Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
Oscar WildeRead
By persistently remaining single a man converts himself into a permanent public temptation.
Interpretation
Remaining single can attract unwanted attention and be seen as a challenge or temptation by others.
Oscar Wilde's quote suggests that a man who chooses to stay single for an extended period may inadvertently become an object of desire for others, drawing attention to himself and possibly complicating his social interactions. The idea highlights the societal perceptions of single individuals and how their status can spark intrigue and temptation in those around them.
In practice
In a speech about modern relationships, one might quote Wilde to emphasize the complexity of being single.
Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
London 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.
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.
Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance.
A truth ceases to be true when more than one person believes in it.
His morality is all sympathy, just what morality should be
I was young I was so young it hurt like a knife inside because there was no alternative except to hide as long as possible--- not in self-pity but with dismay at my limited chance: trying to connect.
Tracy is more a help to me than I am to her.
Handshaking means, 'I don't have a weapon.'
I don't have any children, so I've decided to claim all the future freedom-fighters and hell-raisers as my kin.
But with a sigh he had released her hand, while she was so lost in the fantasy that she hadn't felt it go away, as if he'd known the best moment to let go.
But Catherine did not know her own advantages - did not know that a good-looking girl, with an affectionate heart and a very ignorant mind, cannot fail of attracting a clever young man, unless circumstances are particularly untoward.
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