be-all

plural be-alls

1. poeticThe whole; all that is to be.

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

   a. 1606, William Shakespeare, Macbeth, act 1, scene 7, lines 4–5

   2 more examples

   Bowen also spoke of […] teaching her daughter to rely not just on a mother, but on a community. "No one person should try to be the be-all to another person. We must surround our children with people they can count on."

   1988 February 14, Louise Rice, quoting Angela Bowen, “Confronting The Mythology Of Motherhood”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 30, page 11

   […] to be happy with their lot in life, content with things as they are, things that may once have been be-alls and absolute end-alls but that lost their intoxication after five years, put them on automatic pilot after ten and became a prison after fifteen.

   2007, Kirbyjon H. Caldwell, Be In It to Win It