Quotes from Oscar Wilde

Come down, O Christ, and help me! reach thy hand For I am drowning in a stormier sea Than Simon on thy lake of Galilee: The wine of life is spilt upon the sand, My heart is as some famine-murdered land Whence all good things have perished utterly, And well I know my soul in Hell must lie If this night before God's throne should stand.

I am quite content with philosophic contemplation. But, as the nineteenth century has gone bankrupt through an over-expenditure of sympathy, I would suggest that we should appeal to science to put us straight. The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray, and the advantage of science is that it is not emotional.

The only way to behave to a woman is to make love to her, if she is pretty, and to some one else, if she is plain.

Death is the brother of Sleep, is he not?

The whole of Japan is a pure invention. There is no such country, there are no such people.

O we are wearied of this sense of guilt, Wearied of pleasure's paramour despair, Wearied of every temple we have built, Wearied of every unanswered right, unanswered prayer, For man is weak; God sleeps: and heaven is high: One fiery-colored moment: one great love: and lo! we die.

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all. The nineteenth century dislike of realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass. The nineteenth century dislike of romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass. The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium

I don't think there is a woman in the world who would not be a little flattered if one made love to her. It is that which makes women so irresistibly adorable.

Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession of a good chef ... Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees...

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.

what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose'-how does the quotation run?-'his own soul'?

You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?" He shook his head. "To-night she is Imogen," he answered, "and to-morrow night she will be Juliet." "When is she Sibyl Vane?" "Never." "I congratulate you.