Futility Quotes

I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity. (Dwight D. Eisenhower)
The fatal futility of Fact. View quote
Henry James
The poor on the borderline of starvation live purposeful lives. To be engaged in a desperate struggle for food and shelter is to be wholly free from a sense of futility. View quote
Eric Hoffer
How right politicians are to look upon their constituents as cattle! Anyone who has any experience of dealing with any class as such knows the futility of appealing to intelligence, indeed to any other qualities than those of brutes. View quote
Aleister Crowley
We've been devastated by the severest and deadliest drought in history – that of our profound awareness of the futility of all effort and the vanity of all plans. View quote
Fernando Pessoa
MIND, n. A 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. View quote
Ambrose Bierce
The dread of futility has been my life-long plague. View quote
Maya Angelou
It is not the actual enjoyment of pleasure that we desire. What we want is to test the futility of that pleasure, so as to be no longer obsessed by it. View quote
Cesare Pavese
Sometimes the act of walking in the face of the elements helps us come to grips with reality. Or it simply exhausts us to the point of seeing the futility of resisting reality and the futility of denial. View quote
John Ashcroft
Tell me, Tool, what dominates your thoughts?” The Imass shrugged before replying. "I think of futility, Adjunct.” "Do all Imass think about futility?” "No. Few think at all.” "Why is that?” The Imass leaned his head to one side and regarded her. "Because, Adjunct, it is futile. View quote
Steven Erikson
Futility is the defining characteristic of life. (Stephen R. Donaldson)
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. View quote
Paul
This withdrawal from the day's turmoil into creative silence is not a luxury, a fad, or a futility. It is a necessity, because it tries to provide the conditions wherein we are able to yield ourselves to intuitive leadings, promptings, warnings, teachings, and counsels and also to the inspiring peace of the soul. It dissolves mental tensions and heals negative emotions. View quote
Paul Brunton
So what's on the agenda for tonight? (Danger) Migraine, futility, possible death. Same as every night, I guess. (Alexion) View quote
Sherrilyn Kenyon
Worry compounds the futility of being trapped on a dead-end street. Thinking opens new avenues. View quote
Cullen Hightower
There is an increasingly pervasive sense not only of failure, but of futility. The legislative process has become a cruel shell game and the service system has become a bureaucratic maze, inefficient, incomprehensible, and inaccessible. View quote
Elliot Richardson
Any story about revenge is ultimately a story about forgiveness, redemption, or the futility of revenge. View quote
Nick Wechsler
If. A two-letter word for futility. View quote
Sidney Sheldon
It is not possible, I think, to rise from the perusal of the arguments of Clark and Spinoza without a deep conviction of the futility of all endeavors to establish, entirely à priori, the existence of an Infinite Being, His attributes, and His relation to the universe. The fundamental principle of all such speculations, viz. that whatever we can clearly conceive, must exist, fails to accomplish its end, even when its truth is admitted. For how shall the finite comprehend the infinite? Yet must the possibility of such conception be granted, and in something more than the sense of a mere withdrawal of the limits of phænomal existence, before any solid ground can be established for the knowledge, à priori, of things infinite and eternal. View quote
George Boole
Dusting is a good example of the futility of trying to put things right. As soon as you dust, the fact of your next dusting has already been established. View quote
George Carlin
All the gifted souls, of every rank, who are born to you in this generation. These are appointed, by the true eternal "divine right" which will never become obsolete, to be your governors and administrators; and precisely as you employ them, or neglect to employ them, will your State be favored of Heaven or disfavored. This noble young soul, you can have him on either of two conditions; and on one of them, since he is here in the world, you must have him. As your ally and coadjutor; or failing that, as your natural enemy: which shall it be? I consider that every Government convicts itself of infatuation and futility, or absolves and justifies itself before God and man, according as it answers this question. (Thomas Carlyle)
Well, maybe I'm a latent homosexual." He considered that for a moment. "Or maybe I'm a latent heterosexual. Anyway, I'm pretty latent. I don't know why. Of course, I've taken a number of stabs at it, but then I start thinking about the futility of it all and I give up. Maybe it's because you're expected to do something and after a certain point all I want to do is lie there and stare at the ceiling. View quote
Margaret Atwood
You want a picture of futility? It's a tunnel in the desert, from nowhere to nowhere, four hundred and fifty feet long. View quote
Ian McEwan
So, it becomes an exercise in futility if you write something that does not express the film as the director wishes. It's still their ball game. It's their show. I think any successful composer learns how to dance around the director's impulses. View quote
Danny Elfman
Since all life is futility, then the decision to exist must be the most irrational of all. View quote
Emil Cioran