necessity
/nɪˈsɛsəti/ noun B2- The quality or state of being necessary, unavoidable, or absolutely requisite. · I bought a new table out of necessity. My old one was ruined.· The report I wrote was of necessity rushed and full of errors.
- The condition of being needy; desperate need; lack.
- Something necessary; a requisite; something indispensable. · A tent is a necessity if you plan on camping.
- Something which makes an act or an event unavoidable; an irresistible force; overruling power. · After eating a full meal, the human body's necessity for food will compel the person to eat again in the future.
- The negation of freedom in voluntary action; the subjection of all phenomena, whether material or spiritual, to inevitable causation; necessitarianism.
- Greater utilitarian good; used in justification of a criminal act. · doctrine of necessity
- Indispensable requirements (of life).
Plural necessities
From the library
There are, undoubtedly, many who could not say the same; but, thanks to Lady Catherine de Bourgh, I am removed far beyond the necessity of regarding little matters.”
To Elizabeth, however, he voluntarily acknowledged that the necessity of his absence _had_ been self-imposed.
You know my mother’s ideas as to the necessity of constant company for her friends.
It could not be for society, as he frequently sat there ten minutes together without opening his lips; and when he did speak, it seemed the effect of necessity rather than of choice--a sacrifice to propriety, not a pleasure to himself.
Learn necessity in real texts
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