It was a novel without a plot and with only one character, being, indeed, simply a psychological study of a certain young Parisian who spent his life trying to realize in the nineteenth century all the passions and modes of thought that belonged to every century except his own…loving for their mere artificiality those renunciations that men unwisely have called virtue as much as those natural rebellions that wise men still call sin.
– Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Chapter 10. Dorian is fascinated by the main character in the yellow book. He is impressed by his courage in trying to live all the passions and modes of thought of other centuries, including the virtues and sins.