W. Somerset Maugham Quotes
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What has influenced my life more than any other single thing has been my stammer. Had I not stammered I would probably... have gone to Cambridge as my brothers did, perhaps have become a don and every now and then published a dreary book about French literature.
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In Hollywood, the women are all peaches. It makes one long for an apple occasionally.
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Passion is destructive; if it does not destroy, it dies.
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When I read a book I seem to read it with my eyes only, but now and then I come across a passage, perhaps only a phrase, which has a meaning for me, and it becomes part of me.
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If you don't change your beliefs, your life will be like this forever. Is that good news?
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I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.
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He knew that women appreciated neither irony nor sarcasm, but simple jokes and funny stories. He was amply provided with both.
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Tolerance is another word for indifference.
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The trouble with young writers is that they are all in their sixties.
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The love that lasts longest is the love that is never returned.
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The passing moment is all we can be sure of; it is only common sense to extract its utmost value from it.
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Sentimentality is the only sentiment that rubs you the wrong way.
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Nothing in the world is permanent, and we're foolish when we ask anything to last, but surely we're still more foolish not to take delight in it while we have it. If change is of the essence of existence one would have thought it only sensible to make it the premise of our philosophy.
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It is salutary to train oneself to be no more affected by censure than by praise.
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Conscience is the guardian in the individual of the rules which the community has evolved for its own preservation.
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The writer is more concerned to know than to judge.
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It was like making a blunder at a party; there was nothing to do about it, it was dreadfully mortifying, but it showed a lack of sense to ascribe too much importance to it.
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Few misfortunes can befall a boy which bring worse consequence than to have a really affectionate mother.
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Money is like a sixth sense without which you cannot make a complete use of the other five.
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Considering how foolishly people act and how pleasantly they prattle, perhaps it would be better for the world if they talked more and did less.
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To eat well in England, you should have a breakfast three times a day.
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Hypocrisy is the most difficult and nerve-racking vice that any man can pursue; it needs an unceasing vigilance and a rare detachment of spirit. It cannot, like adultery or gluttony, be practised at spare moments; it is a whole-time job.
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If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom, and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.
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The subjunctive mood is in its death throes, and the best thing to do is to put it out of its misery as soon as possible.