"He had doubts about the utility of examination on subjects which had been crammed for the occasion. He wanted common sense."

W. Somerset Maugham Literature See all quotes by W. Somerset Maugham →

React to this quote

More by W. Somerset Maugham

“After all, a man marries to have a home, but also because he doesn't want to be bothered with sex and all that sort of thing.”

“I don't think of the past. The only thing that matters is the everlasting present.”

“Conscience is the guardian in the individual of the rules which the community has evolved for its own preservation.”

“He was the kind of man with whom one would have hesitated to pass a lonely evening, but with whom one might cheerfully have looked forward to spending six months.”

“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.”

“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.”

Resonant Thoughts

"My father was as well aware as anyone that Christians do not, in general, undergo the demoralizing consequences which seem inherent in such a creed, in the manner or to the extent which might have bee…"

— John Stuart Mill

Philosophy1806–1873

#philosophy

"Kia cannot be experienced directly because it is the basis of consciousness , and it has no fixed qualities which the mind can latch on to. Kia is the consciousness, it is the elusive "I" which confer…"

— Peter J. Carroll

Politics1953

#mind

"A person without hope is doomed to failure, and one of the great gifts God has given us is the gift of faith, which tells us about his love for us and our love for him. Because of that faith, there is…"

— Adam Maida

Religion1930

#hope

"If financial markets aren't efficient, then what are they? According to the 'fractal market hypothesis', they are highly unstable dynamic systems that generate stock prices which appear random, but be…"

— Steve Keen

Economics1953

#science