Le bonheur engloutit nos forces, comme le malheur e¤  teint nos vertus. Happiness engulfs our strength, just as misfortune extinguishes our virtues.

-Balzac, Honore¤   de
La Peau de chagrin.

Calamity, n. A more than commonly plain and unmistakable reminder that the affairs of this life are not of our own ordering.Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.

-Bierce, Ambrose Gwinett
  The Cynic's Word Book. Retitled  The Devil's Dictionary (1911).

It is the misfortune of an old man that though he can put things out of his head he can't put them out of his feelings.

-Cary, (Arthur) Joyce Lunel
  To Be A Pilgrim, ch.8.

   What a misfortune it isto be bornawoman!† Why seek for knowledge, which can prove only that our wretchedness is irremediable? If a ray of light break in upon us, it is but to make darkness more visible; to show usthenew limits, the Gothic structure, theimpenetrable barriers of our prison.

-Edgeworth, Maria
  Leonora, letter1.

Here lies a prince whose intentions were pure, but who had the misfortune to see all his plans collapse.

-Joseph II
Epitaph for himself. Quoted in T C  W Blanning Joseph II (1994), p.1.

Dans l'adversite¤   de nos meilleurs amis, nous trouvons toujours quelque chose qui ne nous de¤  pla|"t pas. In the misfortune of our best friends, we always find something which is not displeasing to us.

-La Rochefoucauld, Fran c° ois, 6th Duc de
  Re¤  flexions, ou sentences et maximes morales, no.99.

To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.

-Wilde, Oscar Fingal O'FlahertieWills
  Lady Bracknell.The Importance of Being Earnest, act1.