Frank J. Wilstach, comp. A Dictionary of Similes. 1916.
Fortune
Fortune, like other females, delights rather on favoring the young than the old.
—Joseph Addison
Fortune is like women, loves youth and is fickle.
—Anonymous
Fortune is like the market, where, many times, if you can stay a little, the price will fall; and again, it is sometimes like Sibylla’s offer, which at first offereth the commodity at full, then consumeth part and part, and still holdeth up the price.
—Francis Bacon
The way of Fortune is like the milky way in the sky; which is a meeting, or knot, of a number of small stars, not seen asunder, but giving light together; so are there a number of little and scarce discerned virtues, or rather faculties and customs, that make men fortunate.
—Francis Bacon
Fortune resembles an unjust distributor of the Olympic prizes, in so much as she most frequently bestows her favours on the undeserving.
—Demophilus
False Fortune, like a fawning strumpet,
About to leave the bankrupt prodigal,
With a dissembled smile would kiss at parting,
And flatter to the last.
—John Dryden
Good fortune, like ripe fruit, ought to be enjoyed while it is present.
—Epictetus
Many fortunes, like rivers, have a pure source, but grow muddy as they grow large.
—J. Petit-Senn
Fortune is like a widow won,
And truckles to the bold alone.
—William Somerville
Fortune, like other drabs, values a man gradually less for every year he lives.
—Jonathan Swift
Fortune is like glass—the brighter the glitter, the more easily it is broken.
—Publius Syrus
Fortune as well as women must be taken in the humor.
—William Wycherley