Go forward with joyful confidence.
As they who make Good luck a god count all unlucky men.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that those who attribute their success solely to luck often overlook the struggles of those who are less fortunate.
George Eliot's quote reflects on the tendency of individuals who believe in the power of 'good luck' to judge others. It highlights the idea that those who consider luck as an essential factor in success often disregard the hardships and difficulties faced by those deemed 'unlucky', fostering a lack of empathy and understanding for different life circumstances. This perspective encourages a more compassionate view of success and acknowledges that effort and resilience play a critical role in achieving one's goals.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech about resilience and hard work, this quote could be used to illustrate how success often requires more than just luck.
More from George Eliot
All quotes βYou must love your work, and not be always looking over the edge of it, wanting your play to begin. And the other is, you must not be ashamed of your work, and think it would be more honorable to you to be doing something else. You must have a pride in your own work and in learning to do it well.
She thought it was part of the hardship of her life that there was laid upon her the burthen of larger wants than others seemed to feel β that she had to endure this wide hopeless yearning for that something, whatever it was, that was greatest and best on this earth.
Life seems to go on without effort when I am filled with music.
I think I should have no other mortal wants, if I could always have plenty of music. It seems to infuse strength into my limbs and ideas into my brain. Life seems to go on without effort, when I am filled with music.
Our dead are never dead to us until we have forgotten them: they can be injured by us, they can be wounded; they know all our penitence, all our aching sense that their place is empty, all the kisses we bestow on the smallest relic of their presence.
Similar quotes
It is an easy thing for one whose foot is on the outside of calamity to give advice and to rebuke the sufferer.
Don't, Sir, accustom yourself to use big words for little matters.
There is no knowledge, no light, no wisdom that you are in possession of, but what you have received it from some source.
Remember, in the vast infinity of life, all is perfect, whole, and complete... and so are you.
There are a million 'oughts' in the world. There's a million ways in which I ought to be serving the world. But the ways I'm gifted to serve and the opportunities that come to me to serve are not a million.
Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it.