"Futile" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... modifying the expressed thoughts of his twenty-first year would have been, as he probably felt, a futile tampering with the work of another man; his literary conscience would have forbidden this, if it had been otherwise possible. But he here proves by his own words what I have already asserted, that the power of detail correction either was, or had ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... der Geschlechtskrankheiten mit nervoesen Leiden, Stuttgart, 1885. (Hegar, however, went much further than this, and was largely responsible for the surgical treatment of hysteria now generally recognized as worse than futile.) Balls-Headley, "Etiology of Nervous Diseases of the Female Genital Organs," Allbutt and Playfair, System of Gynecology, 1896, ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis
... disgraceful than that of the Spanish Marriages; none more futile. The course of history mocked its ulterior purposes; its immediate results were wholly to the injury of the House of Orleans. The cordial understanding between France and Great Britain, which had been revived after the differences of 1840, was now ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe
... be futile for me to attempt detailing the events of that chaotic day. We had all ridden over to Hamilton and spent the day there, with the little town in a turmoil and events seething around us—a seemingly endless stream of reports of what had happened the night before. By daylight ...
— The White Invaders • Raymond King Cummings
... that is to say, the futile encumbrance of the mind, the more will the light of the spirit be darkened and its forces dissipated, making it difficult or impossible not only to reason and act, but even ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori
... disease,—she devotes all her mother love and devotion to it, but she is fighting a hopeless fight, as I previously explained when I stated that one-half of the total effort of one-third of the race is expended in combating conditions against which no successful effort is possible. Even her prayers are futile, because the wrong is implanted in the constitution of the child, and the remedy is elsewhere. These are the tragedies of life, which no words can adequately describe, and compared to which the incidental troubles of the world ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Volume I. (of IV.) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague, M.D.
... 70 and Ismail Oglu Tepe has failed. The enemy has dug himself well in by now and, therefore, we depended far more on our gun fire than we did on the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th. Unfortunately, the bombardment seems to have been pretty near futile—not the fault of the gunners, but simply because, on the one hand, the mist interfered with the accuracy of their aim, on the other, shortage of shell prevented them from making up for inaccuracy by ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume 2 • Ian Hamilton
... been said will suffice to show how baseless is the assertion, so frequently urged as an argument for Home Rule, that the Imperial Parliament is incapable of legislating successfully for Irish wants.[72] Nothing could be more futile than to represent Irish problems, and especially the problems of Irish rural life, as so unique that only a Parliament sitting in Dublin can hope to solve them satisfactorily. As a matter of fact, the rural ...
— Against Home Rule (1912) - The Case for the Union • Various
... stood, as it seemed, face to face with Nature, divided from the ultimate truth by only a thin veil, to temper the splendour and the terror. Then the tension of personal feeling was loosened. She saw how entirely vain and futile were the things of life that we ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird
... in the foolhardy policy of the last half-dozen years. John Quincy Adams never tired of ridiculing the puerile maneuvers of backwoods politicians whose ignorance amounted almost to high crime. To him the Independent Treasury Bill was an attempt to separate the Government from business, as futile as to try to divorce the law from the judges in the administration ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd
... joy known but to few of the sons of men-absolute power over, and supreme contempt for, his fellows. He stood for a moment or two, in the grey, miserable street discordant with the wailings of babies and the clamour of futile little girls, who, after the manner of women, had no idea of political crisis, and the shrill objurgations of slattern mothers and the raucous cries of an idealist vendor of hyacinths, and, cocked hat on head and wooden sword in hand, he looked at his ...
— The Fortunate Youth • William J. Locke
... us that while Iberville was making almost futile attempts with the half-hearted support of his government to establish this colony at the mouth of the Mississippi, Peter the Great was beginning to lay the foundations of St. Petersburg in as unpromising a place—a barren, uncultivated island which was ...
— The French in the Heart of America • John Finley
... Providence, always gentle and strong in its dealings with human liberty, will hasten the day when there will be but "One Fold and One Pastor." In the meantime the efforts made to constitute unity of Christianity outside of its true centre will prove as futile as ploughing ...
— Catholic Problems in Western Canada • George Thomas Daly
... up Saint James's Park, and should go on with these massacres till whole towns and shires were left without one inhabitant, the survivors would still be bound meekly to submit, and to be torn in pieces or roasted alive without a struggle. The arguments in favour of this proposition were futile indeed: but the place of sound argument was amply supplied by the omnipotent sophistry of interest and of passion. Many writers have expressed wonder that the high spirited Cavaliers of England ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... that she and her Aunt Christine had attempted in behalf of the imperilled man had been futile. To apply to the Emperor again every one, including the magistrate, had declared useless, since even the Burgrave had ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... pounds. He stepped astride it, reached down, and strove to get it on his shoulder. His first conclusion was that one hundred pounds were real heavy. His next was that his back was weak. His third was an oath, and it occurred at the end of five futile minutes, when he collapsed on top of the burden with which he was wrestling. He mopped his forehead, and across a heap of grub-sacks saw John Bellew gazing at him, wintry amusement ...
— Smoke Bellew • Jack London
... was almost endless and, although the company comprised two charming misses (at least I know that they eventually grew into two very lovely women), there was no time wasted over anything so sentimental or futile as love-scenes. But whatever else the play contained in the way of great scenes, there was always a mountain pass—the mountains being composed of a chair and two tables—and Richard was forever leading his little band over the pass while the band, wholly indifferent as to whether ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... inscription of King Mesha. Ahaziah, Ahab's immediate successor, was obliged to accept the situation; after his early death a futile attempt again to subjugate them was made by his brother Joram. Such a campaign was possible to him only in the event of the Syrians keeping quiet, and in point of fact it would appear that they were not in a ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... them all energy left him. The appearance of that woman crushed him utterly. Shotaye appeared to him by the side of the great war shaman of his enemies like some fiend, to be sure, but a fiend of so much higher rank than his own that it was futile to cope with her. The Indian believes in evil spirits, but even they are subjected to the power of deities of a higher order beneficial to mankind. As such a shuatyam the woman appeared to Tyope,—as one whom the Shiuana had directed to accomplish his ruin. ...
— The Delight Makers • Adolf Bandelier
... figure his full cloak of quilted black silk, took his shovel hat and his cane, and stalked indignantly and sadly the whole length of the broad central aisle, out of the church, thus making a last but futile protest against modern innovations in church music. Many, in whom the Puritan instincts and blood are still strong, sympathize internally with him in this feeling; and all novelty-lovers must acknowledge that the sublime simplicity and deep piety in which the old Puritan psalm-tunes abound, ...
— Sabbath in Puritan New England • Alice Morse Earle
... Minnesota Row were the social feature of Washington. Cabinet officers, diplomatists, Judges, Congressmen, officers of the army and navy, residents, and the strangers within their gates made up the throng that good- humoredly jostled and crowded each other in futile attempts to move through the parlors and hall. When General Grant had issued cards of invitation to his first reception, hundreds who had received none went, all the same, so he afterward announced through the newspapers that he would be "happy ...
— Perley's Reminiscences, Vol. 1-2 - of Sixty Years in the National Metropolis • Benjamin Perley Poore
... turn my whole life's stream back upon itself if that would bring you peace. I could bear to repent if my repentance could avail But you are gone into the great dark. You will be sad no more and glad no more. I broke your heart, and you tried to patch it with that futile hope. And you were not the man to ask me to be a coward, and a liar to my own soul. I will keep what little rag of ...
— Despair's Last Journey • David Christie Murray
... adjoining, the neighbouring farm and its goodly show of golden-gray wheat-ricks were left behind, and the carriage entered on the flat, furze-dotted expanse of Sandyfield common. Flocks of geese, arising from damp repose upon the ragged autumn turf, hissed forth futile declarations of war. A gipsy caravan painted in staring colours, and hung all over with heath-brooms and basket-chairs, caused the horses to swerve. Parties of home-going school-children backed on to the loose gravel ...
— The History of Sir Richard Calmady - A Romance • Lucas Malet
... that day he had relied upon superior strength and weight to bring him victorious through every casual fray; and it had never before failed him. But that merciless, suffocating hold compelled him to abandon offensive measures to effect his escape. He stopped his wild and futile hammering and with his one free hand he grasped the back ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... authors much of the conviction is conveyed, not always by adherence to facts, but always by grasp of them. But the whole aim and purport and meaning of the work of the Brontes is that the most futile thing in the whole universe is fact. Such a story as "Jane Eyre" is in itself so monstrous a fable that it ought to be excluded from a book of fairy tales. The characters do not do what they ought to do, nor what they would do, nor it might be said, such is the insanity ...
— Varied Types • G. K. Chesterton
... shore until the advancing waves encroached upon and surrounded his little island, and gave him just room to jump to land. He was standing on one of these great stones watching the sunset, and laughing to himself at the odd gambols of two or three porpoises that kept rolling about in a futile manner across the little bay, when he heard a pleasant voice say ...
— St. Winifred's - The World of School • Frederic W. Farrar
... in her heart of hearts she should not oppose him. But being a true woman, she laid hold of a futile excuse. ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... follow, most conclusively, that God is the author of sin. He has decreed and brings to pass all the sensations, perceptions, emotions, inclinations, volitions, and overt actions, of the whole human race. Various attempts have been made to avoid this result, but they are all futile. The Confession of Faith says: "God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so as thereby neither is God ...
— The Calvinistic Doctrine of Predestination Examined and Refuted • Francis Hodgson
... which had been convicted of systematic corruption—he was beaten by a far larger majority,[61] the distinctness of his plan only serving to increase the numbers of his adversaries. A kinsman of Pitt's, Lord Mahon, made an equally futile attempt to diminish the expenses of elections, partly by inflicting very heavy penalties on parties guilty of either giving or receiving bribes,[62] and partly by prohibiting candidates from providing conveyances for electors; and more than one bill for disfranchising revenue-officers, ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge
... sleep were futile for the most part, although dauntless spirits like Bill Witt and Mike Mowrey turned in as usual and dozed away as peacefully as though no danger existed. Midnight and high tide kindled fresh hopes ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll
... Pincher availed himself of the general confusion to seize hold of his enemy's hind leg, which he never afterwards let go. The boar kept snapping and champing his great tusks; but Pincher, even with the leg in his mouth, was too active to be caught: so as the boar found that it was both futile and undignified to try to run away with a dog hanging on his hind-quarters, he tried another plan. Making for a clump of Ti-ti palms he went to bay, and contrived to take up a very good defensive position. Pincher would have never given up his mouthful ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... which mothers on the shores of all the seven seas had once rocked them to sleep—only now the sound of heavy firing, dull booms of the cannon, and the spit and nervous drum of the machine gun, made its song as futile and indistinguishable as the whisper of a child in the roar of a ...
— Story Hour Readings: Seventh Year • E.C. Hartwell
... well-trimmed black beard, bright eyes like a bird's; he jingled money in his pockets; he jangled a great gold watch chain; and he never turned up except dressed just too much like a gentleman to be one. He was no fool though, though a futile idler; he was curiously clever at all kinds of things that couldn't be the slightest use; a sort of impromptu conjuring; making fifteen matches set fire to each other like a regular firework; or cutting a banana or some such thing into a dancing doll. His name was ...
— The Innocence of Father Brown • G. K. Chesterton
... moving about the room was perhaps the thing she feared and hated most in the world. Every scene of this kind—and he forced them on her, in spite of her futile resistance, at fairly frequent intervals—represented to her an hour of torture and humiliation. How to hide the scenes and the being who caused them, from her husband, her servants, her friends, was becoming ...
— Harvest • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... corporal came nearer; but the trooper decided he was a heavy sleeper and knew, moreover, that his whole form was well shielded by his grey blanket. As usual though, all this was futile, and no effort of will could persuade the corporal to pass unmolested his shrouded form. The blanket was pulled from over his face, and, with a slap on the thigh and "Come on, Mac!" shouted down to him, he could hardly, with decency, pretend to be asleep any longer. He ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... stood dazed and confused, feeling that my six feet made me too conspicuous, and longing in a vague and futile way to let her know without words that I would do what ...
— The Old Stone House and Other Stories • Anna Katharine Green
... moment,—with a wife and carpet-slippers and a large-size bottle of paregoric on his mantelpiece,—instead of here, grinning like a fool over some blatant indecency? He ought to marry; every young man ought to marry. Oh, you futile, abject, burbling twin-brother of the first patron that procured a reputation for Bedlam! why aren't you married—married years ago,—with a home of your own, and a victoria for Mrs. Townsend and bills from the kindergarten every quarter? Oh, you bartender of verbal cocktails! ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... first crude human product of Nature's Pliocene workshop turned out in the steaming lowland of Java, and now known to us as the Pithecanthropus erectus, found about him the climatic conditions generally conceded to have been necessary for man in his helpless, futile infancy. Where man has remained in the Tropics, with few exceptions he has suffered arrested development. His nursery has kept him a child. Though his initial progress depended upon the gifts which Nature put ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... only tests the futile explanation by common-sense, but goes on to suggest the true one. He accepts the belief that there is a 'prince of the demons.' He regards the souls of men who have not yielded themselves to God as His 'goods.' He declares ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - St. Mark • Alexander Maclaren
... engaged in superhuman but futile efforts to release his foot, the sentinel of the passage, who had picked himself up, ran through the postern toward the palisade, followed by another soldier from the garrison. Together they fell upon Trenck, overwhelming him with blows with the butts ...
— International Short Stories: French • Various
... kind without "liking" them the less, but we somehow liked Dickens the more for having forfeited half the claim to appreciation. That process belongs to the fact that criticism, roundabout him, is somehow futile and tasteless. His own taste is easily impugned, but he entered so early into the blood and bone of our intelligence that it always remained better than the taste of overhauling him. When I take him up to-day ...
— A Small Boy and Others • Henry James
... has not so much to fear as the criminal who is responsible for what has happened. He may think that he has escaped by saddling his crime upon a woman's shoulders. On the other hand, he may discover that this attempt, which only aggravates his position, will turn out to be futile." ...
— The Box with Broken Seals • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Bennydeck as being "tired of the sea," and as being willing to try, in place of the breezy Channel, the air of a suburb of London, was to make excuses too perfectly futile and absurd to deceive any one who knew the Captain. In spite of the appearance of innocence which pervaded Catherine's letter, the true motive for breaking off his cruise might be found, as Randal concluded, in Catherine herself. Her residence at the sea-side, helped by the lapse of time, ...
— The Evil Genius • Wilkie Collins
... can do it; but how many are trying to work out their salvation by some intricate method of human device, and, stranger still, are very complacent over the mechanical and abnormal results! All such futile efforts, of which many are so vain, must be cast aside. Listen to Christ's own words: 'Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart.' He who would enter upon the Christian life, must come to Christ as the true scientist sits at the feet of nature—docile, teachable, eager ...
— A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century • E. P. Roe
... astonishing until we come to remember Loyseleur's performance and recognize their source. Ah, Bishop of Beauvais, you are now lamenting this cruel iniquity these many years in hell! Yes verily, unless one has come to your help. There is but one among the redeemed that would do it; and it is futile to hope that that one has not already done it—Joan ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... way daunted by their futile effort to secure the regency of Sweden, had kept up continuous negotiations with their friends in Denmark, with the object ultimately to place the king of Denmark on the throne. Owing, however, to the manifest and growing ...
— The Swedish Revolution Under Gustavus Vasa • Paul Barron Watson
... brow cleared, and he was more satisfied. Tearing up the last half sheet of wasted note-paper he had spoilt in futile attempts to address the lady of the Manor, he laughed at ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... earnestly, "this thing is too serious for mere futile argument. Do not suppose that I desire to irritate you by any question I may ask. But I put it to you whether there may not be some fallacy in your information or in your reasoning. There is the sun shining as brightly as ever in the blue sky. There are the heather and the flowers and the birds. ...
— The Poison Belt • Arthur Conan Doyle
... left, at his desire, to the seclusion of a quiet nook on the shore of the Altenfjord, where he succeeded in making a bold and vivid picture of the scene before him. The colors of the sky had, however, defied his palette, and after one or two futile attempts to transfer to his canvas a few of the gorgeous tints that illumed the landscape, he gave up the task in despair, and resigned himself to the dolce far niente of absolute enjoyment. From his half pleasing, half melancholy reverie the voice of the unknown maiden ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... salary of $1000—and travel allowance of $2.50 for each mile between his home and the State House. This is too clear for argument. There is no need to consider those who are too rich to serve for this sum. It would be futile to discuss whether their services are worth more or less than this, as that is not here the question. Membership in the General Court is not a job. There are services rendered to the Commonwealth by senators and representatives ...
— Have faith in Massachusetts; 2d ed. - A Collection of Speeches and Messages • Calvin Coolidge
... sore subject of Mary's unreasonable stand, and many were the plans proposed by which they might soften her stony little heart, but none of them were carried out. They were voiced, only to be laid aside as futile. ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... women about the war are absolutely futile. They follow the war very closely after their own method, and believe that any defeats, such as on the Somme or Verdun, are tactical rearrangements of positions, dictated by the wisdom of the General Staff, and so long as no Allied troops are upon German soil so long will the German populace ...
— The Land of Deepening Shadow - Germany-at-War • D. Thomas Curtin
... moments in silent thought, one small foot tapping nervously the while, a sure sign of irritation with her. At last she said, slowly, and with an undertone of sarcasm, that she made a futile effort ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... Ashburton, which he followed up to its head. Then striking to the south of east, he cut his former track of 1873 at the Alfred and Marie Range, the range he had so ardently striven to reach when the unfortunate man Gibson died. How futile was the vain attempt that led to Gibson's death he now realised. He finally arrived at the Peake telegraph station. Few watercourses were crossed; the country was suffering under extreme drought; and no discoveries ...
— The Explorers of Australia and their Life-work • Ernest Favenc
... thought. "Here we sit who are dearest to each other in all the world and a kind of futile arrogance drives ...
— The Indian Lily and Other Stories • Hermann Sudermann
... "Oh, man of futile fopperies—unnecessary wraps; I own no ponies in the Hills, I drive no tall-wheeled traps; I buy me not twelve-button gloves, 'short-sixes' eke, or rings, Nor do I waste at Hamilton's my wealth ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... think, one of the most destroying tragedies of our industrial society that women are denied this sustenance in a fixed and regulated unison of sacrifice, are forced away from service to life, excited to do violence to their deepest instinct, by engaging in the deadly and futile rivalry, where the greatest successfulness must bring to them ...
— Women's Wild Oats - Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards • C. Gasquoine Hartley
... hand to her hair in a futile effort to stem the havoc there. A moment of furious attempt to quiet the racing in her veins, and then, quite calmly, "It's all as it should be. We've got to look out for such things and take advantage of them. There are no ifs and buts about being ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... time downwards, are all they have yet given to the world. They have ever been boastful and loud-tongued, but have done nothing; there are no great social efforts, no organizations, no practical projects, whether successful or futile, to which they can point. The old 'book-faiths' which you venture to ridicule have been something at all events; and, in truth, I can find no other 'faith' than what is somehow or other attached to a 'book,' which has been any ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... probable successor had seemed futile and of no account, and they all felt that they had wallowed so deeply in the mire of conspiracy together, that it could not have served the purpose of any one of them to betray ...
— "Unto Caesar" • Baroness Emmuska Orczy
... Hanover listened to their debate, and said to himself that it was weak and its purpose futile. He felt sure that the action they proposed would do no good, and when they had fairly exhausted themselves he rose to offer his views on the ...
— Historical Tales, Vol. 2 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... your own life!" I cried. "You have only to tell the truth to have a chance for it. You have only to go on lying in this futile way to throw your last chance into the gutter. I will palter with you no longer, and unless by the time at which Hinge returns you have made a clean breast of it, I shall send for the men whose names are here, I shall bring my charge, and you will ...
— In Direst Peril • David Christie Murray
... matter?" echoed Maria, falling behind after a futile effort to keep up, Paolo slackened his pace with a laconic "Wait and see," ...
— Chico: the Story of a Homing Pigeon • Lucy M. Blanchard
... it seemed so infinitely futile to cry on account of a spoilt blouse. Mrs. Tiralla had quite forgotten that she also had shed tears on account of her hair just before she had left home. She felt so much more unhappy now, really so miserable. She would have ...
— Absolution • Clara Viebig
... in Carey. "No, no, my dear, that would be utterly futile. You can't catch my birds without salt. ...
— Magnum Bonum • Charlotte M. Yonge
... what had happened. There had been a camp of twenty-two, and there were now fifteen. Seven had died— four men, two women, and one child. Each day during the great storm the men had gone out on their futile search for game, and every few days one of them had failed to return. Thus four had died. The dogs were eaten. Corn and fish were gone; there remained but a little flour, and this was for the women and the children. The men ...
— Isobel • James Oliver Curwood
... thither by the gale. Its long, thin arms, with something like a pale flame spiring from the tips of the slender fingers, were stretched out, as in greeting, while the wan smile played over its face; and when he rushed by, unheedingly, it made a futile effort to grasp the swinging arms with which he appeared to buffet back the buffeting gale. Then it glided on by his side, looking earnestly into his countenance, and moving its pallid lips with agonized rapidity, as ...
— The Ghost • William. D. O'Connor
... talking earnestly to a burly police-inspector in uniform, and Mr. Cutler, who had seized the opportunity to attempt amateur detective work on his own account, was groveling perseveringly about the floor, among old porcelain and loose pieces of armor, in the futile hope of finding any clue that the thieves ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison
... gaze upon those whose array's Of impeccable texture and cut, It is futile to go to Pall Mall or the Row, Now the haunt of the second-rate nut; Take a train (G.N.R.), for example, as far As Cleckheaton or Cleethorpes-on-Sea, Where each male that you meet, from his head to his feet, Follows Fashion's most ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 159, October 13, 1920 • Various
... saw a hand shoot out. He felt a strong pull on his bridle, a tearing twist on the bit in his mouth, and found himself thrown out of his stride. But not even with this would he accept defeat. He reared in a nervous effort to shake off the hand. Finding this futile, he dropped back again, and at last came to a ...
— Bred of the Desert - A Horse and a Romance • Marcus Horton
... arrival that one object of her visit to New York would be futile. She would not see Mr. Keith. He had gone abroad.—"In pursuit of Mrs. Lancaster," said Mrs. Nailor; for Lois was willing enough to hear all that lady had to say on this subject, and it was a good deal. "You know, ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... imaginary thread off his lapel. She wanted to adjust the white flower in his buttonhole (he jerked it out presently, because it interfered with his violin, he said). She wanted to do any one of the foolish, futile things that would have served to relieve her own surcharged feelings. But she had learned control in these years. And she ...
— Fanny Herself • Edna Ferber
... centre of unfolding impulsive activity—"teleological" activity. He is an agent seeking in every act the accomplishment of some concrete, objective, impersonal end. By force of his being such an agent he is possessed of a taste for effective work, and a distaste for futile effort. He has a sense of the merit of serviceability or efficiency and of the demerit of futility, waste, or incapacity. This aptitude or propensity may be called the instinct of workmanship. Wherever the circumstances or traditions of life lead to an habitual comparison of one person with another ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen
... Most fatal, most futile, of questions! Wherever the heart of man beats, In the spirit's most sacred retreats, It comes with its sombre suggestions, Unanswered for ever and aye. The blessing may come and may stay, For the wrestlers heroic endeavour; ...
— Pike County Ballads and Other Poems • John Hay
... they. But when one gets among them and really talks to them, when one realizes how profound and intelligent is their contempt for our civilization, how worthless they hold our aims and activities, how illusory our progress, how futile our intelligence, one begins to wonder whether, after all, it is not merely by an effect of habit that one judges them to be wrong and ourselves right, and whether there is anything at all except blind prejudice in any opinions and ideas ...
— The Meaning of Good—A Dialogue • G. Lowes Dickinson
... young. He that has made even a little progress beyond ignorance and pupilage cannot be edified with anything but truth. What is called vindicating the honour of an individual or a nation, is the most futile, tedious, and uninstructive of all writing; although it will always meet with more applause than that sober criticism, which is attributed to the malicious desire of reducing a great man to the common standard of humanity. It is, after all, not unlikely ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron
... Henry exacted the penalty. The positive results of the Cardinal's policy were nil; the chief negative result was that he had staved off for many years the ruin of the Church, but he only did it by plunging England in the maelstrom of foreign intrigue and of futile wars. ...
— Henry VIII. • A. F. Pollard
... language, is at the best of times difficult, and from whom it is never at the best of times expected. It is a heroism something like that of Lear himself in his endeavour to learn patience at the age of eighty. But arguments against the idea that the Fool is wholly sane are either needless or futile; for in the end they are appeals to the perception that this idea almost destroys the poetry of ...
— Shakespearean Tragedy - Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth • A. C. Bradley
... questions his spirits rose to the occasion, and he answered the questions in a prompt, frank, fearless fashion, that more than once evoked a round of applause from the lookers-on. He had nothing but the truth to tell and his cross-examiner ere long came to the conclusion that it was futile endeavouring to get him to tell anything else; and so, with rather bad grace, he gave it up, and said ...
— Bert Lloyd's Boyhood - A Story from Nova Scotia • J. McDonald Oxley
... said that she found it fair. Her place had been so near the door that well-nigh all the congregation was behind her, streaming out of the church, eager to reach the open air, where it might discuss the sermon, the futile and scandalous interruption by the notorious Mr. Darden, and what Mr. Marmaduke Haward might have said or done had ...
— Audrey • Mary Johnston
... Pharaohs of Egypt, he was pleased to read of, and see illustrated by brush and graver, victories he had never won, and events in which he had not shone. He himself dictated or planned out those wonderful lives or allegories of a life which might have been his. It was on such a work of futile self-glorification that he now wished to ...
— Albert Durer • T. Sturge Moore
... stood immovable, facing the speaker, but looking down, not at him, rigid in attitude, silent. Any attempt to stem the torrent of the wretched man's speech would have been futile. Dominic judged it kindest just to wait, letting passion tear him till, by force of its own violence, it had worn itself out. Then, but not till them, it might be helpful to intervene. Still the exhibition was a very painful one, putting a heavy strain upon the spectator. For be ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... cotton and feathers. A cosey cottage it was, fit for the little poets that erected it. Subsequently I made many long and tiresome efforts to find nests of the Audubons, but all these efforts were futile. ...
— Birds of the Rockies • Leander Sylvester Keyser
... futile exchange of words, words that lacked any comfort or hope for the broken-hearted man. Martin soon left ...
— Amanda - A Daughter of the Mennonites • Anna Balmer Myers
... such poor returns. But my head akes at the bare thought of letter writing. I wish all the ink in the ocean dried up, and would listen to the quills shivering [? shrivelling] up in the candle flame, like parching martyrs. The same indisposit'n to write it is has stopt my Elias, but you will see a futile Effort in the next No., "wrung from ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... fifteen thousand florins was brought to account, and paid out of the estates of Trenck. For this shameful purpose some thousand of florins were paid besides to this species of claimants and though, after examination, their pretensions all proved to be futile, and themselves were cast in damages, yet was none of this money ever refunded, or the false claimants punished. Among these the pretended daughter of General Schwerin received two thousand florins, notorious as was her character. Again, ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 1 (of 2) • Baron Trenck
... an honourable man from his rank, and deprive him of the half pay (which in a great measure accrued to him from purchase,) without accusation, arbitrarily, and on secret and suborned information of having; merited the inflicted contumely. But futile has been the effort of malevolence; Sir Robert Wilson's half pay was L460 per annum, and the subscriptions in indemnification of his ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... alternative is between futile secession or implicit or actual falsehood. It has been the instinct of the aggressive controversialist in all ages to seize upon collective organizations and fence them about with oaths and declarations of such a nature as to ...
— First and Last Things • H. G. Wells
... that it was better to wait until they had stopped rattling their beaks and claws on my shell in futile attack. "Meanwhile," I reasoned, "I can be getting good ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... left him. At the next station, Northwick followed him out on the platform to find if he sent any telegram off. When he had once given way to this anxiety, which he knew to be perfectly stupid and futile, he had to yield to it at every station. He took his bag with him each time he left the car, and he meant not to go back if he saw the conductor telegraphing. It was intensely cold, and in spite of the fierce heat of the stove at the end of the ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... objected to this comparison that the form of the pediment does not properly represent that of the rocks of the Trossachs. The objection is utterly futile, for there is not a single spire or pinnacle from one end of the Trossachs to the other. All their rocks are heavily rounded, and the introduction of the word "spire" is a piece of inaccuracy in description, ventured merely for the sake of the Gothic image. Farther: it has been ...
— Lectures on Architecture and Painting - Delivered at Edinburgh in November 1853 • John Ruskin
... the music of antiquity—that is, in an art-form—is nearly, if indeed not quite, enveloped in mystery; and it were futile to profess to give an historical presentation of an art from its birth, when documentary evidence of the ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter
... the nights were torture. Even that poor, tormenting, futile hope that left her sick and shaken was better than hopelessness. There were no stars in the darkness that brooded over her heart after the sun went down. As she lay with clenched hands, counting the ten thousand woolly sheep whose agility in overleaping an obstructive wall is for ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... passenger had been observant enough of sea-going rules to recognize that this reason was final, and that it was equally futile to demand an interview with the captain when that gentleman was not visibly on duty. He turned angrily to the ...
— The Crusade of the Excelsior • Bret Harte
... Maida Vale. She had left Mrs. Tempest with all honours, and Violet had lavished gifts upon her at parting, feeling fonder of her governess in the last week of their association than at any other period of her tutelage. To-day, in her sorrow, it was a relief to Violet to find herself free from the futile consolations of friendship. She flung herself into the arm-chair by the fire and sobbed out ...
— Vixen, Volume I. • M. E. Braddon
... a wondrous vellum-hole waistcoat of a gone-by vintage, and I saw how futile it were to attempt to lead him, while in that state of absorption, to topics which touched my affair. Of a sudden the significance of what he had said crept over me, the word Solway repeating itself in my mind. That firth ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... teeth and nails with such good effect to the thighs of the old lady who held her down, that the latter was compelled to release her grasp, and the poor girl got up, vowing she would not have another incision made. Of course all resistance would have been futile, or probably have only brought down a fearful chastisement upon her if she had been alone with her tribe in the bush; but she took advantage of my presence, and escaped with nearly one-third of the incisions deficient. At this ceremony many ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... in the whole appearance of the stall, and her dainty devices were so graceful and effective, that Gillian and Mysie implored her to come and tell them what to do with theirs, where they were struggling with cushions, shawls, and bags, with the somewhat futile assistance of Mr. Armine Brownlow and Captain Armytage, whenever the latter could be spared from the theatrical arrangements, where, as he said, it was a case of parmi les borgnes-for his small experience with ...
— The Long Vacation • Charlotte M. Yonge
... about the colony of Roald. He lay a long time, thinking about the fine people who were giving up comfortable homes, successful businesses. He thought of Hyram Logan and family; the shopkeeper from Titan with three sets of twin boys; the Martian miner who had spent twenty-five futile years searching for uranium in the asteroid belt. They were all ready to go over fifty billion miles into deep space and begin their lives again. Tom shook his head. He wondered if he had a choice whether he would chance the mystery and danger of ...
— The Space Pioneers • Carey Rockwell
... for believing that human beings conform to this rule, and that the sex of the child is unalterably determined at the moment conception occurs. Consequently, any attempt to influence it after that event must prove futile. ...
— The Prospective Mother - A Handbook for Women During Pregnancy • J. Morris Slemons
... five hundred infantry were besieging the house wherein a large number of our comrades had taken shelter, determined to put them to the sword; yet so desperate was the resistance that they found it impossible to enter, and many were killed in their futile endeavours. At length I noticed that while the main body covered the movements of several of their companions the latter were preparing a mine by which to blow it up. With the half-dozen men beside me we kept up a galling fire upon ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux
... at length with a headache, and, having carefully avoided contact with Buncombe or Mrs Handover, made an effort to absorb himself in a volume of Gregorovius, which was at present his study. The attempt was futile. Talk still seemed to buzz about him; his temples throbbed; his thoughts wandered far and wide. Driven to bed long before his accustomed hour, he heard raucous voices rending the night, bellowing in hideous antiphony from this side of the street and the other, as the vendors of a halfpenny ...
— The Whirlpool • George Gissing
... this instance, and in several others, and also according to Sueton. Caes. fluids were weighed. What idea could be more practical, useful and more "modern" than this? Sheer commercial greed, stubbornness, indolence have thus far made futile all efforts towards more progressive methods in handling food stuffs, particularly in the weighing of them and in selling them by their weight. Present market methods are very chaotic, and are kept purposely so to the ...
— Cooking and Dining in Imperial Rome • Apicius
... Sunday as it was - all hands were kept at work all day, coaling, watering, and making a futile attempt to pull the cable from the shore on board through the sand. This attempt was rather silly after the experience we had gained at Cape Spartivento. This morning we grappled, hooked the cable at once, and have made an excellent start. Though I have ...
— Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Futile figures! The human mind can grasp nothing of the vastness of inter-stellar space. To Lee it was only a shrinking inky void—an emptiness crowded with whirling little worlds all dwindling.... This crowded space! Often little points of star-dust had come whirling ...
— The World Beyond • Raymond King Cummings
... stood upon the bank, watching the futile efforts which the animal was making to free itself, all the while talking to it, and taunting it with spiteful speeches—for Ossaroo had been particularly indignant at the loss of his skirt. When at length the last twelve inches of the ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid
... from the first, why the Black Colonel wanted to meet me, and for no other reason would I have consented to meet him. But our meeting had been so brief, so disturbed, so futile as regards its purpose, that I had got no light from him whatever. Still, ever since then I had been seeing, in the mirror of life, the face of Marget Forbes, a daughter of the clan whose name she bore, a handsome lass with a long ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne
... which we carried the sick men. In the very center we buried two jars of water, to guard us against thirst. In addition we had ten petroleum cans full of water; all told, a supply for four days. Late in the evening Sami's wife came back from the futile negotiations, alone. She had unveiled for the first and only time on this day of the skirmish, had distributed cartridges and had ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 12) - Neuve Chapelle, Battle of Ypres, Przemysl, Mazurian Lakes • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... mists cleared from my brain—I breathed more easily—my nerves steadied themselves by degrees—the prospect of what I purposed doing satisfied me and calmed the fever in my blood. I became perfectly cool and collected. I indulged in no more futile regrets for the past—why should I mourn the loss of a love I never possessed? It was not as if they had waited till my supposed sudden death—no! within three months of my marriage they had fooled ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... absolute chaos. The floes grind stupendously, throw up great ridges, and shatter one another mercilessly. The ridges, or hedgerows, marking the pressure-lines that border the fast- diminishing pieces of smooth floe-ice, are enormous. The ice moves majestically, irresistibly. Human effort is not futile, but man fights against the giant forces of Nature in a spirit of humility. One has a sense of dependence on the higher Power. To-day two seals, a Weddell and a crabeater, came close to the camp and were shot. Four others ...
— South! • Sir Ernest Shackleton
... "Romance" he had so frequently taken into his mouth; he only knew that this creed of Romanticism, whatever it was, had been worn rather challengingly, a chip on the shoulder, to be knocked off at some peril or other. And it had seemed to Romarin a little futile in the violence with which it had been maintained ... But that was neither here nor there. The point was, that the conversation had begun not very happily, and must be mended at once if at all. To mend it, ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... met at a quick lunch counter, an unusual meeting, for Rokeby lunched almost invariably at his club. As Osborn ate his sandwiches and drank his ale he was looking sideways at Rokeby all the time, and feeling, somehow, how futile he was, how worthless bachelors were to the world; and presently, when the space around them had cleared, and the white-capped server had moved away, ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... enlightenment. Why should we fear the attempt to instil these fragments of decayed formulae into the minds of children of tender age? Might we not be certain that they would vanish of themselves? They are superfluous, no doubt, but too futile to be of any lasting importance. I remember that, when the first Education Act was being discussed, mention was made of a certain Jew who not only sent his son to a Christian school, but insisted upon his attending all the lessons. He had paid his fees, he said, for education in ...
— Social Rights and Duties, Volume I (of 2) - Addresses to Ethical Societies • Sir Leslie Stephen
... intricacies of the mechanism, trying to find the cause,—the obscure, the hidden source of all their trouble? And then the probing with wires, the tugs with wrenches, the wrestling with screw-drivers, the many trials,—for the most part futile,—the subdued language of the bunkers, and at length, when least expected, a start, and the machine goes off as if nothing at all had been the matter. It is then the skilled driver looks wise and does not betray ...
— Two Thousand Miles On An Automobile • Arthur Jerome Eddy
... equally industrious and provident fathers and uncles, and it is often bad for the man who gets the income as a reward for no effort of his own, because it gives him a false start in life and sometimes tends to make him a futile waster, who can only justify his existence and his command over other people's work, by pointing to the efforts of his deceased sire or uncle. Further, unless he is very lucky, he is likely to grow up with the notion that, just because he ...
— International Finance • Hartley Withers
... attempt to specify, or to set forth the merits or defects of particular articles, must here be futile. Such a universe of materials, inventions and fabrics defies that mode of treatment. But I will endeavor to give some ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... so kept up heart. They tried to calculate the direction the yacht had taken when she left port, and where the land might lie; and when they had argued about it, they set out to swim a certain way. In their hearts each felt that any calculation was futile, but they pretended to be in earnest. They could not see far, but they created for themselves a goal and worked toward it, which is of itself ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... the past, as we see them to be, have a constant, as well as an historical, value to us. That is, we are always being reminded, first, how we have come to the present mastery over nature, over ourselves, over all being; and, secondly, how imperfect, how futile, our work is still, and seems always doomed to be, if judged from a really final standpoint, or rather from our own dreams of ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... finished speaking, Hawley, Gull, Noaks, and several other boys sprang to their feet, their appearance being the signal for a fresh outburst of cheers and groans. Young "Rats" commenced to hiss like a small steam-engine, while Grundy made frantic but futile attempts to reach over from the desk behind and smite him on the head with ...
— The Triple Alliance • Harold Avery
... woman has nothing else to do, it calls for our humble gratitude and a recognition of the largeness of nature that can put aside any duties to husband or children in devotion to the public welfare. The futile round of society life while it lasts admits of no rival. It seems as important as the affairs of the government. The Drawer is far from saying that it is not. Perhaps no one can tell what confusion would fall into all the political relations if the social relations of the capital ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... miserable condition of those unhappy characters in fable who, having demons or djinns at their beck, and being obliged to supply them with work, found too much of everything done in too short a time. What demons so potent as molecular movements, none the less tremendously potent for not carrying the futile cargo of a consciousness screeching irrelevantly, like a fowl tied head downmost to the saddle of a swift horseman? Under such uncomfortable circumstances our race will have diminished with the diminishing call on their energies, and by the time that the self-repairing ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... more time to myself." He threw back his head as he talked, and swept the curly black hair off his brow with an impatient hand. "You see I had visions—oh, purely futile ones, I daresay—but I had a great idea of finding a cure for a certain disease generally considered incurable——" He broke ...
— Afterwards • Kathlyn Rhodes
... gunwale of the Tortoise. Her head was close to the mast She was groping about with her hands in the bottom of the boat The lower part of her body, which was temporarily, owing to her position, the upper part, was outside the boat. Her feet beat the air with futile vigour. She wriggled convulsively and after a time her legs followed her head and shoulders into the boat. She rose on her knees, very red in the face, a good deal dishevelled, but ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... been astonished, I fancy, had you chanced upon us in the empty room at Chelsea on a certain Friday afternoon. No trio of sane persons could have looked more futile. On a paper pad the professor was making odd diagrams which might have represented a cubist's idea of an aeroplane collision; Zena was looking at her hands as if she had discovered something new and unfamiliar about them; ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... must strengthen our military tools. We are moving into a period of uncertain risk and great commitment in which both the military and diplomatic possibilities require a Free World force so powerful as to make any aggression clearly futile. Yet in the past, lack of a consistent, coherent military strategy, the absence of basic assumptions about our national requirements and the faulty estimates and duplication arising from inter-service rivalries have all made it difficult to assess ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... in the great conflagrations of the prairies, Amelie hoped also to combat the influence of Angelique des Meloises by raising up a potent rival in the fair Heloise de Lotbiniere but she soon found how futile were her endeavors. The heart of Le Gardeur was wedded to the idol of his fancy, and no woman on earth could win him away ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... nothing to be done, so calm yourself, and let things take their course. It has been folly on my part to shelter myself behind mere barriers of wood and stone. The fact is, that inaction was terrible to me, and I felt that to do anything, however futile, in the nature of a precaution, was better than passive resignation. My humble friend here and I have placed ourselves in a position in which, I trust, no poor fellow will ever find himself again. ...
— The Mystery of Cloomber • Arthur Conan Doyle
... period of the dawn of the practical and inquiring Intellect; it was the period of the babyhood of both; and so we perceive among these early people (as we also do among children) that while in the main the heart and the intuitions were right, the intellect was for a long period futile and rambling to a degree. As soon as the mind left the ancient bases of instinct and sub-conscious racial experience it fell into a hopeless bog, out of which it only slowly climbed by means of the painfully-gathered stepping-stones of logic and what we call Science. "Heaven lies about ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter
... which gave me to a certain extent a new sidelight on Oscar's nature by showing just what he thought of me. I make no scruple of setting forth his opinion here in its entirety, though the confession took place after a futile evening when he had talked to M—— of great houses in England and the great people he had met there. The talk had evidently impressed M—— as much as it had bored me. I must first say that Oscar's bedroom was separated from mine by a large sitting-room we had in ...
— Oscar Wilde, Volume 2 (of 2) - His Life and Confessions • Frank Harris
... recovered consciousness," he remarked in a cold, expressionless voice, "you had better realize at the very beginning that you are completely in our power. Any effort to escape will be futile, for there is only one way to reach the outside; the opening through the top; and only one means of travel through that opening: the sphere. And since you know nothing about the operation of the machine, any attempt to run it would be disastrous ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, November, 1930 • Various
... surrendered, these "arch rebels" were stationed on the south side of the York River, at a place called Brick House. When they heard of Ingram's intended desertion, they made desperate but futile efforts to prevent his designs. Failing in this, they determined to gather around them the remnants of the rebel forces and march towards the frontier, in hopes of kindling anew the waning spirit of resistance. "They sent downe ...
— Virginia under the Stuarts 1607-1688 • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... thievish eyes, and clad in a dirty dressing-gown fastened with a belt. Greetings over, I stumbled out something about Emelia Ivanovitch and forty roubles, and then came to a dead halt, for his eyes told me that my errand had been futile. "No." said he, "I have no money. Moreover, what security could you offer?" I admitted that I could offer none, but again added something about Emelia, as well as about my pressing needs. Markov heard me out, and then repeated that he had no money. " Ah," thought I, "I might have known this—I might ...
— Poor Folk • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... agree, and tear off the postcard of the ship that topped each day's menu; but, so far, all hints as to this one drawer had been futile; it remained the one barrier to their perfect confidence, the fly in the ointment ...
— Love Stories • Mary Roberts Rinehart |
