Now only arch. [Erron. form of retchlesnes, obs. var. of RECKLESSNESS. Cf. RECKLESS a.]
Also 1634 Raleigh, Hist. World, IV. iii. § 5; 1718 Daniel, Civ. Wars, V. xxi., where however the earlier edd. have retchlesnes(se, etc.
1. The condition or quality of being reckless or heedless; recklessness.
1625. Purchas, Pilgrims, II. 1304. [A language] corrupted not so much by the mixture of other Tongues, as through a supine wretchlesnesse.
1647. Hammond, Power of Keys, iv. 113. The pride and self-conceit of some, the wretchlesnes of others.
1673. Hickman, Quinquart. Hist., II. 455. For any men to have the Doctor’s … sentence of Predestination alway before them, is no way … apt to beget either despair or wretchlessness.
1855. Kingsley, Westw. Ho! vii. Till lately, from my youth up, I was given over to all wretchlessness and unclean living.
1860. A. L. Windsor, Ethica, iv. 209–10. To the wretchlessness of human nature his [De Foe’s] mind, like the mind of Crabbe and Hogarth, must have been peculiarly sensitive.
2. Disregard or neglect of something.
Frequent in echoes of quot. 1630.
1630. Articles Ch. England, xvii. C 2. Whereby the Devil doth thrust them either into desperation, or into wretchlesness [earlier edd. rech(e)lesnesse] of most unclean living.
[1819. G. S. Faber, Dispensations (1823), I. 171. To drive man to absolute despair and thence (as our Church expresses it) to complete wretchlessness of unclean living.]
1882. Farrar, Early Chr., I. 377. What a rare insolence and wretchlessness of sin must be involved in such expressions.
1892. Sat. Rev., 17 Dec., 719/2. His fault-finding is due to wretchlessness of most unclean desperation in him.
