Vain Quotes

986 Vain quotes by 692 unique authors

Life itself was only futility, vain words, a squabble of cap and bells. — Michel Foucault
All our progress is an unfolding, like the vegetable bud. You have first an instinct, then an opinion, then a knowledge, as the plant has… — Ralph Waldo Emerson
No one, no social group, can today avoid the commitment to contribute to the clean up of public finances in order to prevent the financial… — Giorgio Napolitano
Without common sense, all thine efforts are in vain. — Rudolf Steiner
I'm vain enough to want do a movie again, but right now more roles are the last thing on my list. — Gwen Stefani
Dreams grow holy put in action; work grows fair through starry dreaming, But where each flows on unmingling, both are fruitless and in vain. — Adelaide Anne Procter
Vain is the word of a philosopher which does not heal any suffering of man. For just as there is no profit in medicine if… — Epicurus
In vain we shall penetrate more and more deeply the secrets of the structure of the human body, we shall not dupe nature; we shall… — Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle
I also realized that the philosophers, far from ridding me of my vain doubts, only multiplied the doubts that tormented me and failed to remove… — Jean-Jacques Rousseau
As far as our noblest hardwood forests are concerned, the animals, especially squirrels and jays, are our greatest and almost only benefactors. It is to… — Henry David Thoreau
Perhaps already I am dead, And these perhaps are phantoms vain;— These motley phantasies that pass At night through my disordered brain. Perhaps with ancient… — Heinrich Heine
The day of my departure at length arrived. Clerval spent the last evening with us. He had endeavoured to persuade his father to permit him… — Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
To be vain of one's rank or place is to show that one is below it. — StanisÅ‚aw I LeszczyÅ„ski
Nations! What are nations? Tartars! and Huns! and Chinamen! Like insects they swarm. The historian strives in vain to make them memorable. It is for… — Henry David Thoreau
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root, and it may be that he who… — Henry David Thoreau
Was it Gorky who said: "If your children are no better than you are, you have fathered in vain, indeed you have lived in vain. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
It is in vain to ridicule a rich fool, for the laughers will be on his side. — Jean de la Bruyere
Vain is the hope of finding pleasure in that which one has hitherto disdained; as when the warrior hopes to find pleasure in the joys… — Antoine de Saint-Exupery
It is vain for the sober man to knock at poesy's door. — Plato
Knowing what we must do is neither fundamental nor difficult, but to comprehend which presumptions and vain prejudices we must rid ourselves of in order… — Maria Montessori
One says a lot in vain, refusing; The other mainly hears the "No. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Laws are often made by fools, and even more often by men who fail in equity because they hate equality: but always by men, vain… — Michel de Montaigne
And the small ripple spilt upon the beach Scarcely o'erpass'd the cream of your champagne, When o'er the brim the sparkling bumpers reach, That spring-dew… — Lord Byron
Yes, one must suffer, even in vain, so as not to have lived in vain. — Antonio Porchia
Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry… — Robert Green Ingersoll

Who Wrote These Vain Quotes

692 authors contributed a total of 986 Vain Quotes, led by these top contributors: