luck and misfortune, a human strategy, aphorism 428
428
While it is true that good luck intoxicates: One thinks backwards ... always vainly, as in I did this, or I was like that and therefore I was rewarded. It is also true however that misfortune sobers. Disaster crushes all scaffolding to the ground. One stands again upon the unyielding surface and no longer builds oneself upon promises or fortune. One has at last found something solid to stand upon ... is perhaps even grateful.