Oscar Wilde

Vulgarity is simply the conduct of other people.

London is full of women who trust their husbands. One can always recognize them. They look so thoroughly unhappy.

As a wicked man I am a complete failure. Why, there are lots of people who say I have never really done anything wrong in the whole course of my life. Of course they only say it behind my back.

Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attraction of others.

Vulgarity is the conduct of other people, just as falsehoods are the truths of other people.

In America the young are always ready to give to those who are older than themselves the full benefits of their inexperience.

Those whom the gods love grow young.

Whatever harsh criticisms may be passed on the construction of her sentences, she at least possesses that one touch of vulgarity that makes the whole world kin.

I have found that all ugly things are made by those who strive to make something beautiful, and that all beautiful things are made by those who strive to make something useful.

By persistently remaining single, a man converts himself into a permanent public temptation. Men should be more careful.

Nowadays, all the married men live like bachelors, and all the bachelors like married men.

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

As for begging, it is safer to beg than to take, but it is finer to take than to beg.

You should study the Peerage, Gerald. It is the one book a young man about town should know thoroughly, and it is the best thing in fiction the English have ever done.

I dislike arguments of any kind. They are always vulgar, and often convincing.

Art is not to be taught in Academies. It is what one looks at, not what one listens to, that makes the artist. The real schools should be the streets.

Arguments are to be avoided; they are always vulgar and often convincing.

The old believe everything; the middle aged suspect everything, and the young know everything.

The only difference between a caprice and a life-long passion is that the caprice lasts a little longer.

The suspense is terrible, I hope it will last.

Crying is the refuge of plain women but the ruin of pretty ones.

To be good, according to the vulgar standard of goodness, is obviously quite easy. It merely requires a certain amount of sordid terror, a certain lack of imaginative thought, and a certain low passion for middle-class respectability.

Beauty is a form of genius -- is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection in dark water of that silver shell we call the moon.

Self-denial is the shining sore on the leprous body of Christianity.

I dislike modern memoirs. They are generally written by people who have either entirely lost their memories, or have never done anything worth remembering.

Action is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.

The great events of life often leave one unmoved; they pass out of consciousness, and, when one thinks of them, become unreal. Even the scarlet flowers of passion seem to grow in the same meadow as the poppies of oblivion.

None of us can stand other people having the same faults as ourselves.

It is better to be beautiful than to be good, but it is better to be good than to be ugly.

I delight in men over seventy. They always offer one the devotion of a lifetime.