but had
Mr. O'Connor really thought that the production, such as it is, was mine,
he would naturally have asked my permission before publishing it. Great
licence of comment and attack of every kind is allowed nowadays to
newspapers, but no respectable editor would dream of printing and
publishing a man's work without first obtaining his consent.

Mr. O'Connor's subsequent conduct in accusing me of plagiarism, when it
was proved to him on unimpeachable authority that the verses he had
vulgarly attributed to me were not by me at all, I have already commented
on. It is perhaps best left to the laughter of the gods and the sorrow
of men. I would like, however, to point out that when Mr. O'Connor, with
the kind help of his assistant editor, states, as a possible excuse for
his original sin, that he and the members of his staff 'took refuge' in
the belief that the verses in question might conceivably be some very
early and useful work of mine, he and the members of his staff showed a
lamentable ignorance of the nature of the artistic temperament. Only
mediocrities progress. An artist revolves in a cycle of masterpieces,
the first of which is no less perfect than the last.

In conclusion, allow me to thank you for your courtesy in opening to me
the columns of your valuable paper, and also to express the hope that the
painful expose of Mr. O'Connor's conduct that I have been forced to make
will have the good result of improving the standard of journalistic
ethics in England.--I remain, Sir, your obedient servant,

OSCAR WILDE.
WORTHING, September 22.

THE GREEN CARNATION

(Pall Mall Gazette, October 2, 1894.)

To the Editor of the Pall Mall Gazette.

SIR,--Kindly allow me to contradict, in the most emphatic manner, the
suggestion, made in your issue of Thursday last, and since then copied
into many other newspapers, that I am the author of The Green Carnation.

I invented that magnificent flower. But with the middle-class and
mediocre book that usurps its strangely beautiful name I have, I need
hardly say, nothing whatsoever to do. The flower is a work of art. The
book is not.--I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, OSCAR WILDE.

WORTHING, October 1.

PHRASES AND PHILOSOPHIES FOR THE USE OF THE YOUNG

(Chameleon, December 1894 )

The first duty in life is to be as artificial as possible. What the
second duty is no one has as yet discovered.

Wickedness is a myth invented by good people t