 In more formal terms, essentialism, Quine (1953b/1976, p. 176) says, is the doctrine that there are true sentences of this form: \(\exists x(\Box Fx \amp Gx \amp{\sim}\Box Gx)\) (where ‘\(\Box\)’ may be read as ‘it is necessary that’). According to “maximal essentialism” any given object has only essential properties. It has no accidental ones. That means that according to “maximal essentialism”, there will be no properties to “go in for” the ‘\(G\)’ in Quine’s sentence schema; and so, “maximal essentialism” is no form of essentialism at all on Quine’s characterization.