E. M. Forster Quotes

There is no such thing as security. There never has been.

There is no safety in numbers, or in anything else.

Every good thing in the world stands on the razor-edge of danger.

Luck is a very thin wire between survival and disaster, and not many people can keep their balance on it.

No man can ever be secure until he has been forsaken by Fortune.

Fortune raises up and fortune brings low both the man who fares well and the one who fares badly; and there is no prophet of the future for mortal men.

He that waits upon fortune, is never sure of a dinner.

Life to me is defined by uncertainty. Uncertainty is the state in which we live, and there is no way to outfox it.

Is it security you want? There is no security at the top of the world.

I had thought up the title, 'The Good Luck of Right Now,' several years ago. I had no idea what it meant or what the book would be about but I thought, 'Someday I'm going to write a book with that title.'

Personally, I would say the 'master' of this whole thing is fate... Whoever is on the playing field is fair game, and it's up to them to avoid being used.

Nothing is guaranteed.

Nothing is fixed or foolproof; I have no delusion about that.

Life is dangerous. There are no guarantees.

The great risk of being alive is always that something can happen to you - or to someone you dearly love - at any moment.

It's so easy for all the success in the world to suddenly end, and I'm quite aware of that.

You've got to bear it in mind that nobody that ever lived is specially privileged; the axe can fall at any moment, on any neck, without any warning or any regard for justice.

Nothing is ever certain.

You can't even stand without risking to fall.

You run risks. That's the plain truth. You run risks and, even in the most unlikely places, you are subject to destiny's whims.

Death and disaster are at our shoulders every second of our lives, trying to get at us. Missing, a lot of the time. A lot of miles on the motorway without a front wheel blow-out. A lot of viruses that slither through our bodies without snagging. A lot of pianos that fall a minute after we've passed. Or a month, it makes no difference. So unless we're going to get down on our knees and give thanks every time disaster misses, it makes no sense to moan when it strikes.

Anything can go away. There's no such thing as safety and security. You can do things that give you the illusion of safety and security, but there's really no such thing.

No one from the beginning of time has had security.

Everyone is a threat, and anyone can be beat at any given moment. No one is invincible.

Hazard has conditioned us to live in hazard. All our pleasures are dependent on it. Even though I arrange for a pleasure, and look forward to it, my eventual enjoyment of it is still a matter of hazard. Wherever time passes, there is hazard.