hold fast

A verbal phrase composed of the words: hold ("grasp", "grip") and fast ("resolutely", "steadfastly").

hold fast (third-person singular simple present holds fast, present participle holding fast, simple past and past participle held fast)

1. (idiomatic) To stubbornly resist assault, pressure or opposition, either physically or mentally.

   Synonyms: hold firm, hold hard, hold one's ground, stand firm, stand fast, stand one's ground

   Antonyms: let go, leave go, leave hold

   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick:

     And now, while both elastic gunwales were springing in and out, as the whale dallied with the doomed craft in this devilish way; and from his body being submerged beneath the boat, he could not be darted at from the bows, for the bows were almost inside of him, as it were; and while the other boats involuntarily paused, as before a quick crisis impossible to withstand, then it was that monomaniac Ahab, furious with this tantalizing vicinity of his foe, which placed him all alive and helpless in the very jaws he hated; frenzied with all this, he seized the long bone with his naked hands, and wildly strove to wrench it from its gripe. As now he thus vainly strove, the jaw slipped from him; the frail gunwales bent in, collapsed, and snapped, as both jaws, like an enormous shears, sliding further aft, bit the craft completely in twain, and locked themselves fast again in the sea, midway between the two floating wrecks. These floated aside, the broken ends drooping, the crew at the stern-wreck clinging to the gunwales, and striving to hold fast to the oars to lash them across.

   • 1900, John Burroughs, The Light of Day:

     If we take science as our sole guide, if we accept and hold fast that alone which is verifiable, the old theology must go.

   • 1918 (February), Louise Driscoll, Old Roofs (a poetry collection), poem "Hold Fast Your Dreams":

     Hold fast your dreams! / Within your heart / Keep one still, secret spot / Where dreams may go, / And, sheltered so, / May thrive and grow / Where doubt and fear are not. / O keep a place apart, / Within your heart, / For little dreams to go! // Think still of lovely things that are not true. / Let wish and magic work at will in you. / Be sometimes blind to sorrow. Make believe! / Forget the calm that lies / In disillusioned eyes. / Though we all know that we must die, / Yes you and I / May walk like gods and be / Even now at home in immortality. // We see so many ugly things— / Deceits and wrongs and quarrelings; / We know, alast we know / How quickly fade / The color in the west, / The bloom upon the flower, / The bloom upon the breast / And youth's blind hour. / Yet keep within your heart / A place apart / Where little dreams may go, / May thrive and grow. / Hold fast—hold fast your dreams!

   • 1923, Langston Hughes, Poem "Dreams" in entirety:

     Hold fast to dreams / For if dreams die / Life is a broken-winged bird / That cannot fly. // Hold fast to dreams / For when dreams go / Life is a barren field / Frozen with snow.

   • 1975, Andrei Sakharov, Autobiographical sketch at the official Nobel Prize site:

     Both now and for always, I intend to hold fast to my belief in the hidden strength of the human spirit.

2. (nautical) A formal command to a ship's crew to grasp and hold on to a solid fitting, such as ropes or rails, to avoid being swept overboard, especially during a storm.

   Synonym: hold hard

   All hands...hold fast!

• stand fast