a. [f. STRENGTH sb. + -LESS.] Destitute of strength.
c. 1200. Ormin, 12530. Þe deofell wennde aweȝȝ anan Forshamedd off himm sellfenn, Off þatt he wass all strenncþelæs Onnȝæn þatt newe kemmpe.
1311. Pol. Songs (1839), 255. That lond is streintheles.
1548. Udall, etc., Erasm. Par. John xvi. 29–33. The tyme is full nyghe that ye shall declare howe strengthelesse ye are of your selfes.
1594. Willobie, Avisa (1880), 99. You are the chieftaine, that haue layd This heauie siege to strengthlesse fort.
a. 1603. T. Cartwright, Confut. Rhem. N. T. (1618), 155. A vaine and superstitious feare of the Popes strengthlesse curse.
1836. Hare, Guesses (1859), 229. The laws we have imposed on ourselves, knowing how baseless and strengthless they are, we are impatient to throw off.
1857. Borrow, Romany Rye (1858), I. 166. A time would come when my eyes would be bleared,… my arms … strengthless and sapless.
1883. Miss M. Betham-Edwards, Disarmed, xvi. The listener sank back in his chair, white and strengthless, as if stricken with a blow.
Hence Strengthlessly adv. Strengthlessness.
1666. Bunyan, Grace Ab., ¶ 292 (1900), 384. At which times I should have such a strange faintness and strengthlessness seize upon my body that my legs have scarce been able to carry me.
1833. J. Robertson, Lett., in Life, iv. (1887), 52. With the exception of some considerable strengthlessness, which makes the chariot wheels drag on accordingly, I may call myself quite well.
1877. J. Hawthorne, Garth, II. VII. liv. 291. The fingers of one hand were fumbling strengthlessly at a grey twist of silky material which tightly encircled his neck.
1879. Farrar, St. Paul, II. 83. The corruption, the indignity, the strengthlessness of the mortal body, into which at birth the soul is sown.
