Quotes about Society

Do you smoke? Jack.  Well, yes, I must admit I smoke. Lady Bracknell.  I am glad to hear it.  A man should always have an occupation of some kind. 

The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such a basis that poverty will be impossible.

Sin is the only color- element left in modern life.

Gwendolen.  How absurd to talk of the equality of the sexes!  Where questions of self-sacrifice are concerned, men are infinitely beyond us.

My dear fellow, it isn't easy to be anything nowadays. 

Examinations, sir, are pure humbug from beginning to end. If a man is a gentleman, he knows quite enough, and if he is not a gentleman, whatever he knows is bad for him.

My dear fellow, the way you flirt with Gwendolen is perfectly disgraceful. It is almost as disgraceful as the way Gwendolen flirts with you.

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...

My duty as a gentleman has never interfered with my pleasures in the smallest degree.

The world has been made by fools that wise men may live in it. Women

are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.

However, I don't propose to discuss politics, sociology, or metaphysics with you. I like persons better than principles, and I like persons with no principles better than anything else in the world.