Source: The Grand Chessboard (1997), Chapter 3, The Democratic Bridgehead, p. 62.
“Notions of chance and fate are the preoccupations of men engaged in rash undertakings.”
—
Cormac McCarthy
,
book
Blood Meridian
Blood Meridian (1985)
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Cormac McCarthy 270
American novelist, playwright, and screenwriter 1933Related quotes
“Successful people never rely upon chance or fate.”
Nigel Cumberland
(1967) British author and leadership coach
Your Job-Hunt Ltd – Advice from an Award-Winning Asian Headhunter (2003), Successful Recruitment in a Week (2012) https://books.google.ae/books?idp24GkAsgjGEC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIGjAA#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, 100 Things Successful People Do: Little Exercises for Successful Living (2016) https://books.google.ae/books?idnu0lCwAAQBAJ&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIMjAE
“A lucky chance, that oft decides the fate
Of mighty monarchs.”
Source: The Seasons (1726-1730), Summer (1727), l. 1285.
Bertrand Russell
(1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist
Principles of Social Reconstruction [Originally titled Why Men Fight : A Method Of Abolishing The International Duel], Ch. VIII : What We Can Do, p. 257
1910s
Context: It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents men from living freely and nobly. The State and Property are the great embodiments of possessiveness; it is for this reason that they are against life, and that they issue in war. Possession means taking or keeping some good thing which another is prevented from enjoying; creation means putting into the world a good thing which otherwise no one would be able to enjoy. Since the material goods of the world must be divided among the population, and since some men are by nature brigands, there must be defensive possession, which will be regulated, in a good community, by some principle of impersonal justice. But all this is only the preface to a good life or good political institutions, in which creation will altogether outweigh possession, and distributive justice will exist as an uninteresting matter of course.
The supreme principle, both in politics and in private life, should be to promote all that is creative, and so to diminish the impulses and desires that center round possession.
“Hoddan angrily suspected fate and chance of plain conspiracy against him.”
Source: The Pirates of Zan (1959), Chapter 4
“There is nothing nameable but that some men will undertake to do it for pay.”
Source: Billy Budd, the Sailor (1891), Ch. 21
Context: Who in the rainbow can draw the line where the violet tint ends and the orange tint begins? Distinctly we see the difference of the colors, but where exactly does the one first blendingly enter into the other? So with sanity and insanity. In pronounced cases there is no question about them. But in some supposed cases, in various degrees supposedly less pronounced, to draw the exact line of demarcation few will undertake tho' for a fee some professional experts will. There is nothing nameable but that some men will undertake to do it for pay.
“Fate gave, what Chance shall not control,
His sad lucidity of soul.”
Matthew Arnold
(1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools
Source: Resignation (1849), l. 197
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
(1850–1919) American author and poet
"Will," included in Maurine: And Other Poems, p. 145 (1888). Often quoted by Nigerian drummer Babatunde Olatunji.
Poetry quotes, New Thought Pastels (1913)
Context: There is no chance, no destiny, no fate,
Can circumvent or hinder or control
The firm resolve of a determined soul.
Gifts count for nothing; will alone is great;
All things give way before it soon or late.
What obstacle can stay the mighty force
Of the sea seeking river in its course,
Or cause the ascending orb of day to wait?
“Yet they, believe me, who await
No gifts from Chance, have conquer’d Fate.”
Matthew Arnold
(1822–1888) English poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools
Source: Resignation (1849), l. 248-249