The Taming of Chance

Abstract

In the dim recesses of ancient history, the idea of chance was intertwined with that of fate. What was destined to be would be. Chance was personified, in the Roman Empire at least, by the Goddess Fortuna, who reigned as the sovereign of cynicism and fickleness. As Howard Patch puts it in his study of this Roman deity, “to men who felt that life shows no signs of fairness, and that what lies beyond is at best dubious, that the most you can do is take what comes your way, Fortuna represented a useful, if at times flippant, summary of the way things go.”