essence

essence in philosophy, the nature of a thing. Aristotle maintained that there is a distinction between the form of a thing—its intelligible, verbally formulable character—and the essence of a thing, i.e., what it is in itself, which is not common to anything else. The essence of a thing is what is formulated as a universal in the mind and in language. St. Thomas Aquinas distinguished between the essence of a thing and the fact of its being, or its existence. In modern existentialist thought Jean-Paul Sartre made use of Aquinas's distinction between essence and existence but reversed them by insisting that existence precedes essence. By this he asserted that people do not have predetermined natures; what a person is follows from the choices he or she makes.

essence (ess-ĕns) n. a solution consisting of an essential oil dissolved in alcohol.

es·sence / ˈesəns/ • n. the intrinsic nature or indispensable quality of something, esp. something abstract, that determines its character: conflict is the essence of drama. ∎  Philos. a property or group of properties of something without which it would not exist or be what it is. ∎  something that exists; in particular, a spiritual entity: the position that names express essences. ∎  an extract or concentrate obtained from a particular plant or other matter and used for flavoring or scent.