“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.”

— W. Somerset Maugham, book The Summing Up

Source: The Summing Up (1938), p. 297

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W. Somerset Maugham158

British playwright, novelist, short story writer 1874–1965

Olaf Stapledon book Star Maker

Source: Star Maker (1937), Chapter IX: The Community of Worlds; 3. A Crisis in Galactic History (p. 117)

“Well, so be it. Nothing's perfect in life, so you have an election that's not quite perfect. Is it better than not having an election? You bet.”

Donald Rumsfeld (1932) U.S. Secretary of Defense

Regards upcoming elections in Iraq http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2005/s1283005.htm, January 14, 2005. <br class="br">2000s

“Time changes all things and cultivates even in herself an appreciation of irony, — and, therefore, why shouldn't I have changed a trifle?”

James Branch Cabell (1879–1958) American author

"Auctorial Induction"
The Certain Hour (1916)

“Let us beware of irony when making judgements. Of all the dispositions of the mind, irony is the least intelligent.”

Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve (1804–1869) French literary critic

Gardons-nous de l'ironie en jugeant. De toutes les dispositions de l'esprit, l'ironie est la moins intelligente.
Notebook entry, February 24, 1848, cited from Les cahiers de Sainte-Beuve (Paris: Alphonse Lemerre, 1876) p. 75; Christopher Prendergast The Classic (New York: Oxford University Press, 2007) p. 244.