63 Oscar Wilde Quotes on Psychology

Oscar Wilde quotes on psychology

19. He is really not so ugly after all, provided, of course, that one shuts one's eyes, and does not look at him.

26. Tell me, when you are alone with him [ Max Beerbohm ] Sphinx, does he take off his face and reveal his mask?

28. It is always the unreadable that occurs.

47. 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.

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

55. Conscience and cowardice are really the same things.

56. A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies.

57. Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know.

60. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it.

61. The one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties.

62. Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. The sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. It is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the coloured canvas, reveals himself.

64. Now, the value of an idea has nothing whatsoever to do with the sincerity of the man who expresses it. Indeed, the probabilities are that the more insincere the man is, the more purely intellectual will the idea be, as in that case it will not be coloured by either his wants, his desires, or his prejudices.

66. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat.

68. He knew the precise psychological moment when to say nothing.

69. The only difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that the caprice lasts a little longer.

73. I always like to know everything about my new friends, and nothing about my old ones.

74. The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray:

80. People are very fond of giving away what they need most themselves.

84. There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.

85. Then she paused. A rose shook in her blood and shadowed her cheeks. Quick breath parted the petals of her lips. They trembled. A southern wind of passion swept over her and stirred the dainty folds of her dress. 'I love him', she said simply.

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

88. To be in love is to surpass one's self.

89. The basis of optimism is sheer terror.

90. Conscience makes egotists of us all.

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

92. You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit.

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

94. I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them.

    Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

110. I am the only person in the world I should like to know thoroughly.

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

117. Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.

126. Even the disciple has his uses. He stands behind one's throne, and at the moment of one's triumph whispers in one's ear that, after all, one is immortal.

128. Ambition is the last refuge of the failure.

131. Only the shallow know themselves.

133. The old believe everything; the middle-aged suspect everything; the young know everything.

134. To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.

142. I suppose society is wonderfully delightful. To be in it is merely a bore. But to be out of it simply a tragedy.

144. Mrs. Arbuthnot: [quoting Lord Illingworth from the first act] Children love their parents. Eventually they come to judge them. Rarely do they forgive them.

146. Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone.

151. All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his.

153. I have invented an invaluable permanent invalid called Bunbury, in order that I may be able to go down into the country whenever I choose.

167. The absence of old friends one can endure with equanimity. But even a momentary separation from anyone to whom one has just been introduced is almost unbearable.

197. Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live.

200. Closed eyes listen, afraid to see on their own. Easily influenced and simply conformed.

203. The only thing that one really knows about human nature is that it changes. Change is the one quality we can predicate of it.

205. I never saw a man who looked With such a wistful eye Upon that little tent of blue Which prisoners call the sky.

206. When a voice behind me whispered low, 'That fellow's got to swing.'

207. Yet each man kills the thing he loves By each let this be heard, Some do it with a bitter look, Some with a flattering word, The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword!

209. Something was dead in each of us, And what was dead was Hope.

210. And the wild regrets, and the bloody sweats, None knew so well as I: For he who lives more lives than one More deaths than one must die.

211. And alien tears will fill for him Pity's long-broken urn, For his mourners will be outcast men, And outcasts always mourn.

212. I know not whether Laws be right, Or whether Laws be wrong; All that we know who lie in gaol Is that the wall is strong; And that each day is like a year, A year whose days are long.

213. The vilest deeds like poison weeds Bloom well in prison air; It is only what is good in man That wastes and withers there; Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate And the Warder is Despair.

215. How else but through a broken heart May Lord Christ enter in?

217. A thing is, according to the mode in which one looks at it.

220. We are specially designed to appeal to the sense of humour.

221. We are the zanies of sorrow. We are clowns whose hearts are broken.

222. When one has weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens, there still remains oneself. Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?

224. Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.

227. Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

231. My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us has to go.

233. I don't recognize you - I've changed a lot.

251. Why was I born with such contemporaries?