The Quotes canon
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Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
William Shakespeare5 quotes
There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries. — William Shakespeare · 1599Fortune, that arrant whore,
Ne’er turns the key to th’ poor. — William Shakespeare · 1606O Fortune, Fortune, all men call thee fickle. — William Shakespeare · 1597Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered. — William Shakespeare · 1611Though Fortune’s malice overthrow my state,
My mind exceeds the compass of her wheel. — William Shakespeare · 1595Edward Gibbon2 quotes
The winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators. — Edward Gibbon · 1789Vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave. — Edward Gibbon · 1789Herodotus1 quote
The man who has planned badly, if fortune is on his side, may have had a stroke of luck; but his plan was a bad one nonetheless. — Herodotus · 430 BCLouis Pasteur1 quote
Chance favors only the prepared mind. — Louis Pasteur · 1854Miguel de Cervantes1 quote
Diligence is the mother of good fortune, and idleness, its opposite, never led to good intention's goal. — Miguel de Cervantes · 1615Niccolo Machiavelli1 quote
The cause of the bad and of the good fortune of men is the way in which their method of working fits the times. — Niccolo Machiavelli · 1531Sophocles1 quote
Of all human ills, greatest is fortune's wayward tyranny. — Sophocles · 430 BCTerence1 quote
Fortune assists the brave. — Terence · 161 BC