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Formal   /fˈɔrməl/   Listen
adjective
Formal  adj.  
1.
Belonging to the form, shape, frame, external appearance, or organization of a thing.
2.
Belonging to the constitution of a thing, as distinguished from the matter composing it; having the power of making a thing what it is; constituent; essential; pertaining to or depending on the forms, so called, of the human intellect. "Of (the sounds represented by) letters, the material part is breath and voice; the formal is constituted by the motion and figure of the organs of speech."
3.
Done in due form, or with solemnity; according to regular method; not incidental, sudden or irregular; express; as, he gave his formal consent. "His obscure funeral... No noble rite nor formal ostentation."
4.
Devoted to, or done in accordance with, forms or rules; punctilious; regular; orderly; methodical; of a prescribed form; exact; prim; stiff; ceremonious; as, a man formal in his dress, his gait, his conversation. "A cold-looking, formal garden, cut into angles and rhomboids." "She took off the formal cap that confined her hair."
5.
Having the form or appearance without the substance or essence; external; as, formal duty; formal worship; formal courtesy, etc.
6.
Dependent in form; conventional. "Still in constraint your suffering sex remains, Or bound in formal or in real chains."
7.
Sound; normal. (Obs.) "To make of him a formal man again."
Formal cause. See under Cause.
Synonyms: Precise; punctilious; stiff; starched; affected; ritual; ceremonial; external; outward. Formal, Ceremonious. When applied to things, these words usually denote a mere accordance with the rules of form or ceremony; as, to make a formal call; to take a ceremonious leave. When applied to a person or his manners, they are used in a bad sense; a person being called formal who shapes himself too much by some pattern or set form, and ceremonious when he lays too much stress on the conventional laws of social intercourse. Formal manners render a man stiff or ridiculous; a ceremonious carriage puts a stop to the ease and freedom of social intercourse.


noun
Formal  n.  (Chem.) See Methylal.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Formal" Quotes from Famous Books



... investment, and debt reorganization by the official sector that does not meet concessional terms. Aid is considered to have been committed when agreements are initialed by the parties involved and constitute a formal ...
— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.
... conclusive. The same reason would make us consider other lives imperfect, which are also deficient in such matters. Plutarch, after his fashion, gives incidental information about Caesar's youth and his family. I conceive that he purposely avoided a formal beginning; and according to his plan of biography, he was right. Niebuhr also observes that the beginning of the Life of Caesar in Suetonius is imperfect; "a fact well known, but it is only since the year 1812, that we know that the part which is wanting contained ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... for formal introductions. "We're going to start the Combination Scouts of Bridgeboro!" he shouted. "We're going to be sea scouts and land scouts all rolled into one! We took possession and it's all right! Old Trimmer can't say that he owned an island, ...
— Pee-Wee Harris Adrift • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... relate the history of Italy, not simply the history of the city of Rome. Although, in the formal sense of political law, it was the civic community of Rome which gained the sovereignty first of Italy and then of the world, such a view cannot be held to express the higher and real meaning of history. What has been called the subjugation of Italy by the Romans ...
— The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) • Theodor Mommsen
... the midst of a sea of eternity, and all the time that comes to us comes by solemn public measurement, measurement conducted in the most formal and stately manner by the hand of the Creator. He made that heaven from which we can never shut our regard—we must see it; and in it He set those lights "for signs and for seasons and for days and for years." He might easily have given us a being that would have ...
— The Wesleyan Methodist Pulpit in Malvern • Knowles King


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