Horace Walpole Quote

Serendipity... you will understand it better by the derivation than by the definition. I once read a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip: as their highnesses traveled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of.... Now do you understand serendipity?

Letters. To Sir Horace Mann [January 28, 1754]