The Collaborative International Dictionary
Woeful \Woe"ful\, Woful \Wo"ful\, a.
-
Full of woe; sorrowful; distressed with grief or calamity; afflicted; wretched; unhappy; sad.
How many woeful widows left to bow To sad disgrace!
--Daniel. -
Bringing calamity, distress, or affliction; as, a woeful event; woeful want.
O woeful day! O day of woe!
--Philips. -
Wretched; paltry; miserable; poor.
What woeful stuff this madrigal would be!
--Pope.
Wiktionary
a. (obsolete spelling of woeful English)
Usage examples of "woful".
When I arose from rest, a woful mass That gentlest sleep seemed from my life to sever, As if the light of youth were not withdrawn for ever.
PANTHEA: A woful sight: a youth With patient looks nailed to a crucifix.
I went among my kind, with triple brass Of calm endurance my weak breast I armed, To bear scorn, fear, and hate--a woful mass!
And when I went among my kind, with triple brass Of calm endurance my weak breast I armed, To bear scorn, fear, and hate, a woful mass!
Yet she was no more, and whenever the thought returned to them that they would never see her again, their hands sought one another, met in a woful clasp, while from their crushed and mingling hearts it seemed as if all life, all future, were flowing away to nihility.
Cheemaun exulting, And the noble Hiawatha Sang his war-song wild and woful, And above him the war-eagle, The Keneu, the great war-eagle, Master of all fowls with feathers, Screamed and hurtled through the heavens.
I beheld our nation scattered, All forgetful of my counsels, Weakened, warring with each other: Saw the remnants of our people Sweeping westward, wild and woful, Like the cloud-rack of a tempest, Like the withered leaves of Autumn!
Thus adjured, Topsy confessed to the ribbon and gloves, with woful protestations of penitence.
She avoided the neighbourhood in which she had formerly lived, and after long search discovered what she wanted in a woful byway near Old Street.
The darksome cave they enter, where they found The woful man, low sitting on the ground, Musing full sadly in his sullen mind.
And many signs and woful graved she, A message of the evil things to be.
Gods are to blame, who have roused against me the woful war of the Achaeans.
Danaans were glad at the sight of her, and had no more memory of all their woful toil, and the din of war: such a spirit did Cytherea put into their hearts, out of favour to fair Helen and father Zeus.
Potentate, victor over Diabolus, and conqueror of the town of Mansoul, We, the miserable inhabitants of that most woful corporation, do humbly beg that we may find favour in thy sight, and remember not against us former transgressions, nor yet the sins of the chief of our town: but spare us according to the greatness of thy mercy, and let us not die, but live in thy sight.
Yea, they had more boldness now to walk the streets, to haunt the houses, and to show themselves abroad, than had any of the honest inhabitants of the now woful town of Mansoul.