Daily Inspiration Quote by William Shakespeare

Fortune gets dragged off her pedestal and dropped into the tavern, skirts and all. In a single line, Shakespeare turns the grand, abstract goddess of fate into a "good wench" - not merely female, but socially legible in a bawdy, transactional way. The move is funny because it’s reductive: the cosmic becomes flirtatious, available, maybe even bribable. That’s the joke. It’s also the danger.

The phrase "for this gear" is doing sly work. "Gear" can mean stuff, business, the whole operation at hand; it hints that Fortune’s favor is situational, not moral. She’s "good" for this particular scheme, this moment’s hustle. The subtext is opportunism dressed as charm: when events go your way, you don’t credit virtue or planning - you swagger and anthropomorphize luck as a woman who’s chosen you. It’s a wink at the common masculine habit of narrating success as seduction.

Underneath the misogynistic metaphor is a sharper realism about power. Fortune in Shakespeare is famously fickle, a wheel that turns without warning. Calling her a "wench" flatters her when she’s generous, but it also implies she can be blamed when she isn’t. That’s psychological insurance: if you win, you were favored; if you lose, she’s faithless.

The line’s punch comes from its tonal collision - high concept, low diction - a Shakespearean specialty. It exposes how people domesticate chaos with jokes, turning randomness into a character they can toast, curse, and pretend they understand.