Definition of "helplesse"

For, while they fly that gulf's devouring jawes,They on the rock are rent and sunck in helplesse wawes.

1590, Edmund Spenser, “(please specify the book)”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie

And euen in acute ſickneſſes, as Feauers and burning Agues, we account the patient moſt hopeleſſe and helpleſſe, when as he is paſt feeling of his ſickneſſe.

1622, John Downame, “Of ſuch Reaſons as may mooue vs to abhor carnall ſecuritie, and to vſe all meanes either to preuent it, or to be freed from it” (chapter VIII), in A Guide to Godlynesse: or, A Treatise of A Christian Life, page 53

[H]ovv is it [a worm] vexed vvith the ſcorching beames [of the sun], and vvrings vp and dovvne, in an helpleſſe perplexity; not finding vvhere to ſhrovvd it ſelfe; hovv obnoxious is it to the ſoules of the ayre, to the feet of men, and beaſts?

1630, Ios. Exon. [i.e., Joseph Hall of Exeter], “Upon a Worme”, in R[obert] H[all], editor, Occasionall Meditations, London: […] [Benjamin Alsop and T. Fawcet?] for Nath[aniel] Butter, page 170