Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it without a sense of ironic futility. -Errol Morris
It is futile to talk too much about the past ... like trying to make birth control retroactive. -Charles Wilson
Housework is a treadmill from futility to oblivion with stop-offs at tedium and counter productivity.
-Erma Bombeck
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. -George Carlin
Work is futile if we cannot utilise the experience we collect in one life in the next. -Henry Ford
When I was still a rather precocious young man, I already realized most vividly the futility of the hopes and aspirations that most men pursue throughout their lives. -Albert Einstein
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 David Eisenhower
The limitation of riots, moral questions aside, is that they cannot win and their participants know it. Hence, rioting is not revolutionary but reactionary because it invites defeat. It involves an emotional catharsis, but it must be followed by a sense of futility.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.
Ecclesiates 1 King James Version
ReplyDelete12I the Preacher was king over Israel in Jerusalem.
13And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven: this sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith.
14I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.
15That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered.
16I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I am come to great estate, and have gotten more wisdom than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem: yea, my heart had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.
17And I gave my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit.
18For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.
Yep, that sounds familiar! Sigh........
@crownring - Thanks for sharing that! I love Ecclesiates! Those are some of my favorite verses. Here is the way that The Message says it:
ReplyDelete""I said to myself, "I know more and I'm wiser than anyone before me in Jerusalem. I've stockpiled wisdom and knowledge." What I've finally concluded is that so-called wisdom and knowledge are mindless and witless--nothing but spitting into the wind. Much learning earns you much trouble. The more you know, the more you hurt." (Ecc 1:16-18 MSG)"
Spitting into the wind is so descriptive of futility.