Hope Is Lost Quotes & Sayings

When you're completely lost, when you have no idea what comes next or why things are happening, faith is what gets you through. Even if you're not sure what you believe, you keep doing the things you know in your heart are the right things. That is faith, Carter. It's not the absence of questions. It's continuing, day in and day out, in spite of those questions. — Vannetta Chapman

All cannot be lost when there is still so much being found — Lemony Snicket

The experts are right, he thought. Venice is sinking. The whole city is slowly dying. One day the tourists will travel here by boat to peer down into the waters, and they will see pillars and columns and marble far, far beneath them, slime and mud uncovering for brief moments a lost underworld of stone. Their heels made a ringing sound on the pavement and the rain splashed from the gutterings above. A fine ending to an evening that had started with brave hope, with innocence. ("Don't Look Now") — Daphne Du Maurier

Shortly afterward, I sat puzzled, grieving over the state of our church. "I think I've lost hope in the church," I confessed, brokenhearted, to a friend. I will never forget her response. "No, you haven't lost hope in the church. You may have lost hope in Christianity or Christendom or all the institutions, but you have not lost hope in the church. This is the church." At that moment, we decided to stop complaining about the church we saw, and we set our hearts on becoming the church we dreamed of. — Shane Claiborne

Everything has a past, a voice, existed at some point, even things as small and seemingly meaningless as a house in a huge suburb. It's a house like every other house ... but at some point a family lived there, made it theirs, made it important. When people forget that history, that somebody at some point thought the house mattered, it just becomes an empty pile of nailed wood and brick and concrete that gets torn down for some strip mall or chain store to take its place ... and that's what happens more and more now, everything is disposable, always replaced with no thought at all. That's where things get lost, memories get lost, humanity slips through the cracks, because when we all fail to pay attention to the things that make up our lives, we're no longer human at all, not really. — Rebecca McNutt

I've never been good at writing letters, so I hope you'll forgive me if I'm not able to make myself clear.
I've been thinking about you constantly since I left, wondering why the journey I'm on seemed to have led through you. I know my journey's not over yet, and that life is a winding path, but I can only hope it somehow circles back to the place I belong.
That's how I think of it now. I belong with you.
It is almost as if a part of you is with me. I want to believe that's true. No, change that - I know it's true. Before we met, I was as lost as a person could be, and yet you saw something in me that somehow gave me direction again. It was you, that I had been looking for all along. And it's you who is with me now.
I realize that I miss you more than I've ever missed anyone. In the short time we spent together, we had what most people can only dream about, and I'm counting the days until I can see you again. Never forget how much I love you. — Unknown

I probably continue to hope that I will encounter something down there, that if I go down inside and simply wait, it will be possible for me to encounter a certain something. Not that I expect it to restore my life to me. No, I am far too old to hope for such things. What I hope to find is the meaning of the life that I have lost. By what was it taken away from me, and why? I want to know the answers to these questions with absolute certainty. And I would go so far as to say that if I could have those answers, I would not mind being even more profoundly lost than I am already. Indeed, I would gladly accept such a burden for whatever years of life may be left to me. — Haruki Murakami

On the way from the Renaissance to our days we have enriched our experience, but we have lost the concept of a Supreme Complete Entity which used to restrain our passions and our irresponsibility. We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life. In the East, it is destroyed by the dealings and machinations of the ruling party. In the West, commercial interests tend to suffocate it. This is the real crisis. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

I have this recurring nightmare where I'm lost in a strange forest, and my only hope is your sense of direction. Enough to give a fellow the sweats, it is. — Gerald Morris

Who has never killed an hour? Not casually or without thought, but carefully: a premeditated murder of minutes. The violence comes from a combination of giving up, not caring, and a resignation that getting past it is all you can hope to accomplish. So you kill the hour. You do not work, you do not read, you do not daydream. If you sleep it is not because you need to sleep. And when at last it is over, there is no evidence: no weapon, no blood, and no body. The only clue might be the shadows beneath your eyes or a terribly thin line near the corner of your mouth indicating something has been suffered, that in the privacy of your life you have lost something and the loss is too empty to share. — Mark Z. Danielewski

If a mother is mourning not for what she has lost but for what her dead child has lost, it is a comfort to believe that the child has not lost the end for which it was created. And it is a comfort to believe that she herself, in losing her chief or only natural happiness, has not lost a greater thing, that she may still hope to "glorify God and enjoy Him forever." A comfort to the God-aimed, eternal spirit within her. But not to her motherhood. The specifically maternal happiness must be written off. Never, in any place or time, will she have her son on her knees, or bathe him, or tell him a story, or plan for his future, or see her grandchild. — C.S. Lewis

Part of the problem with the word 'disabilities' is that it immediately suggests an inability to see or hear or walk or do other things that many of us take for granted. But what of people who can't feel? Or talk about their feelings? Or manage their feelings in constructive ways? What of people who aren't able to form close and strong relationships? And people who cannot find fulfillment in their lives, or those who have lost hope, who live in disappointment and bitterness and find in life no joy, no love? These, it seems to me, are the real disabilities. — Fred Rogers

Beauty is the wilderness of sensual perception where we always want to get lost. — Debasish Mridha

Hope is never lost, it just has to be found. — Shivam Ralli

Books are precious things, but more than that, they are the strong backbone of civilization. They are the thread upon which it all hangs, and they can save us when all else is lost. — Louis L'Amour

When you feel like you can't keep going, turn your heart to Allah and say this: I can't. But You can. I'm weak. But You're strong. Take me in, not because of me
but because of You. Your mercy is stronger than my weakness. Your perfection is greater than my humanness. I beseech You to replace what's lost, mend what's broken, and allow my hope in You to kill my despair. — Yasmin Mogahed

The rain will stop, the night will end, the hurt will fade. Hope is never so lost that it can't be found. — Ernest Hemingway,

I know you lost your way, but remember love is the only freeway of life. — Debasish Mridha

The moral of the story, Son," Pun would say, "is Don't take more on your heart than you can shake off on your heels."
Of all lessons, that one I never learned and I hope I never do. My heart daily grows new foliage, always adding people, picking up new heartaches like a wool coat collects cockleburs and beggar's-lice seeds. It gets fuller and fuller as I walk slow as a sloth, carrying all the pain Pun and Frank and so many others tried to walk from. Especially the pain of the lost forest. Sometimes there is no leaving, no looking westward for another promised land. We have to nail our shoes to the kitchen floor and unload the burden of our heart. We have to set to the task of repairing the damage done by and to us. — Janisse Ray

Not only to myself or before the mirror or at the hour of my death, which I hope will be long in coming, but in the presence of my children and my wife and in the face of the peaceful life I'm building, I must acknowledge: (1) That under Stalin I wouldn't have wasted my youth in the gulag or ended up with a bullet in the back of my head. (2) That in the McCarthy era I wouldn't have lost my job or had to pump gas at a gas station. (3) That under Hitler, however, I would have been one of those who chose the path of exile, and that under Franco I wouldn't have composed sonnets to the caudillo or the Holy Virgin like so many lifelong democrats. One thing is as true as the other. My bravery has its limits, certainly, but so does what I'm willing to swallow. Everything that begins as comedy ends as tragicomedy. — Roberto Bolano

Beware, Underlanders, time hangs by a thread.
The hunters are hunted, white water runs red.
The Gnawers will strike to extinguish the rest.
The hope of the hopeless resides in a quest.
An Overland warrior, a son of the sun,
May bring us back light, he may bring us back none.
But gather your neighbors and follow his call
Or rats will most surely devour us all.
Two over, two under, of royal descent,
Two flyers, two crawlers, two spinners assent.
One gnawer beside and one lost up ahead.
And eight will be left when we count up the dead.
The last who will die must decide where he stands.
The fate of the eight is contained in his hands.
So bid him take care, bid him look where he leaps,
As life may be death and death life again reaps. — Suzanne Collins

Don't be afraid of who you are. You cannot hope to control your power if you do not understand it and who you are. You must protect yourself at all costs even against those you ... love.' He hesitated lost for a moment and Victoria felt his thoughts flicker briefly into a strange nothingness before moving back to the consciousness she recognized. His words were hard. 'Love is a breeding ground for betrayal. Guard against it. — Amalie Howard

If I have never had, or worse yet, I have lost the conviction that life (despite all of the blows it wields and the savagery that it spawns) is nonetheless an incalculable privilege, I will have in that single loss forfeited the whole of my life and effectively wiped out any hope that I can or will do anything other than exist. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

There are three levels of service. The highest level is that of one who performs good deeds the whole day and yet feels that he has not acheived anything. The second level is someone who, though he has not done anything, knows that he has not corrected anything in this world. This is good, and there is hope for him that he might correct his ways. However, someone who is righteous in his own eyes deceived himself all his life; his good deeds will be lost. — Yehudi Menuhin

Love is a gamble, heartbreak is the cost.
But never lose hope, for love is never truly lost. — Divya Singh

God rejoices when one repentant sinner returns. Statistically that is not very interesting. But for God, numbers never seem to matter. Who knows whether the world is kept from destruction because of one, two, or three people who have continued to pray when the rest of humanity has lost hope and dissipated itself? From God's perspective, one hidden act of repentance, one little gesture of selfless love, one moment of true forgiveness is all that is needed to bring God from his throne to run to his returning son and to fill the heavens with sounds of divine joy. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

This book attempts to
record a journey to restoration that applies to ordinary people like you and I. It is a shot towards healing. A step headed for a new consciousness. It emerges from a moment in time where all seems lost. — Phindiwe Nkosi

Why are we worn out? Why do we, who start out so passionate, brave, noble, believing, become totally bankrupt by the age of thirty or thirty-five? Why is it that one is extinguished by consumption, another puts a bullet in his head, a third seeks oblivion in vodka, cards, a fourth, in order to stifle fear and anguish, cynically tramples underfoot the portrait of his pure, beautiful youth? Why is it that, once fallen, we do not try to rise, and, having lost one thing, we do not seek another? Why? — Anton Chekhov

Time is an ocean
without any bottom.
We are getting lost
while searching for an atom.
Time is a river
without any beginning or end,
one way flow of life,
without any stop or bend.
Time is rocking and moving
Like a rocking chair.
Life is beginning and ending
but going no where. — Debasish Mridha

Nothing is lost that we do not first see as lost. Visions born of fear give birth to our failing.
Visions born of hope give birth to our success.
What is possible lives within us, and it only remains for us to discover it. — Terry Brooks

Meanwhile, we on this dying Earth can relax and rejoice for our loved ones who are in the presence of Christ. As the apostle Paul tells us, though we naturally grieve at losing loved ones, we are not "to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope" (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Our parting is not the end of our relationship, only an interruption. We have not "lost" them, because we know where they are. They are experiencing the joy of Christ's presence in a place so wonderful that Christ called it Paradise. And one day, we're told, in a magnificent reunion, they and we "will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words" (1 Thessalonians 4:17-18). — Randy Alcorn

Sinner, I would be loth to have thy soul destroyed by wilful self-delusion ... So consequently, there is a despair which is a grievous sin; and there is a despair which is absolutely necessary to thy salvation. I would not have thee despair of the sufficiency of the blood of Christ to save thee, if thou believe, and heartily obey him; nor of the willingness of God to pardon and save thee, if thou be such a one; nor yet absolutely of thy own salvation; because, while there is life and time, there is some hope of thy conversion, and so of thy salvation ... Never stick at the sadness of the conclusion, man, but acknowledge plainly, If I die before I get out of this estate, I am lost forever. It is as good deal truly with thyself as not; God will not flatter thee, he will deal plainly whether thou do or not. The very truth is, this kind of despair is one of the first steps to heaven(233). — Richard Baxter

Music is the one thing on this earth that allows us to be truly free.
Music has no boundaries or rules and never asks for anything in return, only that you listen to it.
It can make you cry tears that you thought you never had.
It can also inspire you to fight on, when all hope is lost.
For that, I am forever in your debt — Harry

The generations before you failed. They didn't stay up all night. They got distracted and lost sight of the fact that life is a miracle every moment of your existence. Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn't ask for a better boss. The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer. Hope only makes sense when it doesn't make sense to be hopeful. This is your century. Take it and run as if your life depends on it. — Paul Hawken

When you have a grasp on eternity your eyes won't ever see the battle or the lost people that hurt you. You will see a beautiful story of hope, in every character. It is not one person god loves. He loves us all and this is his story, our story and theirs. — Shannon L. Alder

When I watch people like Cate Blanchett act, I don't know what is going on in her life, you just get lost in her performance and that's what I hope to do as well. — Kate Bosworth

Jude is my favorite of all the saints," he says. "Patron saint of lost causes. The saint to call on when all hope is gone. The one in charge of miracles. — Jandy Nelson

You should read something else."
Why would he have done that to him?"
I don't know," she said.
Do you ever feel like Job?"
She smiled, a little twinkle in her eyes.
Sometimes."
But you haven't lost your faith?"
No," I knew she hadn't, but I think I was losing mine.
Is it because you think you might get better?"
No," she said,"its because its the only thing I have left. — Nicholas Sparks

Justice divine has weighed: the doom is clear. All hope renounce, ye lost, who enter here. — Dante Alighieri

She's Parisian, which is to say she's melancholy. Her mood responds to the changing colours of her city. She can feel a sudden surge of sorrow or even hope for no reason at all. In the blink of an eye, all those lost memories and smells come flooding back, reminding her of loved ones who are no longer there. And time passing by. — Anne Berest

I believe that we are lost here in America, but I believe we shall be found. And this belief, which mounts now to the catharsis of knowledge and conviction, is for me
and I think for all of us
not only our own hope, but America's everlasting, living dream. — Thomas Wolfe

As I walk through This wicked world Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity, I ask myself Is all hope lost? Is there only pain and hatred, and misery? And each time I feel like this inside, There's one thing I wanna know: What's so funny 'bout Peace, Love, & Understanding? — Elvis Costello

If I could have found what I needed at thirteen, I would not have lost so much of my life chasing vindication or death. Give some child, some thirteen-year old, the hope of the remade life. Tell the truth. Write the story that you were always afraid to tell. I swear to you there is magic in it. — Dorothy Allison

A lesson for all of us is that for every loss, there is victory, for every sadness, there is joy, and when you think you've lost everything, there is hope. — Geraldine Solon

It is an indication of truth's jealousy that it has not made for anyone a path to it, and that it has not deprived anyone of the hope of attaining it, and it has left people running in the deserts of perplexity and drowning in the seas of doubt; and he who thinks he has attained it, it dissociates itself from, and he who thinks he has dissociated himself from it has lost his way. — Naguib Mahfouz

The dawn is brief and the day full often belies its promise. — J.R.R. Tolkien

Every warrior of light has felt afraid of going into battle.
Every warrior of light has, at some time in the past, lied or betrayed someone.
Every warrior of light has trodden a path that was not his.
Every warrior of light has suffered for the most trivial of reasons.
Every warrior of light has, at least once, believed that he was not a warrior of light.
Every warrior of light has failed in his spiritual duties.
Every warrior of light has said 'yes' when he wanted to say 'no'.
Every warrior of light has hurt someone he loved.
That is why he is a warrior of light, because he has been through all this and yet has never lost hope of being better than he is.
— Paulo Coelho

This is a book about lost faith and blaming God when He allows bad things to happen to good people. But, it is also about the wounds we carry around with us when we fail to make a diiference when a difference was needed, whether real or perceived. But there is hope for us all! We are NOT alone! — Norman Whaler

Unlike the hard, iron skeleton of war, the Izzy Doll is soft and cuddly.
Not forced upon, it is given freely and accepted easily. It cannot be bought or sold therefore has no monetary power. It is created in the spirit of love and given in the same. A gesture of kindness, it brings hope to those who have lost hope. It is created by and distributed by volunteers, all who are in the mood for peace. In a world full of woes and wrongs, it is cheerful and right. And it is a gift of peace.
from In the Mood for Peace: the Story of the Izzy Doll — Phyllis Wheaton

All hope is lost of my reception into grace; what worse? For where no hope is left, is left no fear. — John Milton

In The Lost And Found (Honky Bach)"

He held his breath to hold your hand
To walk the stairsteps in pairs
Climbing up a slippery slope
I'm in love, love I hope
Don't go home Angelina
Stay with me, hanging around in the lost and found
He kissed you quick, feeling weird
Lonely leered, and disappeared
This is such a simple place
The passing time can't erase
Don't go home Angelina
Paint tomorrow blue
Day breaks
But every morning when he wakes he thinks of you
I'm alone, but that's okay
I don't mind most of the time
I don't feel afraid to die
She was here, passing by
Don't go home Angelina
Stay with me, hanging around in the lost and found
Stay with me, hanging around in the lost and found — Elliott Smith

The gospel teaches us that though we may have lost a battle or two, the war is not yet over. With the Lord's help and the hope of the gospel, we can win out in the end. Truth ultimately triumphs over falsehood. Evil is overwhelmed by goodness. Sin, however extreme it may have been, can give way to cleansing and refreshing forgiveness. This is the great hope of the gospel, centered as it is in the life, mission and atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. — David S. Baxter

What means the fact
which is so common, so universal
that some soul that has lost all hope for itself can inspire in another listening soul an infinite confidence in it, even while it is expressing its despair? — Henry David Thoreau

One thing you cannot know: The sudden extinction of every alternative, The unexpected crash of the iron cataract. You do not know what hope is, until you have lost it. You only know what it is not to hope: You do not know what it is to have hope taken from you Or to fling it away, to join the legion of the hopeless Unrecognized by other men, though sometimes by each other. — T. S. Eliot

And there is no harm in loving a stranger. In fact, it is more exciting to love a stranger. When you were not together, there was great attraction. The more you have been together, the more the attraction has become dull. The more you have become known to each other, superficially, the less is the excitement. Life becomes very soon a routine. People go on repeating the same thing, again and again. If you look at the faces of people in the world, you will be surprised: Why do all these people look so sad? Why do their eyes look as if they have lost all hope? The reason is simple; the reason is repetition. Man is intelligent; repetition creates boredom. Boredom brings a sadness because one knows what is going to happen tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow ... until one goes into the grave, it will be the same, the same story. Finkelstein — Osho

With overwhelming military strength now deployed against him and with intense monitoring from space surveillance and the U.N. inspection team on the ground, any belligerent move by Saddam against a neighbor would be suicidal ... If Iraq does possess such concealed weapons, as is quite likely, Saddam would use them only in the most extreme circumstances, in the face of an invasion of Iraq, when all hope of avoiding the destruction of his regime is lost ... — Jimmy Carter

When I'm travelling, I feel like the secret to my life, to myself, to really becoming, is one step ahead. It's in the next destination, the next town I get lost in, the next stranger I talk to. It's always next but never here ...
I like having hope. And I hope I find what I'm looking for before I have to leave. — Karina Halle

I would just have to find a hog, slaughter it, butcher it, cure the meat, then fry it up. Thinking about the bacon - the potential of bacon - gives me hope. Not all is lost if bacon isn't. Seriously. — Rick Yancey

Never lose hope, be persistent and stubborn and never give up. There are many instances in history where apparent losers suddenly turn out to be winners unexpectedly, so you should never conclude all hope is lost. — Theodore Kaczynski

There's nothing in this courtyard, after all, that wasn't here in 1977; maybe it's not this year but that one, and everything that follows is still to come ... For if the evidence points to anything, it's that there is no one unitary City. Or if there is, it's the sum of thousands of variations, all jockeying for the same spot. This may be wishful thinking; still, I can't help imagining that the points of contact between this place and my own lost city healed incompletely, left the scars I'm feeling for when I send my head up the fire escapes and toward the blue square of freedom beyond. And you out there: Aren't you somehow right here with me? I mean, who doesn't still dream of a world other than this one? Who among us--if it means letting go of the insanity, the mystery, the totally useless beauty of the million once-possible New Yorks--is ready even now to give up hope? — Garth Risk Hallberg

Letting go is your hope and your power. So refuse to hold on to anything - any memory, any worry, or any fear - that is associated with sin. That means if you are holding a grudge, you've got to let go of it. Holding on to it is a sin. It's not taking a position of power; it's sin, and so it's weakness. So right now, this minute, get over it! If you think getting even with someone is your job, then you've lost your way. Who do you think you are - God? " 'Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,' says the Lord" (Heb 10:30 NKJV). Don't get even. Don't sit around plotting and planning. Get over it. If there is something you can't get over, then you've got a big weakness that is going to tear you down eventually. — Hayley DiMarco

The evil influence of Satan would destroy any hope we have in overcoming our mistakes. He would have us feel that we are lost and that there is no hope. In contrast, Jesus reaches down to us to lift us up. — James E. Faust

There's nothing.
Nothing to hold on to while the current takes me.
Whatever I might have had until today, I've lost.
I feel my love for her, swelling; bloating into something that's about to explode, like an abscess that's been allowed to rot for too long, but the pain drowns it so completely I know I'm never coming back out. This feeling, that you're choking and that your body is underwater, immersed in the ocean, a dense flood that overpowers your breathing abilities, and your will to survive gets drowned right along with it. And as I'm drowning I see her face and hear her voice - and it doesn't give me hope, it terrifies me. I'm terrified because I know she's going to be the death of me. I'm terrified because I know I won't be able to cope. I'm terrified because the darkness is the only true friend I've ever had and if it wants to embrace me I don't have the power to make it stop. — Kady Hunt

For the perversely minded, simply killing the trinkets of your greatest amusement and nutritional satisfaction produces at best only temporary elation, a dazzling sensation that is over in a flash, but to permit your prey to fear calamity and to live through catastrophes large and small, to hope and to weep and to lament, to feel anguish over things lost, to regret things found, and to suffer with physical discomfort, emotional injuries and psychological lesions is the wellhead of enduring pleasure. — John Zande

The opposite of interpersonal trust is not mistrust. It is despair. This is because we have given up on believing that trustworthiness and fulfillment are possible from others. We have lost our hope in our fellow humans. — David Richo

In man's life, the absence of an essential component usually leads to the adoption of a substitute. The substitute is usually embraced with vehemence and extremism, for we have to convince ourselves that what we took as second choice is the best there ever was. Thus blind faith is to a considerable extent a substitute for the lost faith in ourselves; insatiable desire a substitute for hope; accumulation a substitute for growth; fervent hustling a substitute for purposeful action; and pride a substitute for an unattainable self-respect. — Eric Hoffer

But for sorrow there is no remedy provided by nature; it is often occasioned by accidents irreparable, and dwells upon objects that have lost or changed their existence; it requires what it cannot hope, that the laws of the universe should be repealed; that the dead should return or the past should be recalled. — Samuel Johnson

When all hope in life seemed lost always remember, God is with you". — Abdulazeez Henry Musa

Is it not tragic, for example, that while in the last World War almost everyone believed it was the war to end all wars and wanted to make it so, now in this Second World War almost no writer that I have read dares even suggest that this is the war to end all wars, or act on that belief? We have lost the courage to hope. — Lin Yutang

I believe that some people are lost souls, with nothing left to save. But some aren't lost, and the problem is you can't tell which is which. All you can do is try to save them all, and hope none of the good ones slip away, and none of the lost ones hurt you."

Jack Prescott, in Painted Black — Debra R. Borys

Men in a totally planned world will find themselves unspeakably lonely. If they have completely lost sight of God, they will feel the whole horror of their poverty. Then they will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new. They will discover it as a hope that is meant for them, an answer for which they have always been searching in secret. — Pope Benedict XVI

Although the human heart is selfish and arrogant, so many struggle against their selfishness and learn humility; because of them, as long as there is life, there is hope that beauty lost can be rediscovered, that what has been reviled can be redeemed. — Dean Koontz

I sit on the steps in the heat of the sun and listen as one by one these car alarms extinguish themselves until once more only the muted roar of the city is audible, and the city, bathed in sunlight, once again resumes dreaming its collective dream.
Cars roll down the city's roads, plants grow from its soil, wealth is generated in its rooms, hope is created and lost and recreated in the minds and souls of its inhabitants, and the city continues its dream and searches for those ideas that will make it strong. — Douglas Coupland

Nothing, in truth, can ever replace a lost companion. Old comrades cannot be manufactured. There is nothing that can equal the treasure of so many shared memories, so many bad times endured together, so many quarrels, reconciliations, heartfelt impulses. Friendships like that cannot be reconstructed. If you plant an oak, you will hope in vain to sit soon under its shade.
For such is life. We grow rich as we plant through the early years, but then come the years when time undoes our work and cuts down our trees. One by one our comrades deprive us of their shade, and within our mourning we always feel now the secret grief of growing old.
If I search among my memories for those whose taste is lasting, if I write the balance sheet of the moments that truly counted, I surely find those that no fortune could have bought me. You cannot buy the friendship of a companion bound to you forever by ordeals endured together. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Wheels have been set in motion, and they have their own pace, to which we are ... condemned. Each move is dictated by the previous one - that is the meaning of order. If we start being arbitrary it'll just be a shambles: at least, let us hope so. Because if we happened, just happened to discover, or even suspect, that our spontaneity was part of their order, we'd know that we were lost. A Chinaman of the T'ang Dynasty - and, by which definition, a philosopher - dreamed he was a butterfly, and from that moment he was never quite sure that he was not a butterfly dreaming it was a Chinese philosopher. Envy him; his two-fold security. — Tom Stoppard

The Soul bird sang:
My beloved Jay, Look into my eyes.
Look deeply, and you will remember hope.
You will remember the power of your mind,
The great power, big as the sky, that makes all things possible.
Look straight into my eyes.
I can restore to you the hope you've lost.
I can enable restore to you the hope you've lost.
I can enable you to meet your infinite, eternal min.
That is what I can do for you.
I am your soul.
I, who restore your lost hope, am your soul. — Ilchi Lee

There is something in the depths of our being that hungers for wholeness and finality. Because we are made for eternal life, we are made for an act that gathers up all the powers and capacities of our being and offers them simultaneously and forever to God. The blind spiritual instinct that tells us obscurely that our owns lives have a particular importance and purpose, and which urges us to find out our vocation, seeks in so doing to bring us to a decision that will dedicate our lives irrevocably to their true purpose. The man who loses this sense of his own personal destiny, and who renounces all hope of having any kind of vocation in life has either lost all hope of happiness or else has entered upon some mysterious vocation that God alone can understand. — Thomas Merton

The struggle is not lost. I believe we have to live, as long as we live, in the expectation and hope of changing the world for the better. That may sound naive. It may even sound sentimental. Never mind: I believe it. What are we to live for, except life itself? And, with all our doubts, with all our flaws, with all our problems, I believe that we will carry on, with God's help. — Margaret Laurence

All this, and discontent too! Otherwise, why am I sitting here dreaming of England? Why am I gazing at this campfire like a lost should seeking a hope when all that I love is at my wingtips? Because I am curious. Because I am incorrigibly, now, a wanderer. — Beryl Markham

May you listen to the voice within the beat even when you are tired. When you feel yourself breaking down, may you break open instead. May every experience in life be a door that opens your heart, expands your understanding, and leads you to freedom. If you are weary, may you be aroused by passion and purpose. If you are blameful and bitter, may you be sweetened by hope and humor. If you are frightened, may you be emboldened by a big consciousness far wiser than your fear. If you are lonely, may you find love, may you find friendship. If you are lost, may you understand that we are all lost, and still we are guided - by Strange Angels and Sleeping Giants, by our better and kinder natures, by the vibrant voice within the beat. May you follow that voice, for This is the way - the hero's journey, the life worth living, the reason we are here. — Elizabeth Lesser

For those who dispair that their lives are without meaning and without purpose, for those who dwell in a lonelines so terrible that it has withered their hearts, for those who hate because they have no recognition of the destiny they share with all humanity, for those who would squander their lives in self-pity and in self-destruction because they have lost the saving wisdom with which they are born, for all these and many more, hope waits in the dreams of a dog, where the scared bature of life may be clearly experienced without all but binding filter of human need, desire, greed, envy and endless fear. And here, in dream woods and fields, along with the shores of dream seas, with the profound awareness of the playful presence abiding in all things, Curtis is able to prove what she thus far only dared to hope is true: that although her mother never loved her, there is one who always has. — Dean Koontz

Chili is one of those marvelous-simple, elemental, all-important, and fundamental concepts that has been elaborated out of all recognition: rather like justice, or objective reality, or 'being' (ens) in Aquinas. Lean closer and I will whisper to you a horrific, soul-shattering secret: there are actually people so lost to any sense of decency that they put beans in chili. (I hope you sent the children of tender years out of the room before we discussed that horror, lest they be warped for life). — Markham Shaw Pyle

At a time when opportunism is everything, when hope seems lost, when everything boils down to a cynical business deal, we must find the courage to dream. To reclaim romance. The romance of believing in justice, in freedom, and in dignity. For everybody. — Arundhati Roy

All I hope for is one moment of rational thought and a shot at action before I'm lost to a great saddening madness, pithed at the hands of my own stumbling biology.

[Johnny Truant] — Mark Z. Danielewski

The quest for a lost city erodes your body, damaging you beyond all reason. But it is your mind that bears the heaviest toll. Listen to the doubters, the worriers and the weak, and the vaguest hope of success evaporates. — Tahir Shah

We have done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth,
We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung,
And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth.
God help us, for we knew the worst too young!
from Gentleman Rankers — Rudyard Kipling

We play in twelve rounds. The present against me. I lost the previous eleven. Defeat after defeat. And now I am waiting for the last round. The key round. The fact that I did not fall so far gives me more strength. It's only now that I hope to win, by knock-out, because the fate is too tired from punches that it will eventually fall by itself. And maybe it will fall on knees when it realizes that I am not going to fall. — Slavisa Pavlovic

Not merely hope, but any burdensome yearning: ambition, hatred, love (especially love) - how rarely do our emotions meet the object they seem to deserve? How hopelessly we signal; how dark the sky; how big the waves. We are all lost at see, washed between hope and despair, hailing something that may never come to rescue us. Catastrophe has become art; but this is no reducing process. It is freeing, enlarging, explaining. Catastrophe has become art: that is, after all, what it is for. — Julian Barnes

They say that Hope is happiness But genuine Love must prize the past; And Mem'ry wakes the thoughts that bless: They rose first
they set the last. And all that mem'ry loves the most Was once our only hope to be: And all that hope adored and lost Hath melted into memory. Alas! It is delusion all
The future cheats us from afar: Nor can we be what we recall, Nor dare we think on what we are. — Lord Byron

We seek for an explanation,
crawling on this sacred Ground,
that is crying for salvation,
but not many hear the sound.
We yield to regeneration,
lost,we hope we could be found..
once exalted Gods creations,
fallen,but not yet profound.
Only Love,gives clear reflection,
that can turn our fate around.
Once we accept imperfection,
to ourselves we'll be rebound. — Aleksandra Ninkovic

Jesus is deeply connected to the earth on which he walks. He observes the forces of nature, learns from them, teaches about them, and reveals that the God of Creation is the same God who sent him to give good news to the poor, sight to the blind, and freedom to the prisoners. He walks from village to village, sometimes alone and sometimes with others; as he walks, he meets the poor, the beggars, the blind, the sick, the mourners, and those who have lost hope. He listens attentively to those with whom he walks, and he speaks to them with the authority of a true companion on the road. He remains very close to the ground. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

Maybe there is hope in the fragments, that what is lost can always be filled in by someone who knows. — David Levithan

If you care about the 2012 election and value the voices of regular Americans who lost hope in their hope and change candidate, this is one documentary you won't want to miss. — Jedediah Bila

I have faults enough, but they are not, I hope, of understanding. My temper I dare not vouch for. It is, I believe, too little yielding - certainly too little for the convenience of the world. I cannot forget the follies and vices of other so soon as I ought, nor their offenses against myself. My feelings are not puffed about with every attempt to move them. My temper would perhaps be called resentful. My good opinion once lost, is lost forever. — Jane Austen

The fact that, within ten years, I lost one world, and after a time rose again, as it were, from spiritual death to find another, seems to me one of the strongest arguments against suicide that life can provide. There may not be - I believe that there is not - resurrection after death, but nothing could prove more conclusively than my own brief but eventful history the fact that resurrection is possible within our limited span of earthly time. — Vera Brittain

I have known a lot of people in my life, and I can tell you this ... Some of the ones who understood love better than anyone else were those who the rest of the world had long before measured as lost or gone. Some of the people who were able to look at the dirtiest, the poorest, the gays, the straights, the drug users, those in recovery, the basest of sinners, and those who were just ... plain ... different.
They were able to look at them all and only see strength. Beauty. Potential. Hope.
And if we boil it down, isn't that what love actually is? — Dan Pearce

Whether we're overcoming adversity, surviving trauma, or dealing with stress and anxiety, having a sense of purpose, meaning, and perspective in our lives allows us to develop understanding and move forward. Without purpose, meaning, and perspective, it is easy to lose hope, numb our emotions, or become overwhelmed by our circumstances. We feel reduced, less capable, and lost in the face of struggle. The heart of spirituality is connection. When we believe in that inextricable connection, we don't feel alone. — Brene Brown

Bonaventure's theology is never about trying to placate a distant or angry God, earn forgiveness, or find some abstract theory of justification. He is all cosmic optimism and hope! Once it lost this kind of mysticism, Christianity became preoccupied with fear, unworthiness, and guilt much more than being included in - and delighting in - an all-pervasive plan that is already in place. — Richard Rohr

It's lonely to say goodbye. Very lonely. Please. Cry with me. Maybe there's nothing we can do about this. But at least, for now ... cry with me. Like your entire body ... is screaming at the sky. Like it's raging against the world. I lost something. And I don't have a single guarantee. The fear of living in this world again after that ... I have only a shred of hope to sustain me. So I want you at least ... to cry. Cry. Cry with me. Like the day you were first born into this world. — Natsuki Takaya

I have been in my bed for five weeks, oppressed with weakness and other infirmities from which my age, seventy four years, permits me not to hope release. Added to this (proh dolor! [O misery!]) the sight of my right eye - that eye whose labors (dare I say it) have had such glorious results - is for ever lost. That of the left, which was and is imperfect, is rendered null by continual weeping. — Galileo Galilei