“I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about it's use. It is hitting below the intellect.”

“How dreadful!" cried Lord Harry. "I can stand brute force, but brute reason is quite unbearable. There is something unfair about its use. It is hitting below the intellect.”

“Sir John's temper since he has taken seriously to politics has become quite unbearable. Really, now that the House of Commons is trying to become useful, it does a great deal of harm.”

“Pray don't talk to me about the weather, Mr. Worthing. Whenever people talk to me about the weather, I always feel quite certain that they mean something else. And that makes me quite nervous.”

“Never met such a Gorgon . . . I don't really know what a Gorgon is like, but I am quite sure that Lady Bracknell is one. In any case, she is a monster, without being a myth, which is rather unfair.”

“My dear fellow, I am not quite serious. But I can't help detesting my relations. I suppose it comes from the fact that none of us can stand other people having the same faults as ourselves.”

“It often happens that the real tragedies of life occur in suchan inartistic manner that they hurt us by their crude violence, theirabsolute incoherence, their absurd want of meaning, their entire lackof style. They affect us just as vulgarity affects us. They give usan impression of sheer brute force, and we revolt against that.Sometimes, however, a tragedy that possesses artistic elements ofbeauty crosses our lives. If these elements of beauty are real, thewhole thing simply appeals to our sense of dramatic effect. Suddenlywe find that we are no longer the actors, but the spectators of theplay. Or rather we are both. We watch ourselves, and the mere wonderof the spectacle enthralls us.”