Nothing in the world is permanent, and we're foolish when we ask anything to last, but surely we're still more foolish not to take delight in it whil… - William Somerset Maugham

Perhaps his taciturnity hid a contempt for the human race which had abandoned the great dreams of his youth and now wallowed in sluggish ease; or perhaps these thirty years of revolution had taught him that men are unfit for liberty, and he thought that he had spent his life in the pursuit of that which was not worth the finding. Or maybe he was tired out and waited only with indifference for the release of death.

It looked as though the people we thought we knew best carried secrets that they didn't even know themselves. Charley had a sudden inkling that human beings were infinitely mysterious. The fact was that you knew nothing about anybody.

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.