Moreover, love at its highest is independent of sex and sensuality.  Since Luther we have been living in a centrifugal movement, in a wild individualism where all ties of love and affection have been loosened, and now that the centripetal movement has come into power we shall find that in another fifty years or so friendship and love will win again to honor and affinities of all sorts will proclaim themselves without shame and without fear.  In this sense Oscar might have regarded himself as a forerunner and not as a survival or “sport.”  And it may well be that some instinctive feeling of this sort was at the back of his mind though too vague to be formulated in words.  For even in our dispute (see Page 500) he pleaded that the world was becoming more tolerant, which, one hopes, is true.  To become more tolerant of the faults of others is the first lesson in the religion of Humanity.

The End.

A letter from Lord Alfred Douglas to Oscar Wilde that I reproduce here speaks for itself and settles once for all, I imagine, the question of their relations.  Had Lord Alfred Douglas not denied the truth and posed as Oscar Wilde’s patron, I should never have published this letter though it was given to me to establish the truth.  This letter was written between Oscar’s first and second trial; ten days later Oscar Wilde was sentenced to two years imprisonment with hard labor.

FRANK HARRIS.

HOTEL DES DEUX MONDES
22, Avenue de l’Opera, 22
PARIS
Wednesday, May 15, 1895.

My darling Oscar: 

Have just arrived here.

It seems too dreadful to be here without you, but I hope you will join me next week.  Dieppe was too awful for anything; it is the most depressing place in the world, even Petits Chevaux was not to be had as the Casino was closed.  They are very nice here, and I can stay as long as I like without paying my bill which is a good thing, as I am quite penniless.

The proprietor is very nice and most sympathetic; he asked after you at once and expressed his regret and indignation at the treatment you had received.  I shall have to send this by a cab to the Gare du Nord to catch the post as I want you to get it first post to-morrow.

I am going to see if I can find Robert Sherard to-morrow if he is in
Paris.

Charlie is with me and sends you his best love.

I had a long letter from More (Adey) this morning about you.  Do keep up your spirits, my dearest darling.  I continue to think of you day and night and I send you all my love.

I am always your own loving and devoted boy.

BOSIE.

This letter now published for the first time is the most characteristic I received from Oscar Wilde in the years after his imprisonment.  It dates I think from the winter of 1897, say some eight months after his release.  F.H.

HOTEL DE NICE
Rue des Beaux Arts
PARIS