Everlasting a.
1. Lasting or enduring forever; exsisting or continuing without end; immoral; eternal. "The Everlasting God." Gen. xx1. 33.
2. Continuing indefinitely, or during a long period; perpetual; sometimes used, colloquially, as a strong intensive; as, this everlasting nonsence. I will give to thee, and to thy seed after thee . . . the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession. Gen xvii. 8. And heard thy everlasting yawn confess The pains and penalties of idleness. Pope.
Syn. -- Eternal; immortal, interminable; endless; never-ending; infinite; unceasing; uninterrupted; continual; unintermitted; incessant. - Everlasting, Eternal. Eternal denotes (when taken strictly) without beginning or end of duration; everlasting is sometimes used in our version of the Scriptures in the sense of eternal, but in modern usage is confined to the future, and implies no intermission as well as no end. Whether we shall meet again I know not; Therefore our everlasting farewell take; Forever, and forever farewell, Cassius. Shak. Everlasting flower. Sane as Everlasting, n., 3. -- Everlasting pea, an ornamental plant (Lathyrus latifolius) related to the pea; -- so called because it is perennial.
1 other Webster entry under this spelling
Everlasting, n.
1. Eternal duration, past of future; eternity. From everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. Ps. xc. 2.
2. (With the definite article) The Eternal Being; God.
3. (Bot.)
A plant whose flowers may be dried without losing their form or color, as the pearly everlasting (Anaphalis margaritacea), the immortelle of the French, the cudweeds, etc.
4. A cloth fabic for shoes, etc. See Lasting.
Shades of meaning
Fernald has no entry of its own for everlasting; he lists it under eternal.
Where he writes about it:
Eternal strictly signifies without beginning or end, in which sense it applies to God alone; everlasting applies to that which may or may not have beginning, but will never cease; eternal is also used in this more limited sense; endless, without end, in its utmost reach, is not distinguishable from everlasting; but endless is constantly used in inferior senses, especially in mechanics, as in the phrases an endless screw, an endless chain. — from eternal
Everlasting and endless are both used in a limited sense of protracted, indefinite, but not infinite duration; as, the everlasting hills; endless debates; so we speak of interminable quarrels. — from eternal
Everlasting, endless, and eternal may be applied to that which has no life; as, everlasting chains, endless night, eternal death; immortal applies to that which now has life, and is forever exempt from death. — from eternal