Like two doomed ships that pass in storm we had crossed each other's way: but we made no sign, we said no word, we had no word to say.

Cleverness becomes a public nuisance.

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?

How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being.

When I think of all the harm [the Bible] has done, I despair of ever writing anything to equal it.

What the worm was to the corpse, his sins would be to the painted image on the canvas. They would mar its beauty, and eat away its grace. they would defile it, and make it shameful. And yet the thing would still live on. It would be always alive. (Dorian Gray regarding his portrait)

To be natural is such a very difficult pose to keep up.