As in a game ov cards, so in the game ov life, we must play what is dealt tew us, and the glory consists, not so mutch in winning, as in playing a poor hand well.

Josh Billings on Ice, and Other Things (1868), Chapter XXIV: "Perkussion Caps", p. 89; republished in The Complete Works of Josh Billings (1876), Chapter 141: "Ods and Ens", p. 248. Often paraphrased as "Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well."