Oscar Wilde Quotes page 14 812 Quotes on Love, Forgiveness, Rebellion, and Embracing Your Unique Voice

“It is well for his peace that the saint goes to his martyrdom. He is spared the sight of the horror of his harvest.”

Algernon, Act II
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

“In married life, three is company, and two is none.”

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I

“Agitators are a set of interfering, meddling people, who come down to some perfectly contented class of the community, and sow the seeds of discontent amongst them. That is the reason why agitators are so absolutely necessary. Without them, in our incomplete state, there would be no advance towards civilisation.”

Algernon, Act I
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

“In examinations the foolish ask questions that the wise cannot answer.”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

Oscar Wilde book Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young

Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young (1894)

“I have never admitted that I am more than twenty-nine, or thirty at the most. Twenty-nine when there are pink shades, thirty when there are not.”

Oscar Wilde Lady Windermere's Fan

Mrs. Erlynne, Act IV
Lady Windermere's Fan (1892)

“There are three kinds of despots. There is the despot who tyrannises over the body. There is the despot who tyrannises over the soul. There is the despot who tyrannises over the soul and body alike. The first is called the Prince. The second is called the Pope. The third is called the People.”

“For Man's grim Justice goes its way,
And will not swerve aside:
It slays the weak, it slays the strong,
It has a deadly stride:
With iron heel it slays the strong,
The monstrous parricide!”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

Oscar Wilde book The Ballad of Reading Gaol

Pt. III, st. 19
The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898)

“I hear her hair has turned quite gold from grief”

“Indifference is the revenge the world takes on mediocrities.”

Algernon, Act I
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

Oscar Wilde Vera; or, The Nihilists

Vera; or, The Nihilists (1880)

“Lo! with a little rod
I did but touch the honey of romance —
And must I lose a soul's inheritance?”

“It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and live with her too little.”

Helas! http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/wilde/helas.html, l. 12-14 (1881)

Oscar Wilde book De Profundis

De Profundis (1897)

“When a man does exactly what a woman expects him to do she doesn't think much of him. One should always do what a woman doesn't expect, just as one should say what she doesn't understand.”

“When a voice behind me whispered low,
"That fellow's got to swing."”

Algernon, Act II
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

Oscar Wilde book The Ballad of Reading Gaol

Pt. I, st. 4
The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1898)

“There is always more brass than brains in an aristocracy.”

Oscar Wilde Vera; or, The Nihilists

Vera; or, The Nihilists (1880)

“He to whom the present is the only thing that is present, knows nothing of the age in which he lives.”

“Fashion is what one wears oneself. What is unfashionable is what other people wear.”

"Oscariana" (1907), Complete Works, p. 32 https://books.google.com/books?id=-CtXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA32

Oscar Wilde An Ideal Husband

Lord Goring, Act III
An Ideal Husband (1895)

“It is immoral to use private property in order to alleviate the horrible evils that result from the institution of private property.”

“Ah! That must be Aunt Augusta. Only relatives, or creditors, ever ring in that Wagnerian manner.”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891)

“I don't at all like knowing what people say of me behind my back. It makes me far too conceited.”

Algernon, Act I
The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

Oscar Wilde An Ideal Husband

Lord Goring, Act IV
An Ideal Husband (1895)

“To drift with every passion till my soul
Is a stringed lute on which all winds can play,
Is it for this that I have given away
Mine ancient wisdom, and austere control?
Methinks my life is a twice-written scroll
Scrawled over on some boyish holiday
With idle songs for pipe and virelay,
Which do but mar the secret of the whole.”

Oscar Wilde book Poems

"Hélas" (1881)
Poems (1881)

“If it took Labouchere three columns to prove that I was forgotten, then there is no difference between fame and obscurity.”

“Sooner or later we have all to pay for what we do.”

As quoted in The New-York Herald (12 August 1883) http://www.oscarwildeinamerica.org/quotations/fame-and-obscurity.html

Oscar Wilde An Ideal Husband

Mrs Chevely, Act I
An Ideal Husband (1895)

“Lady Hunstanton: But do you believe all that is written in the newspapers?
Lord Illingworth: I do. Nowadays it is only the unreadable that occurs.”

Oscar Wilde A Woman of No Importance

Act I
A Woman of No Importance (1893)

“Here we allow absolute freedom to the journalist and entirely limit the artist. English public opinion, that is to say, tries to constrain and impede and warp the man who makes things that are beautiful in effect, and compels the journalist to retail things that are ugly, or disgusting, or revolting in fact, so that we have the most serious journalists in the world and the most indecent newspapers.”

“It was a fatal day when the public discovered that the pen is mightier than the paving-stone, and can be made as offensive as the brickbat. They at once sought for the journalist, found him, developed him, and made him their industrious and well-paid servant. It is greatly to be regretted, for both their sakes. Behind the barricade there may be much that is noble and heroic. But what is there behind the leading-article but prejudice, stupidity, cant, and twaddle? And when these four are joined together they make a terrible force, and constitute the new authority.”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891) <br class="br">Source: Wilde, Oscar, (1891 / 1912) The Soul of Man Under Socialism, London, Arthur L. Humphreys. Retrieved from University of California Libraries Archive.org https://archive.org 13 February 2018 https://archive.org/details/soulofmanunderso00wildiala

“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.”

The Soul of Man Under Socialism (1891) <br class="br">Source: Wilde, Oscar, (1891 / 1912) The Soul of Man Under Socialism, London, Arthur L. Humphreys. Retrieved from University of California Libraries Archive.org https://archive.org 13 February 2018 https://archive.org/details/soulofmanunderso00wildiala

“Why, what a wonderful piece of luck! Here is a red rose! I have never seen any rose like it in all my life. It is so beautiful that I am sure it has a long Latin name.”

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part II

Oscar Wilde book The Happy Prince and Other Tales

"The Nightingale and the Rose"
The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888)

“Now, nothing should be able to harm a man except himself. Nothing should be able to rob a man at all. What a man really has, is what is in him. What is outside of him should be a matter of no importance.”