The Duchess of Padua Quotes

“I did not think I should be ever loved: do you indeed
Love me so much as now you say you do?

Ask of the sea-bird if it loves the sea,
Ask of the roses if they love the rain,
Ask of the little lark, that will not sing
Till day break, if it loves to see the day:
And yet, these are but empty images,
Mere shadows of my love, which is a fire
So great that all the waters of the main
Can not avail to quench it.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“Let those who have not walked as we have done,
In the red fire of passion, those whose lives
Are dull and colourless, in a word let those,
If any such there be, who have not loved,
Cast stones against you”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“People who shout so loud, my lords, do nothing; the only men I fear are silent men”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“Have you not sometimes noted,
When we unlock some long-disuséd room
With heavy dust and soiling mildew filled,
Where never foot of man has come for years,
And from the windows take the rusty bar,
And fling the broken shutters to the air,
And let the bright sun in, how the good sun
Turns every grimy particle of dust
Into a little thing of dancing gold?
Guido, my heart is that long-empty room,
But you have let love in, and with its gold
Gilded all life.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“I did not know it was such pain to die; I thought that life had taken all the agonies to itself.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“I like no law at all: Were there no law there'd be no law-breakers, So all men would be virtuous”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“Be not spendthrift of your honesty, But keep it to yourself”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“GUIDO

Ay! without love
Life is no better than the unhewn stone
Which in the quarry lies, before the sculptor
Has set the God within it. Without love
Life is as silent as the common reeds
That through the marshes or by rivers grow,
And have no music in them.

DUCHESS

Yet out of these
The singer, who is Love, will make a pipe
And from them he draws music; so I think
Love will bring music out of any life.
Is that not true?”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“Duke

If you are poor,
Are you not blessed in that? Why, poverty
Is one of the Christian virtues,

[Turns to the Cardinal.]

Is it not?
I know, Lord Cardinal, you have great revenues,
Rich abbey-lands, and tithes, and large estates
For preaching voluntary poverty.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“we women never know our lovers till they leave us.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua

“Love is merely passion with a holy name.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Duchess of Padua