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A miserable person; one profoundly unhappy. "The wretch that lies in woe." Shak. Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son, Wretch even then, life's journey just begun Cowper.

distress, as from want, anxiety, or grief; calamitous; woeful; very afflicting. "To what wretched state reserved!" Milton. O cruel! Death! to those you are more kind Than to the wretched mortals left behind. Waller. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore . . .

In a wretched manner; miserably; despicable.

The quality or state of being wretched; utter misery. Sir W. Raleigh.

Wretched. [Obs.] Wyclif.

Reckless; hence, disregarded. [Obs.] -- Wretch"less*ly, adv. [Obs.] -- Wretch"less*ness, n. [Obs.] Bk. of Com. Prayer. Your deaf ears should listen Unto the wretchless clamors of the poor. J. Webster.

Passion; violent emotion. [Obs.] Most wretched man, That to affections does the bridle lend. Spenser.

apostasy; faithless to moral allegiance; renegade. So spake the apostate angel. Milton. A wretched and apostate state. Steele.

To adopt a foreign or barbarous mode of speech. The ill habit . . . of wretched barbarizing against the Latin and Greek idiom, with their untutored Anglicisms. Milton.

ncounter; to remain firm under (a hardship); to endure; to suffer; to undergo. Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm. Shak.

A wretch; -- sometimes used humorously or in playful disparagement. [Low]

Captive; wretched; unfortunate. [Obs.] Chaucer.

Suffering calamity; wretched; miserable. [Obs.] Ten thousands of calamitous persons. South.

rattle; to click. We heard Mr.Hodson's whip clacking on the ahoulders of the poor little wretches. Thackeray.

To attend; to accompany. [Obs.] Thou, wretched boy, that didst consort him here, Shalt with him hence. Shak.

To share. [Obs.] For, of all miserias, I hold that chief Wretched to be, when none coparts our grief. Webster (1661).

coshering, that is to say, by quartering himself on the old tentants of his family, who, wretched as was their own condition, could not refuse a portion of their pittance to one whom they still regarded as their rightful lord. Macaulay.

Destitute of courage; timid; cowardly. Fie, coward woman, and soft-hearted wretch. Shak.

A mean wretch; a base fellow; a poltroon; a scullion. "Away, base cullions." Shak.

over all the evil spirits of the deep, and is seen in various shapes warning the devoted wretch of death and woe. Smollett. Davy Jones's Locker, the ocean, or bottom of the ocean. -- Gone to Davy Jones's Locker, dead, and buried in the sea; thrown overboard.