Essential vs Merely - What's the difference?
essential | merely |
Necessary.
Very important; of high importance.
* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-05-17
, author=George Monbiot, authorlink=George Monbiot
, title=Money just makes the rich suffer
, volume=188, issue=23, page=19
, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly)
Being in the basic form; showing its essence.
Really existing; existent.
* Webster (1623)
Such that each complementary region is irreducible, the boundary of each complementary region is incompressible by disks and monogons in the complementary region, and no leaf is a sphere or a torus bounding a solid torus in the manifold.
(medicine) Idiopathic.
(obsolete) Wholly, entirely.
* 1644 , (John Milton), Aeropagitica :
(focus) Without any other reason etc.; only, just, and nothing more.
As an adjective essential
is necessary.As a noun essential
is a necessary ingredient.As an adverb merely is
(obsolete) wholly, entirely.essential
English
Adjective
(en adjective)citation, passage=In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. The welfare state is dismantled. Essential public services are cut so that the rich may pay less tax. […]}}
- Don’t mind him being grumpy. That’s the essential Fred.
- Is it true, that thou art but a name, / And no essential thing?
Synonyms
* indispensable, crucial, substantive * See alsoAntonyms
* inessential, unessential, accidental, nonessential, unneeded, adscititious, unimportant, accessorial, unnecessary, incidentalDerived terms
* essential amino acid * essential fatty acid * essential listening * essential nutrient * essential oil * essentially * essentialness * quintessentialmerely
English
Adverb
(-)- It is not forgot, since the acute and distinct Arminius'' was perverted meerly by the perusing of a namelesse discourse writt'n at ''Delf , which at first he took in hand to confute.
