Quotes About Futility

There's no better sign that a civilization has reached its height than the awareness, in its members, of the futility of all effort, given that we're ruled by implacable laws, which nothing can repeal or obstruct.

Ever since I was a child, the intrinsic futility of all forms of action has been a cherished touchstone for my detachment from everything, including me.

Desceu sobre nós a mais profunda e a mais mortal das secas dos séculos - a do conhecimento íntimo da vacuidade de todos os esforços e da vaidade de todos os propósitos.

If there's no earth in heaven, then let's not bother with heaven. Far better for everything to turn out to be nothing and for this plotless novel to end there.

The tragic futility of life.

que pesa duramente na alma: é a estupidez que sacrifica vidas e haveres a qualquer coisa inevitavelmente inútil.

The restless anguish of regrets, The weariness caused by so much futility, The surfeit even of imagined things

He kept on digging but the grave did not get any deeper. "The dead are poor," he said in the voice of the stranger. You can't be any poorer than dead.

Uostalom, ništa i ne vredi tražiti; sve je laž! Svaki osmejak skriva zevanje od dosade, svaka radost neko prokletstvo, svako uživanje odvratnost prema njemu samom, a i najbolji poljupci samo vam ostavljaju neku neostvarljivu želju za kakvom višom nasladom.

War is never fatal but always lost. Always lost.

One does not set fire to a world which is already lost.

I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.

All you have to do is hold your first soldier who is dying in your arms, and have that terribly futile feeling that I can't do anything about it... Then you understand the horror of war.

brevedad de la vida, en lo insondable que resulta el destino de los hombres, en la futilidad de los empeños mundanos.

As well to clutch at the moon's reflection in a still midnight pond as to seek a grip on that bright mind.

But when all roads lead to death, there is no point to running down any of them.

His study of war had only reinforced its futility.

But why bother trying to turn a monkey into a goat?

You can't squeeze blood from a stone. You can try, but you do all the bleeding.

Back and back and back. Jonas repeated the familiar phrase. Sometimes it had seemed humorous to him. Sometimes it had seemed meaningful and important. Now it was ominous. It meant, he knew, that nothing could be changed.

Was there someone there, waiting, who would receive the tiny released twin? Would it grow up Elsewhere, not knowing, ever, that in this community lived a being who looked exactly the same? For a moment, he felt a tiny, fluttering hope that he knew was quite foolish. He hoped that it would be Larissa, waiting. Larissa, the old woman he had bathed. He remembered her sparkling eyes, her soft voice, her low chuckle. Fiona had told him recently that Larissa had been released at a wonderful ceremony.

A pesar de su incalculable riqueza y poder marchaba hacia la muerte con el convencimiento de que moriría sin ser amado ni respetado, y que nadie lloraría por él; que su muerte ya estaba siendo precedida por una reunión de buitres, que finalmente su vida había sido más absurda y menos satisfactoria que la de un retrasado mental congénito sin extremidades ni órganos de reproducción.

Dz?ve ir cietums, kas b?v?ts no nabadz?bas un nepiepild?tiem sap?iem, t? ir l?na virz?šan?s uz manu vietu zem zemes, t? ir Dieva vilt?ba, lai liktu mums vilties mies?, t? ir tikai ?su br?di degoša liesmi?a e??as trauk? starp vienu tumsu un citu, kas ir t?s gal?.

What is worse is that one wonders how, to-morrow, one will find strength enough to go on doing what one has been doing the day before, and for so much too long before that, – strength for the whole mad business, for a thousand and one vain projects: attempts to escape crushing necessity; attempts which are always stillborn....