Good resolutions are useless attempts to interfere with scientific laws. Their origin is pure vanity. Their result is absolutely nil. They give us, now and then, some of those luxurious sterile emotions that have a certain charm for the weak…They are simply checks that men draw on a bank where they have no account.
– Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Chapter 8. Lord Henry says this after listening to Dorian’s excuses for resolving too late to reconcile with Sibyl – Dorian complained that the tragedy of her death had prevented him from doing what was right. Henry dismisses good resolutions as "pure vanity."