a thoughtful web.
Good ideas and conversation. No ads, no tracking.   Login or Take a Tour!
comment by rezzeJ
rezzeJ  ·  2742 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: 24th Fortnightly Quotality

    "[...]Ah! Lord Henry, I wish you would tell me how to become young again."

    He thought for a moment. "Can you remember any great error that you committed in your early days, Duchess?" he asked, looking at her across the table.

    "A great many, I fear," she cried.

    "Then commit them over again," he said gravely. "To get back one's youth, one has merely to repeat one's follies."

    "A delightful theory!" she exclaimed. "I must put it into practice."

    "A dangerous theory!" came from Sir Thomas's tight lips. Lady Agatha shook her head, but could not help being amused. Mr. Erskine listened.

    "Yes," he continued, "that is one of the great secrets of life. Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes."

Oscar Wilde's A Picture of Dorian Gray.