Oscar Wilde Quotes

I'm not going to just say nice things about everybody unless I mean it.

Men sometimes think they hate flattery, but they hate only the manner of flattering.

Sometimes we think we dislike flattery, but it is only the way it is done that we dislike.

Flattery is a juggler, and no kin unto sincerity.

Just praise is only a debt, but flattery is a present.

False praise is worse than no praise.

The hardest thing about being famous is that people are always nice to you. You're in a conversation and everybody's agreeing with what you're saying - even if you say something totally crazy. You need people who can tell you what you don't want to hear.

Every time someone says, 'You know, we really ought to get together,' if I were really honest, I would ask 'Why?'

It's so much easier to tell people what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear.

It is better to be sincere in one language than to be a twit in two.

Flattery makes friends and truth makes enemies

Some people say things they think you want to hear, and some people say the things they are actually thinking.

The same man cannot be both Friend and Flatterer.

To be flattered is grateful, even when we know that our praises are not believed by those who pronounce them; for they prove, at least, our power, and show that our favour is valued, since it is purchased by the meanness of falsehood.

If there is no honesty, there is no relationship. The only degree to which there is a relationship is the degree to which you are honest. Expressing your clear desires does not make you a dictator and you telling what you think, feel, and what you want or don’t want, is just called being honest. It doesn't control him at all. You’re trying to control others by withholding information by not getting involved and by not being honest. Withholding information is a form of manipulation. It is dishonest and it’s destructive to a relationship.

I have written letters that are failures, but I have written few, I think, that are lies. Trying to reach a person means asking the same question over and over again: Is this the truth, or not? I begin this letter to you, then, in the western tradition. If I understand it, the western tradition is: Put your cards on the table.

Maybe it was mean, but I really don't think so. You asked for the truth and I told you.

No adulation; 'tis the death of virtue; Who flatters, is of all mankind the lowest Save he who courts the flattery.

What is the good of friendship if one cannot say exactly what one means?

I think in general I personally have a tendency to protect other people's feelings, and I've noticed that becomes a major hindrance to communication. It's better to just be honest, even if it's painful.

Flattery won't hurt you if you don't swallow it.

We have a name for those who try to praise when they have no pleasure in the object. We call them hypocrites.

What signifies protesting so against flattery when a person speaks well of one, it must either be true or false, you know if true, let us rejoice in his good opinion if he lies, it is a proof at least that he loves more to please me, than to sit s