mainspring

Etymology

From main + spring. For figurative sense, compare spring (“source, origin”).

noun

  1. (horology) The principal spring of a clockwork mechanism, which drives it by uncoiling.
  2. (figurative) The most important reason for, or element of, something.
    My daughter is the mainspring of my life.
    But in the England of Shakespeare’s history plays, the mainspring of the system has broken down. 2014-11-02, Paul Mason, “What Shakespeare taught me about Marxism”, in The Guardian

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