

Ethymologically you are right, I wasn’t really aware of the alchemical background of five rounds of destillation when I wrote my comment.
Nonetheless, “quintessential for” is not unheard (or rather unread?) of:
It will take another generation or two until this usage becomes normalized, so thank you for pointing me to a better style.
You need checks to send money from the government to the oligarchs, and balances to know how much money they earned. So yes, checks and balances are fundamental and necessary.