Fortune \For"tune\ (f[^o]r"t[-u]n; 135), n. [F. fortune, L.
   fortuna; akin to fors, fortis, chance, prob. fr. ferre to
   bear, bring. See Bear to support, and cf. Fortuitous.]
   1. The arrival of something in a sudden or unexpected manner;
      chance; accident; luck; hap; also, the personified or
      deified power regarded as determining human success,
      apportioning happiness and unhappiness, and distributing
      arbitrarily or fortuitously the lots of life.
      [1913 Webster]

            'T is more by fortune, lady, than by merit. --Shak.
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            O Fortune, Fortune, all men call thee fickle.
                                                  --Shak.
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   2. That which befalls or is to befall one; lot in life, or
      event in any particular undertaking; fate; destiny; as, to
      tell one's fortune.
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            You, who men's fortunes in their faces read.
                                                  --Cowley.
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   3. That which comes as the result of an undertaking or of a
      course of action; good or ill success; especially,
      favorable issue; happy event; success; prosperity as
      reached partly by chance and partly by effort.
      [1913 Webster]

            Our equal crimes shall equal fortune give. --Dryden.
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            There is a tide in the affairs of men,
            Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.
                                                  --Shak.
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            His father dying, he was driven to seek his fortune.
                                                  --Swift.
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   4. Wealth; large possessions; large estate; riches; as, a
      gentleman of fortune.

   Syn: Chance; accident; luck; fate.
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   Fortune book, a book supposed to reveal future events to
      those who consult it. --Crashaw.

   Fortune hunter, one who seeks to acquire wealth by
      marriage.

   Fortune teller, one who professes to tell future events in
      the life of another.

   Fortune telling, the practice or art of professing to
      reveal future events in the life of another.
      [1913 Webster]

	

	Fortune \For"tune\, v. t. [OF. fortuner, L. fortunare. See
   Fortune, n.]
   1. To make fortunate; to give either good or bad fortune to.
      [Obs.] --Chaucer.
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   2. To provide with a fortune. --Richardson.
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   3. To presage; to tell the fortune of. [Obs.] --Dryden.
      [1913 Webster]

	

	Fortune \For"tune\, v. i.
   To fall out; to happen.
   [1913 Webster]

         It fortuned the same night that a Christian, serving a
         Turk in the camp, secretely gave the watchmen warning.
                                                  --Knolles.
   [1913 Webster]

	

	fortune
     n 1: an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that causes an event
          to result one way rather than another; "bad luck caused
          his downfall"; "we ran into each other by pure chance"
          [syn: luck, chance, hazard]
     2: a large amount of wealth or prosperity
     3: an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that leads to a
        favorable outcome; "it was my good luck to be there";
        "they say luck is a lady"; "it was as if fortune guided
        his hand" [syn: luck]
     4: your overall circumstances or condition in life (including
        everything that happens to you); "whatever my fortune may
        be"; "deserved a better fate"; "has a happy lot"; "the
        luck of the Irish"; "a victim of circumstances"; "success
        that was her portion" [syn: destiny, fate, luck, lot,
         circumstances, portion]

	

	179 Moby Thesaurus words for "fortune":
   Clio, Friday, Friday the thirteenth, Muse of history,
   accidentality, actuarial calculation, adventitiousness, adventures,
   affluence, annals, appointed lot, assets, astral influences,
   astrology, autobiography, beggared, biographical sketch, biography,
   blessing, bomb, boodle, book of fate, bottomless purse, break,
   bulging purse, bundle, calculated risk, case history, casualness,
   chance, chronicle, chronicles, chronology, circumstances,
   confessions, constellation, cup, curriculum vitae, destination,
   destiny, destitute, diary, dies funestis, doom, easy circumstances,
   embarras de richesses, end, estate, expectations, experiences,
   fatality, fate, felicity, flier, flukiness, foredoom,
   fortuitousness, fortuity, fortunateness, fortuneless, fortunes,
   future, gamble, gold, good fortune, good luck, hagiography,
   hagiology, handsome fortune, hap, happenstance, happy chance,
   happy fortune, hazard, heedless hap, high income, high tax bracket,
   historiography, history, holdings, how they fall, ides of March,
   impecunious, impoverished, independence, indeterminacy,
   indeterminateness, indigent, inevitability, journal, karma, kismet,
   law of averages, legend, life, life and letters, life story, lot,
   luck, luckiness, lucre, luxuriousness, mammon, martyrology,
   material wealth, means, memoir, memoirs, memorabilia, memorial,
   memorials, mint, moira, money, money to burn, moneybags, necrology,
   needy, obituary, opportunity, opulence, opulency, packet, pelf,
   penurious, photobiography, pile, planets, play, plunge, portion,
   position, possessions, pot, poverty-stricken, pretty penny,
   principle of indeterminacy, probability, problematicness, profile,
   property, prosperity, prosperousness, random sample, record,
   resources, resume, riches, richness, risk, roll, run of luck,
   serendipity, six-figure income, smiles of fortune, speculation,
   stars, statistical probability, story, substance, the breaks,
   theory of history, theory of probability, tidy sum, treasure,
   uncertainty, uncertainty principle, unlucky day, unprosperous,
   upper bracket, venture, wad, wealth, wealthiness, weird,
   whatever comes, wheel of fortune, will of Heaven, worth

	

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