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Quotes

Good or ill fortune is very little at our disposal.

—David Hume, 1742

One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards.

—Oscar Wilde, 1895

Good fortune is light as a feather, but nobody knows how to hold it up. Misfortune is heavy as the earth, but nobody knows how to stay out of its way.

—Zhuangzi, c. 300 BC

Casting lots causes contentions to cease, and keeps the mighty apart.

—Book of Proverbs, c. 350 BC

We do not suffer by accident. 

—Jane Austen, 1813

Survivors look back and see omens, messages they missed.

—Joan Didion, 2005

A self-made man is one who believes in luck and sends his son to Oxford.

—Christina Stead, 1938

Those who trust to chance must abide by the results of chance.

—Calvin Coolidge, 1932

’Tis not a ridiculous devotion to say a prayer before a game at tables?

—Thomas Browne, 1642

It is weak and silly to say you cannot bear what it is your fate to be required to bear. 

—Charlotte Brontë, 1847

Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.

—William Shakespeare, c. 1610

To hold a throne is luck; to bestow it, virtue.

—Seneca the Younger, c. 45

Some folks want their luck buttered.

—Thomas Hardy, 1886
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