Quotes from Oscar Wilde

It is possible, of course, that I may exaggerate about them. I certainly hope that I do; for where there is no exaggeration there is no love, and where there is no love there is no understanding. It is only about things that do not interest one, that one can give a really unbiassed opinion; and this is no doubt the reason why an unbiassed opinion is always valueless.

All those who come in contact with his [Christ's] personality, even though they may neither bow to his altar or kneel before his priest, in some way find that the ugliness of their sin is taken away and the beauty of their sorrow is revealed to them.

As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination.When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular.

I want the dead lovers of the world to hear our laughter, and grow sad. I want a breath of our passion to stir dust into consciousness, to wake their ashes into pain.

I'm really very sorry, but it is not my fault. People are so annoying. All my pianists look exactly like poets, and all my poets look exactly like pianists

What odd chaps you painters are! You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. A portrait like this would set you far above all the young men in England, and make the old men jealous, if old men are ever capable of any emotion.

My own personality has become a burden to me. I want to escape, to go away, to forget.

For the past is what man should not have been.  The present is what man ought not to be.  The future is what artists are.

each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. it merely intensifies it.

Hear no evil, speak no evil, and you'll never be invited to a party.

Ah, Robbie, when we are dead and buried in our porphyry tombs, and the trumpet of the Last Judgement is sounded, I shall turn and whisper to you, 'Robbie, Robbie, let us pretend we do not hear it.

The art of living. The only really Fine Art we have produced in modern times.