Has fortune dealt you some bad cards. Then let wisdom make you a good gamester.

Quarles frames adversity through the metaphor of card play: life may “deal” you an unfavorable hand, but character and judgment determine how you play it. The line contrasts blind “fortune” (chance, circumstance) with “wisdom” (prudence, self-command), implying that misfortune is not the final verdict on one’s prospects. In a moralistic, devotional vein typical of Quarles, the counsel is practical as well as ethical: accept what cannot be controlled, then respond with skill—patience, strategy, and restraint—rather than complaint or despair. The significance lies in its early-modern articulation of a stoic-Christian ethic of agency under constraint.