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Often appears with: fortune and the turn of the wheel · fate, destiny, and necessity · the rise and fall of greatness · the passions and the emotions · will, choice, and freedom · unexpected reversals · troilus disclosing criseyde · the fear of death · teaching by example · stoic-like evaluation · rhetoric and music · renouncing fortune
Usually: sudden reversal of fortune (4) · detachment (3) · argument (2) · reflection (2) · exhortation (2) · dialogue (1) · confronting death (1) · temptation (1) · the fall of the great (1) · curiosity (1)
“The most striking illustration of the mutability and capriciousness of Fortune is when a man, within a brief period, turns out to have been preparing for the use of his enemies the very things which he imagined that he was elaborating in his own honour.” Polybius, The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 2 (of 2) · insight
“Fortune, whose influence on our life is incalculable, who displays her power by surprises, is even now I think, showing all mankind, by her elevation of the Macedonians into the high prosperity once enjoyed by the Persians, that she has merely lent them these advantages until she may otherwise determine concerning them.” Polybius, The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 2 (of 2) · insight
“It is quite the way of Fortune to confound human calculations by surprises; and when she has helped a man for a time, and caused her balance to incline in his favour, to turn round upon him as though she repented, throw her weight into the opposite scale, and mar all his successes.” Polybius, The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 2 (of 2) · insight
Montaigne argues that people should not be judged happy until after death, using examples like King Croesus, Pompey, Agesilaus’s remarks, and others to show Fortune’s reversals, concluding that death reveals one’s true self.
THAT MEN ARE NOT TO JUDGE OF OUR HAPPINESS TILL AFTER DEATH. [Charron has borrowed with unusual liberality from this and the succeeding chapter. See Nodier, Questions, p. 206.] "Scilicet ultima semper Exspectanda dies homini est; dicique beatus Ante obitum nemo supremaque funera debet." ["We should all look forward to our last day: no one can be called happy till he is dead…
Polybius uses Demetrius of Phalerum’s example of Fortune’s mutability from the rise of Macedon over Persia to interpret Perseus’s ruin, then notes that unexpected threats arise for rulers after victories.
[Sidenote: Demetrius of Phalerum on mutability.] +21.+ One is often reminded of the words of Demetrius of Phalerum. In his treatise on Fortune, wishing to give the world a distinct view of her mutability, he fixed upon the period of Alexander, when that monarch destroyed the Persian dynasty, and thus expresses himself: “If you will take, I don’t say unlimited time or many generations, but only these last fifty years…
Polybius states he recounts Polyaratus and Deinon to teach others a wiser course, then notes Fortune’s mutability using Perseus’s columns later completed and used by Lucius Aemilius.
last degree; but in order that, by clearly showing their folly, I might instruct those who fall into similar difficulties and dangers how to take a better and wiser course.... [Sidenote: The columns constructed at Delphi for statues of Perseus used by Aemilius. Autumn of B.C. 167. Livy, 45, 27.] +10.+ The most striking illustration of the mutability and capriciousness of Fortune is when a man, within a brief period…
Pandarus argues that Fortune’s wheel is common to everyone and urges Troilus to trust healing; Troilus finally reveals Criseyde’s name, and Pandarus praises her virtues and suitability for Troilus’s love.
is commune To every maner wight in som degree? And yet thou hast this comfort, lo, pardee! 845 That, as hir Ioyes moten over-goon, So mote hir sorwes passen everichoon. `For if hir wheel stinte any-thing to torne, Than cessed she Fortune anoon to be: Now, sith hir wheel by no wey may soiorne, 850 What wostow if hir mutabilitee Right as thy-selven…
Philosophy tells Boethius that his longing for former fortune is caused by Fortune’s inherent mutability, not a special betrayal, and urges him to renounce her unreliable gifts.
I. Thereafter for awhile she remained silent; and when she had restored my flagging attention by a moderate pause in her discourse, she thus began: 'If I have thoroughly ascertained the character and causes of thy sickness, thou art pining with regretful longing for thy former fortune. It is the change, as thou deemest, of this fortune that hath so wrought upon thy mind. Well do I understand that Siren's manifold wi…