Quotes by Wilde, Oscar

"A person who, because he has corns himself, always treads on other people's toes."

Wilde, Oscar on sensitivity   

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"A sentimentalist is simply one who desires to have the luxury of an emotion without paying for it."

Wilde, Oscar on time   

"Life is too important to be taken seriously."

Wilde, Oscar on seriousness
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"He knew the precise psychological moment when to say nothing."

Wilde, Oscar on silence   

"The great things in life are what they seem to be. And for that reason, strange as it may sound to you, often are very difficult to interpret (understand). Great passion are for the great of souls. Great events can only be seen by people who are on a level with them. We think we can have our visions for nothing. We cannot. Even the finest and most self-sacrificing visions have to paid for. Strangely enough, that is what makes them fine."

Wilde, Oscar on simplicity   

"I adore simple pleasures. They are the last refuge of the complex."

Wilde, Oscar on simplicity   

"The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future."

Wilde, Oscar on sin
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"What is termed Sin is an essential element of progress. Without it the world would stagnate, or grow old, or become colorless. By its curiosity Sin increases the experience of the race. Through its intensified assertion of individualism it saves us from monotony of type. In its rejection of the current notions about morality, it is one with the higher ethics."

Wilde, Oscar on sin   

"There is no sin except stupidity."

Wilde, Oscar on sin
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"The body sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret."

Wilde, Oscar on sin   

"A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal."

Wilde, Oscar on sincerity
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"Skepticism is the beginning of Faith."

Wilde, Oscar on skepticism   

"I never saw a man who looked with such a wistful eye upon that little tent of blue which prisoners call the sky."

Wilde, Oscar on sky
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"What is said of a man is nothing. The point is, who says it."

Wilde, Oscar on slander
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"The fact is, that civilization requires slaves. Human slavery is wrong, insecure, and demoralizing. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends."

Wilde, Oscar on slavery   

"A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?"

Wilde, Oscar on smoking
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"To make men Socialists is nothing, but to make Socialism human is a great thing."

Wilde, Oscar on socializing and socialism   

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"When one pays a visit it is for the purpose of wasting other people's time, not one's own."

Wilde, Oscar on socializing and socialism
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"Never speak disrespectfully of Society. Only people who can't get into it do that."

Wilde, Oscar on society   

"Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world there are only individuals."

Wilde, Oscar on society   

"Where there is sorrow there is holy ground."

Wilde, Oscar on sorrow
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"How strange a thing this is! The Priest telleth me that the Soul is worth all the gold in the world, and the merchants say that it is not worth a clipped piece of silver."

Wilde, Oscar on soul   

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"Lots of people act well, but few people talk well. This shows that talking is the more difficult of the two."

Wilde, Oscar on speakers and speaking   

"Talk to a woman as if you loved her, and to a man as if he bored you."

Wilde, Oscar on speakers and speaking   

"The State is to make what is useful. The individual is to make what is beautiful."

Wilde, Oscar on state   

"The greatest of all sins is stupidity."

Wilde, Oscar on stupidity
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"The only thing that ever consoles man for the stupid things he does is the praise he always gives himself for doing them."

Wilde, Oscar on stupidity
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"While one should always study the method of a great artist, one should never imitate his manner. The manner of an artist is essentially individual, the method of an artist is absolutely universal. The first is personality, which no one should copy; the second is perfection, which all should aim at."

Wilde, Oscar on style   

"Nothing succeeds like success."

Wilde, Oscar on success   

"To become a spectator of one's own life is to escape the suffering of life."

Wilde, Oscar on suffering
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"I can sympathize with everything, except suffering."

Wilde, Oscar on suffering   

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"While we look to the dramatist to give romance to realism, we ask of the actor to give realism to romance."

Wilde, Oscar on acting and actors   

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"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."

Wilde, Oscar on acting and actors
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"I love acting. It is so much more real than life."

Wilde, Oscar on acting and actors   

"The mere mechanical technique of acting can be taught, but the spirit that is to give life to lifeless forms must be born in a man. No dramatic college can teach its pupils to think or to feel. It is Nature who makes our artists for us, though it may be Art who taught them their right mode of expression."

Wilde, Oscar on acting and actors   

"It is better to be beautiful than to be good, but it is better to be good than to be ugly."

Wilde, Oscar on beauty
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"Beauty is a form of genius -- is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection in dark water of that silver shell we call the moon."

Wilde, Oscar on beauty   

"I have found that all ugly things are made by those who strive to make something beautiful, and that all beautiful things are made by those who strive to make something useful."

Wilde, Oscar on beauty   

"As for begging, it is safer to beg than to take, but it is finer to take than to beg."

Wilde, Oscar on beggars   

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"The old believe everything; the middle aged suspect everything, and the young know everything."

Wilde, Oscar on belief
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