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Perhaps The Most Important Use Of Money - It Saves Time. Life Is So Short, And There's So Much To Do, One Can't Afford To Waste A Minute; And Just Think How Much You Waste, For Instance, In Walking From Place To Place Instead Of Going By Bus And In Going By Bus Instead Of By Taxi.

-W. Somerset Maugham

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Perhaps The Most Important

W. Somerset Maugham

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Perhaps The Most Important Use Of Money - It Saves Time. Life Is So Short, And There's So Much To Do, One Can't Afford To Waste A Minute; And Just Think How Much You Waste, For Instance, In Walking From Place To Place Instead Of Going By Bus And In Going By Bus Instead Of By Taxi.

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When He Sacrifices Himself Man For A Moment Is Greater Than God, For How Can God, Infinite And Omnipotent, Sacrifice Himself?

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.

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The Ballet. I Saw In The Fugitive Beauty Of A Dancer's Gesture A Symbol Of Life. It Was Achieved At The Cost Of Unending Effort But, With All The Forces Of Gravity Against It, A Fleeting Poise In Mid-air, A Lovely Attitude Worthy To Be Made Immortal In A Bas-relief, It Was Lost As Soon As It Was Gained And There Remained No More Than The Memory Of An Exquisite Emotion. So Life, Lived Variously And Largely, Becomes A Work Of Art Only When Brought To Its Beautiful Conclusion And Is Reduced To Nothingness In The Moment When It Arrives At Perfection.

Marriage Is A Very Good Thing, But I Think It's A Mistake To Make A Habit Out Of It.

You Know, When One's In Love,' I Said, 'and Things Go All Wrong, One's Terribly Unhappy And One Thinks One Won't Ever Get Over It. But You'll Be Astounded To Learn What The Sea Will Do.' What Do You Mean?' She Smiled. Well, Love Isn't A Good Sailor And It Languishes On A Sea Voyage. You'll Be Surprised When You Have The Atlantic Between You And Larry To Find How Slight The Pang Is That Before You Sailed Seemed Intolerable.

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.

For Men, As A Rule, Love Is But An Episode Which Takes Place Among The Other Affairs Of The Day, And The Emphasis Laid On It In Novels Gives It An Importance Which Is Untrue To Life. There Are Few Men To Whom It Is The Most Important Thing In The World, And They Are Not The Very Interesting Ones; Even Women, With Whom The Subject Is Of Paramount Interest, Have A Contempt For Them.

When We Come To Judge Others It Is Not By Ourselves As We Really Are That We Judge Them, But By An Image That We Have Formed Of Ourselves From Which We Have Left Out Everything That Offends Our Vanity Or Would Discredit Us In The Eyes Of The World.

It Is Clear That Men Accept An Immediate Pain Rather Than An Immediate Pleasure, But Only Because They Expect A Greater Pleasure In The Future. Often The Pleasure Is Illusory, But Their Error In Calculation Is No Refutation Of The Rule.

People Do Tell A Writer Things That They Don't Tell Others. I Don't Know Why, Unless It Is That Having Read One Or Two Of His Books They Feel On Peculiarly Intimate Terms With Him; Or It May Be That They Dramatize Themselves And, Seeing Themselves As It Were As Characters In A Novel, Are Ready To Be As Open With Him As They Imagine The Characters Of His Invention Are.

Sometimes A Man Hits Upon A Place To Which He Mysteriously Feels That He Belongs.

Excess On Occasion Is Exhilarating. It Prevents Moderation From Acquiring The Deadening Effect Of A Habit. It's A Funny Thing About Life; If You Refuse To Accept Anything But The Best, You Very Often Get It. Like All Weak Men He Laid An Exaggerated Stress On Not Changing One's Mind.

There Is Only One Way To Win Hearts And That Is To Make Oneself Like Unto Those Of Whom One Would Be Loved.

You Can Never Know Enough About Your Characters

It Seems That The Creative Faculty And The Critical Faculty Cannot Exist Together In Their Highest Perfection.

Often The Best Way To Overcome Desire Is To Satisfy It.

When I Was Young I Was Amazed At Plutarch's Statement That The Elder Cato Began At The Age Of Eighty To Learn Greek. I Am Amazed No Longer. Old Age Is Ready To Undertake Tasks That Youth Shirked Because They Would Take Too Long.

The Riviera Isn't Only A Sunny Place For Shady People.

Self-control Might Be As Passionate And As Active As The Surrender To Passion.

Man's Desire For The Approval Of His Fellows Is So Strong, His Dread Of Their Censure So Violent, That He Himself Has Brought His Enemy (conscience) Within His Gates; And It Keeps Watch Over Him, Vigilant Always In The Interests Of Its Master To Crush Any Half-formed Desire To Break Away From The Herd.

When A Man's In Love, He At Once Makes A Pedestal Of The Ten Commandments And Stands On The Top Of Them With His Arms Akimbo. When A Woman's In Love She Doesn't Care Two Straws For Thou Shalt And Thou Shalt Not.

In Hollywood, The Women Are All Peaches. It Makes One Long For An Apple Occasionally.

A Novelist Must Preserve A Childlike Belief In The Importance Of Things Which Common Sense Considers Of No Great Consequence.

Now The Answer ... Is Plain, But It Is So Unpalatable That Most Men Will Not Face It. There Is No Reason For Life And Life Has No Meaning.

If You Don't Change Your Beliefs, Your Life Will Be Like This Forever. Is That Good News?

There Is No Object To Life. To Nature Nothing Matters But The Continuation Of The Species.

But The Only Important Thing In A Book Is The Meaning It Has For You; It May Have Other And Much More Profound Meanings For The Critic, But At Second-hand They Can Be Of Small Service To You.

I've Always Been Interested In People, But I've Never Liked Them.

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 Realize That You Would Not Mind If You Never Saw Her Again. The Tragedy Of Love Is Indifference.

A Soul Is A Troublesome Possession, And When Man Developed It He Lost The Garden Of Eden.

People Are Always A Little Disconcerted When You Don't Recognize Them, They Are So Important To Themselves, It Is A Shock To Discover Of What Small Importance They Are To Others. [the Human Element]

This Love Was A Torment, And He Resented Bitterly The Subjugation In Which It Held Him; He Was A Prisoner And He Longed For Freedom. Sometimes He Awoke In The Morning And Felt Nothing; His Soul Leaped, For He Thought He Was Free; He Loved No Longer; But In A Little While, As He Grew Wide Awake, The Pain Settled In His Heart, And He Knew That He Was Not Cured Yet.

Death Doesn't Affect The Living Because It Has Not Happened Yet. Death Doesn't Concern The Dead Because They Have Ceased To Exist.

Art Is Triumphant When It Can Use Convention As An Instrument Of Its Own Purpose.

You've Been Brought Up Like A Gentleman And A Christian, And I Should Be False To The Trust Laid Upon Me By Your Dead Father And Mother If I Allowed You To Expose Yourself To Such Temptation.' Well, I Know I'm Not A Christian And I'm Beginning To Doubt Whether I'm A Gentleman,' Said Philip.

To Write Simply Is As Difficult As To Be Good.

The Average American Can Get Into The Kingdom Of Heaven Much More Easily Than He Can Get Into The Boulevard St. Germain.

There's Nothing The World Loves More Than A Ready-made Description Which They Can Hang On To A Man, And So Save Themselves All Trouble In Future.

Clearly Much That Seemed Valid Seemed So Only Because He Had Been Taught It From Earliest Youth.

Imagination Grows By Exercise, And Contrary To Common Belief, Is More Powerful In The Mature Than In The Young.

The Important Thing Was To Love Rather Than To Be Loved.

The Essential Element Of Love Is A Belief In Its Own Eternity.

If A Nation Values Anything More Than Freedom, It Will Lose Its Freedom; And The Irony Of It Is That If It Is Comfort Or Money That It Values More, It Will Lose That Too.

Libertarian Party

You Will Have To Learn Many Tedious Things,...which You Will Forget The Moment You Have Passed Your Final Examination, But In Anatomy It Is Better To Have Learned And Lost Than Never To Have Learned At All.

You Learn More Quickly Under The Guidance Of Experienced Teachers. You Waste A Lot Of Time Going Down Blind Alleys If You Have No One To Lead You.

Why Should You Think That Beauty, Which Is The Most Precious Thing In The World, Lies Like A Stone On The Beach For The Careless Passer-by To Pick Up Idly? Beauty Is Something Wonderful And Strange That The Artist Fashions Out Of The Chaos Of The World In The Torment Of His Soul. And When He Has Made It, It Is Not Given To All To Know It. To Recognize It You Must Repeat The Adventure Of The Artist. It Is A Melody That He Sings To You, And To Hear It Again In Your Own Heart You Want Knowledge And Sensitiveness And Imagination.

Almost All The People Who’ve Had The Most Effect On Me I Seem To Have Met By Chance, Yet Looking Back It Seems As Though I Couldn’t But Have Met Them.

Art For Art's Sake Makes No More Sense Than Gin For Gin's Sake.

You Can Do Anything In This World If You Are Prepared To Take The Consequences.

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Do You Absolutely Despise Me, Walter?" "no." He Hesitated And His Voice Was Strange. "i Despise Myself.

It Is Not Difficult To Be Unconventional In The Eyes Of The World When Your Unconventionality Is But The Convention Of Your Set.

I'm Not Only My Spirit Buy My Body, And Who Can Decide How Much I, My Individual Self, Am Conditioned By The Accident Of My Body? Would Byron Have Been Byron But For His Club Foot, Or Dostoyevsky Dostoyevsky Without His Epilepsy?

The Rain Fell Alike Upon The Just And Upon The Unjust, And For Nothing Was There A Why And A Wherefore.

In The Country The Darkness Of Night Is Friendly And Familiar, But In A City, With Its Blaze Of Lights, It Is Unnatural, Hostile And Menacing. It Is Like A Monstrous Vulture That Hovers, Biding Its Time.

The World Is Hard And Cruel. We Are Here None Knows Why, And We Go None Knows Whither. We Must Be Very Humble. We Must See The Beauty Of Quietness. We Must Go Through Life So Inconspicuously That Fate Does Not Notice Us. And Let Us Seek The Love Of Simple, Ignorant People. Their Ignorance Is Better Than All Our Knowledge. Let Us Be Silent, Content In Our Little Corner, Meek And Gentle Like Them. That Is The Wisdom Of Life.

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The Mathematician Who After Seeing Phedre Asked: 'qu'est Que Ca Prouve?' Was Not Such A Fool As He Has Been Generally Made Out. No One Has Ever Been Able To Explain Why The Doric Temple Of Paestum Is More Beautiful Than A Glass Of Cold Beer Except By Bringing In Considerations That Have Nothing To Do With Beauty.

The Best Style Is The Style You Don't Notice.

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She Had A Pretty Gift For Quotation, Which Is A Serviceable Substitute For Wit.

Charm And Nothing But Charm At Last Grows A Little Tiresome. It's A Relief Then To Deal With A Man Who Isn't Quite So Delightful But A Little More Sincere.

The World In General Doesn't Know What To Make Of Originality; It Is Startled Out Of Its Comfortable Habits Of Thought, And Its First Reaction Is One Of Anger.

Imagination Grows By Exercise.

Life Is Really Very Fantastic, And One Has To Have A Peculiar Sense Of Humour To See The Fun Of It. [virtue]

[money] Is The String With Which A Sardonic Destiny Directs The Motions Of Its Puppets.

The Writer Of Prose Can Only Step Aside When The Poet Passes...

Sherry, The Civilized Drink.

The Secret Of Play-writing Can Be Given In Two Maxims: Stick To The Point, And, Whenever You Can, Cut.

Follow Your Inclinations With Due Regard To The Policeman Round The Corner.

I Write Only When Inspiration Strikes. Fortunately It Strikes Every Morning At Nine O'clock Sharp.

If Nobody Spoke Unless He Had Something To Say, The Human Race Would Very Soon Lose The Use Of Speech.

The Audience Is Not The Least Important Actor In The Play And If It Will Not Do Its Allotted Share The Play Falls To Pieces.

A Man Ought To Work. That's What He's Here For. That's How He Contributes To The Welfare Of The Community.

A Good Rule For Writers: Do Not Explain Overmuch.

The Humorist Has A Good Eye For The Humbug; He Does Not Always Recognize The Saint.

Dying Is The Most Hellishly Boresome Experience In The World! Particularly When It Entails Dying Of 'natural Causes'.

Habits In Writing As In Life Are Only Useful If They Are Broken As Soon As They Cease To Be Advantageous.

Have Common Sense And Stick To The Point.

I [death] Was Astonished To See Him In Baghdad, For I Had An Appointment With Him Tonight In Samarra.

I Can Imagine No More Comfortable Frame Of Mind For The Conduct Of Life Than A Humorous Resignation.

She Had No Mercy. He Looked At Her Neck And Thought How He Would Like To Jab It With The Knife He Had For His Muffin. He Knew Enough Anatomy To Make Pretty Certain Of Getting The Carotid Artery. And At The Same Time He Wanted To Cover Her Pale, Thin Face With Kisses.

Love Is What Happens To Men And Women Who Don't Know Each Other.

Thank God, I Can Look At A Sunset Now Without Having To Think How To Describe It

Sentimentality Is The Only Sentiment That Rubs You The Wrong Way.

And He Loved Her Suddenly Because She Loved Him.

The Author Always Loads His Dice, But He Must Never Let The Reader See That He Has Done So.

The Crown Of Literature Is Poetry.

Unfortunately Sometimes One Can't Do What One Thinks Is Right Without Making Someone Else Unhappy.

She Says It's Really Not Very Flattering To Her That The Women Who Fall In Love With Her Husband Are So Uncommonly Second-rate.

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A State Of Reverie Does Not Avoid Reality, It Accedes To Reality.

It Takes Two To Make A Love Affair And A Mans Meat Is Too Often A Woman's Poison.

It Must Be A Fault In Me That I Am Not Gravely Shocked At The Sins Of Others Unless They Personally Affect Me.

Writing Is A Wholetime Job: No Professional Writer Can Afford Only To Write When He Feels Like It.

I Now, Weak, Old, Diseased, Poor, Dying, Hold Still My Soul In My Hands, And I Regret Nothing.

For The Complete Life, The Perfect Pattern Includes Old Age As Well As Youth And Maturity.

He Did Not Care If She Was Heartless, Vicious And Vulgar, Stupid And Grasping, He Loved Her. He Would Rather Have Misery With One Than Happiness With The Other.

Genius Is Talent Provided With Ideals. Genius Starves While Talent Wears Purple And Fine Linen. The Man Of Genius Of Today Will Infifty Years' Time Be In Most Cases No More Than A Man Of Talent.

When You Have Loved As She Has Loved, You Grow Old Beautifully.

Unconsciously, Perhaps, We Treasure The Power We Have Over People By Their Regard For Our Opinion Of Them, And We Hate Those Upon Whom We Have No Such Influence.

There Are Directors Who Desire To Be Artistic. It Is Pathetic To Compare The Seriousness Of Their Aim With The Absurdity Of Their Attainment.

I Wonder How Anyone Can Have The Face To Condemn Others When He Reflects Upon His Own Thoughts.

By The Time An Actor Knows How To Act Any Sort Of Part He Is Often Too Old To Act Any But A Few.

Words Have Weight, Sound And Appearance; It Is Only By Considering These That You Can Write A Sentence That Is Good To Look At And Good To Listen To.

What Does Democracy Come Down To? The Persuasive Power Of Slogans Invented By Wily Self-seeking Politicians.

Impropriety Is The Soul Of Wit.

Hypocrisy Is The Most Difficult And Nerve-racking Vice That Any Man Can Pursue; It Needs An Unceasing Vigilance And A Rare Detachment Of Spirit. It Cannot, Like Adultery Or Gluttony, Be Practiced At Spare Moments; It Is A Whole-time Job.

I'm Afraid You've Thought Me A Bigger Fool Than I Am.

I Happen To Think We’ve Set Our Ideal On The Wrong Objects; I Happen To Think That The Greatest Ideal Man Can Set Before Himself Is Self-perfection.

It Is Bad Enough To Know The Past; It Would Be Intolerable To Know The Future.

People Talk Of Beauty Lightly, And Having No Feeling For Words, They Use That One Carelessly, So That It Loses Its Force; And The Thing It Stands For, Sharing Its Name With A Hundred Trivial Objects, Is Deprived Of Dignity. They Call Beautiful A Dress, A Dog, A Sermon; And When They Are Face To Face With Beauty Cannot Recognise It.

We Know Our Friends By Their Defects Rather Than By Their Merits.

When People Say They Do Not Care What Others Think Of Them, For The Most Part They Deceive Themselves. Generally They Mean Only That They Will Do As They Choose, In The Confidence That No One Will Know Their Vagaries; And At The Utmost Only That They Are Willing To Act Contrary To The Opinion Of The Majority Because They Are Supported By The Approval Of Their Neighbours. It Is Not Difficult To Be Unconventional In The Eyes Of The World When Your Unconventionality Is But The Convention Of Your Set.

She [sadie Thompson] Gathered Herself Together. No One Could Describe The Scorn Of Her Expression Or The Contemptuous Hatred She Put Into Her Answer. "you Men! You Filthy Dirty Pigs! You're All The Same, All Of You. Pigs! Pigs!"

Women Are Often Under The Impression That Men Are Much More Madly In Love With Them Than They Really Are.

It Must Be That To Govern A Nation You Need A Specific Talent And That This May Very Well Exist Without General Ability.

The Prestige You Acquire By Being Able To Tell Your Friends That You Know Famous Men Proves Only That You Are Yourself Of Small Account.

There's No One As Transparent As The Person Who Thinks He's Devilish Deep.

In Religion Above All Things The Only Thing Of Use Is An Objective Truth. The Only God That Is Of Use Is A Being Who Is Personal, Supreme And Good, And Whose Existence Is As Certain As That Two And Two Make Four.

Of All These The Richest In Beauty Is The Beautiful Life. That Is The Perfect Work Of Art. ~waddington

I Prefer A Loose Woman To A Selfish One And A Wanton To A Fool.

I Don't Know Why It Is That The Religious Never Ascribe Common Sense To God.

I Am Told That Today Rather More Than 60 Per Cent Of The Men Who Go To University Go On A Government Grant. This Is A New Class That Has Entered Upon The Scene. It Is The White-collar Proletariat. They Do Not Go To University To Acquire Culture But To Get A Job, And When They Have Got One, Scamp It. They Have No Manners And Are Woefully Unable To Deal With Any Social Predicament. Their Idea Of A Celebration Is To Go To A Public House And Drink Six Beers. They Are Mean, Malicious And Envious . They Are Scum.

There Is Only One Thing About Which I Am Certain, And This Is That There Is Very Little About Which One Can Be Certain

At A Dinner Party One Should Eat Wisely But Not Too Well, And Talk Well But Not Too Wisely.

Art Should Be Appreciated With Passion And Violence, Not With A Tepid, Depreciating Elegance That Fears The Censoriousness Of A Common Room.

My Own Belief Is That There Is Hardly Anyone Whose Sexual Life, If It Were Broadcast, Would Not Fill The World At Large With Surprise And Horror.

He Knew That All Things Human Are Transitory And Therefore That It Must Cease One Day Or Another. He Looked Forward To That Day With Eager Longing. Love Was Like A Parasite In His Heart, Nourishing A Hateful Existence On His Life's Blood; It Absorbed His Existence So Intensely That He Could Take Pleasure In Nothing Else.

The Great Man Is Too Often All Of A Piece; It Is The Little Man That Is A Bundle Of Contradictory Elements. He Is Inexhaustible. You Never Come To The End Of The Surprises He Has In Store For You.

There Are Three Rules For Writing A Novel. Unfortunately, No One Knows What They Are.

We Find Things Beautiful Because We Recognize Them And Contrariwise We Find Things Beautiful Because Their Novelty Surprises Us.

If You Can Tell Stories, Create Characters, Devise Incidents, And Have Sincerity And Passion, It Doesn't Matter A Damn How You Write.

Freedom! That Was The Thought That Sung In Her Heart So That Even Though The Future Was So Dim, It Was Iridescent Like The Mist Over The River Where The Morning Sun Fell Upon It. Freedom! Not Only Freedom From A Bond That Irked, And A Companionship Which Depressed Her; Freedom, Not Only From The Death Which Had Threatened, But Freedom From The Love That Had Degraded Her; Freedom From All Spiritual Ties, The Freedom Of A Disembodied Spirit, And With Freedom, Courage , And A Valiant Unconcern For Whatever Was To Come.

An Author Spends Months Writing A Book, And Maybe Puts His Heart's Blood Into It, And Then It Lies About Unread Till The Reader Has Nothing Else In The World To Do.

It Does The Heart Good To Look At You.

Genius Is Talent Provided With Ideals.

A Good Havana Is One Of The Best Pleasures That I Know.

If Forty Million People Say A Foolish Thing It Does Not Become A Wise One.

The Crown Of Literature Is Poetry. It Is Its End And Aim. It Is The Sublimest Activity Of The Human Mind. It Is The Achievement Of Beauty And Delicacy. The Writer Of Prose Can Only Step Aside When The Poet Passes.

It Has Been Said That Metaphysics Is The Finding Of Bad Reasons For What We Believe Upon Instinct.

A Writer Need Not Devour A Whole Sheep In Order To Know What Mutton Tastes Like, But He Must At Least Eat A Chop. Unless He Gets His Facts Right, His Imagination Will Lead Him Into All Kinds Of Nonsense, And The Facts He Is Most Likely To Get Right Are The Facts Of His Own Experience.

There Was Once A Professor Of Law Who Said To His Students. When You Are Fighting A Case, If You Have Facts On Your Side Hammer Them Into The Jury, And If You Have The Law On Your Side Hammer It Into The Judge. But If You Have Neither The Facts Nor The Law, Asked One Of His Listeners? Then Hammer The Hell Into The Table, Answered The Professor.

Simplicity And Naturalness Are The Truest Marks Of Distinction.

The Only Important Thing In A Book Is The Meaning That It Has For You.

The Most Useful Thing About A Principle Is That It Can Always Be Sacrificed To Expediency.

It Wasn't Until Late In Life That I Discovered How Easy It Is To Say, 'i Don't Know.'

I Always Find It More Difficult To Say The Things I Mean Than The Things I Don't.

The Tragedy Of Love Is Indifference.

The Artist Produces For The Liberation Of His Soul.

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.

Our Natural Egoism Leads Us To Judge People By Their Relations To Ourselves. We Want Them To Be Certain Things To Us, And For Us That Is What They Are; Because The Rest Of Them Is No Good To Us, We Ignore It.

Art Is Merely The Refuge Which The Ingenious Have Invented, When They Were Supplied With Food And Women, To Escape The Tediousness Of Life.

Conscience Is The Guardian In The Individual Of The Rules Which The Community Has Evolved For Its Own Preservation.

A Mother Only Does Her Children Harm If She Makes Them The Only Concern Of Her Life.

We Who Are Of Mature Age Seldom Suspect How Unmercifully And Yet With What Insight The Very Young Judge Us.

It Is Not For Nothing That Artists Have Called Their Works The Children Of Their Brains And Likened The Pains Of Production To The Pains Of Childbirth.

So Long As Some Are Strong And Some Are Weak, The Weak Will Be Driven To The Wall.

Her Tears Were Partly Tears Of Happiness, For She Felt That The Strangeness Between Them Was Gone. She Loved Him Now With A New Love Because He Had Made Her Suffer.

Remember That It Is Nothing To Do Your Duty, That Is Demanded Of You And Is No More Meritorious Than To Wash Your Hands When They Are Dirty; The Only Thing That Counts Is The Love Of Duty; When Love And Duty Are One, Then Grace Is In You And You Will Enjoy A Happiness Which Passes All Understanding.

Few Misfortunes Can Befall A Boy Which Bring Worse Consequence Than To Have A Really Affectionate Mother.

It Is Astonishing How Many Books I Find There Is No Need For Me To Read At All.

Reverie Is The Groundwork Of Creative Imagination; It Is The Privilege Of The Artist That With Him It Is Not As With Other Men An Escape From Reality, But The Means By Which He Accedes To It.

The Last Words He Said To Me When I Bade Him Good-night Were: Tell Amy It's No Good Coming After Me. Anyhow, I Shall Change My Hotel, So She Wouldn't Be Able To Find Me.' My Own Impression Is That She's Well Rid Of You,' I Said. My Dear Fellow, I Only Hope You'll Be Able To Make Her See It. But Women Are Very Unintelligent.

I Do Not Think You Want Too Much Sincerity In Society. It Would Be Like An Iron Girder In A House Of Cards.

Considering How Foolishly People Act And How Pleasantly They Prattle, Perhaps It Would Be Better For The World If They Talked More And Did Less.

For Men And Women Are Not Only Themselves; They Are Also The Region In Which They Are Born, The City Apartment Or Farm In Which They Learnt To Walk, The Games They Played As Children, The Old Wives Tales They Overheard, The Food They Ate, The Schools They Attended, The Sports They Followed, The Poets They Read, And The God They Believed In. It Is All These Things That Have Made Them What They Are, And These Are The Things That You Can't Come To Know By Hearsay.

A Woman May Be As Wicked As She Likes, But If She Isn't Pretty It Won't Do Her Much Good.

There Are Men Who Are Possessed By An Urge So Strong To Do Some Particular Thing That They Can't Help Themselves, They've Got To Do It. They're Prepared To Sacrifice Everything To Satisfy Their Yearning.

By The Time A Man Notices That He Is No Longer Young, His Youth Has Long Since Left Him.

It Is Dangerous To Let The Public Behind The Scenes. They Are Easily Disillusioned And Then They Are Angry With You, For It Was The Illusion They Loved.

Behind The Scenes

I Would Sooner Read A Timetable Or A Catalog Than Nothing At All.

If You'd Ever Had A Grown-up Daughter You'd Know That By Comparison A Bucking Steer Is Easy To Manage. And As To Knowing What Goes On Inside Her - Well, It's Much Better To Pretend You're The Simple, Innocent Old Fool She Almost Certainly Takes You For.

Men Seek But One Thing In Life - Their Pleasure.

It Is An Illusion That Youth Is Happy, An Illusion Of Those Who Have Lost It; But The Young Know They Are Wretched For They Are Full Of The Truthless Ideals Which Have Been Instilled In Them, And Each Time They Come Into Contact With The Real, They Are Bruised And Wounded.

It Is A Nuisance That Knowledge Can Only Be Acquired By Hard Work.

It Was Like Making A Blunder At A Party; There Was Nothing To Do About It, It Was Dreadfully Mortifying, But It Showed A Lack Of Sense To Ascribe Too Much Importance To It.

Life Is So Largely Controlled By Chance That Its Conduct Can Be But A Perpetual Improvisation.

There Are Many Foolish People In The World And When A Man In A Rather High Position Puts On No Frills, Slaps Them On The Back, And Tells Them He'll Do Anything In The World For Them, They Are Very Likely To Think Him Clever.

I Am Afraid Of People With Too Much Charm. They Devour You. In The End You Are Made A Sacrifice To The Exercise Of Their Fascinating Gift And Their Insincerity.

Sometimes People Carry To Such Perfection The Mask They Have Assumed That In Due Course They Actually Become The Person They Seem.

Our Wise Old Church...has Discovered That If You Will Act As If You Believed Belief Will Be Given To You; If You Pray With Doubt, But Pray With Sincerity, Your Doubt Will Be Dispelled; If You Will Surrender Yourself To The Beauty Of That Liturgy The Power Of Which Over The Human Spirit Has Been Proved By The Experience Of The Ages, Peace Will Descend Upon You.

Most People Are Such Fools That It Is Really No Great Compliment To Say That Someone Is Above The Average.

...i Couldn't But Surmise That The Devil, Looking At The Cruel Wars That Christianity Has Occasioned, The Persecutions, The Tortures Christian Has Inflicted On Christian, The Unkindness, The Hypocracy, The Intolerance, Must Consider The Balance Sheet With Complacency. And When He Remembers That It Has Laid Upon Mankind The Bitter Burden Of The Sense Of Sin That Has Darkened The Beauty Of The Starry Night And Cast A Baleful Shadow On The Passing Plesures Of A World To Be Enjoyed, He Must Chuckle As He Murmurs: Give The Devil His Due.

We Are Like People Living In A Country Whose Language They Know So Little That, With All Manner Of Beautiful And Profound Things To Say, They Are Condemned To The Banalities Of The Conversation Manual. Their Brain Is Seething With Ideas, And They Can Only Tell You That The Umbrella Of The Gardener's Aunt Is In The House.

When She Liked Anyone It Was Quite Natural For Her To Go To Bed With Him. She Never Thought Twice About It. It Was Not Vice; It Wasn't Lasciviousness; It Was Her Nature. She Gave Herself As Naturally As The Sun Gives Heat Or The Flowers Their Perfume. It Was A Pleasure To Her And She Liked To Give Pleasure To Others.

The Well Dressed Man Is He Whose Clothes You Never Notice

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.

I Do Not Confer Praise Or Blame: I Accept. I Am The Measure Of All Things. I Am The Center Of The World.

Tolerance Is Only Another Name For Indifference.

Everyone Had Some Defect, Or Body Or Of Mind: He Thought Of All The People He Had Known (the Whole World Was Like A Sick House And There Was No Rhyme Or Reason In It), He Saw A Long Procession, Deformed In Body, Warped In Mind, Some With Illness Of The Flesh, Weak Hearts Or Weak Lungs, And Some With Illness Of The Spirit, Languor Of Will, Or Craving For Liquor. At That Moment He Felt A Holy Compassion For Them All. …the Words Of The Dying God Crossed His Memory: Forgive Them, For They Know Not What They Do.

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.

I Daresay One Profits More By The Mistakes One Makes Off One's Own Bat Than By Doing The Right Thing On Somebody's Else Advice.

In Civilized Communities Men's Idiosyncrasies Are Mitigated By The Necessity Of Conforming To Certain Rules Of Behavior. Culture Is A Mask That Hides Their Faces.

I Wish I Could Make You See How Much Fuller The Life I Offer You Is Than Anything You Have A Conception Of. I Wish I Could Make You See How Exciting The Life Of The Spirit Is And How Rich In Experience. It's Illimitable. It's Such A Happy Life. There's Only One Thing Like It, When You're Up In A Plane By Yourself, High, High, And Only Infinity Surrounds You. You're Intoxicated By The Boundless Space.

Through The History Of The World There Have Always Been Exploiters And Exploited. There Always Will Be ... Because The Great Mass Of Men Are Made By Nature To Be Slaves, They Are Unfit To Control Themselves, And For Their Own Good Need Masters.

Its A Toss-up When You Decide To Leave The Beaten Track. Many Are Called, Few Are Chosen.

The Arguments For Immortality, Weak When You Take Them One By One, Are No More Cogent When You Take Them Together... For My Part, I Cannot See How Consciousness Can Persist When Its Physical Basis Has Been Destroyed, And I Am Too Sure Of The Interconnection Of My Body And My Mind To Think That Any Survival Of My My Consciousness Apart From My Body Would Be In Any Sense A Survival Of Myself.

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Antonio Lobo Antunes

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