Popular quotes about Clever! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 46
In regard to the divine and holy mysteries of the faith, not the least part may be handed on without the Holy Scriptures. Do not be led astray by winning words and clever arguments. Even to me, who tell you these things, do not give ready belief, unless you receive from the Holy Scriptures the proof of the things which I announce. The salvation in which we believe is not proved from clever reasoning, but from the Holy Scriptures.
Cyril of JerusalemI don't mind people putting us down, because if everybody really liked us, it would be a bore. You've got to have people putting you down. It doesn't give any edge to it if everybody just falls flat on their face saying, "You're great." We enjoy some of the criticisms as well, they're quite funny; some of the clever criticisms, not the ones that don't know anything, but some of the clever ones are quite fun.
John LennonMost companies, 97 percent or more, put all their focus on clever advertising and clever taglines to get people to buy average or mediocre products. You need to back off and offer a really good product or service.
Brian TracyPeople often say to me - how clever you are! How brilliant to be able to go from ballet to theatre as you do. I answer that it is not clever at all. It is the gift of looking at oneself coolly, of calculating the future objectively. I could see the danger signals as far as ballet was concerned before anyone else did, that's all.
Robert Helpmanna person who was clever ought to be clever enough not to be unjust or deliberately unkind to anyone.
Frances Hodgson BurnettIn a stupid society, a clever man can come into the power; but in a clever society no stupid can come into the power!
Mehmet Murat IldanIf I write a paragraph and I don't get a certain lift from it, if I don't feel connected to it emotionally, then it's dead to me. When I'm reading other fiction writers, if I don't get any emotional investment from the writer, if it's just intellectual or clever - you know, most writing that passes as deep is just clever - I don't feel any connection.
Oscar HijuelosI'm not a boy-writer, I've never been. I wanted to be a boy-writer when I was young, and I think that held me back. I wanted to be very clever, and funny, but I'm not very clever and not terribly funny. I've finally accepted my limits, and I do what I can do.
Paul AusterI have an apple that thinks its a pear. And a bun that thinks itโs a cat. And a lettuce that thinks its a lettuce." "Itโs a clever lettuce, then." "Hardly," she said with a delicate snort. "Why would anything clever think itโs a lettuce?" "Even if it is a lettuce?" I asked. "Especially then," she said. "Bad enough to be a lettuce. How awful to think you are a lettuce too.
Patrick RothfussAlways remember you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, smarter than you think and twice as beautiful as you'd ever imagined. Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself
RumiI wish our clever young poets would remember my homely definitions of prose and poetry; that is, prose = words in their best order; - poetry = the best words in the best order.
Samuel Taylor ColeridgeAnd out of a desire essentially to imitate what I was reading, I began to write, like a clever monkey.
Russell BanksCleopatra stood at one of the most dangerous intersections in history; that of women and power. Clever women, Euripides had warned hundreds of years earlier, were dangerous.
Stacy SchiffIt's a wicked world, and when a clever man turns his brain to crime it is the worst of all.
Arthur Conan DoyleFootball is a game based on emotion and intelligence. Anyone can be clever, the trick is not to think the other guy is stupid.
Jose MourinhoAs a theatrical troupe, the Muppets haven't exactly been AWOL these past dozen years; the gang rocked YouTube in 2009 with their kick-ass rendition of Queen's 'Bohemian Rhapsody.' But they've certainly been lying low while our twitchy, tweet-y times have favored snarkier, more air-quote-driven entertainment, even from puppets. And in a way, that showbiz hiatus has worked in favor of The Muppets. For adults, the movie's gentle, clever, unironic humor feels freshly, trendily retro now, enhanced by laughs provided in cameos from a very up-to-date roster of stars.
Lisa SchwarzbaumBy being so long in the lowest form [at Harrow] I gained an immense advantage over the cleverer boys. . . . I got into my bones the essential structure of the ordinary British sentence - which is a noble thing. Naturally I am biased in favor of boys learning English; I would make them all learn English: and then I would let the clever ones learn Latin as an honor, and Greek as a treat.
Winston ChurchillIn the next few years I'd love to play a female version of Doctor Who. I know exactly how I would play her - she would be crafty in a clever kind of way.
Billie PiperIt's quite similar to guitar solos, only with programming you have to use your brain. The most important thing is that it should have some emotional effect on me, rather than just, 'Oh, that's really clever.'
Aphex TwinLars von Trier is very, very, very clever about women. He gives the woman a space that I don't know any filmmaker does. Because in Breaking The Waves, protagonist Emily Watson is the Christ. Which man is doing that? I don't know any man giving that space to a woman. No one.
Chantal AkermanI was born and brought up in Liverpool with my clever little sister Jemma, who is 14 and wants to be a vet. My mum Jane is an administrator and my dad Peter is a taxi driver.
Jennifer EllisonI think some journalists and bloggers want their articles to be clever, and the way into that is by writing nasty things. I think our culture likes to be mean. I don't just find this in fashion - I find it in the news. More and more, it is about ripping people apart.
Tom FordModern pictures are, no doubt, delightful to look at. At least, some of them are. But they are quite impossible to live with; they are too clever, too assertive, too intellectual. Their meaning is too obvious, and their method too clearly defined. One
Oscar WildeHitherto acceptable norms of human conduct do not apply. If the United States is to survive, long-standing American concepts of 'fair play' must be reconsidered. We must develop effective espionage and counterespionage services and must learn to subvert, sabotage and destroy our enemies by more clever, more sophisticated, and more effective methods than those used against us. It may become necessary that the American people be made acquainted with, understand and support this fundamentally repugnant philosophy.
Jimmy DoolittleI have always thought it rather interesting to follow the involuntary movements of fear in clever people. Fools coarsely display their cowardice in all its nakedness, but the others are able to cover it with a veil so delicate, so daintily woven with small plausible lies, that there is some pleasure to be found in contemplating this ingenious work of the human intelligence.
Alexis de TocquevilleIt is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. A handsome woman talks nonsense, you listen and hear not nonsense but cleverness. She says and does horrid things, and you see only charm. And if a handsome woman does not say stupid or horrid things, you at once persuade yourself that she is wonderfully clever and moral.
Leo TolstoyI have not much patience with a certain class of Christians nowadays who will hear anybody preach so long as they can say, 'He is very clever, a fine preacher, a man of genius, a born orator.' Is cleverness to make false doctrine palatable? Why, sirs, to me the ability of a man who preaches error is my sorrow rather than my admiration.
Charles SpurgeonBehind your every bad fate, almost always there lie your own stupid mistakes! Behind your every good fate, almost always there lie your own clever deeds! Skies have nothing whatsoever to do with your fate!
Mehmet Murat IldanYou don't have to dumb down - you just have to find a clever, good, secure man. I've found a couple - I've been lucky - but it's probably hard for everybody to find that true love of a good man.
Kimora Lee SimmonsIf we only knew how many times our seemingly clever comment cut straight into the heart of the person with whom we have just spoken, it is we who would bleed.
Guy FinleyI would [call myself a feminist], yes. I believe in the unadulterated advancement of women. And we have so far to go still. I do think because women are so clever and flexible and such good communicators, it been hard for men to evolve and keep up. I think we could do a little better to help them out.
Rashida JonesThe problem with movies and books is they make evil look glamorous, exciting, when it's no such thing. It's boring and it's depressing and it's stupid. Criminals are all after cheap thrills and easy money, and when they get them, all they want is more of the same, over and over. They're shallow, empty, boring people who couldn't give you five minutes of interesting conversation if you had the piss-poor luck to be at a party full of them. Maybe some can be monkey-clever, some of the time, but they aren't hardly ever smart.
Dean KoontzWe can be seduced...by powerful political groups that promise more wealth and lower taxes. Those with power can use clever, psychological tricks and play upon our weaknesses and brokenness in order to attract us to their way of thinking. We can be manipulated into illusion.
Jean VanierGood morning. You have a moment?" It's clever the way she says it, not as a question. I would have to contradict her in order to have my moment back. I make a note to use the method in the future.
Maggie StiefvaterNothingโs changed. Youโll go home. Youโll be bored. Youโll be ignored. No one will listen to you, really listen to you. Youโre too clever and too quiet for them to understand. They donโt even get your name right.
Neil GaimanOne has the idea of a stupid man as perfectly healthy and ordinary, and of illness as making one refined and clever and unusual.
Thomas MannYou are not going to waltz in here and distract me with a clever phrase and a beguiling smile." "You think my smile is beguiling?
Julia QuinnHow many stars can you count in the sky? How many mistakes can you count in your life? Stop counting! No clever man ever is stuck in the past!
Mehmet Murat IldanAs a writer, you get to play, you get alter time, you get to come up with the smart lines and the clever comebacks you wish you'd thought of.
Iain BanksI wish I were one of those terribly clever people who, when they write their autobiographies, always say, when I was fifteen months old I distinctly remember my Aunt Fanny saying to me, etc.
George SeatonI thought," Shad said slowly, "that she was offended if you referred to Blind Seer or Elation as her pets.""True," Derian assured him. "Absolutely the correct etiquette-to her face. However, well... When I first met Firekeeper, less than a year ago, her relationships with animals fell into pretty much two categories: those you ate and those you befriended. I remember that she thought we were pretty clever for bringing horses along so we wouldn't need to hunt our meat. It took me a while to show her they had other uses.
Jane LindskoldWhen you meditate you have to try to quiet and calm the mind. There should be no thought within the mind. Right now you feel that if you can cherish twenty ideas at a time, then you are the wisest man on earth. The more thoughts that enter into our minds, the more clever we feel we are. But in the spiritual life it is not like that. If consciously we can make the mind calm and quiet, we feel that a new creation dawns inside us.
Sri Chinmoy