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Perfection has one grave defect: it is apt to be dull.
W. Somerset Maugham
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W. Somerset Maugham
Age: 90 †
Born: 1874
Born: January 1
Died: 1965
Died: January 1
Army Scout
Literary Critic
Novelist
Physician Writer
Playwright
Prosaist
Screenwriter
Writer
Paris
France
W. Somerset Maugham
Somerset Maugham
Defects
Grave
Graves
Dull
Humility
Perfection
Perfectionism
Defect
More quotes by W. Somerset Maugham
Loving-kindness is the better part of goodness.
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Art is triumphant when it can use convention as an instrument of its own purpose.
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Evil is a necessary part of the order of the universe.
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Perhaps it would have been possible to see in him a new Prometheus...the hero who for the good of mankind exposes himself to the agonies of the damned...undaunted by failure, by an unceasing effort of courage holding despair at bay, doggedly persistent in the face of self-doubt, which is the artist's bitterest enemy.
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To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.
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In the conduct of life we make use of deliberation to justify ourselves in doing what we want to do.
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When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.
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She [Sadie Thompson] 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!
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We can none of us step into the same river twice, but the river flows on and the other river we step into is cool and refreshing, too
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You know, of course, that the Tasmanians, who never committed adultery, are now extinct.
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For my part I cannot believe in a God who is angry with me because I do not believe in him. I cannot believe in a God who is less tolerant than I. I cannot believe in a God who has neither humour nor common sense.
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Women are often under the impression that men are much more madly in love with them than they really are.
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People talk of beauty lightly, and having no feeling for words, they use that one carelessly, so that it loses its force and the thing it stands for, sharing its name with a hundred trivial objects, is deprived of dignity. They call beautiful a dress, a dog, a sermon and when they are face to face with Beauty cannot recognise it.
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Imagination grows by exercise, and contrary to common belief, is more powerful in the mature than in the young.
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Women's hearts are like old china, none the worse for a break or two.
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The trouble with young writers is that they are all in their sixties.
W. Somerset Maugham
A soul is a troublesome possession, and when man developed it he lost the Garden of Eden.
W. Somerset Maugham
The secret to life is meaningless unless you discover it yourself.
W. Somerset Maugham
It is not for nothing that artists have called their works the children of their brains and likened the pains of production to the pains of childbirth.
W. Somerset Maugham
Music-hall songs provide the dull with wit, just as proverbs provide them with wisdom.
W. Somerset Maugham
