LUCKY AND UNLUCKY MEN.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2519, 1 September 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

LUCKY AND UNLUCKY MEN.

—♦ One of the unluckiest men wo have ever known wag even conscious of hie ill-luck, and declared that, somehow or other, the off-chance always hit him. It was partly true; but the intimate friends who knew and loved him understand well thai there was in him this awkwardness, this redundancy of angle 3 presented to fate, in a vory high degree, that, boing at once a good man, a thoughtful man, and a highly cultivated one, ho always in critical moments contrived to do precisely the wrong thing. This capability of being incapable is by no means unusual, and the first Rothschild was probably right from his point of view when he snid that he never would employ an unlucky man. On the other hand, the lucky man is usually the man who fits his fortunes, who, whether apparently able or stupid, can do just what his especial ciroumstances require him to do. Very stupid men are often ready men, armed with a readiness as of dogs when thoy twist from under a cart-wheel unhu*. The '' fool who makes a fortune " is usually a man with just the foresight, or the judgment, or the intuitive perception of the way thiujjs are going—a faculty like long night and keenest of hearing and independence of intellectual power—requisite to make large profits quickly, In fnct; the fortunate man is usually the rami who, in consequence of some hidden quality in his natnrp, deserves fortune. Nevertheless there ia a residuum of true personal good or ill-luck of men to whom things happen so unusual, nnd so little explicable by their ante or auything that either is or can be in themselves, that the world, despairing of interpretation, considers them either the favourites or the victims ol fortune.—Speculator.