W. Somerset Maugham Quotes

There is nothing so degrading as the constant anxiety about one's means of livelihood.

Any society that values wealth above freedom will lose its freedom, and will ultimately lose its wealth as well

Art is a manifestation of emotion, and emotion speaks a language that all may understand.

The future will one day be the present and will seem as unimportant as the present does now.

Love is only a dirty trick played on us to achieve the continuation of the species.

The well dressed man is he whose clothes you never notice

You can do anything in this world if you are prepared to take the consequences.

The ability to quote is a serviceable substitute for wit.

Dullness is the first requisite of a good husband.

There's always one who loves and one who lets himself be loved.

The important thing was to love rather than to be loved.

There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.

Love is what happens to men and women who don't know each other.

Sometimes a man hits upon a place to which he mysteriously feels that he belongs.

Life is so largely controlled by chance that its conduct can be but a perpetual improvisation.

If a man hasn't what's necessary to make a woman love him, it's his fault, not hers.

Often the best way to overcome desire is to satisfy it.

Life isn't long enough for love and art.

One cannot find peace in work or in pleasure, in the world or in a convent, but only in one's soul.

I always find it more difficult to say the things I mean than the things I don't.

Only a mediocre person is always at his best.

It was such a beautiful day I decided to stay in bed.

The only important thing in a book is the meaning that it has for you.

The great tragedy of life is not that men perish, but that they cease to love.

Tolerance is only another name for indifference.

The most valuable thing I have learned from life is to regret nothing.

The fact that a great many people believe something is no guarantee of its truth.

The secret to life is meaningless unless you discover it yourself.

It's a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it.

To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.

The essence of the beautiful is unity in variety.

I can imagine no more comfortable frame of mind for the conduct of life than a humorous resignation.