- 1必要的（今日常改說 needed / necessary；印度英語 Please do the needful 仍常用）
Needful means necessary — something you must have or must do. The pieces are plain: need + -ful. Though actually, most English speakers today do not reach for this word in ordinary talk. They say needed or necessary instead. You will still meet it in older books, in church language, and in a few set phrases. In Indian English, “please do the needful” is a normal, polite way to ask someone to do what the situation requires. In British and American English that same sentence can sound stiff, old, or even a little funny, as if the speaker had copied a form letter. There is also an old slang use of the needful for money, but you are unlikely to hear it now.
組成need + -ful. From Middle English needeful, from Old English nēodful “necessary; earnest”.
原始詞典資料4 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，摘錄並精簡格式，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
needfuladj/ˈniːdfl̩/
- 1
Needed; necessary; mandatory; requisite; indispensable.
- And be it further Enacted by the Authority aforeſaid, That in every Town in the Colony, where Bread is Baken for Sale, there ſhall be Choſen one Clerk of the Market, or more, as each Town ſhall find needful, at their Annual Election of Town Officers, who ſhall duly be Engaged, to the faithful performance of ſaid Office, as other Town Officers are ;[…]
- So I went to keep house with him at the Why Not? and my aunt sent down my bag of clothes, and would have made over to Elzevir the pittance that my father left for my keep, but he said it was not needful, and he would have none of it.
- 2
archaicNeedy; in need.
- […] where his active benevolence was ever found in cheerful co-operation for the cause of the humble & needful orphan […]
needfulnoun/ˈniːdfl̩/
- 1
Anything necessary or requisite.
- I think better of you for looking steadily to the needful.
- 2
slangReady money; wherewithal.
摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary，已精簡格式；依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用，改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。