Hoyt & Roberts, comps. Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations. 1922.
Luck
O, once in each man’s life, at least,
Good luck knocks at his door;
And wit to seize the flitting guest
Need never hunger more.
But while the loitering idler waits
Good luck beside his fire,
The bold heart storms at fortune’s gates,
And conquers its desire.
Lewis J. Bates—Good Luck.
As ill-luck would have it.
Cervantes—Don Quixote. Pt. I. Bk. I. Ch. II.
As they who make
Good luck a god count all unlucky men.
George Eliot—The Spanish Gypsy. Bk. I.
A farmer travelling with his load
Picked up a horseshoe on the road,
And nailed it fast to his barn door,
That luck might down upon him pour;
That every blessing known in life
Might crown his homestead and his wife,
And never any kind of harm
Descend upon his growing farm.
James T. Fields—The Lucky Horseshoe.
Now for good lucke, cast an old shooe after mee.
Heywood—Proverbs. Pt. I. Ch. IX.
Some people are so fond of ill-luck that they run half-way to meet it.
Douglas Jerrold—Jerrold’s Wit. Meeting Trouble Half-Way.
Felix ille tamen corvo quoque rarior albo.
A lucky man is rarer than a white crow.
Juvenal—Satires. VII. 202.
Happy art thou, as if every day thou hadst picked up a horseshoe.
Longfellow—Evangeline. Pt. I. St. 2.
“Then here goes another,” says he, “to make sure,
For there’s luck in odd numbers,” says Rory O’More.
Samuel Lover—Rory O’More.
Good luck befriend thee, Son; for at thy birth
The fairy ladies danced upon the hearth.
Milton—At a Vacation Exercise in the College.
By the luckiest stars.
All’s Well That Ends Well. Act I. Sc. 3. L. 252.
When mine hours were nice and lucky.
Antony and Cleopatra. Act III. Sc. 13. L. 179.
And good luck go with thee.
Henry V. Act IV. Sc. 3. L. 11.
As good luck would have it.
Merry Wives of Windsor. Act III. Sc. 5. L. 83.
Good luck lies in odd numbers***They say there is divinity in odd numbers, either in nativity, chance, or death.
Merry Wives of Windsor. Act V. Sc. 1. L. 2.
And wheresoe’er thou move, good luck
Shall fling her old shoe after.
Tennyson—Will Waterproof’s Lyrical Monologue. St. 27.