[f. as prec. + -NESS.] The quality or fact of being essential.
1640. Ld. Digby, Sp. conc. Trienn. Parl. (1641), 12. The essentialnesse Sir of frequent Parliaments to the happinesse of this Kingdome.
a. 1699. Bonnell, in W. Hamilton, Life, II. (1703), 175. Each endeavouring … to pretend them to be of more Essentialness and Weight in Religion, than indeed they are.
1736. in Bailey.
1854. Ruskin, Lect. Archit., Add. 120. A confusion of the idea of essentialness … with the idea of nobleness.
