De Profundis
1905
De Profundis, written by Oscar Wilde and first published in 1905, is an epistolary reflection composed during his imprisonment. The work explores themes of suffering, guilt, and existential contemplation as Wilde reflects on his past life of excess and the lessons learned in solitude. He examines the transformative power of love and sorrow, arguing that true understanding and artistic expression arise from profound pain rather than indulgence. This introspective meditation on the complexities of the human experience highlights the necessity of suffering as a path to enlightenment.
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“Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.””
— Oscar Wilde
“Hearts are made to be broken.””
— Oscar Wilde
“With freedom, flowers, books, and the moon, who could not be perfectly happy?””
— Oscar Wilde
“The most terrible thing about it is not that it breaks one’s heart”
— Oscar Wilde
“To regret one’s own experiences is to arrest one’s own development. To deny one’s own experiences is to put a lie into the lips of one’s own life. It is no less than a denial of the soul.””
— Oscar Wilde
“The only people I would care to be with now are artists and people who have suffered: those who know what beauty is, and those who know what sorrow is: nobody else interests me.””
— Oscar Wilde
“When you really want love, you will find it waiting for you.””
— Oscar Wilde
“The final mystery is oneself. When one has weighed the sun in the balance, and measured the steps of the moon, and mapped out the seven heavens star by star, there still remains oneself. Who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?””
— Oscar Wilde
“The gods are strange. It is not our vices only they make instruments to scourge us. They bring us to ruin through what in us is good, gentle, humane, loving.””
— Oscar Wilde
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Wilde, Oscar. De Profundis. Lex, lex-books.com/book/de-profundis-be9d7661-94c0-4617-9f79-ce1850af4e66.Wilde, O. (1905). De Profundis. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/de-profundis-be9d7661-94c0-4617-9f79-ce1850af4e66Wilde, Oscar. De Profundis. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/de-profundis-be9d7661-94c0-4617-9f79-ce1850af4e66.
