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What mean and cruel things men can do for the love of God.
W. Somerset Maugham -
In art honesty is not only the best but the only policy.
W. Somerset Maugham
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We who are of mature age seldom suspect how unmercifully and yet with what insight the very young judge us.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Life isn't long enough for love and art.
W. Somerset Maugham -
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.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Habits in writing as in life are only useful if they are broken as soon as they cease to be advantageous.
W. Somerset Maugham -
She plunged into a sea of platitudes, and with the powerful breast stroke of a channel swimmer made her confident way towards the white cliffs of the obvious.
W. Somerset Maugham -
'I sometimes think,' said the Eternal, 'that the stars never shine more brightly than when reflected in the muddy waters of a wayside ditch.'
W. Somerset Maugham
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It might be that to surrender to happiness was to accept defeat, but it was a defeat better than many victories.
W. Somerset Maugham -
It is cruel to discover one's mediocrity only when it is too late.
W. Somerset Maugham -
He was the kind of man with whom one would have hesitated to pass a lonely evening, but with whom one might cheerfully have looked forward to spending six months.
W. Somerset Maugham -
People ask for criticism, but they only want praise.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Death doesn't affect the living because it has not happened yet. Death doesn't concern the dead because they have ceased to exist.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Perfection is a trifle dull. It is not the least of life's ironies that this, which we all aim at, is better not quite achieved.
W. Somerset Maugham
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It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it.
W. Somerset Maugham -
He had a bitter pain in his heart, for he knew that she was still a stranger to him and his hungry love was destined ever to remain unsatisfied.
W. Somerset Maugham -
The great American novel has not only already been written, it has already been rejected.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Bob Forestier had pretended for so many years to be a gentleman that in the end, forgetting that it was all a fake, he had found himself driven to act as in that stupid, conventional brain of his he thought a gentleman must act. No longer knowing the difference between sham and real, he had sacrificed his life to a spurious heroism.
W. Somerset Maugham -
It is very natural that clever young men should be rather odious. They are conscious of gifts that they do not know how to use. They are exasperated with the world that will not recognize their merit. They have something to give, and no hand is stretched out to receive it. They are impatient for the fame they regard as their due.
W. Somerset Maugham -
Passion doesn't count the cost. … Passion is destructive.
W. Somerset Maugham
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She gathered herself together. No one could describe the scorn of her expression or the contemptuous hatred she put into her answer. 'You men! You filthy dirty pigs! You're all the same, all of you. Pigs! Pigs!'
W. Somerset Maugham -
Love is not always blind and there are few things that cause greater wretchedness than to love with all your heart someone who you know is unworthy of love.
W. Somerset Maugham -
The life force is vigorous. The delight that accompanies it counter-balances all the pains and hardships that confront men. It makes life worth living.
W. Somerset Maugham -
She could not admit but that he had remarkable qualities, sometimes she thought that there was even in him a strange and unattractive greatness; it was curious then that she could not love him, but loved still a man whose worthlessness was now so clear to her.
W. Somerset Maugham