Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
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.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The absence of someone's name suggests that they are likely a person of high regard and respect.
Oscar Wilde's quote suggests that if a person has not heard of someone's name throughout their life, it may indicate that this individual is quite respectable. Instead of being notorious or controversial, a lack of recognition might imply a dignified life led in an honorable manner, where the individual is valued but perhaps not in the public eye.
Themes
RespectReputationDignityNameHonor
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of living a respectable life.
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
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
Intellectual generalities are always interesting, but generalities in morals mean absolutely nothing.
Oscar WildeRead
Similar quotes
The truly great man is he who would master no one, and who would be mastered by none.
Khalil GibranRead
One of the things that I've come to understand is that as I talk a lot about Picard, what I find is that I'm talking about myself.
Patrick StewartRead
It may be that there is no such thing as an equable motion, whereby time may be accurately measured. All motions may be accelerated or retarded, but the true, or equable, progress of absolute time is liable to no change.
Isaac NewtonRead
No revolution is worth anything unless it can defend itself.
Vladimir LeninRead
Once established, reputations do not easily change.
Albert BanduraRead
After one has been in prison, it is the small things that one appreciates: being able to take a walk whenever one wants, going into a shop and buying a newspaper, speaking or choosing to remain silent. The simple act of being able to control one's person.
Nelson MandelaRead