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Each of us has heaven and hell in him...
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Yes, there is a terrible moral in 'Dorian Gray' - a moral which the prurient will not be able to find in it, but it will be revealed to all whose minds are healthy. Is this an artistic error? I fear it is. It is the only error in the book.
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Society exists only as a mental concept; in the real world there are only individuals.
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When a love comes to an end, weaklings cry, efficient ones instantly find another love, and the wise already have one in reserve.
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Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won't expect it back.
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Divorces are made in Heaven.
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Nothing makes one so vain as being told one is a sinner. Conscience makes egotists of us all.
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The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means.
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With age comes wisdom, but sometimes age comes alone.
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Let us have no machine-made ornament at all; it is all bad and worthless and ugly.
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To have become a deeper man is the privilege of those who have suffered.
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When the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.
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Nothing that actually occurs is of the smallest importance.
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Romance lives by repetition, and repetition converts an appetite into an art. Besides, each time that one loves is the only time one has ever loved. Difference of object does not alter singleness of passion. It merely intensifies it. We can have in life but one great experience at best, and the secret of life is to reproduce that experience as often as possible.
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Life under a good government is rarely dramatic; life under a bad government is always so.
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Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more.
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My sweet rose, my delicate flower, my lily of lilies, it is perhaps in prison that I am going to test the power of love. I am going to see if I cannot make the bitter warders sweet by the intensity of the love I bear you. I have had moments when I thought it would be wise to separate. Ah! Moments of weakness and madness! Now I see that would have mutilated my life, ruined my art, broken the musical chords which make a perfect soul. Even covered with mud I shall praise you, from the deepest abysses I shall cry to you. In my solitude you will be with me.
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I quite agree with Dr. Nordau's assertion that all men of genius are insane, but Dr. Nordau forgets that all sane people are idiots.
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It is always with the best intentions that the worst work is done.
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Give me the luxuries and I can dispense with the necessities.
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In married life three is company and two none.
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At every single moment of one's life one is what one is going to be no less than what one has been.
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My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us has to go.
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Looking good and dressing well is a necessity. Having a purpose in life is not.