is a very poor consolation to be told that the man who has
given one a bad dinner, or poor wine, is irreproachable in his private
life. Even the cardinal virtues cannot atone for half-cold entrees, as
Lord Henry remarked once, in a discussion on the subject, and there is
possibly a good deal to be said for his view. For the canons of good
society are, or should be, the same as the canons of art. Form is
absolutely essential to it. It should have the dignity of a ceremony,
as well as its unreality, and should combine the insincere character of
a romantic play with the wit and beauty that make such plays delightful
to us. Is insincerity such a terrible thing? I think not. It is
merely a method by which we can multiply our personalities.

Such, at any rate, was Dorian Gray's opinion. He used to wonder at the
shallow psychology of those who conceive the ego in man as a thing
simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a
being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform
creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and
passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies
of the dead. He loved to stroll through the gaunt cold picture-gallery
of his country house and look at the various portraits of those whose
blood flowed in his veins. Here was Philip Herbert, described by
Francis Osborne, in his Memoires on the Reigns of Queen Elizabeth and
King James, as one who was "caressed by the Court for his handsome
face, which kept him not long company." Was it young Herbert's life
that he sometimes led? Had some strange poisonous germ crept from body
to body till it had reached his own? Was it some dim sense of that
ruined grace that had made him so suddenly, and almost without cause,
give utterance, in Basil Hallward's studio, to the mad prayer that had
so changed his life? Here, in gold-embroidered red doublet, jewelled
surcoat, and gilt-edged ruff and wristbands, stood Sir Anthony Sherard,
with his silver-and-black armour piled at his feet. What had this
man's legacy been? Had the lover of Giovanna of Naples bequeathed him
some inheritance of sin and shame? Were his own actions merely the
dreams that the dead man had not dared to realize? Here, from the
fading canvas, smiled Lady Elizabeth Devereux, in her gauze hood, pearl
stomacher, and pink slashed sleeves. A flower was in her right hand,
and her left clasped an enamelled collar of white