THE TRUE VOICE OF CULTURE
Oscar Wilde
Society, which is the beginning and basis of
morals, exists simply for the concentration of human energy, and in order to
ensure its own continuance and healthy stability it demands, and no doubt
rightly demands, of each of its citizens that he should contribute some form of
productive labour to the common weal, and toil and travail that the day’s work
may be done. Society often forgives the criminal; it never forgives the
dreamer. The beautiful sterile emotions that art excites in us, are people
dominated by the tyranny of this dreadful social ideal that they are always
coming shamelessly up to one at private Views and other places that are open to
the general public, and saying in a loud stentorian voice, ‘what are you
thinking?’ is the only question that any single civilized being should ever be
allowed to whisper to another, They mean well, no doubt, these honest beaming
folk. Perhaps that is the reason why they are so excessively tedious. But
someone should teach them that while, in the opinion of society, contemplation
is the gravest sin of which any citizen can be guilty, in the opinion of the
highest culture it is the proper occupation of man.