Oscar Wilde

“The suspense is terrible. I hope it will last.”

“If you are not long, I will wait for you all my life.”

“All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does, and that is his.”

“Oh, brothers! I don't care for brothers. My elder brother won't die, and my younger brothers seem never to do anything else.”

“To give an accurate description of what has never occurred is not merely the proper occupation of the historian, but the inalienable privilege of any man of parts and culture.”

“Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes.”

“Misfortunes one can endure--they come from outside, they are accidents. But to suffer for one's own faults--ah!--there is the sting of life.”

“Millionaire models are rare enough; but, by Jove, model millionaires are rarer still!”

“I am not young enough to know everything.”

“I have nothing to declare except my genius.”

“Where there is sorrow, there is holy ground.”

“The man who could call a spade a spade should be compelled to use one.”

“Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.”

“Credit is a young man's capital.”

“Indeed I have always been of the opinion that hard work is simply the refuge of people who have nothing to do.”

“Morality is simply the attitude we adopt towards people we personally dislike.”

“She...can talk brillantly upon any subject provided she knows nothing about it.”

“America has never quite forgiven Europe for having been discovered somewhat earlier in history than itself.”

“Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast.”

“The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.”

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

“Cheap editions of great books may be delightful, but cheap editions of great men are absolutely detestable”

“To lose one parent, Mr. Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.”

“It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible....”

“All art is quite useless.”

“Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them.”

“It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious.”

“I think God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability.”

“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.”

“Yes: I am a dreamer. For 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.”

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.”

“It is what you read when you don't have to that determines what you will be when you can't help it.”

“Quotation is a serviceable substitute for wit.”

“In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing.”

“I can believe anything provided it is incredible.”

“You can never be overdressed or overeducated.”

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

“I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.”

“You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit.”

“A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.”

“One has a right to judge a man by the effect he has over his friends.”

“One should never trust a woman who tells one her real age. A woman who would tell one that would tell one anything.”

“Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault. Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope. They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only Beauty. There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.”

“Who, being loved, is poor?”

“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”

“One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards.”

“I never read a book I must review; it prejudices you so.”

“The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly - that is what each of us is here for.”

“Music makes one feel so romantic - at least it always gets on one's nerves - which is the same thing nowadays.”

“To disagree with three-fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity.”