Chapter 2

"'Yes," continued Lord Henry, 'that is one of the great secrets of life-- to cure the soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of the soul.  You are a wonderful creation.  You know more that you think you know, just as you know less than you want to know.'"

In this passage, Wilde uses diction, paradoxes, and syntax.

Wildes choice of the words "wonderful creation" to describe Dorian Gray has a little bit of a religious connotation to it.  He is going back to the Bible's view that people are creations, and this is a holy characterization of Gray.  He is something that required time and thought to build.  However, there is also a negative aspect to being called a creation.  It is a little degrading to be called a creation.  It takes away the human essence from Gray.  He is so perfect that it is unnatural.

Wilde also uses two paradoxes.  The first is "to cure he soul by means of the senses, and the senses by means of the soul."  This sounds wrong because the soul is first the problem and then it is the remedy and vice versa with the senses.  However, it can be interpreted as meaning that Dorian Gray needs to use his senses and take in the world to garner some of that human essence he so lacks because of his other-worldliness.  I take the second part of the paradox to mean that Gray needs to stick with his soul, or his gut, and listen to what his heart tells him to do in order to stay alive, in order to keep his body in good shape.

The reverse parallelism in this paradox makes the line much more beautiful and profound. Throughout the book, Wilde writes in such a beautiful manner that is appropriate for his book on art.  This is what I believe to be one of his key purposes: to write beautifully, because this book is to him as a painting is to Basil.  Furthermore, the syntax of the line helps draw a distinction between the senses and the soul.  The soul represents the physical body and the soul is more the emotional body.  Both need to remain in balance and check the other in order for a body to properly function.  This mechanical like task also relates to the idea that Gray is a creation.  The unnatural way Gray is described correlates with the idea that Gray's body needs to regulate itself.

The second paradox, "You know more than you think you know, just as you know less than you want to know," discusses the subconscious versus the conscious mind.  How can a person know more than he thinks he knows?  If he is not conscious of this knowledge.  This paradox conveys Gray's obliviousness of his own mind.  He has been ignoring seeds of thought in his mind for so long that he has completely thrown some things into his subconscious.  This represents a struggle within Gray, a man with self conflict.  Gray doesn't know what he wants, or what he wants does not correlate with the things he believes he should want.  I think this idea will be an important one in the book.  It goes along with the previous paradox as the soul can be identified as the subconscious, and the senses are more real and more obvious the way the conscious mind is.  The second clause of the paradox portrays Gray's desire to know more about his subconscious and how he wants to address the things that lie there but cannot because of the boundaries set by version of him that is proper for society.  Within the paradox, Lord Henry uses the words "you" and "know" many times.  This creates a more flowing line and makes the paradox resemble a riddle in the convoluted way both the riddle and the paradox state things.  The repetition also adds to the beauty of the line. 

Drawing distinctions between two things seems to be common with Lord Henry.  He is the character that is always simplifying the world into two opposing sides.