remainder

remainder, residue, residuum, remains, leavings, rest, balance, remnant can all mean what is left after the subtraction or removal of a part.

Remainder is the technical term for the result in the arithmetical process of subtraction

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subtract 8 from 10 and the remainder is 2

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It is otherwise a comprehensive term for things that remain after the others of a collection, assemblage, or stock have been taken away, used up, or accounted for, or for any persons that remain after the others of the group have departed

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he spent the remainder of his life in seclusion

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it took a week to eat up the remainder of their Thanksgiving feast

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the remainder of the exploring party turned homeward

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Residue and residuum are often interchanged with remainder, but they usually imply whatever may be left of a former whole, often a previously intact whole, after it has been subjected to some process which depletes or diminishes it but does not annihilate it.

Both terms, but especially residue, have acquired specific meanings; thus, a testator, after making certain bequests and providing for the payment of all his debts and charges, usually leaves the residue of his estate to a legatee, or to legatees, of his choice; water after evaporation often leaves a residue of mineral material; the residue of something destroyed by burning is called ash or ashes.

Residuum is frequently used in place of residue, especially when evaporation or combustion is implied, and it may be preferred to residue when what is left after a process, whether physical or chemical or mental, is such that it cannot be ignored or left out of account or may have value as a product or significance as a result

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the residuum of the process by which sugar is extracted from cane is called molasses

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there is always a residuum of air in the lungs after the most forcible expiration possible

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one might say that every fine story must leave in the mind of the sensitive reader an intangible residuum of pleasure— Cather

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Remains is chiefly used of what is left after death, decay, decline, disintegration, or consumption; the term is specifically applied to a corpse, to the unpublished works of a dead author, and to the ruins of an ancient civilization

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they buried Keats's remains in the Protestant cemetery in Rome

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appointed executor of a friend's literary remains

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the remains of Pompeii

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the remains of a meal

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Leavings usually implies that the valuable or useful parts or things have been culled out and used up or taken away or that what is left has been rejected or discarded

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how like the leavings of some vast overturned scrap basket— Brooks

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Rest is seldom distinguishable from remainder (except in the latter's technical arithmetical sense), and the two are commonly used interchangeably without loss. However it may be preferred to remainder when it means simply the persons or things not previously referred to or mentioned (as in an enumeration or list) and carries no implication of subtraction, deduction, or depletion

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England, as well as the rest of Europe, awaited the effect of the ultimatum with anxiety

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only two stories in this book are interesting and the rest are uniformly dull

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Balance is sometimes used in the simple sense of remainder or rest

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answers will be given in the balance of this chapter— R. W. Murray

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But balance is more often found in technical and especially commercial use; thus, in reference to a banking account, balance usually is applied only to the amount left after withdrawals and other charges have been deducted from the deposits and accumulated interest; in a mercantile charge account, balance is usually applied to the amount owed after credits have been deducted from the debits

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a balance in the bank is a sum of money to the depositor's credit

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a balance of a bill is an amount still owed by the debtor

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a balance in hand is an amount left when all assets are reckoned after all liabilities have been dis- charged

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Remnant and its plural remnants are applied to a remainder that is small in size or numbers or that represents only ap insignificant part or piece left from a former whole

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the remnant of a once powerful army

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a sale of remnants of cloth

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living in Santa Fe on the remnants of the family fortune— Mary Austin

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sleeping bits of woodlands— remnants of the great forests in which Tom had worked as a boy— Anderson

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