I could only laugh at him and advise him to read "The Picture of Dorian Gray."

This book, however, gave Oscar's puritanic enemies a better weapon against him
than even "The Portrait of Mr. W. H." The subject, they declared, was the same
as that of "Mr. W. H.," and the treatment was simply loathsome. More than one
middle-class paper, such as "To-Day" in the hands of Mr. Jerome K. Jerome,
condemned the book as "corrupt," and advised its suppression. Freedom of speech
in England is more feared than licence of action: a speck on the outside of the
platter disgusts your puritan, and the inside is never peeped at, much less
discussed.

Walter Pater praised "Dorian Gray" in the "Bookman"; but thereby only did
himself damage without helping his friend. Oscar meanwhile went about boldly,
meeting criticism now with smiling contempt.

One incident from this time will show how unfairly he was being judged and how
imprudent he was to front defamation with defiance.

One day I met a handsome youth in his company named John Gray, and I could not
wonder that Oscar found him interesting, for Gray had not only great personal
distinction, but charming manners and a marked poetic gift, a much greater gift
than Oscar possessed. He had besides an eager, curious mind, and of course
found extraordinary stimulus in Oscar's talk. It seemed to me that intellectual
sympathy and the natural admiration which a younger man feels for a brilliant
senior formed the obvious bond between them. But no sooner did Oscar republish
"Dorian Gray" than ill-informed and worse-minded persons went about saying that
the eponymous hero of the book was John Gray, though "Dorian Gray" was written
before Oscar had met or heard of John Gray. One cannot help admitting that this
was partly Oscar's own fault. In talk he often alluded laughingly to John Gray