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THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST, ACT 2 / 171 7
ALGERNON Australia? I'd sooner die.
CECILY
Well, he said at dinner on Wednesday night, that you would have to
choose between this world, the next world, and Australia.
ALGERNON
Oh, well! The accounts I have received of Australia and the next
world are not particularly encouraging. This world is good enough for me,
cousin Cecily.
CECILY
Yes, but are you good enough for it? ALGERNON I'm afraid I'm not that. That is why I want you to reform me. You might make that your mission, if you don't mind, cousin Cecily.
CECILY
I'm afraid I've no time, this afternoon.
ALGERNON
Well, would you mind my reforming myself this afternoon? CECILY It is rather Quixotic of you. But I think you should try. ALGERNON I will. I feel better already. CECILY
You are looking a little worse. ALGERNON That is because I am hungry. CECILY How thoughtless of me. I should have remembered that when one is
going to lead an entirely new life, one requires regular and wholesome
meals. Won't you come in?
ALGERNON
Thank you. Might I have a buttonhole6 first? I never have any
appetite unless I have a buttonhole first. CECILY A Marechal Niel?7 [Picks up scissors.] ALGERNON
No, I'd sooner have a pink rose. CECILY Why? [Cuts a flower.] ALGERNON
Because you are like a pink rose, cousin Cecily. CECILY I don't think it can be right for you to talk to me like that. Miss Prism never says such things to me. ALGERNON Then Miss Prism is a shortsighted old lady, [CECILY puts the rose in his buttonhole.] You are the prettiest girl I ever saw.
CECILY
Miss Prism says that all good looks are a snare.
ALGERNON
They are a snare that every sensible man would like to be caught
in. CECILY Oh! I don't think I would care to catch a sensible man. I shouldn't know what to talk to him about.
[The)' pass into the house, MISS PRISM and DR. CHASUBLE return.]
MISS PRISM
YOU are too much alone, dear Dr. Chasuble. You should get mar
ried. A misanthrope I can understand?a womanthrope, never! CHASUBLE [With a scholar's shudder.]8 Believe me, I do not deserve so neologistic a phrase. The precept as well as the practice of the Primitive Church9
was distinctly against matrimony. MISS PRISM [Sententiously.] That is obviously the reason why the Primitive Church has not lasted up to the present day. And you do not seem to realize,
dear Doctor, that by persistently remaining single, a man converts himself
into a permanent public temptation. Men should be more careful; this very
celibacy leads weaker vessels astray.
6. I.e., a flower to wear in the buttonhole of his rect word for woman hater, misogynist, she has coat lapel. coined her own term, one that is etymologically 7. A chrome-yellow variety of rose named after nonsensical. Adolphe Niel (1802-1869), one of the generals of 9. The early Christian Church, of the 1st to 4th Napoleon III. centuries. 8. He shudders because instead of using the cor
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1 1718 / OSCAR WILDE
CHASUBLE
But is a man not equally attractive when married?
MISS PRISM
NO married man is ever attractive except to his wife. CHASUBLE
