2. To wear away by degrees; to impair gradually; to diminish by constant loss; to use up; to consume; to
spend; to wear out.
Until your carcasses be wasted in the wilderness.
Num. xiv. 33.
O, were I able
To waste it all myself, and leave ye none!
Milton.
Here condemned
To waste eternal days in woe and pain.
Milton.
Wasted by such a course of life, the infirmities of age daily grew on him.
Robertson. 3. To spend unnecessarily or carelessly; to employ prodigally; to expend without valuable result; to apply
to useless purposes; to lavish vainly; to squander; to cause to be lost; to destroy by scattering or injury.
The younger son gathered all together, and . . . wasted his substance with riotous living.
Luke xv. 13.
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Gray. 4. (Law) To damage, impair, or injure, as an estate, voluntarily, or by suffering the buildings, fences,
etc., to go to decay.
Syn. — To squander; dissipate; lavish; desolate.
Waste
(Waste) v. i.
1. To be diminished; to lose bulk, substance, strength, value, or the like, gradually; to be consumed; to
dwindle; to grow less.
The time wasteth night and day.
Chaucer.
The barrel of meal shall not waste.
1 Kings xvii. 14.
But man dieth, and wasteth away.
Job xiv. 10. 2. (Sporting) To procure or sustain a reduction of flesh; — said of a jockey in preparation for a race,
etc.
Waste
(Waste), n. [OE. waste; cf. the kindred AS. wsten, OHG. wsti, wuosti, G. wüste. See Waste,
a. & v.]
1. The act of wasting, or the state of being wasted; a squandering; needless destruction; useless consumption
or expenditure; devastation; loss without equivalent gain; gradual loss or decrease, by use, wear, or decay; as,
a waste of property, time, labor, words, etc. "Waste . . . of catel and of time." Chaucer.
For all this waste of wealth loss of blood.
Milton.
He will never . . . in the way of waste, attempt us again.
Shak.
Little wastes in great establishments, constantly occurring, may defeat the energies of a mighty capital.
L. Beecher. 2. That which is wasted or desolate; a devastated, uncultivated, or wild country; a deserted region; an
unoccupied or unemployed space; a dreary void; a desert; a wilderness. "The wastes of Nature." Emerson.
All the leafy nation sinks at last,
And Vulcan rides in triumph o'er the waste.
Dryden.
The gloomy waste of waters which bears his name is his tomb and his monument.
Bancroft.
