or a woman ‘levitated’ to the ceiling, floated about there, and finally sailed out by the window.
2. trans. † a. To make lighter or of less weight. Obs. b. Chiefly in the language of ‘spiritualists’: To cause to rise in the air in consequence of lightness, or by reversing the action of gravity.
1686. Goad, Celest. Bodies, II. v. 221. The Air being of a sudden levitated to such a measure.
1875. Q. Jrnl. Sci., XII. 54. Many were levitated only in these unconscious states.
1884. Besant, in Longm. Mag., V. 167. Tables turn, furniture dances, men are ‘levitated,’ thought is read.
1892. W. S. Lilly, Gt. Enigma, 114. No reasonable man would receive Mrs. Guppy as an ambassadress from the Infinite and Eternal, merely because she was levitated.
1894. R. V. V. Sewell, in Century Mag., April, 834/1. If I would pay for the extra amount of gas required to levitate my person to the clouds [in a balloon], I might go.
Hence Levitated, Levitating ppl. adjs. Also Levitative a., adapted for or capable of levitation. Levitator, one who believes in levitation or professes ability to practise it.
1859. Herschel, Fam. Lect. Sci. Subj., iii. § 45 (1866), 131. The levitating portion of it being hurried off—the gravitating remaining behind.
1875. Q. Jrnl. Sci., XII. 52. In the century of the Church’s triumph, at least one Christian and one heathen case of levitated persons are recorded.
1887. Huxley, in 19th Cent., Feb., 202. Our reply to the levitators is just the same. Why should not your friend ‘levitate’?
1890. Edinb. Rev., July, 109. It had not indeed altogether escaped notice that bodies gain in weight through combustion; but the difficulty … was evaded by attributing to phlogiston a ‘levitative’ power.
1892. A. M. Clerke, Fam. Stud. Homer, x. 263. The dream of a levitative art lurked nowhere within the Homeric field of view.
1893. A. Lang, in Contemp. Rev., Sept., 380. The levitated boy … flew over a garden.
