Archive

Quotes

Luck takes the step that no one sees.

—Publilius Syrus, c. 50 BC

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

—Seneca the Younger, c. 45

Survivors look back and see omens, messages they missed.

—Joan Didion, 2005

We do not suffer by accident. 

—Jane Austen, 1813

Nothing is as obnoxious as other people’s luck.

—F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1938

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

—Oscar Wilde, 1895

Misfortune, n. The kind of fortune that never misses.

—Ambrose Bierce, 1906

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

—Christina Stead, 1938

Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.

—William Shakespeare, c. 1610

Luck, in the great game of war, is undoubtedly lord of all.

—Arthur Griffiths, 1899

Luck is believing you’re lucky. 

—William Carlos Williams, 1947

Good fortune turns aside destruction by a great god.

—Instructions of Ankhsheshonqy, c. 100 BC

Luck is not something you can mention in the presence of self-made men.

—E.B. White, 1944