Quotes About Oscar Wilde

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 among them. That is the reason why agitators are so absolutely necessary.

Love is wiser than Philosophy, though he is wise, and mightier than Power, though he is mighty... His lips are sweet as honey, and his breath is like frankincense.

And how delightful other people's emotions were!-much more delightful than their ideas, it seemed to him. One's own soul, and the passions of one's friends-those were the fascinating things in life.

At the present moment I am eating muffins because I am unhappy. Besides, I am particularly fond of muffins.

Unconsciously he defines for me the lines of a fresh new school, a school that is to have in it all the passion of the romantic spirit, all the perfection of the spirit that is Greek. The harmony of soul and body - how much that is! We in our madness have separated the two, and have invented a realism that is vulgar, an ideality that is void. Harry! If only you knew what Dorian Gray is to me!

What on earth you are serious about I haven't got the remotest idea.  About everything, I should fancy.  You have such an absolutely trivial nature.

I cannot repeat an emotion. No one can, except sentimentalists.

Cecily: "Miss Prism says that all good looks are a snare" Algernon: "They are a snare that every sensible man would like to be caught in." Cecily: "Oh, I don't think I would care to catch a sensible man. I shouldn't know what to talk to him about.

Really the answers I get are idiotic. The entire correspondence of you and Robbie with me should be published. The best title would be Letters from Two Idiots to a Lunatic, I should fancy.

She is at rest. Peace, peace, she cannot hear, Lyre or sonnet, All my life's buried here, Heap earth upon it.

Colonel. Can she read and write?   Peter. Ay, that she can, sir. Colonel. Then she is a dangerous woman.

He was prisoned in thought. Memory, like a horrible malady, was eating his soul away.

Do you smoke? Jack.  Well, yes, I must admit I smoke. Lady Bracknell.  I am glad to hear it.  A man should always have an occupation of some kind.  There are far too many idle men in London as it is. 

I turned halfway round, and saw Dorian Gray for the first time. When our eyes met, I felt that I was growing pale. A curious sensation of terror came over me. I knew that I had come face to face with someone whose mere personality was so fascinating that, if I allowed it do so, it would absorb my whole nature, my whole soul, my very art itself.

Have some bread and butter. The bread and butter is for Gwendolen. Gwendolen is devoted to bread and butter.

Intellect is in itself an exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid.

From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor's craft is the type.

Why, my dear Basil, he is a Narcissus, and you—well, of course you have an intellectual expression, and all that. But beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself an exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of any face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid.

Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry. Except in America, rejoined Lord Henry, languidly.

For his mourners will be outcast men, And outcasts always mourn.

really don't see anything romantic in proposing. It is very romantic to be in love. But there is nothing romantic about a definite proposal. Why, one may be accepted. One usually is, I believe. Then the excitement is all over. The very essence of romance is uncertainty. If ever I get married, I'll certainly try to forget the fact.

I remember having read somewhere, in some strange book, that when the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.

The Americans are an extremely interesting people. They are absolutely reasonable. I think that is their distinguishing characteristic...I assure you there is no nonsense about the Americans.

I shall write it in my diary to-night What? That a burnt child loves the fire