“There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.”

—  Oscar Wilde

Variant: There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.

Last update Sept. 27, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up." by Oscar Wilde?
Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde 812
Irish writer and poet 1854–1900

Related quotes

George Meredith photo

“How many a thing which we cast to the ground,
When others pick it up, becomes a gem!”

George Meredith (1828–1909) British novelist and poet of the Victorian era

St. 41.
Compare: "Once in a golden hour / I cast to earth a seed. Up there came a flower, The people said, a weed", Alfred Tennyson, The Flower.
Modern Love http://www.ev90481.dial.pipex.com/Meredith/modern_love.htm (1862)

Henry David Thoreau photo
Neil Gaiman photo
Mark Rowley photo

“The people who have done the most ghastly things overseas, the ones who don't fight to the death, we would all like to see them never able to do anyone any harm ever again. Locking them up and throwing away the key would be a great idea.”

Mark Rowley (1964) British police officer

Far-right terror threat 'growing' in UK as four plots foiled https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-43200966 BBC News (26 February 2018)

Derren Brown photo
Anna Sewell photo
John Steinbeck photo
Jenny Han photo
John Steinbeck photo
Arthur C. Clarke photo

“Democracy is our most important possession. If we throw it away when the going gets tough, we might never get it back.”

Source: 2000s and posthumous publications, A Time Odyssey, Sunstorm (2005), Chapter 24, “BDO” (p. 182)

Related topics