oscar wilde

The wit and wisdom of Wilde

• Those who see any difference between soul and body have neither.

• I am not in favour of long engagements. They give people the opportunity of finding out each other’s character before marriage.

• One’s real life is often the life that one does not lead. I see an intimate connection between the life of Christ and the life of the artist. Christ’s place indeed is with the poets.

• I can resist everything except temptation.

• We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

• It is the confession, not the priest, that gives us absolution.

• The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.

• There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.

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

• Nothing makes one so vain as being told that one is a sinner.

• In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.

• What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

• Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.

• What a pity that in life we only get our lessons when they are of no use to us.