W. Somerset Maugham Quotes
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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.
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She had a very agreeable smile; it did not light up her face suddenly, but seemed rather to suffuse it by degrees with charm. It hesitated for a moment about her lips and then slowly travelled to those great shining eyes of hers and there softly lingered.
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Any nation that thinks more of its ease and comfort than its freedom will soon lose its freedom; and the ironical thing about it is that it will lose its ease and comfort too.
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In art honesty is not only the best but the only policy.
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I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.
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I forget who it was that recommended men for their soul’s good to do each day two things they disliked: it was a wise man, and it is a precept that I have followed scrupulously; for every day I have got up and I have gone to bed.
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The most useful thing about a principle is that it can always be sacrificed to expediency.
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At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely.
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Sometimes people carry to such perfection the mask they have assumed that in due course they actually become the person they seem.
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There are men who are possessed by an urge so strong to do some particular thing that they can't help themselves, they've got to do it. They're prepared to sacrifice everything to satisfy their yearning.
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We know our friends by their defects rather than by their merits.
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Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it.
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It's no good trying to keep up old friendships. It's painful for both sides. The fact is, one grows out of people, and the only thing is to face it.
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Beauty is an ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger. There is really nothing to be said about it. It is like the perfume of a rose: you can smell it and that is all.
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He loved her so passionately he wanted her to be one soul and one body with him; and he was conscious that here, with those deep roots attaching her to the native life, she would always keep something from him.
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Remember that it is nothing to do your duty, that is demanded of you and is no more meritorious than to wash your hands when they are dirty; the only thing that counts is the love of duty; when love and duty are one, then grace is in you and you will enjoy a happiness which passes all understanding.
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I made up my mind long ago that life was too short to do anything for myself that I could pay others to do for me.
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There are directors who desire to be artistic. It is pathetic to compare the seriousness of their aim with the absurdity of their attainment.
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An unfortunate thing about this world is that the good habits are much easier to give up than the bad ones.
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Old age has its pleasures, which, though different, are not less than the pleasures of youth.
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Life isn't long enough for love and art.
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Don't you know? Because American women expect to find in their husbands a perfection that English women only hope to find in their butlers.
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The poignancy which all beauty has.