It chanceth in an hour that comes not in seven years.
Meaning: Fortune can deliver in moments what patient waiting over years might never produce.
Origin: Recorded in A Dictionary of English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, an undated collection published in London by Whittaker & Co. around 1880 and credited to Thomas Preston. Its earlier history hasn't been traced.
More proverbs about Wisdom
- Change of pasture makes fat calves. — New environments and fresh opportunities allow young, developing people to thrive and gro…
- The charitable give out at the door, and God puts in at the window. — Generosity creates a virtuous cycle where outward giving mysteriously returns through une…
- A cherry year, a merry year. — Abundant harvests of cherries historically signaled prosperity and good fortune for the c…
- A chip of the old block. — Children naturally inherit their parents' character traits and behaviors, reproducing the…
- The nearer the church the farther from God. — Proximity to religious institutions cannot substitute for genuine spiritual devotion or m…
- Pater-noster built churches, and Our Father pulls them down. — Reciting prayers alone, without genuine faith or action, cannot sustain what was built th…
From our tongue twisters
- خالد خلّى خلال خاله في الخلاء. (Khālid khallā khalāl khālih fī al-khalāʾ.) — A rapid-fire 'kh' (خ) drill — the throaty fricative that non-Arabic speakers find uniquel…
- غاب الغيم وغابت غابة الغاب. (Ghāb al-ghaym wa ghābat ghābat al-ghāb.) — An unbroken sequence of 'gh' (غ) — a voiced uvular fricative that drills the back of the…
- Khadak Singh ke khadakne se khadakti hain khidkiyan, khidkiyon ke khadakne se khadakte hain Khadak Singh. — A 'kh/kh/kh' recursive loop — each clause triggers the other, like a rattling chain react…