|
52da3ac
|
Marriage is always a hopeless idiocy for a woman who has enough of her own to live upon.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
2212534
|
Everything was soft about her, her voice, her smile, her laugh; her eyes, which were small and pale, had the softness of flowers; her manner was as soft as the summer rain.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
2cb8915
|
He was so pleasant that his fellow writers, his rivals and contemporaries, forgave him even the fact that he was a gentleman.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
c368c69
|
But their fondest thoughts went to the two sons who had brought honour and glory to their ancient name.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
f29f4b5
|
The great have no friends, dear Blasco. It is the price they must pay for their greatness.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
013c037
|
Dona Beatriz was too proud to lie.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
27b49b0
|
No one ever died of love yet," said the prioress with a savage bitterness."
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
94c4fa8
|
She had in point of fact by now made up her mind to accept it, but she well knew that men like to think they decide matters for themselves.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
e5486ec
|
She had the serenity of a summer evening when the light fades slowly from the unclouded sky.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
0a65df1
|
We're all so dreadfully tired of being goddesses. For centuries foolish men have set us up on a pedestal and vowed they were unworthy to touch the hem of our garments. And it is so dull.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
a570fbd
|
A virtue that only causes havoc and unhappiness is worth nothing. You can call it virtue if you like. I call it cowardice.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
ff838b3
|
Time, because it is so fleeting, time, because it is beyond recall, is the most precious of human goods and to squander it is is the most delicate form of dissipation in which man can indulge. Cleopatra dissolved in wine a priceless pearl, but she gave it to Anthony to drink; when you waste the brief golden hours you take the beaker in which the gem is melted and dash its contents to the ground.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
e28bbbe
|
It was a cold morning, and he shivered a little; but he had been taught by his uncle that his prayers were more acceptable to God if he said them in his nightshirt than if he waited till he was dressed. This did not surprise him, for he was beginning to realise that he was the creature of a God who appreciated the discomfort of his worshippers.
|
|
religion
discomfort
penitence
repression
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
3e0f772
|
Men have always formed gods in their own image.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
bba57c8
|
I respect him. He has brains and character; and that, I may tell you, is a very unusual combination. I don't suppose you know what he is doing here, because I don't think he's very expansive with you. If any man singlehanded can put a stop to this frightful epidemic he's going to do it. He's doctoring the sick, cleaning the city up, trying to get the drinking water pure. He doesn't mind where he goes nor what he does. He's risking his life ..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
7c7e032
|
Beauty is a blind alley. It is a mountain peak which once reached leads nowhere [...] Beauty is that which satisfies the aesthetic instinct. But who wants to be satisfied? It is only to the dullard that enough is as good as a feast. Let us face it: beauty is a bit of a bore.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
214250f
|
But that wasn't the chief thing that bothered me: I couldn't reconcile myself with that preoccupation with sin that, so far as I could tell, was never entirely absent from the monks' thoughts. I'd known a lot of fellows in the air corps. Of course they got drunk when they got a chance, and had a girl whenever they could and used foul language; we had one or two had hats: one fellow was arrested for passing rubber cheques and was sent to pri..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
0a40208
|
There are men whose sense of humour is so ill developed that they still bear a grudge against Copernicus because he dethroned them from the central position in the universe. They feel it a personal affront that they can no longer consider themselves the pivot upon which turns the whole of created things.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
bcf6364
|
I've always felt that there was something pathetic in the founders of religion who made it a condition of salvation that you should believe in them. It's as though they needed your faith to have faith in themselves. They remind you of those old pagan gods who grew wan and faint if they were not sustained by the burnt offerings of the devout. Advaita doesn't ask you to take anything on trust; it asks only that you should have a passionate cr..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
f7485ef
|
He did not know what he sought or what his journeys would bring him; but he had a feeling that he would learn something new about life and gain some clue about the mystery that he had solved only to find more mysterious. And even if he found nothing he would allay the unrest which gnawed his heart.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
ad5007a
|
To Lucy it was an admirable study, the contrast between the man who threw his whole soul into a certain aim, which he pursued with a savage intensity, knowing that the end was a dreadful, lonely death; and the man who was making up his mind deliberately to gather what was beautiful in life, and to cultivate its graces as though it were a flower garden. "And the worst of it is that it will all be the same in a hundred years," said Dick. "We ..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
683540d
|
When he sacrifices himself man for a moment is greater than God, for how can God, infinite and omnipotent, sacrifice himself? At best he can only sacrifice his only begotten son.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
0d4d0d2
|
I'm sure I'm very grateful to you, Philip. I'm very much flattered at your proposal.' 'Oh, don't talk rot. You will marry me, won't you?' 'D'you think we should be happy?' 'No. But what does that matter?
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
ff87510
|
You should read Spanish,' he said. 'It is a noble tongue. It has not the mellifluousness of Italian--Italian is the language of tenors and organ-grinders--but it has grandeur: it does not ripple like a brook in a garden, but it surges tumultuous like a mighty river in a flood.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
ffd8f68
|
Pensei para mim que os homens sao mais interessantes do que os livros, mas tem o defeito de nao podermos saltar certos capitulos. Temos, no minimo, de folhear o livro inteiro para encontrar uma pagina que valha a pena. E nao podemos coloca-los numa estante e pegar neles quando nos apetece; e preciso le-los quando a oportunidade se apresenta, a semelhanca de um livro de uma biblioteca itinerante que e muito procurado, e temos de esperar a no..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
e334480
|
But to secure freedom, entire and absolute freedom, she was ever ready to make any sacrifice: ties affected her with a discomfort that seemed really akin to physical pain, and she avoided them--ties of family or of affection, ties of habit or of thought--with all the strenuousness of which she was capable.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
fb5f9da
|
How happy life would be if an undertaking retained to the end the delight of its beginning, if the dregs of a cup of wine were as sweet as the first sip.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
113420a
|
Malko zdrav razum, malko t'rpimost, malko chuvstvo za khumor i ti shche otkriesh, che se chuvstvash mnogo udobno na tazi planeta.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
219d77c
|
I'm only twenty-five. If I've made a mistake I have time to correct it.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
4df5232
|
Era muito simples o que ele ensinava.Dizia que somos maiores do que pensamos, e que a sabedoria e o caminho da liberdade. Para nos salvarmos nao e necessario a pessoa retirar-se do Mundo, mas apenas renunciar a individualidade. O trabalho feito desinteressadamente purifica o espirito, e os deveres sao oportunidades dadas ao homem para abafar a propria individualidade e identificar-se com a individualidade universal. (...)'' Dificil e andar..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
d1e00dc
|
The belief of God is not a matter of common sense, or logic, or argument, but of feeling. It is as impossible to prove the existence of God as to disprove it. I do not believe in God. I see no need of such an idea. It is incredible to me that there should be an after-life. I find the notion of future punishment outrageous and of future reward extravagant. I am convinced that when I die, I shall cease entirely to live; I shall return to the ..
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
a66da67
|
On the earth, satellite of a star speeding through space, living things had arisen under the influence of conditions which were part of the planet's history; and as there had been a beginning of life upon it, so, under the influence of other conditions, there would be an end: man, no more significant than other forms of life, had come not as the climax of creation but as a physical reaction to the environment.
|
|
man
human
life
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
1f08253
|
One of the odd things about Stendhal is that though he was always on the watch lest anyone made a fool of him, he was constantly making a fool of himself.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
fd0b6b0
|
None was more indifferent to convention than herself, and the marriage tie especially excited her ridicule, but she despised entirely those who disregarded the by-laws of society, yet lacked courage to suffer the results of their boldness: to seek the good opinion of the world, and yet secretly to act counter to its idea of decorum, was a very contemptible hypocrisy.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
45441ed
|
Even here is something sad and terrible. But the impression is fleeting, and serves only to give a greater acuteness to the enjoyment of the moment. It is like the sadness which you may see in the jester's eyes when a merry company is laughing at his sallies; his lips smile and his jokes are gayer because in that communion of laughter he find himself more intolerably alone.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
78ed58e
|
he was responsible only to himself for the things he did. Freedom! He was his own master at last. From old habit, unconsciously he thanked god he no longer believed in him."
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
ffd6161
|
Human beings filled him with disgust.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
868fdc3
|
He was interested in the human side of that struggle to express something which was so obscure in the man's mind that he was become morbid and querulous. Philip felt vaguely that he himself was himself in the same case, but with him it was the conduct of his life as a whole that perplexed him. That was his means of self-expression, and what he must do with it was not clear.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
08d5fa9
|
The love that lasts longest is the love that is never returned. It
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
49f0510
|
laugh while you've got the chance, you won't laugh much when you're dead and buried.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
25f356e
|
I have great affection for you, Roy" I answered, "but I don't think you are the sort of person I'd care to have breakfast with."
|
|
clever
wit
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
0d3a52b
|
Owing to the rise of prices Mrs. Hudson was able to get more for her rooms than in my day, and I think in her modest way she was quite well off. But of course people wanted a lot nowadays. "You wouldn't believe it, first I 'ad to put in a bathroom, and then I 'ad to put in the electric light, and then nothin' would satisfy them but I must 'ave a telephone. What they'll want next I can't think."
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
7cb3aa9
|
The tragedy of love is not death or separation. How long do you think it would have been before one or other of them ceased to care? Oh, it is dreadfully bitter to look at a woman whom you have loved with all your heart and soul, so that you felt you could not bear to let her out of your sight, and realise that you would not mind if you never saw her again. The tragedy of love is indifference.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |
|
f93df8f
|
He saw that nothing was good and nothing was evil; things were merely adapted to an end.
|
|
|
W. Somerset Maugham |