Alex

“People, in general," he said, "only ask advice not to follow it; or if they do follow it, it is for the sake of having someone to blame for having given it.”
― Alexandre Dumas, The Three Musketeers

“Yes! All it would take is just once in my life to be careful and patient and – and that’s all there is to it! All it would take is to stand firm just once, and I can change my whole destiny in a single hour! The main thing is standing firm. Just remember what happened to me in similar circumstances seven months ago in Roulettenburg, before my final loss. Oh, that was a remarkable instance of resolve: I had lost everything, everything … I’m leaving the casino, and I see that I still have a single gulden knocking about in my waistcoat pocket. ‘Ah, so I’ll be able to buy myself some dinner!’ I thought, but after taking about a hundred steps, I changed my mind and went back. I staked that gulden on manque (this time it was manque), and there really is something peculiar in the feeling, when you’re alone, in a foreign country, far from your native land and friends, and you don’t know if you’re going to eat that day, you stake your last gulden, the very, very last one! I won and twenty minutes later I walked out of the casino with 170 gulden in my pocket. That is a fact, sir! That’s what your last gulden can mean sometimes! And what if I had lost heart, if I hadn’t dared to bring myself to do it? … Tomorrow, tomorrow it will all be over! 1866”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Gambler and Other Stories

“open me carefully”
― Emily Dickinson, Selected Letters

“A true gentleman, even if he loses his entire fortune, must not show emotion. Money is supposed to be so far beneath a gentleman that it’s almost not worth thinking about.”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Gambler and Other Stories