Fortune

Fortune is the powerful, changeable personification of worldly favor in the arbitration over the Duke of Newcastle’s misfortunes. She treats his preference for Honesty and Prudence as a personal slight, and her account of that slight is set against the Duchess’s portrait of a man who endured exile and ruin rather than surrender his reputation. The hearing gives Fortune a forceful defense, but not a verdict: unwilling to submit to Truth’s judgment, she storms away, leaving reconciliation unresolved.

Identity and Character

Fortune is represented as a powerful princess, and some regard her as a deity. Her authority is expressed through the ability to favor some people and oppose others, but her conduct is presented as inconstant rather than reliably just. The Empress’s spirits warn that Fortune may agree to hear a case and then lack the patience to see it through; even securing her attendance requires persistent persuasion.

Her grievance against the Duke arises from a clash of values. As she tells the assembly, he preferred Honesty and Prudence to her and fought against her by placing innocence above her power. Fortune interprets that choice as contempt: in her view, his refusal to rely on her favors gives her grounds to become his enemy. Her defense therefore turns on a pointed claim of injured status—she expects her power and favors to be acknowledged, while the Duke’s conduct denies her precedence.

The Hearing Against the Duke

The dispute is arranged after the Duchess’s soul, the Empress, and the Duke’s friends consider how to resolve the conflict. The Duke is not present to speak for himself. He has said that he sought Fortune’s friendship with great industry but found her his enemy; he entrusts his case to Prudence and Honesty. Fortune, for her part, chooses Folly and Rashness as her advocates. After difficulty over who should decide the matter, the parties agree that Truth will hear and judge it.

At the hearing, Fortune stands upon a golden globe and addresses the assembled company, directing her speech especially to the Empress. She notes that the Duke is absent, then presents his preference for Honesty and Prudence—and his resistance to her power—as evidence that he has made himself her enemy. The golden globe lends a visual emblem to her authority, while her argument makes clear that she regards the Duke’s independent moral judgment as a refusal of the deference she believes her position deserves.

Conflict with the Duchess and the Duke

The Duchess answers on her husband’s behalf. She maintains that choosing Honesty and Prudence was wise, and rejects Fortune’s allegation that the Duke was rude or contemptuous toward women. In her account, he served and defended women, risking both life and estate in their cause; his caution toward Fortune instead arose from the importance he placed on his reputation. He could not entrust that reputation to a power that, she says, abandoned the honest and honorable.

The Duchess describes the material consequences of Fortune’s hostility: she fought the Duke in several battles, sometimes hand to hand, overcame him, cast him into banishment, ruined his estate, and deprived him of most of his friends. The contrast between Fortune’s charge of disrespect and the Duchess’s account of patient endurance makes the hearing about more than etiquette. The issue is whether integrity can be blamed for refusing to follow an unstable power, especially when that power can turn its displeasure into political and financial devastation.

The Duchess does not claim that the Duke has always despised Fortune. She says that Honesty counseled him not to flatter her, while Prudence advised him not to reject her favors; following both counsels, he remained humble and respectful as far as honor, conscience, and honesty allowed. She presents him as still willing to serve Fortune honestly and prudently, and asks that she become his friend in the future. That appeal seeks accommodation without asking the Duke to abandon the principles that caused the conflict.

Advocates, Judgment, and Outcome

The choice of advocates briefly turns the hearing into a demonstration of the qualities at stake. Folly and Rashness speak over one another until the assembly cannot understand them, and Fortune has to order them either to speak separately or remain silent. Prudence objects that speaking separately is not enough if they cannot speak wisely. Fortune takes offense, then calls on Folly, whose incoherent address is so tedious that Fortune silences her and gives the floor to Rashness. Rashness urges Fortune to punish the Duke, the Duchess, and their allies lest people cease to admire or serve her.

Honesty’s speech offers the opposing account: Fortune resents merit, became the Duke’s inveterate enemy, and harmed him because he would not flatter her. Yet Honesty also acknowledges Prudence’s caution against despising Fortune’s favors. The Duke’s conduct, in this telling, consisted in balancing the two counsels—neither flattering nor scorning Fortune, but respecting her within the limits set by conscience. Honesty submits this account to Truth, the appointed judge.

Fortune refuses the process before Truth can deliver a judgment. Offended by Honesty’s plain speech, she will not listen to Truth and leaves in anger. The Empress and Duchess are distressed that their efforts have failed; Honesty rebukes the Duchess for wanting Fortune’s favor, and the Duchess replies that she seeks only to protect her husband from powerful enemies. No ruling or settlement follows. The spirits later promise to try to make peace between Fortune and the Duke, leaving the conflict open rather than resolved.

Narrative Significance

Fortune embodies the danger of worldly power when favor depends on submission rather than merit. The hearing gives her reasons of her own: she feels slighted by a man who refused to make her superior to Honesty and Prudence. But the proceedings also expose the imbalance between her grievance and the Duke’s losses. She can inflict banishment, financial ruin, and isolation, yet when asked to face a judgment, she can simply withdraw.

The failed arbitration sharpens the distinction between virtue and success without pretending that virtue protects its possessor from harm. The Duke’s honesty does not prevent Fortune from defeating him; it shapes how he responds to her power. The Duchess seeks protection from further hostility, while Honesty insists that dependence on Fortune’s favor risks compromising the very integrity the Duke has preserved. The unresolved ending leaves that tension intact: Fortune remains powerful, but her departure denies her the vindication she sought.