Pagina 264 de 490

He shuddered, and for a moment he regretted that he had not told

Basil the true reason why he had wished to hide the picture away.

Basil would have helped him to resist Lord Henry's influence, and

the still more poisonous influences that came from his own

temperament. The love that he bore him-for it was really love-had

nothing in it that was not noble and intellectual. It was not

that mere physical admiration of beauty that is born of the

senses and that dies when the senses tire. It was such love as

Michelangelo had known, and Montaigne, and Winckelmann, and

Shakespeare himself. Yes, Basil could have saved him. But it was

too late now. The past could always be annihilated. Regret,

denial, or forgetfulness could do that. But the future was

inevitable. There were passions in him that would find their

terrible outlet, dreams that would make the shadow of their evil

real.