I had been foolish in imagining that I had seen anything in it, more than that you were extremely good looking, and that I could paint.

I have never met any really wicked person before. I feel rather frightened. I am so afraid he will look just like everyone else.

he loathed his own beauty, and flinging the mirror on the floor, crushed it into silver splinters beneath his heel. It was his beauty that had ruined him, his beauty and the youth that he had prayed for. But for those two things, his life might have been free from stain. His beauty had been to him but a mask, his youth but a mockery. What was youth at best? A green, an unripe time, a time of shallow moods, and sickly thoughts. Why had he worn its livery? Youth had spoiled him.

That's always seemed so ridiculous to me, that people would want to be around someone because they're pretty. It's like picking your breakfast cereals based on color instead of taste.

The only way to behave to a woman is to make love to her, if she is pretty, and to some one else, if she is plain.

I don't think there is a woman in the world who would not be a little flattered if one made love to her. It is that which makes women so irresistibly adorable.

Society--civilized society, at least--is never very ready to believe anything to the detriment of those who are both rich and fascinating. It feels instinctively that manners are of more importance than morals, and, in its opinion, the highest respectability is of much less value than the possession of a good chef ... Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees...

How sad it is! murmured Dorian Gray with his eyes still fixed upon his own portrait. How sad it is! I shall grow old, and horrible, and dreadful. But this picture will remain always young. It will never be older than this particular day of June.... If it were only the other way! If it were I who was to be always young, and the picture that was to grow old! For that--for that--I would give everything! Yes, there is nothing in the whole world I would not give! I would give my soul for that!

are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.

Appearance is, in fact, a matter of effect merely, and it is with the effects of nature that you have to deal, not with the real condition of the object.

Academic training in beauty is a sham. When we love a woman, we don't start measuring her legs.

Wanting to look good to others is also a form of the desire of the eyes.