Quotes by W. Somerset Maugham

It is not wealth one asks for, but just enough to preserve one's dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

It's asking a great deal that things should appeal to your reason as well as your sense of the aesthetic.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

Life wouldn't be worth living if I worried over the future as well as the present.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

Men seek but one thing in life - their pleasure.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

Money is like a sixth sense without which you cannot make a complete use of the other five.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

The important thing was to love rather than to be loved.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

The rain fell alike upon the just and upon the unjust, and for nothing was there a why and a wherefore.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

There was an immeasurable distance between the quick and the dead: they did not seem to belong to the same species; and it was strange to think that but a little while before they had spoken and moved and eaten and laughed.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

There's always one who loves and one who lets himself be loved.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

When I read a book I seem to read it with my eyes only, but now and then I come across a passage, perhaps only a phrase, which has a meaning for me, and it becomes part of me.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

When things are at their worst I find something always happens.
"Of Human Bondage", 1915

A woman can forgive a man for the harm he does her...but she can never forgive him for the sacrifices he makes on her account.
(The Moon and Sixpence)

I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.
(The Moon and Sixpence)

Life isn't long enough for love and art.
(The Moon and Sixpence)

Sometimes people carry to such perfection the mask they have assumed that in due course they actually become the person they seem.
(The Moon and Sixpence)