Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of someone else's music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly—that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to one's self. Of course they are charitable. They feed the hungry, and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion—these are the two things that govern us. And yet, I believe that if one man were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream—I believe that the world would gain such a fresh impulse of joy that we would forget all the maladies of medievalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal—to something finer, richer, than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind, and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also. ~Oscar Wilde
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. ~Oscar Wilde
Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship. ~Oscar Wilde
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. ~Oscar Wilde
But we never get back our youth… The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. ~Oscar Wilde
Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them. ~Oscar Wilde
Conformity is the last refuge of the unimaginitive ~Oscar Wilde
Consistency is the hallmark of the unimaginative. ~Oscar Wilde
Crying is for plain women. Pretty women go shopping. ~Oscar Wilde
Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace. ~Oscar Wilde
Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance. ~Oscar Wilde
Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. ~Oscar Wilde
Each man kills the thing he loves. ~Oscar Wilde
Each of us has heaven and hell in him... ~Oscar Wilde
Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. ~Oscar Wilde
Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. ~Oscar Wilde
Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future. ~Oscar Wilde
Every woman is a rebel, and usually in wild revolt against herself. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything in moderation, including moderation. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything popular is wrong. ~Oscar Wilde
Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes. ~Oscar Wilde
Experience is one thing you can't get for nothing. ~Oscar Wilde
Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. ~Oscar Wilde
For one moment our lives met, our souls touched. ~Oscar Wilde
Friendship is far more tragic than love. It lasts longer. ~Oscar Wilde
He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends. ~Oscar Wilde
Hear no evil, speak no evil, and you won't be invited to cocktail parties. ~Oscar Wilde
Hearts Live By Being Wounded ~Oscar Wilde
How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being ~Oscar Wilde
How else but through a broken heart may Lord Christ enter in? ~Oscar Wilde
Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the cave-man had known how to laugh, History would have been different. ~Oscar Wilde
Behind every exquisite thing that existed, there was something tragic. ~Oscar Wilde
Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship. ~Oscar Wilde
Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. ~Oscar Wilde
But we never get back our youth… The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to. ~Oscar Wilde
Children begin by loving their parents; as they grow older they judge them; sometimes they forgive them. ~Oscar Wilde
Conformity is the last refuge of the unimaginitive ~Oscar Wilde
Consistency is the hallmark of the unimaginative. ~Oscar Wilde
Crying is for plain women. Pretty women go shopping. ~Oscar Wilde
Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace. ~Oscar Wilde
Deceiving others. That is what the world calls a romance. ~Oscar Wilde
Disobedience, in the eyes of any one who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion. ~Oscar Wilde
Each man kills the thing he loves. ~Oscar Wilde
Each of us has heaven and hell in him... ~Oscar Wilde
Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. ~Oscar Wilde
Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. ~Oscar Wilde
Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future. ~Oscar Wilde
Every woman is a rebel, and usually in wild revolt against herself. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything in moderation, including moderation. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything in the world is about sex except sex. Sex is about power. ~Oscar Wilde
Everything popular is wrong. ~Oscar Wilde
Experience is merely the name men gave to their mistakes. ~Oscar Wilde
Experience is one thing you can't get for nothing. ~Oscar Wilde
Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. ~Oscar Wilde
For one moment our lives met, our souls touched. ~Oscar Wilde
Friendship is far more tragic than love. It lasts longer. ~Oscar Wilde
He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends. ~Oscar Wilde
Hear no evil, speak no evil, and you won't be invited to cocktail parties. ~Oscar Wilde
Hearts Live By Being Wounded ~Oscar Wilde
How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being ~Oscar Wilde
How else but through a broken heart may Lord Christ enter in? ~Oscar Wilde
Humanity takes itself too seriously. It is the world's original sin. If the cave-man had known how to laugh, History would have been different. ~Oscar Wilde