Quotes from W Somerset Maugham

There is only one thing about which I am certain, and this is that there is very little about which one can be certain.

We know our friends by their defects rather than by their merits.

When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.

Life is so largely controlled by chance that its conduct can be but a perpetual improvisation.

We know our friends by their defects rather than their merits.

If a man hasn't what's necessary to make a woman love him, it's his fault, not hers.

Love is only a dirty trick played on us to achieve continuation of the species.

It is funny about life: if you refuse to accept anything but the very best you will very often get it.

The nature of men and women - their essential nature - is so vile and despicable that if you were to portray a person as he really is, no one would believe you.

If a man should importune me to give a reason why I loved him, I find it could no otherwise be expressed, than by making answer: because it was he, because it was I.

By the time a man notices that he is no longer young, his youth has long since left him.