Adverb
In a vain manner; in vain.
Source: Webster's dictionaryUnless a tree has borne blossoms in spring, you will vainly look for fruit on it in autumn. Walter Scott
I recalled the voice I had heard; again I questioned whence it came, as vainly as before: it seemed in me not in the external world. I asked, was it a mere nervous impression a delusion? I could not conceive or believe: it was more like an inspiration. Charlotte Brontë
In ambition, as in love, the successful can afford to be indulgent toward their rivals. The prize our own, it is graceful to recognize the merit that vainly aspired to it. Christian Nestell Bovee
Vainly you talk about voting it down. When you have cast your millions of ballots, you have not reached the evil. It has fastened its root deep into the heart of the nation, and nothing but God's truth and love can cleanse the land. We must change the moral sentiment. Frederick Douglass
I fell victim to the temptation of every autobiographer, to the illusion that since the past exists only in one's memories and the words which strive vainly to encapsulate them, it is possible to create past events simply by saying they occurred. Salman Rushdie
Do not anxiously hope for that which is not yet come; do not vainly regret what is already past. Chinese Proverb