# Quote — William Somerset Maugham, The Summing Up

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

- Author: [William Somerset Maugham](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham.md)
- Book: [The Summing Up](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up.md)
- Page: 182
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/W._Somerset_Maugham#The_Summing_Up_(1938)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up/habits-in-writing

## More from this book

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

p. 290 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up/old-age-is-ready.md)

> 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 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up/we-are-not.md)

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

p. 214 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-somerset-maugham/the-summing-up/i-have-been.md)