Everything is dangerous, my dear fellow. If it wasn't so, life wouldn't be worth living.
Oscar WildeRead
To disagree with three-fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Disagreeing with the majority can be a sign of rational thinking.
In this quote, Oscar Wilde suggests that holding a contrary opinion to a large portion of the population may indicate a healthy state of mind. It implies that critical thinking and individuality are essential, and that mere conformity to popular opinion may not necessarily lead to truth or sanity.
Themes
DisagreementSanityIndividualityOpinionTruth
In practice
Example use cases
During a debate about social issues where many people have similar views, this quote can emphasize the importance of dissenting opinions.
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
Never forget that there are only two philosophies to rule your life: the one of the cross, which starts with the fast and ends with the feast. The other of Satan, which starts with the feast and ends with the headache.
Fulton J. SheenRead
To every people the land is given on condition. Perceived or not, there is a Covenant, beyond the constitution, beyond sovereign guarantee, beyond the nation's sweetest dreams of itself.
Leonard CohenRead
A little flesh, a little breath, and a Reason to rule all - that is myself.
Marcus AureliusRead
The correct description is that we try every day to become more humble when we talk about divinity, we try to realize how little we know and how open minded we should be.
John TempletonRead
Every moment a taste of that beauty in our mouths, another stashed in a pocket. Impossible to say what: no cypress so handsome, no sunlight, a lonely hiddenness. Other pleasure gathers a crowd, starts a fight, lots of noise there. But soul beauty stays quiet..his amazing whereabouts unknown inside my heart.
RumiRead
Arrakis teaches the attitude of the knife - chopping off what's incomplete and saying: "Now it's complete because it's ended here."
Frank HerbertRead