The Wit and Wisdom of Oscar Wilde, Page 6

  —Wilde, as quoted by an audience member at a lecture, San Francisco [OW]

  LADY BASILDON: I hate being educated!

  MRS. MARCHMONT: So do I. It puts one almost on a level with the commercial classes …

  —An Ideal Husband, Act 1

  I am afraid that you have been listening to the conversation of someone older than yourself. That is always a dangerous thing to do, and if you allow it to degenerate into a habit, you will find it absolutely fatal to any intellectual development.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 1

  … everybody who is incapable of learning has taken to teaching …

  —“The Decay of Lying”

  To tell people what to read is as a rule either useless or harmful, for the true appreciation of literature is a question of temperament, not of teaching, to Parnassus there is no primer, and nothing that one can learn is ever worth learning. But to tell people what not to read is a very different matter, and I venture to recommend it as a mission to the University Extension Scheme.

  —“To Read, or Not to Read”

  With your quick sympathies, your delicate intuition, and your enthusiasm, you could teach wonderfully. You have the power of making others love you, which is the first essential of a teacher.

  —Letter [November 14, 1885]

  Why should not degrees be granted for good acting? Are they not given to those who misunderstand Plato and who mistranslate Aristotle?

  —“Henry the Fourth at Oxford”

  I can fancy a man who had led a perfectly commonplace life, hearing by chance some curious piece of music, and suddenly discovering that his soul, without his being conscious of it, had passed through terrible experiences, and known fearful joys, or wild romantic loves, or great renunciations.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 1

  As regards erudition, it is always difficult, even for the most modest of us, to remember that other people do not know quite as much as one does oneself.

  —Letter [June 26, 1890]

  We become lovers when we see Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet makes us students. The blood of Duncan is upon our hands, with Timon we rage against the world, and when Lear wanders out upon the heath the terror of madness touches us. Ours is the white sinlessness of Desdemona, and ours, also, the sin of Iago. Art, even the art of fullest scope and widest vision, can never really show us the external world. All that it shows us is our own soul, the one world of which we have any real cognizance. And the soul itself, the soul of each one of us, is to each one of us a mystery. It hides in the dark and broods, and consciousness cannot tell us of its workings. Consciousness, indeed, is quite inadequate to explain the contents of personality. It is Art, and Art only, that reveals us to ourselves.

  —“The Portrait of Mr. W. H.”

  … after reading the “Comedie Humaine” one begins to believe that the only real people are the people who have never existed. … A steady course of Balzac reduces our living friends to shadows, and our acquaintances to the shadows of shades.

  —“Balzac in English”

  “In examinations, the foolish ask questions that the wise cannot answer.”

  —Wilde, as quoted in conversation [OW]

  “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.”

  —Lord Fermor, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 3

  Chapter 10

  THE MASK OF STYLE

  Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 2

  In all unimportant matters, style, not sincerity, is the essential. In all important matters, style, not sincerity, is the essential.

  —“Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young”

  “I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.”

  —Wilde as quoted in conversation [POW]

  I never smoke. My dressmaker wouldn’t like it, and a woman’s first duty in life is to her dressmaker, isn’t it? What the second duty is, no one has as yet discovered.

  —Mrs. Cheveley, An Ideal Husband, Act 3

  Costume is a growth, an evolution, and a most important, perhaps the most important, sign of the manners, customs, and mode of life of each century.

  —“Pen, Pencil and Poison”

  “With an evening coat and a white tie, as you told me once, anybody, even a stock-broker, can gain a reputation for being civilized.”

  —Basil Hallward, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 1

  LORD GORING: I am glad you have called. I am going to give you some good advice.

  MRS. CHEVELEY: Oh! pray don’t. One should never give a woman anything that she can’t wear in the evening.

  —An Ideal Husband, A ct 3

  … she wore far too much rouge last night, and not quite enough clothes. That is always a sign of despair in a woman.

  —Lord Goring, An Ideal Husband, Act 2

  “It’s personalities, not principles, that move the age.”

  —Wilde as quoted in conversation [POW]

  To the world I seem, by intention on my part, a dilettante and dandy merely—it is not wise to show one’s heart to the world—and as seriousness of manner is the disguise of the fool, folly in its exquisite modes of triviality and indifference and lack of care is the robe of the wise man.

  —Letter [c. February 12, 1894]

  “Basil Hallward is what I think I am: Lord Henry what the world thinks of me: Dorian what I would like to be—in other ages, perhaps.”

  —Wilde, as quoted in conversation, regarding characters from The Picture of Dorian Gray[OW]

  … there is a great deal of good in Lord Augustus. Fortunately it is all on the surface. Just where good qualities should be.

  —Mrs. Erlynne, Lady Windermere’s Fan, Act 2

  “He fascinated everybody who was worth fascinating, and a great many people who were not.”

  —“The Portrait of Mr. W. H.”

  “You are an extraordinary fellow. You never say a moral thing, and you never do a wrong thing. Your cynicism is simply a pose.”

  “Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know …”

  —Basil Hallward and Lord Henry, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 1

  It is awfully hard work doing nothing. However, I don’t mind hard work where there is no definite object of any kind.

  —Algernon, The Importance of Being Earnest, Act 1

  Pain, unlike pleasure, wears no mask.

  —De Profundis

  I don’t play accurately—anyone can play accurately—but I play with wonderful expression. As far as the piano is concerned, sentiment is my forte.

  —Algernon, The Importance of Being Earnest, Act 1

  … you’ve wonderfully good taste, Ernest. It’s the excuse I’ve always given for your leading such a bad life.

  —Cecily, The Importance of Being Earnest, Act 2

  One should not look at anything. Neither at things, nor at people should one look. Only in mirrors is it well to look, for mirrors do but show us masks.

  —Herod, Salomé

  “I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious or marvelous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it.”

  —Basil Hallward, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 1

  Ah! it is so easy to convert others. It is so difficult to convert oneself. To arrive at what one really believes, one must speak through lips different from one’s own.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 2

  “I love acting. It is so much more real than life.”

  —Lord Henry, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 6

  “It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.”

  —Lord Henry, The Pictu
re of Dorian Gray, Ch. 2

  Is insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is merely a method by which we can multiply our personalities.

  —The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 11

  One should either be a work of art, or wear a work of art.

  —“Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young”

  Chapter 11

  CIVILIZED SOCIETY

  Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their life a mimicry, their passions a quotation.

  —De Profundis

  Oh, nowadays so many conceited people go about Society pretending to be good, that I think it shows rather a sweet and modest disposition to pretend to be bad. … If you pretend to be good, the world takes you very seriously. If you pretend to be bad, it doesn’t. Such is the astounding stupidity of optimism.

  —Lord Darlington, Lady Windermere’s Fan, Act 1

  You believe good of everyone, Jane. It is a great fault.

  —Lady Caroline, A Woman of No Importance, Act 1

  … the aim of the liar is simply to charm, to delight, to give pleasure. He is the very basis of civilized society …

  —“The Decay of Lying”

  Nothing pains me except stupidity and morality.

  —Letter [November 18, 1893]

  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.

  —Lord Darlington, Lady Windermere’s Fan, Act 1

  I find that forgiving one’s enemies is a most curious morbid pleasure; perhaps I should check it.

  —Letter [c. April 20, 1894]

  Men are such cowards. They outrage every law of the world, and are afraid of the world’s tongue.

  —Lady Windermere, Lady Windermere’s Fan, Act 3

  “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.”

  —Lord Henry, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 2

  Society, civilized society, at least, is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and fascinating.

  —The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 11

  “… anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they stagnate.”

  —Lord Henry, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Ch. 19

  As long as war is regarded as wicked it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 2

  If we lived long enough to see the results of our actions, it may be that those who call themselves good would be sickened with a dull remorse, and those whom the world calls evil stirred by a noble joy. Each little thing that we do passes into the great machine of life, which may grind our virtues to powder and make them worthless, or transform our sins into elements of a new civilization, more marvellous and more splendid than any that has gone before.

  —Gilbert, The Critic as Artist, Part 1

  … after a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations.

  —Lady Caroline, A Woman of No Importance, Act 2

  Ordinary cruelty is simply stupidity. It is the entire want of imagination. It is the result in our days of stereotyped systems of hard-and-fast rules, and of stupidity. Wherever there is centralisation there is stupidity.

  —Letter [May 27, 1897]

  There is only one class in the community that thinks more about money than the rich, and that is the poor. The poor can think of nothing else. That is the misery of being poor.

  —“The Soul of Man under Socialism”

  We are often told that the poor are grateful for charity. Some of them are, no doubt, but the best amongst the poor are never grateful. … Charity they feel to be a ridiculously inadequate mode of partial restitution, or a sentimental dole, usually accompanied by some impertinent attempt on the part of the sentimentalist to tyrannize over their private lives.

  —“The Soul of Man under Socialism”

  “To be Greek one should have no clothes: to be medieval one should have no body: to be modern one should have no soul.”

  —Wilde, as quoted in conversation [OW]

  If one could only teach the English how to talk, and the Irish how to listen, society here would be quite civilized.

  —Mrs. Cheveley, An Ideal Husband, Act 3

  Oh, I love London Society! I think it has immensely improved. It is entirely composed now of beautiful idiots and brilliant lunatics. Just what Society should be.

  —Mabel Chiltern, An Ideal Husband, Act 1

  … to disagree with three-fourths of the British public on all points is one of the first elements of sanity, one of the deepest consolations in all moments of spiritual doubt.

  —“The English Renaissance of Art”

  “The Catholic church is for saints and sinners alone. For respectable people the Anglican Church will do.”

  —Wilde, as quoted in conversation [OW]

  The French can treat any subject with wit, and where one laughs there is no immorality; immorality and seriousness begin together.

  —Letter [May 25, 1898]

  Other people are quite dreadful. The only possible society is oneself.

  —Lord Goring, An Ideal Husband, Act 3

  Chapter 12

  AMERICA AND AMERICANS

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

  —“The American Invasion”

  There is no such thing as a stupid American. Many Americans are horrid, vulgar, intrusive, and impertinent, just as many English people are also; but stupidity is not one of the national vices. Indeed, in America there is no opening for a fool. They expect brains even from a boot-black, and get them.

  —“The American Man”

  From its earliest years, every American child spends most of its time in correcting the faults of its father and mother …

  —“The American Invasion”

  The prairie reminded me of a piece of blotting-paper.

  —“Impressions of America”

  … no American child is ever blind to the deficiencies of its parents, no matter how much it may love them.

  —“The American Invasion”

  Warned by the example of her mother that American women do not grow old gracefully, she tries not to grow old at all, and often succeeds.

  —“The American Invasion”

  The Americans are certainly great hero-worshipers, and always take their heroes from the criminal classes.

  —Letter [April 19, 1882]

  … the great success of marriage in the States is due partly to the fact that no American wife is considered responsible for the quality of her husband’s dinners.

  —“The American Man”

  … American girls have a wonderful charm, and, perhaps, the chief secret of their charm is that they never talk seriously, except to their dressmaker, and never think seriously, except about amusements.

  —“The American Invasion”

  Even the American freedom of divorce, questionable though it undoubtedly is on many grounds, has at least the merit of bringing into marriage a new element of romantic uncertainty. When people are tied together for life they too often regard manners as a mere superfluity, and courtesy as a thing of no moment; but where the bond can be easily broken, its very fragility makes its strength, and reminds the husband that he should always try to please, and the wife that she should never cease to be charming.

  —“The American Man”

  All Americans
do dress well. They get their clothes in Paris.

  —Lady Hunstanton, A Woman of No Importance, Act 1

  The first thing that struck me on landing in America was that if the Americans are not the most well-dressed people in the world, they are the most comfortably dressed.

  —“Impressions of America”

  LADY CAROLINE: These American girls carry off all the good matches. Why can’t they stay in their own country? They are always telling us it is the Paradise of women.

  LORD ILLINGTON: It is, Lady Caroline. That is why, like Eve, they are so extremely anxious to get out of it.

  —A Woman of No Importance, Act 1

  I was disappointed with Niagara—most people must be disappointed with Niagara. Every American bride is taken there, and the sight of the stupendous waterfall must be one of the earliest, if not the keenest, disappointments in American married life.