Sayfa 448 / 490

"How fond you are of saying dangerous things, Harry! In the

present instance, you are quite astray. I like the duchess very

much, but I don't love her."

"And the duchess loves you very much, but she likes you less, so

you are excellently matched."

"You are talking scandal, Harry, and there is never any basis for

scandal."

"The basis of every scandal is an immoral certainty," said Lord

Henry, lighting a cigarette.

"You would sacrifice anybody, Harry, for the sake of an epigram."

"The world goes to the altar of its own accord," was the answer.

"I wish I could love," cried Dorian Gray with a deep note of

pathos in his voice. "But I seem to have lost the passion and

forgotten the desire. I am too much concentrated on myself. My

own personality has become a burden to me. I want to escape, to

go away, to forget. It was silly of me to come down here at all.

I think I shall send a wire to Harvey to have the yacht got

ready. On a yacht one is safe."