A Quote by W. Somerset Maugham

It must be that to govern a nation you need a specific talent and that this may very well exist without general ability. — © W. Somerset Maugham
It must be that to govern a nation you need a specific talent and that this may very well exist without general ability.
Language is like money, without which specific relative values may well exist and be felt, but cannot be reduced to a common denominator.
In the next place, the state governments are, by the very theory of the constitution, essential constituent parts of the general government. They can exist without the latter, but the latter cannot exist without them.
For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling in the nation must be quickened, the conscience of the nation must be roused, the propriety of the nation must be startled, the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed: and its crimes against God and man must be denounced.
Fame has no necessary conjunction with praise; it may exist without the breath of a word: it is a recognition of excellence which must be felt, but need not be spoken. Even the envious must feel it: feel it, and hate in silence.
The ability to work hard for days on end without losing focus is a talent. The ability to keep absorbing new information after many hours of study is a talent.
The Internet may well disempower the nation state, but at the same time, it also strengthens certain specific state functions - like surveillance. As a political entity, it doesn't empower the nation sate. It creates the availability of much more data than the digestive system of the nation state could possibly assimilate.
We simply must have faith in each other, faith in our ability to govern ourselves, and faith in the future of this Nation. Restoring that faith and that confidence to America is now the most important task we face.
Everybody has talent and it's just a matter of moving around until you've discovered what it is. A talent is a combination of something you love a great deal and something you can lose yourself in - something that you can start at 9 o'clock, look up from your work and it's 10 o'clock at night - and also something that you have a talent, not a talent for, but skills that you have a natural ability to do very well. And usually those two things go together.
In general, it can be said that no contemplative life is possible without ascetic self-discipline. One must learn to survive without the habit-forming luxuries which get such a hold on men today. I do not say that to be a contemplative one absolutely has to go without smoking or without alcohol, but certainly one must be able to use these things without being dominated by an uncontrolled need for them.
May be is very well, but Must is the master. It is my duty to show justice without recompense.
A soul might very well exist, but we, as physicists, try to measure and quantify everything. So far, no one has been able to create an experiment to do this for the soul. Efforts have been made to weigh the body after death, but each time we find no evidence of a soul. So a soul may very well exist, but it is not a testable theory.
To truly be of service to others, we must first serve the server. The ability to bring an enlightened presence to those in need is the ability to light a candle without burning ourselves out.
There are in France some fifty thousand young men of good birth and fairly well off who are encouraged to live a life of complete idleness. They must either cease to exist or must come to see that there can be no happiness, no health even, without regular daily labor of some sort... The need of work is in me.
I just like voicing films in general. I do a lot of documentary work and it's a short hop really to narrating a character, especially if you're on film and you're there in a visual way. It sounds obvious, but voicing an animation really focuses you on the way that you're communicating through your voice. It's a very specific ability that you need to be able to have in order to pitch it just right.
The problem is that the right doesn't need any ideas to govern, but the left can't govern without ideas.
A man cannot govern a nation if he cannot govern a city; he cannot govern a city if he cannot govern a family; he cannot govern a family unless he can govern himself; and he cannot govern himself unless his passions are subject to reason
This site uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. More info...
Got it!