“You must have a cigarette. A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?”

“Good heavens! how marriage ruins a man! It's as demoralizing as cigarettes, and far more expensive.”

“The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly - that is what each of us is here for.”

“But don't you think one can be happy when on is married?Perfectly happy. But the happiness of a married man, my dear Gerald, depends on the people he has not married.But if one is in love?One should always be in love. That is the reason one should never marry.”

“From your silken hair to your delicate feet you are perfection to me. Pleasure hides love from us, but pain reveals it in its essence.”

“This ghastly state of things is what you call Bunburying, I suppose?Algernon. Yes, and a perfectly wonderful Bunbury it is. The most wonderful Bunbury I have ever had in my life.Jack. Well, you've no right whatsoever to Bunbury here.Algernon. That is absurd. One has a right to Bunbury anywhere one chooses. Every serious Bunburyist knows that.”

“What you have told me is quite a romance, a romance of art one might call it, and the worst of having a romance of any kind is that it leaves one so unromantic.”