sternliest

sternliest

1. (rare, poetic) superlative form of sternly: most sternly
   • 1620, Tho[mas] Dekker, “The Worme of Conscience”, in Dekker His Dreame. In Which, Beeing Rapt with a Poeticall Enthusiasme, the Great Volumes of Heauen and Hell to Him Were Opened, in Which He Read Many Wonderfull Things., London: Nicholas Okes, →OCLC, page 35:

     I tooke delights / In plucking Apples from t’Heſperian Trees, / Which Eating, I grew Learn’d: adde to All theſe / My Priuate Readings, which more School’d my Soule, / Then Tutors, when they ſternliest did Controll / With Frownes or Rods: […]

   • 1837 November, [John Sterling], “ Mirabeau.”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume XLII, number CCLXV, Edinburgh: William Blackwood & Sons; London: T Cadell, , page 594:

     The law is holier than a sage’s prayer; / The godlike power bestowed on men demands of them a godlike care; / And noblest gifts, if basely used, will sternliest avenge the wrong, / And grind with slavish pangs the slave whom once they made divinely strong.

   • 1889, Arthur Bennett, “The Inexplicable Sex”, in The Music of My Heart, Manchester: Palmer & Howe, ; London: Simpkin, Marshall & Co., page 123:

     In them [women], hypocrisy itself can charm: / It makes our young devotion doubly warm, / Draws while it drives, lures while it whispers “Go!” / Means “Yes!” when sternliest it answers “No!” / Request a kiss—at once a negative / Their lips of coral sternly frame!—but if / You note their eyes, the answer there belies it, / And he who doubts me, well, suppose he tries it?

   • 1892 November, Aubrey [Thomas] de Vere, “ The Poet”, in James [Thomas] Knowles, editor, The Nineteenth Century: A Monthly Review, volume XXXII, number CLXXXIX, London: Sampson Low, Marston & Company , page 841:

     None sang of Love more nobly; few as well; / Of Friendship none with pathos so profound; / Of Duty sternliest-proved when myrtle-crowned; / Of English grove and rivulet, mead and dell: […]