Basil Hallward – Character Quotes

I worshipped you too much. I am punished for it. You worshipped yourself too much. We are both punished.

An artist should create beautiful things, but should put nothing of his own life into them.

When I leave town now I never tell my people where I am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, I daresay, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance into one's life.

It was a confession. Now that I have made it, something seems to have gone out of me. Perhaps one should never put one's worship into words.

It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him.

No man came across two ideal things. Few come across one.

Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man's face. It cannot be concealed.

I really can't exhibit it. I have put too much of myself into it.

I feel that I have given away my whole soul to someone who treats it as if it were a flower to put in his coat, a bit of decoration to charm his vanity, an ornament for a summer's day.

"Are you serious?"
"Quite serious, Basil. I should be miserable if I thought I should ever be more serious than I am at the present moment."

When I like people immensely I never tell their names to anyone. It is like surrendering a part of them.

My heart shall never be put under their microscope.

People talk sometimes of secret vices. There are no such things. If a wretched man has a vice, it shows itself in the lines of his mouth, the droop of his eyelids, the moulding of his hands even.

"Dorian is far too wise not to do foolish things now and then, my dear Basil."
"Marriage is hardly a thing that one can do now and then, Harry."

The world is wide, and has many marvellous people in it.