Jack? . . . No, there is very little music in the name Jack, if any at all, indeed. It does not thrill. It produces absolutely no vibrations . . . I have known several Jacks, and they all, without exception, were more than usually plain. Besides, Jack is a notorious domesticity for John! And I pity any woman who is married to a man called John. She would probably never be allowed to know the entrancing pleasure of a single moment’s solitude. The only really safe name is Ernest.

Aestheticism is a search after the signs of the beautiful. It is the science of the beautiful through which men seek the correlation of the arts. It is, to speak more exactly, the search after the secret of life.

In fact, now you mention the subject, I have been very bad in my own small way. I don't think you should be so proud of that, though I am sure it must have been very pleasant.

It is always a silly thing to give advice, but to give good advice is absolutely fatal.

I am sorry my life is so marred and maimed by extravagance. But I cannot live otherwise. I, at any rate, pay the penalty of suffering.

Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific laws.

"There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is immoral — immoral from the scientific point of view." "Why?" "Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul."