Quotes about Vanity

Enlightenment is mere vanity, responsibility is the bedrock of the universe.

'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for they shall see God' suggested to me a heavenly welfare program for the meek. Today that saying reveals an astute insight into egotism, about how those with swollen pride or vanity cannot see anything larger than themselves.

Virtue would not go to such lengths if vanity did not keep her company.

God is the only evil. His vanity made him the devil.

Every noble action is selfish. Some selfish actions are nobler than others. But they are all selfish. And as such there can be no action purely noble anyway. Even the nobility in God's great philosophical intentions is bounded by his vanity.

If God were to exist for the entire humanity, he would be profoundly vile, as he allows the existence of unfathomable sin, stupidity, madness, and misery for no reason than his own despicable enjoyment. God exists though, not for all humanity, but for a one chosen man - a philosopher - who is bound to answer the greatest philosophical question, the question about the nature of the questioner's existence, which progressively quenches the divine vanity.

The reason for human existence is the ultimate philosophical questioner's vanity.

Life is a question asked by God about the way he exists.

The worst of lusts is vanity.

The meaning of life is ‘the ultimate questioner's vanity'.

Philosophy is the only excuse God has for his cruelty and vanity.

God's greatest thirst and his greatest sin is his ultimate vanity.

A fundamental condition of Being is slavery. Man is the slave of God, and God that of His vanity.

The only evil is the ultimate questioner's vanity.

I am philosophical Christ; crucified on the cross of ignorance for the sake of divine vanity.

Or you think you are always gentle, yet look at how viciously the world strikes at you nonetheless! This idea of your victimization is merely cynicism turned inside out and made more impenetrable to insight. You are clever enough to disguise your addiction to gloom in protests of innocence. The good news is that you may never be effectively challenged by others about this routine; few friends have enough wisdom and chutzpah at the same time. The bad news is that you will probably never walk your way to forgiveness in sensible steps. You will have to leap your own well-built defenses, disowning your morbid vanity in mid-flight.

Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one's self-esteem. That is why young children, before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily; and why older persons, especially if vain or important, cannot learn at all.

Nul nobi sub Sole

People who worship only themselves begin to look like monuments. Too bad they had to go so soon.

"If only the picture could grow old, and I stay young. For that...for that, I would give my SOUL for that."

The best of conversations occur when there is no competition, no vanity, but a calm quiet interchange of sentiments.

Oh, Vanity of vanities! How wayward the decrees of Fate are; How very weak the very wise, How very small the very great are!

Man has always sacrificed truth to his vanity, comfort and advantage. He lives by make-believe.

We are all potentially such sick men. The sanest and best of us are of one clay with lunatics and prison-inmates. And whenever we feel this, such a sense of the vanity of our voluntary career comes over us, that all our morality appears as a plaster hiding a sore it can never cure, and all our well-doing as the hollowest substitute for that well-being that our lives ought to be grounded in, but alas! are not so.

Things said or done long years ago Or things I did not do or say But thought that I might say or do, Weigh me down, and not a day But something is recalled, My conscience or my vanity appalled.

What helps luck is a habit of watching for opportunities, of having a patient, but restless mind, of sacrificing one's ease or vanity, of uniting a love of detail to foresight, and of passing through hard times bravely and cheerfully.

Beneath this stone are deposited the remains of one who possessed Beauty without Vanity, Strength without Insolence, Courage without Ferocity, and all the virtues of a man without his vices.

A man can tolerate a woman who doesn't laugh; what his vanity, immediately rejects is a woman who laughs at what he considers the wrong times.

Speaking much is a sign of vanity; for he that is lavish in words is a niggard in deed.

No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a public library.