# The Summing Up

- Author: [William Somerset Maugham](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham.md)
- Quotes: 24
- Book page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up

## Quotes

> Old age is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long.

p. 290

> We are not the same persons this year as last ; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.

p. 306

> I have been forced to conclude from this that we know our friends by their defects rather than by their merits.

p. 214

> Every production of an artist should be the expression of an adventure of his soul.

p. 310

> Perfection is a trifle dull. It is not the least of life's ironies that this, which we all aim at, is better not quite achieved.

p. 297

> Old age has its pleasures, which, though different, are not less than the pleasures of youth.

p. 290

> Imagination grows by exercise, and contrary to common belief, is more powerful in the mature than in the young.

p. 164

> ... habits in writing as in life are only useful if they are broken as soon as they cease to be advantageous.

p. 182

> Tradition is a guide and not a jailer.

p. 223

> The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.

p. 185

> The great critic ... must be a philosopher, for from philosophy he will learn serenity, impartiality, and the transitoriness of human things.

p. 223

> The common idea that success spoils people by making them vain, egotistic and self-complacent is erroneous; on the contrary it makes them, for the most part, humble, tolerant and kind. Failure makes people bitter and cruel.

p. 182

> By the time I was twenty-four I had constructed a complete system of philosophy. It rested on two principles: The Relativity of Things and The Circumferentiality of Man. I have since discovered that the first was not a very original discovery. It may be that the other was profound, but though I have racked my brains I cannot for the life of me remember what it was.

> There is no explanation for evil. It must be looked upon as a necessary part of the order of the universe. To ignore it is childish, to bewail it senseless.

p. 285

> It is salutary to train oneself to be no more affected by censure than by praise...

p. 223

> I'll give you my opinion of the human race in a nutshell... their heart's in the right place, but their head is a thoroughly inefficient organ.

p. 206

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

> There is a sort of man who pays no attention to his good actions, but is tormented by his bad ones. This is the type that most often writes about himself.

p. 11

> ...we learn resignation not by our own suffering, but by the suffering of others.

p. 64

> I would sooner read a time-table or a catalogue than nothing at all. ... They are much more entertaining than half the novels that are written.

p. 1

> You are not angry with people when you laugh at them. Humour teaches tolerance, and the humorist, with a smile and perhaps a sigh, is more likely to shrug his shoulders than to condemn.

p. 67

> ...the future will one day be the present and will seem as unimportant as the present does now.

p. 51

> I have not been afraid of excess: excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents moderation from acquiring the deadening effect of a habit.

p. 48

> I do not believe they are right who say that the defects of famous men should be ignored. I think it is better that we should know them. Then, though we are conscious of having faults as glaring as theirs, we can believe that that is no hindrance to our achieving also something of their virtues.

p. 71