Emily Dickinson Lexicon

OB-SE'QUI-OUS, a. [from L. obsequium, complaisance, from obsequor, to follow; ob and sequor.]

1. Promptly obedient or submissive to the will of another; compliant; yielding to the desires of others, properly to the will or command of a superior, but in actual use, it often signifies yielding to the will or desires of such as have no right to control. His servants weeping, / Obsequious to his orders, bear him hither. Addison.
2. Servilely or meanly condescending; compliant to excess; as, an obsequious flatterer, minion or parasite.
3. Funereal; pertaining to funeral rites. [Not used.] Shak.