Daily Inspiration Quote by W. Somerset Maugham

Maugham gives indulgence a respectable alibi: not as vice, but as maintenance. The first sentence is a sly little door-opening - "on occasion" keeps the champagne cork from popping too often, while "exhilarating" frames excess as a sensory reset, not a moral failure. Then comes the sharper turn: the real danger isn’t too much, it’s too steady. Moderation, usually sold as virtue, gets recast as something that can go stale, even narcotic. The line lands because it reverses the expected villain. Habit, not pleasure, is the deadener.

The subtext is classically Maugham: a worldly observer watching respectable society perform self-control until self-control becomes its own prison. As a playwright and chronicler of manners, he understood that people don’t just want rules; they want rules that make them feel sophisticated. This quote punctures that performance. It suggests that a life organized entirely around temperance can become a kind of emotional bureaucracy - efficient, safe, and quietly lifeless. A well-timed breach reintroduces risk, appetite, and choice, reminding you that moderation is a tool, not an identity.

Context matters: Maugham wrote through eras that prized propriety while privately indulging empire-level appetites. His line reads like counsel to the cultivated hypocrite and the over-disciplined striver alike: don’t let virtue harden into routine. Even restraint needs a holiday, or it turns into habit masquerading as character.