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The most useful thing about a principle is that it can always be sacrificed to expediency.
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
Expedience
Expediency
Sacrificed
Useful
Principle
Principles
Thing
Always
More quotes by W. Somerset Maugham
Evil can be condoned only if in the beyond it is compensated by good and god himself needs immortality to vindicate his ways to man.
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A novelist must preserve a childlike belief in the importance of things which common sense considers of no great consequence.
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From old habit, unconsciously he thanked God that he no longer believed in Him.
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Its a toss-up when you decide to leave the beaten track. Many are called, few are chosen.
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He did not care upon what terms he satisfied his passion. He had even a mad, melodramatic idea to drug her.
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Genius is talent provided with ideals. Genius starves while talent wears purple and fine linen. The man of genius of today will infifty years' time be in most cases no more than a man of talent.
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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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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.
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It has been said that metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct.
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It is astonishing how many books I find there is no need for me to read at all.
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Marriage is a very good thing, but I think it's a mistake to make a habit out of it.
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The secret to life is meaningless unless you discover it yourself.
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I'm not only my spirit buy my body, and who can decide how much I, my individual self, am conditioned by the accident of my body? Would Byron have been Byron but for his club foot, or Dostoyevsky Dostoyevsky without his epilepsy?
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Writing is the supreme solace.
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The writer of prose can only step aside when the poet passes...
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Advice to first year medical students: In anatomy, it is better to have learned and lost than never to have learned at all.
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Look after your laundry, and your soul will look after itself.
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Follow your inclinations with due regard to the policeman round the corner.
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Self-control might be as passionate and as active as the surrender to passion.
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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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