How To Use Vain In A Sentence

But try telling that to the little old lady who has waited in vain a couple of years for a vital eye operation.
Finishing the mission so our troops will not have died in vain is the most screwed up thing I have ever heard. Think Progress » 9%.
Marshals struggled in vain to prevent spectators rushing onto the racetrack.
Either switch to decaffeinated tea or coffee or herbal infusions like vervain, mint or camomile.
Mordred and Agravaine propose to call the guileless Arthur's attention to Guenever and Sir A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

Last week, exultant rebels in Tripoli clambered on Gaddafi's vainglorious statue of an American warplane in the grip of a mighty Libyan fist.
At the beginning of the play, we see Lear as a proud, vain, quick-tempered old king, not necessarily evil, but certainly not good.
I tried in vain to start a conversation.
Nothing that we do, is done in vain. I believe, with all my soul, that we shall see triumph. Charles Dickens
But this belongs to vainglory, which is opposed to magnanimity, as stated above (Q. 131, A. 2). Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province
Except the Lord keep the city, the _Wakeman_ waketh in vain. Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Ripon A Short History of the Church and a Description of Its Fabric
Catholic, a name vainly usurped by the Romanists, ii. Sermons Preached Upon Several Occasions. Vol. IV.
For a man so vain about his face, why is he content to flaunt his wrinkly torso and pot belly? The Sun
The way he's overcome adversity has been a real inspiration - and in a vain attempt to copy him I'm following his training programme as I prepare for my first duathlon.
She ran to alert neighbours who battled in vain to douse the blaze until firefighters arrived. The Sun
Like many vainglorious self-publicists, he probably thought he could charm the acid interviewer.
At best, he's a vain, insecure man; at worst, he's a paranoid megalomaniac narcissist.
Augustine was a local boy who made good, a provincial from the southern edge of Fourth-Century Roman Africa, vain and enslaved to a fierce mother.
a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned: 6 From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling; 7 Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm. Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume VI (Acts to Revelation)
We hug the coastline in a vain attempt to seek shelter from the wind. Times, Sunday Times
My talk with the old Dutchman, and the lies to which I was constrained, had already given me a sense of how my conduct must appear to others; and now, after the strong admiration I had just experienced and the immoderacy with which I had continued my vain purchases, I began to think of it myself as very hazarded. David Balfour, a sequel to Kidnapped.
She closed her eyes tightly in a vain attempt to hold back the tears.
If the world again sinks into the ruins of some ideological framework this history will have been written in vain and later people will revise it for themselves. Nobel Lecture - Literature 2000
Still more profound a touch is that where Ottima, daring her lover to the "one thing that must be done; you know what thing: Come in and help to carry," says, with affected lightsomeness, "This dusty pane might serve for looking-glass," and simultaneously exclaims, as she throws them rejectingly from her nervous fingers, "Three, four -- four grey hairs!" then with an almost sublime coquetry of horror turns abruptly to Sebald, saying with a voice striving vainly to be blithe -- Life of Robert Browning
What kind of rich man doesn't own a TV remote, makes all his own food, cleans his own clothes, busses his own table, and exercises WITHOUT vain motivations? Why Don’t More Women Ride? « PubliCola
Anyone vain and foolish enough to have himself or herself injected with a deadly toxin to remove so-called frown lines is a good candidate for a silicone brain implant as well," suggested another. What's Wrong With Wrinkles?
The doctors gave him more powerful drugs in the vain hope that he might recover.
The "hup" was rather an exclamation of necessity than of delight, inasmuch as that it was caused by Davie coming suddenly down flat on the ice in the act of vainly attempting to go leap-frog over Mivins's head. The World of Ice
The effect of his language was till knaw, what skaith they had done, whow many they had won to ther oppinion sen their last meting, what succes the melting of the pictour had tane, and sic vain toyes. The Witch-cult in Western Europe A Study in Anthropology
Where even the vinously literate search in vain for clues, getting down on their knees to turn over handfuls of soil or gazing down from the crest of the slope in utter bewilderment.
In a childishly vain manner, she was gathering pillows to throw at him.
The two ships were brought into such a situation that the muzzles of their guns came in contact, and in this manner the action continued with the greatest fury for two hours, during which time Jones, who had far more men than his opponent, vainly attempted to board, and the "Serapis" was set on fire ten or twelve times. The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. From George III. to Victoria
He was vain, egotistical, boorish and gloriously insensitive.
But Mousie, thou art no thy lane, in proving foresight may be vain; the best-laid schemes o 'mice an' men gang aft agley, an 'lea'e us nought but grief an' pain, for promis'd joy. Roy M. Pitkin: Happy Birthday, Robert Burns
As she leafs through the yellow pages, my eyes try in vain to grab a word or two from the looped, fastidious handwriting.
An old dog barks not in vain.
For two hours Erasmus Smith, the Boer predicant, argued in vain in behalf of his flock. A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year Volume Two (of Three)
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain — Tom Thompson reads “Ode to a Nightingale” by John Keats
The gods are dispassionate, jealous, vainly superior, and sometimes unfair and bitter.
She is perceived as vain, spoilt and promiscuous.
In a typical moment, Blanche, the vain Southern belle played by Rue McClanahan, preens, "One thing I know for sure, I have not lost my hourglass figure. Slate Magazine
Vega is seen here as vicious and impossibly vain, but not quite the psycho nutjob of the Japanese anime movie.
The mother I knew during my lifetime was a beautiful and vain woman, one who resisted having a mastectomy for breast cancer because she could not bear to be, as she put it, "mutilated" and "disfigured. We Remember - Eleanor Hatkin Freedman, 1924 - 1974
The thing is reduced to a cruel mockery when stores and granaries are over-gorged, while people clamor in vain for clothing and food, and drop dead within reach of these prime elements of warmth and sustentation. Black and White
Life is just one big vain, greedy, acquisitive, covetous, furious orgy - and then you die.
In vain he travelled to the most esteemed saints and the most celebrated martyries. Gathering Clouds: A Tale of the Days of St. Chrysostom
Unfortunately, rather than considering specific solutions, opponents of spam are currently adopting a blunderbuss approach, latching on to every anti-spam technology going in the vain hope that one of them might do the job.
Ivory screamed as she wriggled and twisted, trying in vain to get away.
But city girls wait in vain for theirs to grow big and sexy.
Towards the middle of the plain, there lay the bodies of several men who had fallen in the very act of grappling with the enemy; and there were seen countenances which still bore the stern expression of unextinguishable hate and defiance, hands which clasped the hilt of the broken falchion, or strove in vain to pluck the deadly arrow from the wound. The Monastery
That's what happens when you use my name in vain. The Sun
Ye can stop as ye are, little lay mothers, and wait in wish and wish in vain till the grame reaper draws nigh, with the sickle of the sickles, as a blessing in disguise. Finnegans Wake
The demand for quarters, seldom refused to a vanquished foe was at once found to be in vain. Red Coats and Rebels - the war for America 1770-1781
He made a vain attempt to reach the drowning child.
Although Johnston depicts Cook as a cautious and dignified man compared to his vainglorious counterpart, both men risked their reputations in their mutual quest.
Sometimes he presents her as a vain and trivial woman, sometimes as merely ignorant and fearful.
Attempts to shore up the value of a derivative without shoring up the value of the assets from which they ultimately derive their value are likely to be in vain however cleverly we may try to finagle.
From what I could gather, he was being sent around to cold-call upon the local residents in a vain attempt to convert them to the service of his electricity utility provider.
Each one was a girl of fair common-sense, and she did not delude herself with any vain conceits, or dress herself up, or give herself airs, in the idea of outshining the others.
That's what public relations propaganda is all about - conning frail, vain humans.
the city fathers tried vainly to find a solution
Without ears to hear, the nightingale would sing in vain.
[1894] Padua in Italy they have a stone called the stone of turpitude, near the senate-house, where spendthrifts, and such as disclaim non-payment of debts, do sit with their hinder parts bare, that by that note of disgrace others may be terrified from all such vain expense, or borrowing more than they can tell how to pay. Anatomy of Melancholy
Our ways may be wicked, and the movements of our mind wicked; such as adulteries, thefts, idolatries, slanders, strife, passion, sedition, vain-glory, and all that the apostle Paul enumerates among the works of the flesh. NPNF2-08. Basil: Letters and Select Works
It is now on its knees, offering succour and plugs to vain mediocrities. Times, Sunday Times
There were rumblings and grumblings at special meetings called by the church council in a vain bid to restore peace.
Väinämöinen; and in such words as _kannel_ (harp) for _kantele_. The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country
While trustless chance me with vain favours crowned, The Theological Tractates and The Consolation of Philosophy
After much search, and lumbering painfully up two or three staircases in vain, and at last going about in a strange circuity, we found her in a small chamber of a large old building, situated a little way from the brow of the Tarpeian Rock. Passages from the French and Italian Notebooks, Volume 1.
Other companies will have to act on costs after months of hanging on in the vain hope of a revival. The Sun
It makes me think we are dealing with a vain mendacious man who clung to power as long as he possibly could wrapped in a cloud of vainglory and falsehood, when he should have had the good grace to go quietly long ago.
* The effect of this little bit of science may be thus stated -- Men for two years had been punished as refractory for not making all day two thousand revolutions per hour of a 15 lb. crank, when all the while it was a _45 lb. crank_ they had been vainly struggling against all day. It Is Never Too Late to Mend
The UN Human Rights Council machers then recruited richard goldstone, a Vain south african Jewish judge, who despite being aware from the outset of the biased composition of the panel, permitted himself to be used as a fig leaf to provide credibility to the Israel bashers. On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with...
Hell, I'm too vain not to be flattered at least a little bit.
His promise to the commissioner of more to come is not just a journalist's vainglorious bluster.
He was not vain, but he was quietly proud of his literary achievements.
October 27th, 2006 at 12: 39 am paris hiton is ugly skinny and useless her eyes are too squinty and those boobs are fake shes soo vain and whoever said she was beautiful must be blind now catherine zeta jones is beautiful liv tyler is beauyiful lots of actresses are beautiful mbut paris not much of a looker at all elliosh Says: David Letterman Interviews Paris Hilton
Lundberg noted the "slavocracy was not terminated .... for moral reasons; it committed suicide for political and economic reasons, blinded by simple greed and vaingloriousness, and long after slavery was abolished in most places elsewhere. Reviewing Ferdinand Lundberg's "Cracks in the Constitution"
He seeks in vain to occupy his days with rural pursuits, -- he to whom the excitements of a metropolis, with all its corruption and its vices, were the sole sources of the turpid stream that he called "pleasure. My Novel — Volume 12
She had listened from a respectful distance, and with the humble deference born of years of bondage, to the honeyed words with which the great lady deigned to cajole a girl-slave: but when Dea Flavia had finished speaking and the chorus of admiration had died down around her, the freedwoman, with steps which she vainly tried to render firm, approached to the foot of the catasta and stood between the great lady and her own child. "Unto Caesar"
The team captain vainly tried to rally his troops.
Her "Potemkin villages" had deceived the self-important pundit into endorsing absolutism, just as Jean-Paul Sartre would prove vain enough to applaud Stalin. Why They All Came to Versailles
We sought in vain for cyanite, which we had discovered in some blocks near Maniquarez. Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America
Because keeping Love locked up within ourselves is to go against the spirit of God, it proves that we never knew Him, that He loved us in vain, and that His Son died to no avail. Blog De Ganz | Archive | September
They faded away in distress, in vain and into the forgotten pages of local history.
Bad enough to just kill someone but when they start taking God's name in vain then watchout. Christian Atrocities: Humanity's "Sin" or God's?
Hundreds of tarred and burning hoops were skilfully quoited around the necks of the soldiers, who struggled in vain to extricate themselves from these fiery ruffs, while as fast as any of the invaders planted foot upon the breach, they were confronted face to face with sword and dagger by the burghers, who hurled them headlong into the moat below. A Wanderer in Holland
Five days after this last trial I gave him assafetida in large quantity, flattered by a hope that his extreme sufferings from the state of his respiration, might perhaps arise in part from spasm, but my hopes were in vain. An Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases
She pitied her aching "fum," and kissed it herself to make it feel better; but all in vain; "the pain kept on and on;" the "fum" grew big as fast as the candy had grown little. Dotty Dimple's Flyaway
The two young gentlemen, having seen their blooming charges safely within the door of the Alms-House, and vainly endeavored to look through the keyhole at them going up-stairs, scuffle away together with that sensation of blended imbecility and irascibility which is equally characteristic of callow youth and inexperienced Thomas Cats when retiring together from the society of female friends who seem to be still on the fence as regards their ultimate preferences. Punchinello, Volume 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870
But "they are so devoid of both originality and unity," says Sir Charles Eliot, [81] that acutest of observers, "that it is vain to seek for anything in politics, art, religion, literature or customs to which the name Albanian can be properly applied as denoting something common to the Albanian race. The Birth of Yugoslavia, Volume 2
vain about her clothes
Cameron released the man, who fell onto all fours, vainly trying to suck air in. MINUTES TO BURN
In what other sport but cricket could you get 26,000 people splashing around in the puddles of a filthily overcast ground, waiting in vain for a game that might never resume?
Teravainen belonged to the brute force school; off the tee, he was as long as anybody.
I've picked out his gift and struggled over an appropriate note that makes a vain attempt to impart something passing for wisdom.
At the film's end, Harry is left alone in his destroyed apartment, torn to shreds in a vain search for a planted microphone.
Add to that: vain, an inveterate breaker of promises, a gambler and a lover of alibis, and the picture becomes ever more confusing.
Arsenal's Sylvain Wiltord opening the scoring after 13 before wantaway Fulham striker Steve Marlet scored the second nine minutes after the break.
The way he's overcome adversity has been a real inspiration - and in a vain attempt to copy him I'm following his training programme as I prepare for my first duathlon.
It was in vain to argue the tyranny of some husbands, when he could turn upon us the follies of some wives; and that wives and daughters were never more faulty, more undomestic, than at present; and when we were before a judge, who, though he could not be absolutely unpolite, would not flatter us, nor spare our foibles. Sir Charles Grandison
But of what they call counterfeit pleasures they make naught; as of pride in apparel and gems, or in vain honours; or of dicing; or hunting, which they deem the most abject kind of butchery. The World's Greatest Books — Volume 14 — Philosophy and Economics
Not to be vain or conceited, but it was the truth and anyone sensible would agree.
He made many appeals to the Government of the day for restoral of his patents, and offered to find security for payment of the debt due by his firm to the Crown, but in vain. Industrial Biography
8 The experience of so many princes, whom he had esteemed or endured, from the vain follies of Elagabalus to the useful rigor of Aurelian, taught him to form a just estimate of the duties, the dangers, and the temptations of their sublime station. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Matthew Gilson Joseph Epstein Perhaps with this last reference he is playing off a quote from Saint-Simon: "Mme de Saint Simon, all goodness, tried in vain to check our most outrageous utterances, but the brakes were off and there ensued the most fearful struggle between the expression of sentiments that, humanly speaking, were quite natural, and the sensations that they were not altogether Christian. Boulevardier's Delight
In those days, few football players lifted weights because it was considered vain and because they feared becoming "musclebound" and losing their speed. Stan Jones, 78, Hall of Fame lineman with the Chicago Bears; all-American at U-Md., dies
It is vain to resist.
Possessive, vain and self-absorbed, she stifled him until, he said, he could no longer stand women.
Some ABC bunting waiting in vain for a puff of wind
After a winter break spent visiting friends and family in Australia and New Zealand, Lesley Vainikolo can't wait to get back into action at the Jungle on Friday.
They became trapped by the rapidly incoming tide and eventually drowned as rescue teams - who could hear Stewart Rushton's calls for help - worked in vain to locate them.
jibs" might be seen perambulating the courts, in the vain effort to discover their tutors 'chambers, the names having undergone an alteration that left all trace of their original proprietors unattainable: Doctor Charles O'Malley — Volume 1
Over a million men and women, from the hilariously vain to the eye-wateringly repugnant, have submitted themselves to this image-obsessed court of public opinion, where they can be casually rated, from 1-10, on their looks alone.
She attempted in vain to introduce some order into the classroom.
Mr P in my estimation is the vainest of all authors. Letter 129
The first stanza reveals a speaker characterized by vainglory and chivalry at one and the same time.
Such vain ceremony is a thin disguise of rebellion, nor are there perhaps any personal wrongs that can authorize a subject to take arms against his sovereign: but the want of preparation and success may confirm the assurance of the usurper, that this decisive step was the effect of necessity rather than of choice. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Once that clears up, Vainio turns his prey down a dark passage, chloroforming them again until all you can hear is their drugged, staggering heartbeats and the swaying neon of the red-light district.
He hunted vainly through his pockets for a piece of paper.
I knocked loudly in the vain hope that someone might answer.
One searches in vain through the colonial period for evidence of Americans armed with guns rising to defend their liberties, whether in organized militia units or unorganized crowds.
An inequality of years so considerable, had led him to expect that the fortune he had thus acquired, would speedily be released from the burthen with which it was at present incumbered; but his expectations proved as vain as they were mercenary, and his lady was not more the dupe of his protestations than he was himself of his own purposes. Cecilia
When the gems were discovered in 1930, the British colonial government tried in vain to slap strict controls on mining.
•of'iervaints, and Iked in ai ftile very firitsihle co his fortune, ourifiriend has very little trouble ivith his. domeftic arrangements; the works he is carrying on at the Parfooage Houle fcem to be - his principal occupation at prefent, and ffor the prefent he turns a deif car to all prqjefts for the embcliiihmcnt of his ownddmain. — Arundel
Goes, has gone in a hurry, the wish detains is also in vain however, the cosmic inventory all have the rule which one live, nobody can change.
Shadowy clouds completely obscured the moon, leaving a meager handful of stars to vainly attempt to provide light.
He attempted another smile, but the effort was in vain, suddenly he felt cold all over, and mortally afraid.
A few years ago I admit I did think she was rather too vain and gigglesome; but now she is nothing of the sort. Rilla of Ingleside
If, as it must be, what I have said, 'in vain,' is really the fact Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
These include the American germander and various species of vervains.
Money spent on the brain is never spent in vain.
Then she sent for her chariot of green rushes, ornamented with May dewdrops, which she particularly valued and always collected with great care; and ordered her six short-tailed moles to carry them all back to the well-known pastures, which they did in a remarkably short time; and Sylvain and Jocosa were overjoyed to see their dearly-loved home once more after all their toilful wanderings. The Green Fairy Book
He was at pains to stress that his whole-hearted commitment to drawing in larger crowds with gate reductions and the acquisition of quality players seems to be in vain.
Still-warm bread, yoghurt and tangy cherry marinade dressed with vervain appeared in an instant.
And so that these young people will not have died in vain, as President Lincoln said, we have to recommit our country to a sense of community.
There are always men like him, eager vaingloriously to display their would-be-insuperable power.
She scrabbled in vain for purchase on the stone floor, which was smooth from the years of pedestrian traffic pounding the irregularities into powder.
Le Bourgeois gentilhomme satirizes attempts at social climbing, poking fun both at the vulgar, pretentious middle-class and the vain, snobbish aristocracy. Capsule Summaries of the Great Books of the Western World
Among the favorites are asters and daisies, milkweeds, mustards, mints, peas, and vervains.
I in turn don't contain even the merest trace elements of sympathy for the ambitious, vain and greedy trendoids who masquerade as contestants on these shows.
He tried in vain to keep the two dogs apart before the neighbour intervened.
First, Methods and means of reformation had been tried in vain (v. 13): In thy filthiness is lewdness; thou hast become obstinate and impudent in it; thou hast got a habit of it, which is confirmed by frequent acts. Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume IV (Isaiah to Malachi)
The wood that had been drawn for the fire was green, and it ignited too slowly to satisfy the shivering impatience of women and children; I vented mine in audibly grumbling over the wretched fire, at which I in vain endeavoured to thaw frozen bread, and to dress crying children. Roughing It in the Bush
I'm looking about the country-side and I see but a horde of lameter privatemen and half-pay officers maimed in limb or mind sitting about the dram bottle, hoved up with their vain-glory, blustering and blowing, instead of being honest, eident lairds and farmers. Gilian The Dreamer His Fancy, His Love and Adventure
Jesus shall come to effect, by His presence (Isa 11: 4; Da 7: 17), that which in vain is looked for, in His absence, by other means. Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
In vain I say unto myself that this must be a mere fantasy of mine; I, who am marked with the 'frost of eild,' who will soon be -- let me see -- seven-and-thirty years old. Olive A Novel
I've clambered up rocks in the tropical heat in the vain hope that there might be grasswren on top of the escarpment.
He had the image of himself, like a goblin or ghost, haunting her gravesite for weeks, vainly trying to protect her.
Three days we spent in vain endeavour to find "baloo," and on the fourth we wended our toilsome way up the hill again to Gulmarg. A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil
He reaches the walls of the city, and the Romans, to save it from destruction, send emissaries, old friends of Coriolanus, to propose terms, but in vain.
He said a car had just managed to squeeze past the people carrier, and he had tried to do the same but in vain.
He would become a vain listener to himself, instead of a speaker, a pedant in place of a serious man, a histrion instead of a sincere person. Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic
-- "It may be redargued," saith he, "by those who have more spleen than brain, that forasmuch as the Archbishop preacheth in English, he will not thereby much edify the Turkish folk, who do altogether hold in a vain gabble of their own. The Lock and Key Library Classic Mystery and Detective Stories: Old Time English
She ran to alert neighbours who battled in vain to douse the blaze until firefighters arrived. The Sun
A vain aristocrat, Gray had a picture painted of himself when he was in the prime of his youth.
He is a very self-involved, vain, voyeuristic, childlike, power-hungry but brilliant guy.
Mousa fled in disguise from the palace of Boursa; traversed the Propontis in an open boat; wandered over the Walachian and Servian hills; and after some vain attempts, ascended the throne of Adrianople, so recently stained with the blood of Soliman. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Is then this a fellow fit to be believed when he writes of any man or city, who in one word deprives Greece of the victory, throws down the trophy, and pronounces the inscriptions they had set up to Diana Proseoa (EASTWARD-FACING) to be nothing but pride and vain boasting? Essays and Miscellanies
The murmurs would die away, and then rise again, and from time to time we knew that a baffled bicycler was pulling at our door, or vainly bumping against it. Seven English Cities
In vain, you will have harassed your mind with cankering thoughts for half a lifetime; for it will be just as if you had gone through the confused mazes of a dream on the third watch! Hung Lou Meng
Thus, with each page, she becomes increasingly unattractive and vainglorious - brains and spirit corrupted by driving ambition.
But they did not turn turtle in vain: they hatched a monster that has enslaved millions of people. Times, Sunday Times
Gregory, however (Moral. xxxi), reckons pride to be the queen of all the vices, and vainglory, which is the immediate offspring of pride, he reckons to be a capital vice: and not without reason. Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province
Badenoch's penetrating eye saw that it was indeed the patriotic guardian of his country to whom he bowed, and not the vain affecter of regal power. The Scottish Chiefs
The password is 'Louvain'," said Helen, retiring, not at all sorry to seek the comfort of her bed. For the Sake of the School
He gives monosyllabic answers to the simplest of questions in a vain attempt to close down any area of questioning about his public life. The Sun
Part of her, a tiny voice of caution in the back of her head, struggled vainly to be heard. LOST SUMMER
Sometimes I believe that this less material life is our truer life, and that our vain presence on the terraqueous globe is itself the secondary or merely virtual phenomenon. The Lovecraft News Network
Then, while Billy wandered in a vain search for abalones, Saxon lay and dabbled in the crystal-clear water of a roak-pool, dipping up handfuls of glistening jewels -- ground bits of shell and pebble of flashing rose and blue and green and violet. CHAPTER VI
Each week another dire e-commerce venture sinks vaingloriously beneath the mire.
As she leafs through the yellow pages, my eyes try in vain to grab a word or two from the looped, fastidious handwriting.
The vision of the vain, silly girl she had been seemed to accuse her in some obscure way.
Horrified bystanders tried in vain to drive the berserk animal away until a policeman grabbed a fire extinguisher and sprayed it. The Sun
Je n'ai pas ici a me faire une reputation de heros magnanime, mais a guerir, si la cure est possible, l'Europe qui se meurt, epuisee de ressources et de sang, l'Europe dont vous negligez les vrais interets, pre-occupes que vous etes d'une vaine renommee de clemence. Life of Charlotte Brontë — Volume 1
Vets tried in vain to save two others. Times, Sunday Times
His virtues, as well as the vices of Elagabalus, contracted a tincture of weakness and effeminacy from the soft climate of Syria, of which he was a native; though he blushed at his foreign origin, and listened with a vain complacency to the flattering genealogists, who derived his race from the ancient stock of Roman nobility. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
You desire vainly that I seek you.
For who would not thinke it a ridiculous thing to see a Lady in her milke-house with a velvet gowne, and at a bridal in her cassock of mockado: a Gentleman of the Countrey among the bushes and briers, goes in a pounced dublet and a paire of embroidered hosen, the the Cities to weare a fries Ierkin and a paire of leather breeches? yet some such phantasticals haue I knowen, and one a certaine knight, of all other the most vaine, who commonly would come to the The Arte of English Poesie
He refused to countenance all the signs of worldly glory and churchly vainglory.
On the press benches those deputed to chronicle the roll-call of the accused had adopted a glassy-eyed fascination with the process, scanning the lists of handlers of stolen goods for genuine firestarters, mostly in vain. England riots: justice grinds on as courts sit through the night
Remic's new book BIOHELL is due out November 2008, and is about what happens when vanity nano-technology goes horribly wrong, and turns a full planet of vain footballer's wives into quite horrific zombies. MIND MELD: Is There Gender Imbalance in Genre Fiction Publishing?
Lewis XII strove in vain to alarm him by the National Council of Tours, -- Germany, by severe gravamina (complaints of national grievances against the Papal Luther Examined and Reexamined A Review of Catholic Criticism and a Plea for Revaluation
This little childe was cut of the white vayne of Achates [A] or Onix, and the Eagle of the other vaine of the same stone called sardius which is of black couler of some called Cordeoll, ioyning both in one selfe same stone. Hypnerotomachia The Strife of Loue in a Dreame
Money spent on the brain is never spent in vain.
91 The light brigantines of the Greeks were scattered in ignominious flight: the nine castles of the Venetians maintained a more obstinate conflict; seven were sunk, two were taken; two thousand five hundred captives implored in vain the mercy of the victor; and the daughter of Alexius deplores the loss of thirteen thousand of his subjects or allies. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
And Carinthia Jane was proclaimed by John Rose Mackrell (to his dying day the poor gentleman tried vainly to get the second syllable of his name accentuated) a young woman who would outlive twice over the husband she had. The Amazing Marriage — Volume 3
There, 150 years ago this month, 132 delegates from 21 states bickered, bargained and tried in vain to bridge the chasm that widened beneath them even as they met. The Willard: Where hope collapsed as slavery raged
In the vain hope that if she ignored him, he might go away, she took out her book again, opening it to where her bookmark had marked her spot.
It then flourished from 1925 to 1932 in Dessau, an industrial backwater where the school's first director, Walter Gropius, built its image-making headquarters (see illustration on page 25); and it ultimately but vainly sought refuge in cosmopolitan Berlin, where it closed in 1933, when Hitler took power. The Brief, Glorious Life Of Bauhaus (New York Review)
While the living comrades of those buried in a New Caledonia cemetery stand at salute, a bugle sounds ‘Taps’ - voicing the promise that they have not died in vain.
Elizabeth, vain and proud about her legendary beauty, was convinced she'd found the secret of youth.
He footslogged it around the world-famous Dal Lake, visiting all the Mughal Gardens at Nishat, Shalimar and Harwan and the Botanical Gardens, but all in vain.
And vain as Carlo was (the vanity being most intricate and subtle, like a nervous fluid), he was very open to the belief that he could diplomatize as well as fight, and lead a movement yet better than follow it. Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith
Best of all, for those who have spent years of misery denying themselves the foods they love and existing on watery cabbage soup in a vain attempt to regain the shape they had as a teenager, it does seem to work.
They promptly blamed each other for driving him away, and stormed off in opposite directions in the vain hope of finding their way back to the palace.
What a deal of money did Henry VIII. and Francis I. king of France, spend at that [1719] famous interview? and how many vain courtiers, seeking each to outbrave other, spent themselves, their livelihood and fortunes, and died beggars? Anatomy of Melancholy
Such a nice affected mien is not only a force upon that which is natural, and ridiculous before men, men of sense; but as it is an evidence of a vain mind, it is offensive to Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume IV (Isaiah to Malachi)
But it was a vain thing, and I speedily forwent the thought of it. Chapter 19
Many are carried away with those bewitching sports of gaming, hawking, hunting, and such vain pleasures, as [4526] I have said: some with immoderate desire of fame, to be crowned in the Olympics, knighted in the field, &c., and by these means ruinate themselves. Anatomy of Melancholy

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