Oscar Wilde was an Irish playwright, novelist, poet, and critic. He is best known for his witty epigrams and plays such as The Picture of Dorian Gray and The Importance of Being Earnest. He was a leading figure in the Aesthetic Movement of the late 19th century and is remembered for his biting social commentary on Victorian society. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Oscar Wilde on love, love and marriage, life.
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.
Everyone may not be good, but there's always something good in everyone. Never judge anyone shortly because every saint has a past and every sinner has a future.
Anybody can sympathise with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature to sympathise with a friend's success.
Never love anyone who treats you like you're ordinary.
I don't want to go to heaven. None of my friends are there.
Oscar Wilde inspirational quote
Oscar Wilde Image Quotes
Women are made to be loved, not understood. — Oscar Wilde
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. — Oscar Wilde
I don't want to go to heaven. None of my friends are there. — Oscar Wilde
Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. The consciousness of loving and being loved brings a warmth and a richness to life that nothing else can bring. — Oscar Wilde
In love, it is better to know and be disappointed, than to not know and always wonder. — Oscar Wilde
WIth freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy.
I love to talk about nothing. It's the only thing I know anything about. — Oscar Wilde
Women are meant to be loved, not to be understood. — Oscar Wilde
The man who says his wife can't take a joke, forgets that she took him. — Oscar Wilde
Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. — Oscar Wilde
Loveless marriages are horrible. But there is one thing worse than an absolutely loveless marriage. A marriage in which there is love, but on one side only; faith, but on one side only; devotion, but on one side only, and in which of the two hearts one is sure to be broken. — Oscar Wilde
Those whom the gods love grow young. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Love And Marriage
Marriage is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. Second marriage is the triumph of hope over experience. — Oscar Wilde
There is one thing worse than an absolutely loveless marriage: a marriage in which there is love, but on one side only. — Oscar Wilde
What a fuss people make about fidelity! Why, even in love it is purely a question for physiology. It has nothing to do with our own will. Young men want to be faithful, and are not; old men want to be faithless, and cannot: that is all one can say. — Oscar Wilde
The proper basis for marriage is mutual misunderstanding. The happiness of a married man depends on the people he has not married. One should always be in love - that's the reason one should never marry. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Life
There are moments when one has to choose between living one's own life, fully, entirely, completely-or dragging out some false, shallow, degrading existence that the world in its hypocrisy demands. — Oscar Wilde
Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won't expect it back. — Oscar Wilde
Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing. — Oscar Wilde
What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise — Oscar Wilde
Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace. — Oscar Wilde
If you are not too long, I will wait here for you all my life. — Oscar Wilde
Art provides the language we need to appreciate life. — Oscar Wilde
I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being good all the time. That would be hypocrisy. — Oscar Wilde
Gwendolen, it is a terrible thing for a man to find out suddenly that all his life he has been speaking nothing but the truth. Can you forgive me? — Oscar Wilde
Life is too short to learn German — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Marriage
Ultimately the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is conversation. — Oscar Wilde
Young men want to be faithful, and are not. Old men want to be faithless, and cannot. — Oscar Wilde
They flaunt their conjugal felicity in one's face, as if it were the most fascinating of sins. — Oscar Wilde
Bigamy ? It's having one wife too much...
...Monogamy ? It's the same. — Oscar Wilde
To speak frankly, I am not in favour of long engagements. They give people the opportunity of finding out each other's character before marriage, which I think is never advisable. — Oscar Wilde
How marriage ruins a man! It is as demoralizing as cigarettes, and far more expensive. — Oscar Wilde
It is he who has broken the bond of marriage -- not I. I only break its bondage. — Oscar Wilde
The husbands of very beautiful women belong to the criminal classes. — Oscar Wilde
London is full of women who trust their husbands. One can always recognize them. They look so thoroughly unhappy. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Friendship
An acquaintance that begins with a compliment is sure to develop into a real friendship. — Oscar Wilde
Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far the best ending for one. — Oscar Wilde
I always like to know everything about my new friends, and nothing about my old ones. — Oscar Wilde
It is a very dangerous thing to know one’s friends. — Oscar Wilde
Friendship never forgets. That is the wonderful thing about it. — Oscar Wilde
Friendship is far more tragic than love. It lasts longer. — Oscar Wilde
Ultimately the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is conversation, and conversation must have a common basis, and between two people of widely different culture the only common basis possible is the lowest level. — Oscar Wilde
What is the good of friendship if one cannot say exactly what one means? — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Writing
Every great man nowadays has his disciples, and it is usually Judas who writes the biography. — Oscar Wilde
From the point of view of literature Mr. Kipling is a genius who drops his aspirates. From the point of view of life, he is a reporter who knows vulgarity better than any one has ever known it. — Oscar Wilde
With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy? — Oscar Wilde
An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all. — Oscar Wilde
This morning I took out a comma and this afternoon I put it back in again. — Oscar Wilde
Anybody can write a three-volume novel. It merely requires a complete ignorance of both life and literature. — Oscar Wilde
His style is chaos illumined by flashes of lightning. As a writer he has mastered everything except language. — Oscar Wilde
He would stab his best friend for the sake of writing an epigram on his tombstone. — Oscar Wilde
Who am I to tamper with a masterpiece? — Oscar Wilde
Books are well written, or badly written. That is all. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Art
Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known. — Oscar Wilde
Beauty is a form of genius -- is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. — Oscar Wilde
The sign of a Philistine age is the cry of immorality against art. — Oscar Wilde
Art is the only serious thing in the world. And the artist is the only person who is never serious. — Oscar Wilde
As for borrowing Mr. Whistler's ideas about art, the only thoroughly original ideas I have heard him express have had reference to his own superiority as a painter over painters greater than himself. — Oscar Wilde
Beauty ...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. — Oscar Wilde
Popularity is the crown of laurel which the world puts on bad art. Whatever is popular is wrong. — Oscar Wilde
No great artist ever sees things as they really are, if he did he would cease to be an artist. — Oscar Wilde
All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. — Oscar Wilde
Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. — Oscar Wilde
Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world there are only individuals. — 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
Never speak disrespectfully of Society. Only people who can't get into it do that. — Oscar Wilde
The aim of the liar is simply to charm, to delight, to give pleasure. He is the very basis of civilized society. — Oscar Wilde
Thirty-five is a very attractive age. London society is full of women of the very highest birth who have, of their own free choice, remained thirty-five for years. — Oscar Wilde
The security of Society lies in custom and unconscious instinct, and the basis of the stability of Society, as a healthy organism, is the complete absence of any intelligence amongst its members. — Oscar Wilde
Oh, I love London Society! It is entirely composed now of beautiful idiots and brilliant lunatics. Just what Society should be. — Oscar Wilde
Other people are quite dreadful. The only possible society is oneself. — Oscar Wilde
For the canons of good society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is absolutely essential to it. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Death
The mystery of love is greater than the mystery of death. — Oscar Wilde
One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing. — Oscar Wilde
I am dying beyond my means. — Oscar Wilde
My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One of us has got to go. — Oscar Wilde
I am sick to death of cleverness. Everybody is clever nowadays. — Oscar Wilde
The Governor was strong upon
The Regulation Act:
The Doctor said that Death was but
A scientific fact:
And twice a day the Chaplain called,
And left a little tract. — Oscar Wilde
One can survive everything, nowadays, except death, and live down everything except a good reputation. — Oscar Wilde
Reported as Oscar Wilde's last words on his death bed... This wallpaper is killing me. One of us has to go. — Oscar Wilde
Biography lends to death a new terror. — Oscar Wilde
My own business always bores me to death; I prefer other people's. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Beauty
Lord Illingworth told me this morning that there was an orchid there as beautiful as the seven deadly sins. — Oscar Wilde
Crying is for plain women. Pretty women go shopping. — Oscar Wilde
Plain women are always jealous of their husbands. Beautiful women never are. They are always so occupied with being jealous of other women's husbands. — Oscar Wilde
Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. — 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
You love the beauty that you can see and touch and handle, the beauty that you can destroy, and do destroy, but of the unseen beauty of life, of the unseen beauty of a higher life, you know nothing. — Oscar Wilde
Schools should be the most beautiful place in every town and village-so beautiful that the punishment for undutiful children should be barred from going to school the following day. — Oscar Wilde
You are Beautiful when you are happy — Oscar Wilde
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. — Oscar Wilde
Genius lasts longer than Beauty. That accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate ourselves. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About Witty
A man who does not think for himself does not think at all. — Oscar Wilde
I don't at all like knowing what people say of me behind my back. It makes me far too conceited. — Oscar Wilde
I never forget a face, but in your case I'll make an exception. — Oscar Wilde
Women, as some witty Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always prevent us from carrying them out. — Oscar Wilde
It is always a silly thing to give advice, but to give good advice is absolutely fatal. — Oscar Wilde
Most modern calendars mar the sweet simplicity of our lives by reminding us that each day that passes is the anniversary of some perfectly uninteresting event. — Oscar Wilde
I won't belong to a club that accepts me as a member — Oscar Wilde
If you want to be witty, say what you think at all times — Oscar Wilde
It is a curious fact that people are never so trivial as when they take themselves seriously — Oscar Wilde
Genius is born-not paid — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Quotes About People
People may fail many times, but they become failures only when they begin to blame someone else. Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. — Oscar Wilde
It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious. — Oscar Wilde
Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation. — Oscar Wilde
Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people. — Oscar Wilde
There are only two kinds of people who are really fascinating - people who know absolutely everything, and people who know absolutely nothing. — Oscar Wilde
It is only shallow people who require years to get rid of an emotion. A man who is master of himself can end a sorrow as easily as he can invent a pleasure. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them. — Oscar Wilde
Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast. — Oscar Wilde
People fashion their God after their own understanding. They make their God first and worship him afterwards. — Oscar Wilde
The well-bred contradict other people. The wise contradict themselves. — Oscar Wilde
We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell. — Oscar Wilde
The books that the world calls immoral are the books that show the world its own shame. — Oscar Wilde
After the first glass, you see things as you wish they were. After the second, you see things as they are not. Finally, you see things as they really are, and that is the most horrible thing in the world. — Oscar Wilde
To do nothing at all is the most difficult thing in the world, the most difficult and the most intellectual. — Oscar Wilde
Simple pleasures are the last healthy refuge in a complex world. — 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
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
A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing. — Oscar Wilde
The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history. — Oscar Wilde
To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be respectable. — Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde Famous Quotes And Sayings
Women are made to be loved, not understood. — Oscar Wilde
If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing well. If it is worth having, it is worth waiting for. If it is worth attaining, it is worth fighting for. If it is worth experiencing, it is worth putting aside time for. — Oscar Wilde
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. — Oscar Wilde
I don't want to go to heaven. None of my friends are there. — Oscar Wilde
Religion is like a blind man looking in a black room for a black cat that isn't there, and finding it. — Oscar Wilde
We live in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities. — Oscar Wilde
To be natural is such a very difficult pose to keep up. — Oscar Wilde
True friends stab you in the front. — Oscar Wilde
The final mystery is oneself. When one has weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens star by star, there still remains oneself. Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul? — Oscar Wilde
The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future. — Oscar Wilde
No man is rich enough to buy back his past. — 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
What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise — Oscar Wilde
Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. — Oscar Wilde
Two men look out a window. One sees mud, the other sees the stars. — Oscar Wilde
Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. — Oscar Wilde
Be yourself; everyone else is already taken. — Oscar Wilde
The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple. — Oscar Wilde
If you are not too long, I will wait here for you all my life. — Oscar Wilde
Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes. — Oscar Wilde
Murder is always a mistake. One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner. — 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
Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious. — Oscar Wilde
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. — Oscar Wilde
A pessimist is somebody who complains about the noise when opportunity knocks. — Oscar Wilde
A man's face is his autobiography. A woman's face is her work of fiction. — Oscar Wilde
The English country-gentleman galloping after a fox — the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable. — Oscar Wilde
Rugby is a good occasion for keeping thirty bullies far from the center of the city. — Oscar Wilde
Don't be afraid. There are exquisite things in store for you. This is merely the beginning. — Oscar Wilde
Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known. — Oscar Wilde
I can resist everything except temptation. — Oscar Wilde
Success is a science; if you have the conditions, you get the result. — Oscar Wilde
After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one's own relations. — Oscar Wilde
Everybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching. — Oscar Wilde
I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them. — Oscar Wilde
An excellent man; he has no enemies; and none of his friends like him. — Oscar Wilde
A man who does not think for himself does not think at all. — Oscar Wilde
A grapefruit is just a lemon that saw an opportunity and took advantage of it. — Oscar Wilde
A good friend will always stab you in the front. — Oscar Wilde
The old believe everything, the middle-aged suspect everything, the young know everything. — Oscar Wilde
Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. — Oscar Wilde
A red rose is not selfish because it wants to be a red rose. It would be horribly selfish if it wanted all the other flowers in the garden to be both red and roses. — Oscar Wilde
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. — Oscar Wilde
Work is the curse of the drinking classes. — Oscar Wilde
If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all. — Oscar Wilde
Every woman is a rebel. — Oscar Wilde
To define is to limit. — Oscar Wilde
Punctuality is the thief of time — Oscar Wilde
Women have a wonderful instinct about things. They can discover everything except the obvious. — Oscar Wilde
Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else. — Oscar Wilde
Hearts Live By Being Wounded — Oscar Wilde
It seems to me that we all look at Nature too much, and live with her too little. — Oscar Wilde
Nowadays, saying what you really think can be a serious error since one risks being misunderstood. — Oscar Wilde
Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow. — Oscar Wilde
Life Lessons by Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde taught that it is important to live life to the fullest and not be afraid to take risks. He also emphasized the importance of being true to oneself and staying true to one's values.
He also showed that it is important to be kind and generous and to treat others with respect and compassion.
Finally, Wilde taught us to not take ourselves too seriously, to enjoy the little things in life, and to not be afraid to laugh at ourselves.
Citation
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