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Oscar Fingal O’Flahertie Wills Wilde (16 October 185430 November 1900) was an Irish writer and poet.
After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London’s most popular playwrights in the early 1890s.
The Best Oscar Wilde Quotes
A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing. —Oscar Wilde
A dreamer is one who can only find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world. —Oscar Wilde
A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally. —Oscar Wilde
A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal. —Oscar Wilde
A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love her. —Oscar Wilde
A man can’t be too careful in the choice of his enemies. —Oscar Wilde
A man who does not think for himself does not think at all. —Oscar Wilde
A man’s face is his autobiography. A woman’s face is her work of fiction. —Oscar Wilde
A poet can survive everything but a misprint. —Oscar Wilde
A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it. —Oscar Wilde
A true friend stabs you in the front. —Oscar Wilde
A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament. —Oscar Wilde
Ah, well, then I suppose I shall have to die beyond my means. —Oscar Wilde
Alas, I am dying beyond my means. —Oscar Wilde
All art is quite useless. —Oscar Wilde
All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. —Oscar Wilde
All that I desire to point out is a general principle that life imitates art far more than art imitates life. —Oscar Wilde
All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That’s his. —Oscar Wilde
Always forgive your enemies – nothing annoys them so much. —Oscar Wilde
Ambition is the germ from which all growth of nobleness proceeds. —Oscar Wilde
Ambition is the last refuge of the failure. —Oscar Wilde
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. —Oscar Wilde
An excellent man; he has no enemies; and none of his friends like him. —Oscar Wilde
An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all. —Oscar Wilde
Anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there. —Oscar Wilde
Arguments are extremely vulgar, for everyone in good society holds exactly the same opinion. —Oscar Wilde
Arguments are to be avoided: they are always vulgar and often convincing. —Oscar Wilde
Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known. —Oscar Wilde
As long as a woman can look ten years younger than her own daughter, she is perfectly satisfied. —Oscar Wilde
As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular. —Oscar Wilde
Authority is quite degrading. —Oscar Wilde
Between men and women, there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship. —Oscar Wilde
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. —Oscar Wilde
Biography lends to death a new terror. —Oscar Wilde
By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. —Oscar Wilde
Charity creates a multitude of sins. —Oscar Wilde
Children begin by loving their parents; after a time they judge them; rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. —Oscar Wilde
Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative. —Oscar Wilde
A conversation about the weather is the last refuge of the unimaginative. —Oscar Wilde
Death and vulgarity are the only two facts in the nineteenth century that one cannot explain away. —Oscar Wilde
Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance. —Oscar Wilde
Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. —Oscar Wilde
Do you really think it is a weakness that yields to temptation? I tell you that there are terrible temptations which it requires strength, strength, and courage to yield to. —Oscar Wilde
Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. —Oscar Wilde
Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. —Oscar Wilde
Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future. —Oscar Wilde
Everybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching. —Oscar Wilde
Everything popular is wrong. —Oscar Wilde
Experience is one thing you can’t get for nothing. —Oscar Wilde
Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes. —Oscar Wilde
Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. —Oscar Wilde
Fathers should be neither seen nor heard. That is the only proper basis for family life. —Oscar Wilde
Hatred is blind, as well as love. —Oscar Wilde
He has no enemies but is intensely disliked by his friends. —Oscar Wilde
How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being? —Oscar Wilde
How marriage ruins a man! It is as demoralizing as cigarettes, and far more expensive. —Oscar Wilde
I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself. —Oscar Wilde
I am not young enough to know everything. —Oscar Wilde
I am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word of what I am saying. —Oscar Wilde
I am the only person in the world I should like to know thoroughly. —Oscar Wilde
I can resist everything except temptation. —Oscar Wilde
I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. It is hitting below the intellect. —Oscar Wilde
I choose my friends for their good looks, my acquaintances for their good characters, and my enemies for their intellects. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. —Oscar Wilde
I have nothing to declare except my genius. —Oscar Wilde
I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best. —Oscar Wilde
I like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no principles better than anything else in the world. —Oscar Wilde
I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read on the train. —Oscar Wilde
I put all my genius into my life; I put only my talent into my works. —Oscar Wilde
I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being. —Oscar Wilde
I see when men love women. They give them but a little of their lives. But women when they love give everything. —Oscar Wilde
I sometimes think that God in creating man somewhat overestimated his ability. —Oscar Wilde
I suppose society is wonderfully delightful. To be in it is merely a bore. But to be out of it is simply a tragedy. —Oscar Wilde
I think that God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability. —Oscar Wilde
I want my food dead. Not sick, not dying, dead. —Oscar Wilde
If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all. —Oscar Wilde
If one could only teach the English how to talk, and the Irish how to listen, society here would be quite civilized. —Oscar Wilde
If one plays good music, people don’t listen and if one plays bad music people don’t talk. —Oscar Wilde
If there was less sympathy in the world, there would be less trouble in the world. —Oscar Wilde
If you are not too long, I will wait here for you all my life. —Oscar Wilde
If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism. —Oscar Wilde
The illusion is the first of all pleasures. —Oscar Wilde
In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane. —Oscar Wilde
In America, the President reigns for four years, and Journalism governs forever and ever. —Oscar Wilde
In America, the young are always ready to give to those who are older than themselves the full benefits of their inexperience. —Oscar Wilde
In married life, three is a company, and two none. —Oscar Wilde
In modern life, nothing produces such an effect as a good platitude. It makes the whole world kin. —Oscar Wilde
It is a very sad thing that nowadays there is so little useless information. —Oscar Wilde
It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious. —Oscar Wilde
It is always the unreadable that occurs. —Oscar Wilde
It is better to be beautiful than to be good. But… it is better to be good than to be ugly. —Oscar Wilde
It is better to have a permanent income than to be fascinating. —Oscar Wilde
It is only an auctioneer who can equally and impartially admire all schools of art. —Oscar Wilde
It is only by not paying one’s bills that one can hope to live in the memory of the commercial classes. —Oscar Wilde
It is only the modern that ever becomes old-fashioned. —Oscar Wilde
It is through art, and through art only, that we can realize our perfection. —Oscar Wilde
It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it. —Oscar Wilde
Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. —Oscar Wilde
Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is for the best ending for one. —Oscar Wilde
Life imitates art far more than Art imitates Life. —Oscar Wilde
Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about. —Oscar Wilde
Life is never fair, and perhaps it is a good thing for most of us that it is not. —Oscar Wilde
Life is too important to be taken seriously. —Oscar Wilde
Man can believe the impossible, but man can never believe the improbable. —Oscar Wilde
Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason. —Oscar Wilde
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth. —Oscar Wilde
Memory… is the diary that we all carry about with us. —Oscar Wilde
Men always want to be a woman’s first love – women like to be a man’s last romance. —Oscar Wilde
Men marry because they are tired; women, because they are curious; both are disappointed. —Oscar Wilde
Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess. —Oscar Wilde
Morality is simply the attitude we adopt towards people whom we personally dislike. —Oscar Wilde
Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. —Oscar Wilde
Most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes. —Oscar Wilde
Mr. Henry James writes fiction as if it were a painful duty. —Oscar Wilde
No great artist ever sees things as they really are. If he did, he would cease to be an artist. —Oscar Wilde
No man is rich enough to buy back his past. —Oscar Wilde
No object is so beautiful that, under certain conditions, it will not look ugly. —Oscar Wilde
No woman should ever be quite accurate about her age. It looks so calculating. —Oscar Wilde
Nothing can cure the soul but the senses, just as nothing can cure the senses but the soul. —Oscar Wilde
Nothing is so aggravating than calmness. —Oscar Wilde
Now that the House of Commons is trying to become useful, it does a great deal of harm. —Oscar Wilde
One can survive everything, nowadays, except death, and live down everything except a good reputation. —Oscar Wilde
One of the many lessons that one learns in prison is, that things are what they are and will be what they will be. —Oscar Wilde
One should always be in love. That is the reason one should never marry. —Oscar Wilde
One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards. —Oscar Wilde
One’s past is what one is. It is the only way by which people should be judged. —Oscar Wilde
One’s real life is so often the life that one does not lead. —Oscar Wilde
Only the shallow know themselves. —Oscar Wilde
Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you. —Oscar Wilde
Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more. —Oscar Wilde