The Picture of Dorian Gray

by Oscar Wilde

"anybody can be good in the country. There are no temptations there. That is the reason why people who live out of town are so absolutely uncivilized. Civilization is not by any means an easy thing to attain to. There are only two ways by which man can reach it. One is by being cultured, the other by being corrupt. Country people have no opportunity of being either, so they stagnate."

One should never do anything that one cannot talk about after dinner.

The things one feels absolutely certain about are never true. That is the fatality of faith, and the lesson of romance.

To get back my youth I would do anything in the world, except take exercise, get up early, or be respectable.