"Futility" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... trained in Pittsburg, a Frenchman of the new style, whose silky sweetness of manner was the mask of a steely tenacity of purpose. He had a little devilish black moustache, waxed at the points, like an earl of melodrama, and with it a narrow cheerless smile that jeered into futility Raleigh's effort to handle the subject on a basis of easy good fellowship. The heart-to-heart talk degenerated into a keen business controversy, involving the consultation of letter-files; it ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... above, and to look down upon the uproar, where were they? His melancholy paralysed him more and more. He was too listless even to cater for his daily bread by writing his articles for the magazines. Why should he? He had nothing to say. Why should he pour out words and empty sound, and add one more futility to the herd of 'prophets that had become wind, and had no truth in them'? Those who could write without a conscience, without an object except that of seeing their own fine words, and filling their own pockets—let ...
— Yeast: A Problem • Charles Kingsley
... visible to other eyes than ours. Some time ago I heard an address given by a friend of mine, an Indian Mohammedan of warrior descent, to University students of his own faith. He was urging on them the futility of dreams and the necessity of self-discipline and self-devotion. 'Why do the people of this country', he said, 'count for so much all the world over? It is not because of their dreams; it is because thousands of them are lying at the bottom ...
— England and the War • Walter Raleigh
... mysterious form of matter secreted by the brain. Its chief activity consists in the endeavor to ascertain its own nature, the futility of the attempt being due to the fact that it has nothing but itself to know itself with. From the Latin mens, a fact unknown to that honest shoe-seller, who, observing that his learned competitor ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... young man, abashed him. He found himself of a sudden endowed with a painful appreciation of his own imperfections, the littleness of his ego, the inherent coarseness of his masculine fiber, the poor futility of his ways, contrasted with her perfections. He felt as if rebuked for some unwarrantable presumption.... For he had looked into eyes that were windows of a soul; and the soul was that of a child, unsullied ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... House. The State Convention of 1871; my chairmanship and presidency of it. My speech; appointment of committees; anti-administration demonstration; a stormy session; retirement of the anti-administration forces; attacks in consequence; rally of old friends to my support. Examples of the futility of such attacks; Senator Carpenter, Governor Seward, Senator Conklin. My efforts to interest Conkling in a reform of the civil service. Republican National Convention at Philadelphia in 1872; ability of sundry colored delegates; nomination of Grant and Wilson. Mr. Greeley's death. Characteristics ...
— Volume I • Andrew Dickson White
... also undated, seems, like the last passage, best explained as delivered by Jeremiah while he watched during the close of Josiah's reign the hardening of the people's trust in their religious institutions and felt its futility; or alternatively when that futility was exposed by the defeat at Megiddo. It has, however, been woven by some hand or other into a passage reflecting the revival of the Baal-worship under Jehoiakim (verse ...
— Jeremiah • George Adam Smith
... not the place for Etheldred May to talk of the futility of youthful aspirations, but it did not so strike either of the brothers, to whom Cocksmoor had long been a familiar fact. Harry laughed to hear the old Ethel so like herself; and Aubrey said, 'By the bye, what did you do, the day you ...
— The Trial - or, More Links of the Daisy Chain • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Captain Vancouver, situate in the latitude of 35 degrees 03 minutes south, and longitude 118 degrees 12 minutes east; and it is to be hoped, that a few years will disclose many others upon the coast, as well as the confirmation or futility of the conjecture*, that a still larger than Bass Strait dismembers ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 2 • David Collins
... that had been thrust in under the door. In an instant he had snatched it up from the floor, and in another, acting instinctively, even while he realised the futility of what he did, he wrenched the door open, stared out into a dark and empty passageway—and, with a strange, almost hysterical laugh, closed ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... decadent, the artist must take as many pains as fall to the prosiest bourgeois. This is the paradox of the position. Just as the pyrrhonist in maintaining that there is no truth asserts one, so the literary pessimist partly contradicts his contention of the futility of existence by his anxiety to express himself elegantly. Leopardi's Italian and Schopenhauer's German are far superior to those of the optimistic philosophers; and one of the most polished poems of our day is poor Thomson's "City of Dreadful Night." So, too, the poet who declares himself an idler ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... such opinions long after their practical futility had become manifest. Indeed, it was a matter of common knowledge that negro suffrage had been undone by force and fraud; hardly more than a perfunctory denial of the fact was ever made in Congress, and meanwhile it was a source of jest and anecdote ...
— The Cleveland Era - A Chronicle of the New Order in Politics, Volume 44 in The - Chronicles of America Series • Henry Jones Ford
... police summoned him and informed him that the emperor was so well pleased with the play that he wished to have it all to himself; wherefore the dramatist would please hand over the manuscript, at his own price! Dynastic considerations probably moved the emperor to this preposterous demand. The very futility of it—since a number of copies of the manuscript had already been made, and one or the other was sure to escape seizure—is a good example of the trials to which the patience of Austrian poets was subjected during the old regime. Grillparzer was at this ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... sloped buttress and glittering pinnacle. The spire was the natural consummation. Internally, the sublimity of space in the cupola had been superseded by another kind of infinity in the prolongation of the nave; externally, the spherical surface had been proved, by the futility of Arabian efforts, incapable of decoration; its majesty depended on its simplicity, and its simplicity and leading forms were alike discordant with the rich rigidity of the body of the building. The ...
— On the Old Road Vol. 1 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin
... is that the history of Greek thought had shown conclusively the absolute futility of any efforts to arrive at a certain proof of the existence of God by purely rational methods. The attempts of each school to attain such certainty were repudiated by their successors, and even by their contemporaries; and the later ...
— The Basis of Early Christian Theism • Lawrence Thomas Cole
... worthy work of fiction may properly be labelled romantic, realistic or symbolic, since every great work of art contains all these in some proportion. Love and fighting are not necessarily romance; nor are soup-kitchens and divorce courts necessarily realism.... Malice, futility and ugliness—the dreadful monotony of existence—are not necessarily real life; nor the tales of summer love and marriage ceremonies, successful fightings, or sacrifice and chivalry ...
— Short Story Writing - A Practical Treatise on the Art of The Short Story • Charles Raymond Barrett
... Fifty years from now, according to George, we'll all be living in plastic houses with three helicopters in each garage. There won't be any unemployment, we'll have a four-day week, atomic energy'll be doing all the heavy work, mankind'll have realized the futility of war, everything'll be just hunky-dory. Nuts! Guys like ...
— The Amazing Mrs. Mimms • David C. Knight
... us,—to bury the past in a fathomless grave,—to make it impossible that we should ever meet, until you confront me at the bar of Judgment! You little can imagine what steps I took to render all this secure; and what was the result? Our strange interview in the bowels of the earth convinced me of the futility of my design." ...
— The Marble Faun, Volume I. - The Romance of Monte Beni • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... denounced the system over and over again in language the most indignant and the most scornful that even his scathing humor could command. But there were numbers of Protestant clergymen in Ireland who saw and proclaimed its injustice and its futility. The Archbishop of Dublin declared that no Government could ever accomplish the collection of tithes in Ireland otherwise than at the point of the bayonet. Protestant country clergy often found that the very attempts ...
— A History of the Four Georges and of William IV, Volume IV (of 4) • Justin McCarthy and Justin Huntly McCarthy
... with the seven primary colors raying from a centre, and made to whirl where the motion produced rather the effect of pure light. We must not mix the colors of national life until conflicting interests muddle themselves into a gray drab of human futility, but strive, so far as possible, to keep them pure and unmixed, each retaining its own peculiar lustre, so that in their conjunction with others they will harmonize, as do the pure primary colors, and in their motion make a ...
— National Being - Some Thoughts on an Irish Polity • (A.E.)George William Russell
... opposite taste of Salmasius and Grotius, (Bayle, Mahomet, Rem. Aa.) Hottinger doubts of its authenticity, (Hist. Orient. p. 237;) Renaudot urges the consent of the Mohametans, (Hist. Patriarch. Alex. p. 169;) but Mosheim (Hist. Eccles. p. 244) shows the futility of their opinion and inclines to believe it spurious. Yet Abulpharagius quotes the impostor's treaty with the Nestorian patriarch, (Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. tom. ii. p. 418;) but Abulpharagius ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... the grievance of the young dancer, and I read the agreement he had made with her, telling him politely that I could easily force him to fulfil it. The Jew put in several excuses, of which the Corticelli demonstrated the futility. At last the son of Judah was forced to give in, and promised to speak to the ballet-master the same day, in order that she might dance the 'pas' with the actor ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... the futility of trying to overcome the guards by wrestling. The only thing to do was dodge and punch. The guards were trying to take the Earthmen alive, but, because of their greater weight, they couldn't move quite as fast as Arcot ...
— Islands of Space • John W Campbell
... shot will take them to the green. Peter and James combined the two policies. Peter aimed to the left and got a slice, and James, also aiming to the left, topped into the bunker. Peter, realizing from experience the futility of searching for his ball in the woods, drove a second, which also disappeared into the jungle, as did his third. By the time he had joined James in the bunker he had played ...
— The Clicking of Cuthbert • P. G. Wodehouse
... in vain. A prismatic blur reeled before him. He could not distinguish sky from snow, or sun from tree. Only, the pain suddenly leaped with new life and flooded the useless eyeballs with stinging tears. The futility of his effort sickened the man. But, by a mighty exercise of will, he thrust down his emotion, and set himself doggedly to the task of finding a way back. To this end, he knelt down, and felt the smooth ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... betting broadsheets sprang up to supply the newly-created want. Under their influence the betting habit became if anything rather wore widely diffused than before. The Duke had possibly overlooked the futility of koepenicking the leaders of the nation with excellently intentioned angel under-studies, while leaving the mass of the people in ...
— The Chronicles of Clovis • Saki
... allowing them to look on. If they once get the fact thoroughly impressed upon them that we can both pot them, if necessary, at fifty yards, it will go a long way toward simplifying matters, by convincing them of the futility of attempting any tricks. But you must not let this very elementary precaution alarm you, sweetheart. As likely as not they will prove ...
— Dick Leslie's Luck - A Story of Shipwreck and Adventure • Harry Collingwood
... out of the way, so that it slid along the rough floor a little distance and overturned with a crash. Calumet cursed. He was minded to take the chair up and hurl it down again, so vengeful was the temper he was in, but his second sober sense urged upon him the futility of attacking inanimate things and he contented himself with snarling at it. He stood silent for a moment, a hope in his heart that his father, alarmed over the sudden commotion, would come to investigate, and a wave of sardonic satisfaction swept over him when ...
— The Boss of the Lazy Y • Charles Alden Seltzer
... some of his lesser works, most of the characters are either altogether bad or worthless and the others very largely weak or absurd, so that the impression of human life which the reader apparently ought to carry away is that of a hopeless chaos of selfishness, hypocrisy, and futility. One word, which has often been applied to Thackeray, best expresses his attitude—disillusionment. The last sentences of 'Vanity Fair' are characteristic: 'Oh! Vanitas Vanitatum! which, of us ...
— A History of English Literature • Robert Huntington Fletcher
... he and his father had attended, the Friends had counseled against open rebellion and shown each other the futility of such a step. All acts of violence and bloodshed were deprecated, and Lexington and Concord pronounced a useless sacrifice, and displeasing to God. But in the little knots that had gathered afterward there had been more than one low, dissentient ...
— A Little Girl in Old Philadelphia • Amanda Minnie Douglas
... vassals during his exile in France is abridged from an interesting and valuable work. [Chambers's "Domestic Annals of Scotland."] It brings out in a prominent light the state of the Highlands and the futility of the power of the Government during that period in the North. As regards several of the forfeited estates which lay in inaccessible situations in the Highlands, the commissioners had up to this time been entirely baffled, never having been able ...
— History Of The Mackenzies • Alexander Mackenzie
... his money. Spent the latter portion of his life dodging subpoenae servers, and doubling his fortune by the dissolution of his business. Ambition: More churches, colleges, and less competition. Also another Supreme Court decision. Recreation: Golf, the coiffeurs, and telling young men of the futility of competition. Address: Courts and church. Clubs: Y. M. C. A., when he can spare the time from his ...
— Who Was Who: 5000 B. C. to Date - Biographical Dictionary of the Famous and Those Who Wanted to Be • Anonymous
... the Professor was explaining the beliefs which he had for long held so strongly, and Bob listened greedily. He spoke not only of the horror of war, but of its unrighteousness and of its futility. ...
— All for a Scrap of Paper - A Romance of the Present War • Joseph Hocking
... and his eyes went dull, as though a film rose up and covered them from the world. And he dreamed as only age can dream upon the colossal futility ...
— Children of the Frost • Jack London
... staked a good deal on his possession of this hold upon the men who had been his associates. The whole situation had to be readjusted in the altered light of events. The first impulse of the man, to act, seemed strangled almost at its birth by the absolute futility of any move he could possibly make. He had no idea where to find his daughter, with whom she was living, or how. Any publicity of any sort was of course out of the question. No wonder that his frown grew ...
— The Governors • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... lapse into ordinary speech. Ordinary speech, however, is the only kind of speech that an expeditious drama can tolerate, and it is not raised to a higher power by the blowing of brass or the beating of drums. The frankest confession of the futility of Giordano's effort to make a lyric drama out of "Fedora" is contained in the fact that only those moments in his score are musical in the accepted sense when the play stops, as in the case of the intermezzo which cuts the second act in two, or when the old operatic principles wake into life ...
— Chapters of Opera • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... unscrupulously altered and reduced to dullness by english compilers, with the object of conforming it in rhythm to words that are unworthy of any music whatever. The chief offenders here are the protestant reformers, whose metrical psalms, which the melodies were tortured to fit, exhibit greater futility than one would look for even in men who could thus ...
— A Practical Discourse on Some Principles of Hymn-Singing • Robert Bridges
... shifting the body of the Texan so that his head would remain clear of the ever deepening wash in the bottom of the boat, she seized the pole and worked frantically. But after a few moments she realized the futility of her puny efforts to deviate the heavy craft a hair's breadth from its course. The tree-root that had knocked the Texan unconscious had descended upon the boat, and remained locked over the gunwale, holding the trunk with its high-flung tangle of roots and branches ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx
... The Ridge boys failed to see anything offensive in language that had a gun behind it; and realising the futility of any further attempt to get away with a successful disturbance they wisely yielded to superior quickness at the draw. With a whoop of resignation they rushed back to the dance-hall where the voice of the caller was exhorting the gents—whose partners were mostly ...
— The Girl of the Golden West • David Belasco
... and ready at an early hour on the morning of August 1st. Again the city was blue with police. But this time they were reinforced. As I walked through streets lined with soldiers in the workingmen's quarters, I realised the futility of any further anti-war ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... purchased, as the fair is growing, and they should not be governed solely by our present demands. Secretary Shaffer touched briefly on the weather of last summer, the acreage and yield of crops, the demonstration of the futility of trying to acclimatize Southern seed-corn in the North, and the appointment of a State entomologist. He thought the State should assist the society in distributing its publications. The improvement of the Mississippi ...
— Prairie Farmer, Vol. 56: No. 3, January 19, 1884. - A Weekly Journal for the Farm, Orchard and Fireside • Various
... when applied to diamagnetic bodies which are repelled by magnets. Like soft iron, such bodies are thrown into a state of temporary excitement, in virtue of which they are repelled; but any attempt to explain such a repulsion by the decomposition of a fluid will demonstrate its own futility.] ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... Futility of the question whether woman is or is not inferior to man. Conversation as a means of improvement. Taciturnity and loquacity. Seven rules in regard to conversation. Reading another means of mental progress. Thoughts on a perverted taste. Choosing the evil ...
— The Young Woman's Guide • William A. Alcott
... effort to open up trade with the interior by a mission, and two of their servants penetrated 300 miles inland to Timbo, capital of that part of Pulo-land. A deputation of chiefs presently visited the settlement to propose terms; but the futility of the negro settler was a complete obstacle to the development of the internal commerce, the main object for which the Company was formed. Yet the colony prospered; in 1798 Freetown numbered, besides ...
— To The Gold Coast for Gold, Vol. II - A Personal Narrative • Richard Francis Burton and Verney Lovett Cameron
... royal portrait, and gave forth his famous utterance: "Imitate Nature, which watches over the preservation of the race but has no regard for individuals." The decree was passed on the 31st of July, 1793, yet its futility was apparent in less than two months, when the Convention decreed that there should be issued two thousand millions of francs more in assignats between the values of ten sous and four hundred francs, and ...
— Fiat Money Inflation in France - How It Came, What It Brought, and How It Ended • Andrew Dickson White
... utter futility of attempting to parley with the infuriated wretches below, he ran into the room, exclaiming, "Put on some clothes, Emily! shoes first—quick—quick, wife!—your life depends upon it. I'll bring down the children and wake the servants. We must escape ...
— The Garies and Their Friends • Frank J. Webb
... Both adhered to the dictates of nature, and in both cases the result was the same; nor could the most marked inconveniences which circumstances imposed hinder that result. A time comes when false things shew their futility, and things depending upon truth assert their supremacy. The difference between the authoress and the author lay in those external circumstances of station and position which could not long, much less always, be ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... publicly. He accounted for this disorder by the fact that the prosecution and exemplary punishment of heretics had ceased to be the uniform rule; as if the experience of the past score of years had not demonstrated the futility of attempting to compel religious uniformity by the fear of human tribunals and ignominious death. He therefore begged the parliament to spare neither him nor his brother prelates in the matter of defraying the expense of bringing "Lutherans" to trial and death. ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird
... not uncommon in trunks large enough to allow of its production. The trunk nerves of the arm, and the great sciatic nerve, were probably the most frequent seats of such wounds. As, however, a very short experience of the futility of early interference in the case of nerve lesions warned me against exploration before a date at which observations of this nature were unsatisfactory, I gained less experience on this point ...
— Surgical Experiences in South Africa, 1899-1900 • George Henry Makins
... times, to some, as an idle loafer, but now he arose to a sublime height. He repeated with emphasis all he had ever said against their foolish superstitions, and arraigned the waste and futility of the idle rich. The power of the man was revealed as never before, and those who had intended to let him go with a fine, now thought it best to dispose of him. The safety of the state was endangered by such an agitator—the question of religion is really not what has sent ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great Philosophers, Volume 8 • Elbert Hubbard
... saw, even if he had not so considerately dressed the part. The other bruiser was an equally distinctive type, with a formidable fighting face and a chest like a barrel; but in Piccadilly he seemed to me less occupied in taking notice than in avoiding it. In innocuous futility one could scarcely excel the other; and between them they raised my ...
— Mr. Justice Raffles • E. W. Hornung
... listened, as if in a dream, to the wild improvisations of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a closer and still closer intimacy admitted me more unreservedly into the recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive the futility of all attempt at cheering a mind from which darkness, as if an inherent positive quality, poured forth upon all objects of the moral and physical universe, in ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 2 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... can't have guessed that it was like this ... like Alice in Wonderland, like an ill-intentioned Drury Lane pantomime, like all the dusty futility ...
— One Man's Initiation—1917 • John Dos Passos
... the futility of the objection, here follow the acts of cession. The cession of Maryland was made in November, 1788, and is as follows: "An act to cede to Congress a district of ten miles square in this state for the seat of the government of ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society
... House of Commons, for instance, is not only worse than the speaking was, it is worse than the speaking is, in all or almost all other places in small debating clubs or casual dinners. Our countrymen probably prefer this solemn futility in the higher places of the national life. It may be a strange sight to see the blind leading the blind; but England provides a stranger. England shows us the blind leading the people who can see. And this again is an under-statement of the case. For the English political ...
— Tremendous Trifles • G. K. Chesterton
... felt the futility of what they were doing. They might wait for weeks without ever seeing another ...
— The Scarlet Lake Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... the long lull and the active preparations observed in its front. At 1 P.M. Longstreet's batteries opened, and the superior guns of the Union Army, though not in position in such great number, promptly responded. This terrific duel lasted about two hours. Meade, recognizing the futility of his artillery fire, and in anticipation of the assault soon to come, ordered a large portion of his artillery withdrawn under cover, to give the guns time to cool and to be resupplied with ammunition. This led the enemy to believe he had ...
— Slavery and Four Years of War, Vol. 1-2 • Joseph Warren Keifer
... that had resulted from the evolution of man were sliding down towards, or had already arrived at, an altogether new relationship. The Eloi, like the Carolingian kings, had decayed to a mere beautiful futility. They still possessed the earth on sufferance: since the Morlocks, subterranean for innumerable generations, had come at last to find the daylit surface intolerable. And the Morlocks made their garments, I inferred, and maintained them in their habitual needs, perhaps ...
— The Time Machine • H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
... hatreds, this thing called the day, which she had first reviewed in the open boat after the wreck of the Gaston de Paris terrified to find it torn from her—this thing had been returned to her that morning in all its futility. It seemed to her, as she cast it away, a horrible gaud, a thing made of tinsel, yet a thing that could destroy the soul and blind the eyes and numb ...
— The Beach of Dreams • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... which should always attend a public officer in the execution of his duty, and at the same time with a firmness and courage that will impress the lawless with a wholesome sense of the dangers and futility of resistance. You will assure the officers of the law and those who have foolishly and wickedly thought to set the law at defiance that every resource lodged with the Executive by the Constitution and the laws will as the necessity arises be employed ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Volume IX. • Benjamin Harrison
... vanity of the hope of establishing a cognition which is to extend its rule beyond the limits of experience—a cognition which is one of the highest interests of humanity; and thus is proved the futility of the attempt of speculative philosophy in this region of thought. But, in this interest of thought, the severity of criticism has rendered to reason a not unimportant service, by the demonstration ...
— The Critique of Pure Reason • Immanuel Kant
... declared to himself to be false. He had not destroyed the will. He had not even hidden it. He had only put a book into its own place, carrying out as he did so his innocent intention when he had first lifted the book. When these searchers had come, doing their work so idly, with such incurious futility, he had not concealed the book. He had left it there on its shelf beneath their hands. Who could say that he had been guilty? If the will were found now, who could reasonably suggest that there had been ...
— Cousin Henry • Anthony Trollope
... end of the holidays she had learned to enjoy Jim's companionship, but she had no respect for his opinions at all. He had taught her a good deal, however. He had taught her, for one thing, the futility of discussion with people of his capacity. The small intellect should be treated like the small child—with tenderest consideration. It must not hear too much of anything at a time, and there are certain things that it must never be told at all. ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... minds of both flashed a thought of springing upon their captors, but each, after a moment's reflection, realized the futility of such an action. It would merely delay the firing of the ...
— The Boy Allies Under Two Flags • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... politics, were not unqualified to enter the courts of western capitals. But the revelation to the Japanese envoys was still greater and more surprising. For the first time they saw the terrible armaments of western powers, and realized the futility of attempting to make armed resistance to their measures. But they encountered on every hand not hatred and aversion, but the warmest interest and kindness,(288) and a desire to render them every courtesy. Instead of barbarians, as they had been taught to regard all foreigners, they found ...
— Japan • David Murray
... do not bore your readers with dictionary definitions of words whose meaning no one doubts; that is a waste of good paper for you, and of good time for them; and we have seen in Chapter II the futility of the dictionary for cases in which there is real disagreement over ...
— The Making of Arguments • J. H. Gardiner
... was a connoisseur in feminine ethics (as he naturally would be, having had such able instructors as Sarah and Hagar) and realized the utter futility of attempting to persuade, bribe or induce a woman to do anything she ...
— Fair to Look Upon • Mary Belle Freeley
... since both of them had sought to bring their feud forcibly to an end in the Law Courts, the Anglo-Saxon peoples had had no cause to complain of any lack of effort on their part to be entertaining. The upshot of the law proceedings had been that the Court, with a futility almost fatuous, had ordered the duchess to return to her husband, and, what was far more important, had given the custody of their little daughter of twelve, Lady Marion Ricksborough, ...
— Happy Pollyooly - The Rich Little Poor Girl • Edgar Jepson
... with a pocket-knife. The amado are thin sliding screens of soft wood, easy to break with a single blow; and in most Izumo homes there is not a lock which could resist one vigorous pull. Indeed, the Japanese themselves are so far aware of the futility of their wooden panels against burglars that all who can afford it build kura—small heavy fire-proof and (for Japan) almost burglar-proof structures, with very thick earthen walls, a narrow ponderous door fastened with a gigantic padlock, ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... enlightenment, have all contributed to this artistic progress. There appears to be more of the artistic and intellectual quality in the average architecture of the present time, on both sides of the Atlantic, than at any previous period in this century. The futility of the archological revival of extinct styles is generally recognized. New conditions are gradually procuring the solution of the very problems they raise. Historic precedent sits more lightly on the architect than formerly, and the essential unity of principle underlying all good design is ...
— A Text-Book of the History of Architecture - Seventh Edition, revised • Alfred D. F. Hamlin
... arms and equipment. One of his chief preoccupations in those months was with this matter, and it explains his desire to have the proclamation against the import of arms withdrawn. The Larne exploit had proved the futility of it; articles by Colonel Repington in The Times testified to the completeness of the provision which had been made for Ulster. But smuggling is always a costly business, and Nationalists were hampered by the cost. More ...
— John Redmond's Last Years • Stephen Gwynn
... because it's English," said he. "You'd understand fast enough if I should put it in Italian. But I only quoted it to show the futility of proverbs. Laugh at locksmiths, indeed! Why, it can't even laugh at such an insignificant detail as a Papist's prejudices. But I wish I were a duke and a millionaire. Do you know any one who could create me a duke and endow me ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... had subsided with the sudden sense of its futility, received this in silence, and the lawyer, reassured, continued with a touch of condescension: "My only specific charge from Mrs. Westmore was to hand you this cheque; but, in spite of what has passed, I take it upon myself ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... I make no denunciation. On the other hand, I am trying to impress upon you the utter futility of your love." ...
— Hushed Up - A Mystery of London • William Le Queux
... of concealing the case about her person, but a second's reflection showed her the futility of such a move. She had not seen the papers themselves; any one of them might be an absolute proof of Droulde's guilt; the correspondence ...
— I Will Repay • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... Cause of Man, and Man's work in God's Earth, got no furtherance from the Arabian Caliph, then no matter how many scimetars he drew, how many gold piasters pocketed, and what uproar and blaring he made in this world—he was but a loud-sounding inanity and futility; at bottom, he was not at all. Let us honour the great empire of Silence, once more! The boundless treasury which we do not jingle in our pockets, or count up and present before men! It is perhaps, ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... it. If by any chance when he was standing on his corner of idleness his little girl came past, he melted away imperceptibly. He could not bear it that the child should see him standing there in that company of futility and openly avowed inadequacy. The child was a keen-eyed, slender little girl, resembling neither father nor mother, but looking rather like her paternal grandmother, who was a fair, attenuated woman, with an intelligence which had sharpened on herself for want ...
— The Portion of Labor • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... detention." In reply to this Jackson held that the convention of 1822 did not grant the commissioners the power to fix interests and, besides, that interests not being a part of the debt could not be allowed. Realizing the futility of his claims Cheves offered to submit the difference to arbitration, but ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 5, 1920 • Various
... be, a great general conformity behind the distinctions, a deep underlying common basis beneath the unlikeness. And for true union of hearts, this equality must have a spiritual source. If then there must be some spiritual affinity, agreement in what is best and highest in each, we can see the futility of most of the selfish attempts to make capital out of our intercourse. Our friends will be, because they must be, our equals. We can never have a nobler intimacy, until we are made fit ...
— Friendship • Hugh Black
... face opposite me always, instead of bald-headed babblers. Ah, if you knew how often, of late, it has floated before me in the House, reducing historic wrangles to the rocking of children's boats in stormy ponds, accentuating the ponderous futility." He took her hand again, and a great joy filled him as he felt its gentle ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... So far he had gone, determined that, if the man would not stop for his commands, he should be collared and dragged back by main force to face the thing which he had brought, but by degrees even the angry young man perceived the futility of chasing mad cattle. He drew up panting, and, turning, walked back once more. He did not walk slowly; he was in no frame to loiter and his run had brought such a flush of heat upon him that it would have been madness to linger in the bitter cold. At the same time, while his ...
— What Necessity Knows • Lily Dougall
... shoot up into his throat. It was not a sensation of fear but of humiliation—the humiliation of defeat, the knowledge of his own weakness in the hands of this man who had so quickly and so surely blocked his claim. His quick brain saw the futility of argument. He possessed no absolute proof and he had thought that he needed none. Strang saw the flash of doubt in his face, the hesitancy in his answer; he divined the working of the other's brain ...
— The Courage of Captain Plum • James Oliver Curwood
... framed some vague sentence of democratic sentiment when suddenly doubts overwhelmed him. His belief in his heroic quality and calling he found had altogether lost its assured conviction. The picture of a little strutting futility in a windy waste of incomprehensible destinies replaced it. Abruptly it was perfectly clear to him that this revolt against Ostrog was premature, foredoomed to failure, the impulse of passionate inadequacy ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... low and musical; that of a cultured woman. She evidently recognized the futility of further subterfuge ...
— The Quest of the Sacred Slipper • Sax Rohmer
... in his chapter on Aliwal the curiously intimate sketch of the Boer character—"A people hard to arouse, but, you would say, very hard to subdue." Well, it is by the objective side of life that we have to judge him. The futility of death makes that an absolute necessity; but I like to think of a possible George Steevens who, when the dust and sand of campaigns and daily journalism had been wiped away from his shoon, would have combined in a great and single-hearted ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens
... doubly sweet. It was not the work of chance. More than once he had tested the strength of that old halter rope, covertly, with none to watch, and had felt it stretch and give a little under the strain of his weight; but he had long since learned the futility of breaking ropes so long as there were stable walls or lofty corral fences to contain him. A moment of local freedom meant nothing, and he had waited until he should find open sky and clear country; this was his reward ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... of old-world tranquillity or mid-Victorian futility according to their position in the home. Outside the home, in that wild state from which civilization has dragged them, they may have stood for dare-devil courage or constancy or devotion; I cannot tell. I may only speak of them now as I find them, which is in the garden ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... grasped his hand, and for a moment he envied the other the generous thought. But smiling bitterly, he shook his head, as if conscious of the futility of even this ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper
... concerning the action of the larynx, and more especially the vocal cords in tone-production. While the early discoveries regarding the mechanism of the voice were hopefully believed to have solved all problems concerning its cultivation, experience has shown the futility of attempting to formulate a set of rules for voice-culture based alone upon the incomplete data furnished by the laryngoscope. This instrument is a small, round mirror which is introduced into the throat at such an angle, that if horizontal rays of light are thrown upon it, the larynx, ...
— The Child-Voice in Singing • Francis E. Howard
... dismiss last night's experience as a mere fantasy of sleep, or, if not an actual dream, some vision hailing from the borderland of consciousness, at the point where the senses merge. Yet, even as she argued with herself, she felt the utter futility of it, and knew her denials were vain ...
— Master of the Vineyard • Myrtle Reed
... I realize the futility of endeavour when I see how funny others can be without ...
— I'll Leave It To You - A Light Comedy In Three Acts • Noel Coward
... his crowning offense. What had infuriated Shirley was the fact that she had been at some pains to inform Bryce Cardigan that she loathed him—whereat he had looked her over coolly, grinned a little, and declined to believe her! Then, seemingly as if fate had decreed that her futility should be impressed upon her still further, Bryce Cardigan had been granted an opportunity to save, in a strikingly calm, heroic, and painful manner, her and her uncle from certain and horrible death, thus placing upon Shirley an ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... critic arose, who, in one of the most judicious and spirited essays that our nation has produced, on a point of classical literature, completely overturned this ill-founded edifice, and exposed the arrogance and futility of its assuming architect." He even condescends to justify an acrimony of style, which had been gently blamed by the more unbiassed German; "Paullo acrius quam velis - - -,perstrinxit." But I cannot forgive myself the contemptuous ...
— Memoirs of My Life and Writings • Edward Gibbon
... of Falsehood, Hypocrisy, and Impiety. — Futility of the Charge, and utter failure of the Evidence on which alone it is grounded. — He is urged by his people to vindicate the Rights of his Crown, himself having a conscientious conviction of the Justice of his Claim. — Story of the Tennis-Balls. — ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 2 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... weakness of futility they had come to associate the aspect of death or terror with the Blind Spot. Yet, here was Watson! Watson, alive and strong; he was the reverse of what they ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... of dalliance is in his hands merely a figure of fun, but the militant Boer in field and camp is a faithful picture, so faithful, indeed, when contrasted with the other, that it leaves me astounded at such a combination of skill and futility. ...
— Punch or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, October 21, 1914 • Various
... he recognized the futility of his efforts. The baseball swing of the figure below could not be mistaken. There was a roar beneath, and a flash of fire, as the bomb exploded on the door. Then came a rush of men, and the Tower had fallen. Heritage ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan
... apartment on the ground floor of the Embassy, where the ambassador was giving instructions to two of his secretaries. He dismissed them with a little wave of his hand and bowed politely to his visitor. There was no longer any pretext on the part of Monsieur Guillot. He recognised its complete futility. ...
— The Kingdom of the Blind • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... commonest among his subjects. Nothing could indicate more vividly the omnipotence of the o-omi; everything had been prepared so that his partisans could bury the body almost before it was cold. Had Prince Shotoku protested, he would have been guilty of the futility described by a Chinese proverb as "spitting at the sky." Besides, Shotoku and Umako were allies otherwise. The Soga minister, in his struggle with the military party, had needed the assistance of Shotoku, and had secured it by community of allegiance to Buddhism. ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... to closed doors he made no attempt to open, expatiating voluminously on conditions that all the world knew, elucidating the obvious, ranging from one platitude to another—and avoiding the vital and concrete as though it were poisonous. And as Mr. Carp read Mary became oppressed with his total futility. ...
— Little Lost Sister • Virginia Brooks
... the place of secretary of state. With a curious respect for those theories his familiarity with the secret social history of France had caused him to entertain, he hoped and attempted to retain a hold over the king through the influence of Lady Yarmouth, though the futility of such means had already been demonstrated to him by his relations with Queen Caroline's "ma bonne Howard." The influence of Newcastle and Sandwich, however, was too strong for him; he was thwarted and over-reached; and in 1748 he resigned the seals, and returned ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 1 - "Chtelet" to "Chicago" • Various
... time, some of you may say, and not altogether creditable to a grown-up man. And yet, from the deepest point of view, who knows the more of truth, and who knows the less,—Whitman on his omnibus-top, full of the inner joy with which the spectacle inspires him, or you, full of the disdain which the futility of his ...
— Talks To Teachers On Psychology; And To Students On Some Of Life's Ideals • William James
... obligation to endure disgrace and ill-treatment. He might have refrained from his benevolent ministrations when he saw the futility of his efforts with the Jews. But he did not so; even in his sufferings upon the cross he charitably prayed for his enemies. He had authority, he had power enough, and he would have been justified in the action, had he revenged himself on his furious enemies, invoked ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. II - Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost • Martin Luther
... if they had doubted her statements. But Vera doubted neither. She knew the accusation was true; and when on Jimmy coming in a few moments later and finding her red-eyed and white-faced, she taxed him with it, he recognised the futility of denial, though ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... vision to perceive that the World War would come to an end in the near future. Austria-Hungary, acting with the full approval of the German Government, had made overtures for peace, and Bulgaria, recognizing the futility of further struggle, had signed an armistice which amounted to an unconditional surrender. These events were soon followed by the collapse of Turkish resistance and by the German proposals which resulted in the armistice which went into ...
— The Peace Negotiations • Robert Lansing
... whom we shall hear more of elsewhere), whose passport was not quite right on this occasion!—Never was a more disgraceful Peace. But also never had been worse fighting; planless, changeful, powerless, melting into futility at every step:—not to be mended by imprisonments in Gratz, and still harsher treatment of individuals. "Has all success forsaken me, then, since Eugene died?" said the Kaiser; and snatched at this Turk Peace; glad to have it, by mediation of ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. X. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—At Reinsberg—1736-1740 • Thomas Carlyle
... Bjoernson was sent to the Latin school at Molde, where, however, his progress was not encouraging. He was one of those thoroughly healthy and headstrong boys who are the despair of ambitious mothers, and whom fathers (when the futility of educational chastisement has been finally proved) are apt to regard with a resigned and half-humorous regret. His dislike of books was instinctive, hearty, and uncompromising. His strong, half-savage boy-nature could brook no restraints, and looked longingly ...
— Essays on Scandinavian Literature • Hjalmar Hjorth Boyesen
... said Mr. Caryll pensively, and the look in his eyes betrayed the trend of his thoughts; they were of pity—but of pity at the futility of such strong emotions. ...
— The Lion's Skin • Rafael Sabatini
... my own company ("K")from Fort Yamhill. The men, inspired by the urgency of our situation, marched more than forty miles a day, accomplishing the whole distance in so short a period, that I doubt if the record has ever been beaten. When this reinforcement arrived, the Indians saw the futility of further demonstrations against their agent, who they seemed to think was responsible for the insufficiency of food, and managed to exist with the slender rations we could spare and such indifferent food as they could pick up, until the Indian Department succeeded in getting ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... weeks at the academy I got my first lesson in the futility of non-resistance, so that all the lessons of my life in favour of this doctrine were, of a sudden, rendered vain. We were going home in the afternoon, gay and happy, Jack Warder to take supper with me, and to use a boat my aunt ...
— Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker • S. Weir Mitchell
... that moment their attitude toward Slone changed as subtly as had come the knowledge of his feeling. The gravity and gloom left their faces. It seemed they might have regretted what they had said about the futility of catching Wildfire. They did not want Slone to see or feel the ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... especially among the moderns, may be said to choose imperfect rimes deliberately, both as a fresh means of securing variety and avoiding the monotony of hackneyed rimes, and also as a means of subtly suggesting the imperfection and futility of life. A few famous examples, defensible and indefensible, are: Wordsworth's robin: sobbing, sullen: pulling; Tennyson's with her: together, valleys: lilies; Keats's youths: soothe, pulse: culls; Swinburne's ...
— The Principles of English Versification • Paull Franklin Baum
... of a hundred and fifty thousand men marches direct on the capital. The ttes-du-pont on the Niemen, and the entrenched camp which it had cost Russia two years to fortify, were turned in the first march of the French; and the futility of the whole costly and rather timorous system was exhibited in the fact, that the crowning battle was fought ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various
... might) I should have trembled, but still hoped and asked for her forgiveness; and yet mine had been a treason in the teeth of love. But let me tell you, madam," he pursued, with rising irritation, "where a husband by futility, facility, and ill-timed humours has outwearied his wife's patience, I will suffer neither man nor woman to misjudge her. She is free; the man has been ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Ignorance of the laws and economy of nature is the one great source of these absurd opinions. They have not only no foundation in nature or experience, but are directly opposed to both. In proportion, then, as we advance in our researches into Nature's economy and laws, shall we perceive their futility and absurdity. As in other cases, take away the cause, and the effect ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew
... leg-weary as he was, Judson's first impulse prompted him to seek for the path to the end that he might dash down the hill and give chase. But if he would have yielded, another pursuer was before him to show him the futility of that expedient. While the clicking of the hand-car wheels was still faintly audible, a man—the door-hammering madman, Judson thought it must be—materialized suddenly from somewhere in the under-shadows to run down the ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... the great theologians are for those interested in theology. But I can think of no Christian writer, not Newman even, more to be commended than Pascal to those who doubt, but who have the mind to conceive, and the sensibility to feel, the disorder, the futility, the meaninglessness, the mystery of life and suffering, and who can only find peace through a satisfaction of ...
— Pascal's Pensees • Blaise Pascal
... himself unable to pursue, and right it is also that he should pause now, and breathe, and feel his wings. But it will soon be time for energy and action. We are not here for ourselves only; there is so much to be done. And if I am often discontented with myself for the futility of my dreams, for sitting here a mere spectator, as it were, of struggles that I long to share, yet know not how, greater still is my impatience at the sight of one wasting his days in mere speculation, who, having all the strength, the manhood, that I lack, might ...
— The Wings of Icarus - Being the Life of one Emilia Fletcher • Laurence Alma Tadema
... quickly set the Martians right about the futility of gold. They eagerly turned it over to the Earthmen in exchange for green certificates with ...
— Mars Confidential • Jack Lait
... it. He was going upon this business in reckless haste, without forethought or caution. He would stake his life to save twenty yards of distance. There was no discretion in his valor. Blithe young gambler that he was, he would do the thing in his own way. No one could tell him. Tom knew the utter futility of shouting any last warnings or ...
— Tom Slade's Double Dare • Percy Keese Fitzhugh
... trudge to business and those other women let lodgings. And in reality even that magic garden-close resolves itself into a villa at Morningside Park and my father being more and more cross and overbearing at meals—and a general feeling of insecurity and futility." ...
— Ann Veronica • H. G. Wells
... diffusing the performance. Indeed, my good lord, I have lived too long not to have divested myself both of vanity and affected modesty. I have not existed to past seventy-three without having discovered the futility and triflingness of my own talents: and, at the same time, it would be impertinent to pretend to think that there is no merit in the execution of a tragedy, on which I have been so much flattered; though I am sincere in condemning the egregious absurdity of selecting a subject so improper for the ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole
... doubt of Cuthbert's attachment to Violet. No remonstrances of his mother—and they were but mild, in spite of her objection to Violet, since she recognized the futility of opposing her son's determined will—had the slightest effect with him. He felt confident in the final acquiescence of both parents in whatever he might choose to do with regard to marriage. Everything, as he saw, rested ...
— Up in Ardmuirland • Michael Barrett
... motive for the systematic observation of actual society came from persons who wanted social reforms but who were forced to realize the futility of Utopian projects. The science of sociology as conceived by Auguste Comte was to substitute fact for doctrines about society. But his attempt to interpret social evolution resulted in a philosophy of history, not a natural science ...
— Introduction to the Science of Sociology • Robert E. Park
... paint? Everything in London and its vicinity has been depicted innumerable times, but never once translated into intelligible images; it is an "old, old story," never yet told, nor to be told. While writing these reminiscences, I am continually impressed with the futility of the effort to give any creative truth to ink sketch, so that it might produce such pictures in the reader's mind as would cause the original scenes to appear familiar when afterwards beheld. Nor have ...
— Our Old Home - A Series of English Sketches • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... clammy fur. He felt the utter futility of even being afraid. He would simply remain as he was, and soon he ...
— The Memory of Mars • Raymond F. Jones
... death penalty "a relic of barbarism," which is neither conclusive nor true. What is required is not loose assertion and dogs-eared phrases, but evidence of futility, or, in lack of that, cogent reasoning. It is true that the most barbarous nations inflict the death penalty most frequently and for the greatest number of offenses, but that is because barbarians are more criminal in instinct and less ...
— The Shadow On The Dial, and Other Essays - 1909 • Ambrose Bierce
... Fall. The diary revealed the gradual transformation of a sunny disposition into a dark one, of a man with gregarious instincts into a wild beast asking only for solitude. Additions to the house were chronicled from time to time, with now and then a pathetic comment upon the futility of the additions. ...
— At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern • Myrtle Reed
... international peace propaganda illuminates this point. Not long ago a meeting in Carnegie Hall, New York, to forward peace among nations broke up in great disorder. Thousands of people who hate the waste and futility of war as much as any of the orators of that evening were filled with an unholy glee. They chuckled with delight at the idea of a riot in a peace meeting. Though it would have seemed perverse to the ordinary ...
— A Preface to Politics • Walter Lippmann
... passages thereof hardly to be reduced to demonstration. Again, the wisdom of antiquity (the shadows whereof are in the poets) in the description of torments and pains, next unto the crime of rebellion, which was the giants' offence, doth detest the offence of futility, as in Sisyphus and Tantalus. But this was meant of particulars: nevertheless even unto the general rules and discourses of policy and government there is due a reverent and ...
— The Advancement of Learning • Francis Bacon
... and stood with her back to the wall and answered him in a firm voice. She understood the futility of ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... the pleasant weather even the dune was not an unfrequented place, and the bay was overlooked on all sides. Caius could not decide whether his suspicion of O'Shea had been just or a monstrous injustice. He felt such suspicion to be morbid, and he said nothing. The futility of asking a question that would not be answered, the difficulty of interference, and his extreme dislike of incurring from O'Shea farther insult, were enough to produce his silence. Behind that ...
— The Mermaid - A Love Tale • Lily Dougall
... enough and not too much. All these thoughts flashed through her mind while Stefana counted ten. But it was without accompaniment of injunctions that Miss Theodosia answered on that wistful little stroke of ten. In her soul she felt the futility of injunctions. ...
— Miss Theodosia's Heartstrings • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... therefore Helene Vauquier hated her. And her hatred reached out beyond the girl, and embraced the old, superstitious, foolish woman, whom a young and pretty face could so easily beguile. Helene Vauquier despised them both, hated them both, and yet must nurse her rancour in silence and futility. Then came the seances, and at once, to add fuel to her hatred, she found herself stripped of those gifts and commissions which she had exacted from the herd of common tricksters who had been wont to make their harvest out of Mme. Dauvray. Helene ...
— At the Villa Rose • A. E. W. Mason
... was found on his person. Not circumstantial evidence, but fact. Signed on one side by R.E. Lee and, on the other, by Colonel Morrison." He laughed shortly over the futility of argument under such circumstances. "Do you presume to contest ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple
... officer opened the door. Evidently the burglar was wise enough to appreciate the futility of fighting against odds. Perhaps he did not wish to add the charge of manslaughter to that of robbery. Certainly, he did not feel himself called to sudden death. At any rate, his hands were above his head, and in less than a second he was ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston
... chair! Instead there was life! Instead there was the triumph of life! Instead there was a great yea to all lofty, beautiful and daring things!... And Luther restored the church: he attacked it.... The Renaissance—an event without meaning, a great futility!—Ah, these Germans, what they have not cost us! Futility—that has always been the work of the Germans.—The Reformation; Leibnitz; Kant and so-called German philosophy; the war of "liberation"; the empire—every time a futile substitute for something ...
— The Antichrist • F. W. Nietzsche
... saying of hers, with the full melody of her voice. One day, treating of modern pessimism, he had draped a cadaverous view of our mortal being in a quotation of the wisdom of the Philosopher Emperor: 'To set one's love upon the swallow is a futility.' And she, weighing it, nodded, and replied: 'May not the pleasure for us remain if we set our love upon the beauty of ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... moment he stood like an infuriated steer at bay, caught in the narrow branding "pinch." He waited for a revealing flash of lightning in the hope that it would show him a way out. He should have realized the futility of his hope, but, if he were soaked by the downpour, his spirit of optimism was as yet ...
— The Law-Breakers • Ridgwell Cullum
... stranger, is supreme in its artistic triumph. "The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg" is one of the mightiest sermons against self-righteousness ever preached. Its philosophy, that every man is strong until his price is named; the futility of the prayer not to be led into temptation, when it is only by resisting temptation that men grow strong—these things blaze out in a way that makes us fairly blink ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... valleys and plains that separate them. About twelve miles to the eastward of Ukamba live a tribe called Wasongo, and to the west, at twenty miles' distance, are the Waquanda. To-day was fully verified the absolute futility of endeavouring to march against time in ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... the sky, on the ground that the farmer had just ploughed. He seemed to smile cynically at the hoarse cheering now spreading from field to field, from camp to camp. Perhaps even then he had realised the futility of it ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
... and our peoples from the catastrophe of a nuclear holocaust, free nations must maintain countervailing military power to persuade the Communists of the futility of seeking their ends through aggression. If Communist rulers understand that America's response to aggression will be swift and decisive—that never shall we buy peace at the expense of honor or faith—they will be powerfully deterred from launching a military venture engulfing their ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Dwight D. Eisenhower • Dwight D. Eisenhower
... caress could penetrate to the unconscious state, or influence the happiness of her who lay in the vault beneath. This conviction, together with the remembrance of soft replies to bitter speeches, of gentle looks repaying angry glances; the perception of the falsehood, paltryness and futility of her cherished dreams of birth and power; the overpowering knowledge, that love and life were the true emperors of our mortal state; all, as a tide, rose, and filled her soul with stormy and bewildering confusion. It fell to my lot, to come as the influential ...
— The Last Man • Mary Shelley
... and those of the centre grew wider. The remnants of Saul's army sought shelter on the eastern bank of the Jordan, but found no leader to reorganise them. The reverse sustained by the Israelitish champion seemed, moreover, to prove the futility of trying to make a stand against the invader, and even the useless-ness of the monarchy itself: why, they might have asked, burthen ourselves with a master, and patiently bear with his exactions, if, when put to the test, he fails to discharge ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 6 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... new trend in Greek thought was charged with and sentenced for impiety. We have already mentioned the singular prelude to the indictment afforded by the comedy of Aristophanes. We have also remarked upon the futility of looking therein for any actual enlightenment on the Socratic point of view. And Plato makes Socrates state this with all necessary sharpness in the Apology. Hence what we may infer from the attack ...
— Atheism in Pagan Antiquity • A. B. Drachmann
... September, 1903, a monument was unveiled commemorating the battle of Lake George one hundred and forty-eight years before. The monument embodies the heroic figures of Sir William Johnson and King Hendrick the Indian chief. It represents the Indian chief demonstrating to General Johnson the futility of dividing his forces. Governor Odell of New York, Governor Guild of Massachusetts, Governor Chamberlain of Connecticut, and Governor McCulloch of Vermont and ...
— The Hudson - Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention • Wallace Bruce
... the force of units and determines that nobody shall use it. It eliminates force. And it thus cancels the power of the units to use it against other units (other than as a part of the community) by standing ready at all times to reduce the power of any one unit to futility. If A says that B began it, the community does not say, "Oh, in that case you may continue to use your force; finish him off." It says, on the contrary, "Then we'll see that B does not use his force; we'll restrain him, we won't have either of you using force. We'll cancel it and suppress it wherever ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various
... feeling the futility of making any further observations. He feared to fall into some trap. The answers made by the boys did not seem to fit particularly well with what he expected and was accustomed to. The parson could not make out whether the ...
— The Round-up - A Romance of Arizona novelized from Edmund Day's melodrama • John Murray and Marion Mills Miller
... again like a metaphysical discussion, but is illustrative of the futility of formal motions, so that actually the decision depends upon the good plain common sense of the judge. The tendency is that if the case has gone to the length of a full trial and there is any question of fact involved, that the jury should determine ...
— The Man in Court • Frederic DeWitt Wells
... the difficulty—the futility of attempting to fasten on Emerson any particular doctrine, philosophic, or religious theory. Emerson wrings the neck of any law, that would become exclusive and arrogant, whether a definite one of metaphysics or an indefinite one of mechanics. He hacks his way up and down, as near as he can to ...
— Essays Before a Sonata • Charles Ives |
