The Picture of Dorian Gray help with homework: the protagonist twice attacks

In Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, the protagonist twice attacks and tries to destroy his conscience, first by killing Basil Hallward and then by taking a knife to his portrait. What do these actions tell us about Dorian Gray’s condition? Compare his situation to the description of false teachers given by Paul in I Timothy 4:2 as men “whose consciences have been seared as with a hot iron.” Are his actions indicative of a man with a seared conscience, or one whose conscience is so active that he can no longer tolerate what it is telling him? Support your answer with specifics from the novel.