Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
Oscar WildeRead
When the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that fulfilling our desires may lead to negative consequences.
Oscar Wilde's quote emphasizes the idea that when we receive what we wish for, especially through prayers, it may not be a blessing but rather a punishment in disguise. It reflects on the notion that longing and desire can lead us to situations that may seem favorable but could ultimately result in unforeseen challenges or suffering. Thus, it invites reflection on the nature of our desires and the potential pitfalls that come with their fulfillment.
Themes
DesirePrayersConsequencesWisdomPunishment
In practice
Example use cases
During a philosophical discussion about the nature of wishes and consequences.
More from Oscar Wilde
All quotes βLondon is too full of fogs and serious people. Whether the fogs produce the serious people, or whether the serious people produce the fogs, I don't know.
Oscar WildeRead
When one has never heard a man's name in the course of one's life, it speaks volumes for him; he must be quite respectable.
Oscar WildeRead
Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.
Oscar WildeRead
A truth ceases to be true when more than one person believes in it.
Oscar WildeRead
His morality is all sympathy, just what morality should be
Oscar WildeRead
Similar quotes
To suggest things may be going on in our brains that we aren't fully conscious of, that we unknowingly make classist, sexist and racist presumptions... Well, there just aren't many comfortable ways to take that. And in the face of discomfort comes the mask of defence.
Michaela CoelRead
Masonry is too great an institution to have been made in a day, much less by a few men, but was a slow evolution through long time, unfolding its beauty as it grew. Indeed, it was like one of its own cathedrals which one generation of builders wrought and vanished, and another followed, until, amidst vicissitudes of time and change, of decline and revival, the order itself became a temple of Freedom and Fraternity.
Joseph Fort NewtonRead
It is not funny that anything else should fall down; only that a man should fall down. Why do we laugh? Because it is a gravely religious matter: it is the Fall of Man. Only man can be absurd: for only man can be dignified.
Gilbert K. ChestertonRead
A fanatic commits to an ideal to whatever end. A fanatic throws everything aside to pursue their idea. Take something which it would be good to be committed to, like basic human rights. You might campaign for such a thing. You might spend every day of your life pursuing such a thing. But once you become fanatical about it, anything can happen.
Douglas MurrayRead
The transformation of silence into language and action is an act of self-revelation .
Audre LordeRead
Contemplate the extent and stability of the heavens, and then at last cease to admire worthless things.
BoethiusRead