Quotes about fate

He knew that sooner or later he would obey O'Brien's summons. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps after a long delay — he was not certain. What was happening was only the working-out of a process that had started years ago. The first step had been a secret, involuntary thought, the second had been the opening of the diary. He had moved from thoughts to words, and now from words to actions. The last step was something that would happen in the Ministry of Love. He had accepted it. The end was contained in the beginning. But it was frightening: or, more exactly, it was like a foretaste of death, like being a little less alive. Even while he was speaking to O'Brien, when the meaning of the words had sunk in, a chilly shuddering feeling had taken possession of his body. He had the sensation of stepping into the dampness of a grave, and it was not much better because he had always known that the grave was there and waiting for him.

Fate seemed to be playing a series of extraordinarily unamusing jokes.

He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish. In the first forty days a boy had been with him. But after forty days without a fish the boy's parents had told him that the old man was now definitely and finally salao, which is the worst form of unlucky, and the boy had gone at their orders in another boat which caught three good fish the first week.

Every day is a new day. It is better to be lucky. But I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready.

I fell indeed into a morbid state, deep and enduring, and alien to fear, which has left permanent scars upon my mind. I must confess that I lost faith in the sanity of the world when I saw it suffering the painful disorder of this island. A blind Fate, a vast pitiless Mechanism, seemed to cut and shape the fabric of existence; and I, Moreau (by his passion for research), Montgomery (by his passion for drink), the Beast People with their instincts and mental restrictions, were torn and crushed, ruthlessly, inevitably, amid the infinite complexity of its incessant wheels.

We sometimes had those little rubs which Providence sends to enhance the value of its favors.

To what fortuitous occurrence do we not owe every pleasure and convenience of our lives.

In discourse more sweet;

For eloquence the soul, song charms the sense.

Others apart sat on a hill retired,

In thoughts more elevate, and reasoned high

Of Providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate,

Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute,

And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost.

Such was the unhappy condition of the Roman emperors, that, whatever might be their conduct, their fate was commonly the same. A life of pleasure or virtue, of severity or mildness, of indolence or glory, alike led to an untimely grave; and almost every reign is closed by the same disgusting repetition of treason and murder.

Vicissitudes of fortune, which spares neither man nor the proudest of his works, which buries empires and cities in a common grave.

"You mean it's my destiny?" she said at last.

"Million-to-one chances," she said, "crop up nine times out of ten."