Be-all

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The whole; all that is to be. poetic

    "That but this blow / Might be the be-all and the end-all!"

Synonyms

All synonyms
aggregateallassemblagecomplementcorpuseverything

Example

More examples

"If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well / It were done quickly: if the assassination / Could trammel up the consequence, and catch / With his surcease success; that but this blow / Might be the be-all and the end-all here, / But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, / We'd jump the life to come."

Related phrases

be-all and end-allend-all and be-all

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.