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We find things beautiful because we recognize them and contrariwise we find things beautiful because their novelty surprises us.
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
Find
Things
Contrariwise
Surprises
Novelty
Recognize
Surprise
Beauty
Beautiful
More quotes by W. Somerset Maugham
Dying is the most hellishly boresome experience in the world! Particularly when it entails dying of 'natural causes'.
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One cannot find peace in work or in pleasure, in the world or in a convent, but only in one's soul.
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Women's hearts are like old china, none the worse for a break or two.
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A good rule for writers: do not explain overmuch.
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They say a woman always remembers her first lover with affection but perhaps she does not always remember him.
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When I was young I was amazed at Plutarch's statement that the elder Cato began at the age of eighty to learn Greek. I am amazed no longer. Old age is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long.
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In civilized communities men's idiosyncrasies are mitigated by the necessity of conforming to certain rules of behavior. Culture is a mask that hides their faces.
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The important thing was to love rather than to be loved.
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The secret to life is meaningless unless you discover it yourself.
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Of all these the richest in beauty is the beautiful life. That is the perfect work of art. ~Waddington
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Impropriety is the soul of wit.
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When you're eighteen your emotions are violent, but they're not durable.
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Beauty is also a Gift of God, one of the most rare and precious, and we should be thankful if we are happy enough to possess it and thankful, if we are not, that others possess it for our pleasure.
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The great trues are too important to be new.
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I happen to think we’ve set our ideal on the wrong objects I happen to think that the greatest ideal man can set before himself is self-perfection.
W. Somerset Maugham
The average American can get into the kingdom of heaven much more easily than he can get into the Boulevard St. Germain.
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Comedy appeals to the collective mind of the audience and this grows fatigued while farce appeals to a more robust organ, their collective belly.
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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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I can imagine no more comfortable frame of mind for the conduct of life than a humorous resignation.
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Man has always sacrificed truth to his vanity, comfort and advantage. He lives not by truth but by make-believe.
W. Somerset Maugham
