Fortune-telling

“ We are telling a tale with Truth for its basis, and how can the mere historian help it if there is nothing new in one of the main incidents of his narrative? Human hopes and fears, and sorrows and troubles, and joys and pleasures, are a constant repetition of the same occurrences, and love of money forms the axis upon which this world of trouble revolves. ”

“ Declare that a great fortune, or something greatly to the advantage of the subject, or something which will gratify him, will soon come in his way, but that he must be keen to watch his opportunity and be bold and energetic. ”

“ Which wealth as soon as fame can yield;
Thou scornedst at such low rates to purchase worth,
Nor couldst thou owe it only to thy birth,
Thy self-born greatness was above the power
Of parents to entail, or fortune to deflower.
Thy soul, which, like the sun, heaven moulded bright. ”

“ Let Fortune strike down a victim, and even the heathen cries, 'This is the hand of God!' But where Fortune brings no vicissitude; where her wheel runs smooth, dropping wealth or honours as it rolls—where Affliction centres its work within the secret, unrevealing heart—there, even the wisest man may not readily perceive by what means Heaven is admonishing, forcing, or wooing him nearer to itself. ”

“ Fortune-tellers are rife amongst them—those sages whose comprehensive view knows the past, the present, and the future. They seek unto familiar spirits, that peep and mutter, for the living to the dead. ”

“ The sense to value riches, with the art
T’ enjoy them, and the virtue to impart,
Not meanly, nor ambitiously pursued,
Not sunk by sloth, nor raised by servitude;
To balance fortune by a just expense,
Join with economy, magnificence;
With splendour, charity; with plenty, health;
O teach us, Bathurst! yet unspoiled by wealth!
That secret rare, between the extremes to move
Of mad good-nature, and of mean self-love.
B. To worth or want well weighed, be bounty given,
And ease, or emulate, the care of Heaven
(Whose measure full o’erflows on human race) ”

“ You judge by the rule of the penny— In this true success isn't told. This falsely man's story is telling, For wealth often brings on distress, But wherever love brightens a dwelling, There lives; rich or poor, a success. ”

“ Undoubtedly the effort which you are making is a noble one, and a paying one. In thirty years, you have increased your wealth ten-, twenty-, even thirty-fold. You have been wonderfully quick in extending cultivation, railways, and population over the vast territory which Fortune has given you. You are now flooding the world with riches, and, profiting by the experience of others, you can transform, reshape, and make perfect your public services, your institutions, and your whole mode of living in the smallest number of years. ”

“ Most men would be satisfied if they had accomplished what I have. Do you realize that my wealth is so vast that I scarcely know myself what I am worth? What my fortune will be in another fifty years staggers the imagination. ”

“ But after a deal of blundering and being blundered up and down the world’s by-ways I have learned and know by heart now these two fundamentals: there is nothing so unprofitable as to speculate in terms of “might have been;” and fortune favors the man who favors fortune. ”

“ You cannot transfer the skill, sagacity, prudence, foresight, which lie concealed in your wealth. It meant a great deal for you, but means nothing to your heir. In climbing to your fortune, you developed the muscle, stamina, and strength which enabled you to maintain your lofty position, to keep your millions intact. You had the power which comes only from experience, and which alone enables you to stand firm on your dizzy height. Your fortune was experience to you, joy, growth, discipline, and character; to him it will be a temptation, an anxiety, which will probably dwarf him. ”

“ Kings of Fortune—or the Triumphs and Achievements of Noble, Self-made men.—Whose brilliant careers have honored their calling, blessed humanity, and whose lives furnish instruction for the young, entertainment for the old and valuable lessons for the aspirants of fortune. ”

“ From my childhood I have been accustomed to luxury and idleness, and have been bred as though my fortune were large, and my expectations almost without a limit. The idea of wealth has been familiarised to me from my cradle. I have been taught to look upon those means, by which men raise themselves to riches and distinction, as being beyond my heeding, and beneath my care. ”

“ The one, in a word, by the depth of his genius and the incredible resources of his courage, rose superior to the greatest perils and even knew how to profit by every kind of fickleness of fortune; the other, by reason of the advantages derived from high birth, by his great conceptions derived from Heaven, and by a kind of admirable instinct, the secret of which is not given to ordinary men, seemed born to mold fortune to conform to his designs and bring destiny to his feet. ”

“ I do not speak only (says the poet) of riches and dominions, and such like gratuities of Fortune, but of things also which Fortune can neither grant nor resume. Much fame is there which Time has withdrawn—infinite prayers and vows which are made to God Almighty by us poor sinners. ”

“ ROSALIND
Nay; now thou goest from Fortune's office to Nature's: Fortune reigns in gifts of the world, not in the lineaments of Nature.
CELIA
No; when Nature hath made a fair creature, may she not by Fortune fall into the fire?—Though Nature hath given us wit to flout at Fortune, hath not Fortune sent in this fool to cut off the argument? ”

“ From news which I received to-day, and which I had little expectation of ever hearing, I have reason, good reason, to hope that within a very short time I am likely to come into possession of an enormous fortune--a fortune so large that it will make me one of the richest men in the kingdom. You are a man of business. ”

“ Men whose minds are bound down and engrossed by the world may speak of this and that fortunate accident, and how well their efforts succeeded, and how skilfully they seized the all-important moment of Fortune ”

“ It is not for the sake of wealth itself or the eclat attending its possession that I desire an immediate fortune, but that by means of it I may attain another object dearer than wealth, and more precious than my career. ”

“ Fortunes may be acquired in a kind of intermediate way, that is, by a method between that by which wealth is raised, by assuming land in the manner as before represented; and that by which a fortune is made, by accumulating only such things as are the work of a man's own hand. ”

“ At the worst it can be left in trust. But when I follow my father, only ten millions will go to—to—relatives. You must be the custodian of the bulk; and when I give you its present figure—reminding you that such wealth rolls up wealth unceasingly, by the mere force of momentum—it may dawn upon you that you still have it in your power to become as great and as mighty as ever your boyish imaginings dictated, and that you will need all the character you have put in storage. What is your idea of a great fortune—an American fortune? ”

“ Before we embark, suffer me to make an observation, and tell a story. Fortune is a capricious jade; she flies from those who pursue; and pursues those who shun her. The remark is old; but not, I believe, the tale to which it leads. ”

“ So plausible was everything made to appear, that men of commercially acquired fortune, of the greatest experience, and of long-tried judgment, invested their capital in the fullest confidence of success. ”

“ Fortune to come like a peddler with his goods,—as wreaths of laurel, diamonds, crowns; selling them, but asking for them the sacrifice of health, of integrity, perhaps of life in the battle-field, and of the real pleasures of existence. ”

“ What then has that capricious damsel, Fortune, to do in this chain of argument? Nothing. He who has capacity, attention, and economy, has a fortune within himself. She does not command him, he commands her. ”

“ That, if it had been my good fortune to come into the world a struldbrug, as soon as I could discover my own happiness, by understanding the difference between life and death, I would first resolve by all arts and methods whatsoever, to procure myself riches. In the pursuit of which, by thrift and management, I might reasonably expect, in about two hundred years, to be the wealthiest man in the kingdom. ”

“ They were entirely without the capacity of spending money either upon themselves or on other people, and yet they had striven as eagerly for the possession of this fortune as ever any proud, ambitious spirit strove for the golden means by which he hoped to work his way upon the road that leads to glory. ”

“ That which We commonly call Good Fortune, is properly, Providence, and when Matters succeed Better with us by Accident, then we could pretend to, by Skill; We ought to Ascribe it to the Divine Goodness, as a Blessing upon Industry. ”

“ Therefore, if at great things thou wouldst arrive, Get Riches first, get Wealth, and Treasure heap, Not difficult, if thou hearken to me, Riches are mine, Fortune is in my hand; They whom I favour thrive in wealth amain, 430 While Virtue, Valour, Wisdom sit in want. ”

“ I consider your wonderful genius, noble disposition, and prolific imagination to be the most fatal and lamentable qualities distributed by Fortune to humanity. But since you possess them, you will scarcely be able to avoid their harmful influence. In the present day there is but one possible benefit to be gained from such endowments as yours; viz., the glory that sometimes rewards industry in literature and study. ”

“ Yet, in looking into particulars, we find that much is to be attributed to fortune, as well as skill; and that her glory is even lessened by considerations, which, on a careless view, may seem to augment it. ”

“ In the eyes of reason, human right, and even of a well-understood social interest, a great fortune should be a hereditary deposit, confided to prudent, firm, skilful, generous hands, which, entrusted at the same time to fructify and expend this fortune, know how to fertilise, vivify, and ameliorate all that should have the felicity to find themselves within the scope of its splendid and salutary rays. ”

“ I have augmented our fortune, and it has continued to increase during the last fifteen years, till extraordinary and unexpected catastrophes have suddenly overturned it, -- without any fault of mine, I can honestly declare. ”

“ The aim of the writer has been to present the histories of those who have won the highest fame and achieved the greatest good in their respective callings, whether that success has brought them riches or not, and above all, of those whose labors have not only opened the way to fortune for themselves, but also for others, and have thus conferred lasting benefits upon their country. ”

“ Wealth, and scorn of wealth to spend it—oh! but these be virtues rare!"
"Sentences of studied wisdom, nought avail they unapplied;
Though the blind man hold a lantern, yet his footsteps stray aside."
"Would'st thou, know whose happy dwelling Fortune entereth unknown?
His, who careless of her favour, standeth fearless in his own ”

“ But Fortune is a jealous goddess; and offerings are due to her who has given us an inviolate soil. I seem to see Fortune standing apart, watching—wondering. “What have they made—what are they going to make of their Land?” ”

“ The fortunes which people have acquired for themselves, answer the purpose quite as well, indeed much better; since a person is more powerfully stimulated by the example of somebody who has earned a fortune, than by the mere sight of somebody who possesses one ”

“ The person who acts as the fortune-teller, must always bend his or her thoughts upon him or her who is to have their fortune told, and on their rank in life, and profession, in order to give plausibility to the predictions. ”

“ So use all that is called Fortune. Most men gamble with her, and gain all, and lose all, as her wheel rolls. But do thou leave as unlawful these winnings, and deal with Cause and Effect, the chancellors of God. ”

“ Shakespeare had the Emblematist's Fortune in his mind when he wrote: "Fortune is painted blind, with a muffler afore her eyes, to signify to you, which is the moral of it, that she is turning, and inconstant, and mutability, and variation: and her foot, look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone, which rolls, and rolls, and rolls." ”

“ Many of you have accumulated or will inherit large fortunes directly or indirectly due to our hard work and sacrifices, you accept the fat of the land as your due and for your own pleasure, without even gratitude to those few that still live who helped to make your fortune. ”

“ Has wealth been the dream that has vanished?
Gold and silver have many a mine;
Plough the deep, seek the populous city,
And the wealth of the East may be thine.
Has fame been the thing to allure thee? ”

“ Give fools their gold, and knaves their power;
Let fortune's bubbles rise and fall;
Who sows a field, or trains a flower,
Or plants a tree, is more than all. ”

“ TRUE RICHES; or, WEALTH WITHOUT WINGS,
12mo, 210 pages, with a fine mezzotint Frontispiece.
NOTICES OF THE PRESS. This volume is written by T.S. Arthur, the most popular of all our American writers on domestic subjects. His intention is to direct the reader to the real riches of life, the wealth which cannot be taken away by the adverse events of fortune. The true wisdom of life, he shows us, is to place our fortune in ourselves, to make our own minds rich in intellectual treasures, and our hearts true to the legitimate purposes and ends of life. ”

“ In the struggle for natural riches—the wealth that meets the eye and charms the imagination—how many forget that true riches can only be laid up in the heart; and that, without these true riches, which have no wings, gold, the god of this world, cannot bestow a single blessing! ”