"When people talk to us about others..." - Quote by Oscar Wilde
When people talk to us about others they are usually dull. When they talk to us about themselves they are nearly always interesting.
More by Oscar Wilde
“Punctuality is the thief of time”
“LADY BRACKNELL Algernon is an extremely, I may almost say an ostentatiously, eligible young man. He has nothing, but he looks everything. What more can one desire?”
“The honest ratepayer and his healthy family have no doubt often mocked at the dome-like forehead of the philosopher, and laughed over the strange perspective of the landscape that lies beneath him. If they really knew who he was, they would tremble. For Chuang Tsǔ spent his life in preaching the great creed of Inaction, and in pointing out the uselessness of all things.”
More on Conversation
“My dear Algy, you talk exactly as if you were a dentist. It is very vulgar to talk like a dentist when one isn't a dentist. It produces false impression”
“She had lost the art of conversation but not, unfortunately, the power of speech.”
“Musical people always want one to be perfectly dumb at the very moment when one is longing to be perfectly deaf.”
More on Self Interest
“A great many men's gratitude is nothing but a secret desire to hook in more valuable kindnesses hereafter.”
“While the gentleman cherishes benign rule, the small man cherishes his native land. While the gentleman cherishes a respect for the law, the small man cherishes generous treatment.”
“When he has the power to see things detached from self-interest and from the insistent claims of the lust of the senses, then alone can he have the true vision of the beauty that is everywhere.”