Popular quotes about Innocence! Wisdom and inspiration are here!
It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, "whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection," and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.
John AdamsIf I could, Sister James, I would certainly choose to live in innocence. But innocence can only be wisdom in a world without evil. Situations arise and we are confronted with wrongdoing and the need to act.
John Patrick ShanleyI forget nothing and then, one day, there will be revenge. Innocence isn't exactly everywhere. But I will say innocence also takes you far in photography.
Karl LagerfeldPeople who remember court madness through pain, the pain of the perpetually recurring death of their innocence; people who forget court another kind of madness, the madness of the denial of pain and the hatred of innocence; and the world is mostly divided between madmen who remember and madmen forget.
James A. BaldwinOver the years Woodstock got glorified and romanticised and became the event that symbolised Utopia. It's the last page of our collective memory of the age of innocence. Then things turned ugly and would never be the same again.
Ang LeeThe talk of pale, burning-eyed students, anarchists and utopians all, over tea and cigarettes in a locked room long past midnight, is next morning translated, with the literalness of utter innocence, into the throwing of the bomb, the shouting of the proud slogan, the dragging away of the young dreamer-doer, still smiling, to the dungeon and the firing squad.
Christopher IsherwoodThe decision of such judges as Claudius and his Senate is worth very little in the question of a man's innocence or guilt; but the sentence was that Seneca should be banished to the island of Corsica.
Frederic FarrarI want your innocence. I want your blind, unquestioning devotion to your father, your acceptance of who and what he is. I want you to look at me the way you look at him, knowing the worst. I want you to trust me, even when your brain tells you you shouldn't, I want you to ignore common sense and your lifelong need to protect yourself. I want you to give yourself to me, body and soul.
Anne StuartAmerica has a hold on imaginations that no other country does. I think that is partly because it is an immigrant country and there is still a kind of innocence in America that translates very well everywhere in the world.
Pico IyerMeditation is the art of cleaning your mirror from all the dust that the society, the religion, the educational system has poured on you, to take away everything that has not been born with you, to bring you to your absolute innocence as you were born as a child.
RajneeshObscurity and Innocence, twin sisters, escape temptations which would pierce their gossamer armor, in contact with the world.
Nicolas ChamfortLike, you can find your dream, if you firmly believe. You have to have the innocence, and you have to have the daringness to trust.
Bai LingIt is easy, retrospectively, to endow one's youth with a false precocity or a false innocence; to tamper with the dates marking one's stature on the edge of the door.
Evelyn Waugh[In old age] there is a childlike innocence, often, that has nothing to do with the childishness of senility. The moments become precious . . .
May SartonThere is an innate innocence in the concious Vata personality. A delicate, sensitive, and aware nature reveals the graceful Vata component of any type.
Maya TiwariI'm just glad I was able to return to some of that innocence and beauty I had as a child when I started my own family, and my children brought me back some of that spirit.
Angelina JolieTruly, it is a blessing and not a blasphemy when I teach that "above all things there stands the heaven of chance, the heaven of innocence, the heaven of accident, the heaven of wantonness".
Friedrich NietzscheI started writing books for children because I could illustrate them myself and because, in my innocence, I thought they'd be easier.
Mark HaddonEvery trait of beauty may be traced to some virtue, as to innocence, candor, generosity, modesty, and heroism.
Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-PierreRemorse is virtue's root; its fair increase is fruits of innocence and blessedness.
William C. BryantDeath during adolescence feels unfair. We're young. We're invincible. Death is supposed to come with old age. When death breaks into our lives and steals our innocence, its finality leaves us unnaturally older. There are too many elderly young people.
Sara ShandlerThe magic, the wonder, the mystery and the innocence of a childโs heart are the seeds of creativity that will heal the world.
Michael JacksonMy detention has been worth every second if only to prove my innocence to those who truly matter most my countrymen.
Joseph EstradaThe practice of Zen mind is beginner's mind. The innocence of the first inquiryโwhat am I?โis needed throughout Zen practice. The mind of the beginner is empty, free of the habits of the expert, ready to accept, to doubt, and open to all the possibilities. It is the kind of mind which can see things as they are, which step by step and in a flash can realize the original nature of everything.
Shunryu SuzukiMan, even man debased by the neocapitalism and pseudosocialism of our time, is a marvelous being because he sometimes speaks. Language is the mark, the sign, not of his fall but of his original innocence. Through the Word we may regain the lost kingdom and recover powers we possessed in the far-distant past.
Octavio PazI haven't lost my innocence particularly. I'm always ready to pretend I haven't. Yeah, it is a shame in a way.
Robert PlantThough Snow White might triumph in the tale, she will undoubtedly acquire a mirror after she marries, matures, and has children, and as the mirror reflects her aging and loss of beauty, she will be confronted by a young girl whose innocence and youth will spark her envy and hatred and perhaps drive her to eliminate her โcompetition.โ It appears as though there is a vicious cycle that entraps women up through today. Everything is played out under the male gaze.
Jack ZipesCrime like virtue has its degrees; and timid innocence was never known to blossom suddenly into extreme license.
Jean RacineMaybe innocence is a skin you must shed to build layers more resistant to the caustic truths of the world.
Hector TobarThe essence of art is to recapturel the fantasy and the imagination of a child again, but without the innocence of a child.
Romare BeardenRemember that every man is a variation of yourself. No man's guilt is not yours, nor is any man's innocence a thing apart.
William SaroyanThe culture will not be able to persist in light of the rigid systems of its own innocence.
Michael Eric DysonI feel like I'm a much better person when I'm developing my imagination and my innocence and my vulnerability. I like that version of me better than the version where I'm just working on my analytical mind.
Brit MarlingIn April 1917 the illusion of isolation was destroyed, America came to the end of innocence, and of the exuberant freedom of bachelor independence. That the responsibilities of world power have not made us happier is no surprise. To help ourselves manage them, we have replaced the illusion of isolation with a new illusion of omnipotence.
Barbara Tuchmantheir powerlessness, innocence, and imagination fused to enable them to turn time inside out, travel on the wind, and enter the souls of animals.
Mark HelprinEmotional truths woven by lawyers in the court of law are apparently more important than the truths of actual events. I have grown to fear for those whose innocence became trapped within the legal system.
Neil deGrasse TysonInnocence is indeed a glorious thing; but, unfortunately, it does not keep very well and is easily led astray.
Immanuel Kant