innocence quotes

They represented tomeanabsolute idea of thefirst state of innocence, before man knew how to sin.

- Brendan Francis Behan
  Of the Indians of Surinam. Oroonoko, or the Royal Slave.

The secret motive of the absent-minded is to be innocent while guilty. Absent-mindedness is spurious innocence.

- Saul Bellow
  More Die of Heartbreak.

Ignorance is not innocence but sin.

- Robert Browning
  The Inn  Album, canto 5.

Je ne suis pas innocente. L'innocence est une science du sublime. Et je ne suis qu'au tout de  but de l'apprentissage. I am not innocent.Innocence is a science of thesublime. And I am only at the very beginning of the apprenticeship.

- He  le'  ne Cixous
  Vivre l'orange/ To Live the Orange (bilingual text, translated by Ann Liddle and Sarah Cornell).

   Innocence ends when one is stripped of the delusion that one likes oneself.

-Joan Didion
  'On Self Respect', collected in Slouching Towards Bethlehem (1968).

Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man's heart, and the fall through the air of a true, wise friend called Piggy.

- Sir William (Gerald) Golding
  Lord of the Flies, ch.12.

English children have lost their innocence, for their first lessons have been in the exploitation of their adult slave.

- Germaine Greer
  Of the mother's subjugation to her family's demands. The Female Eunuch,'Love: Family'.

Consider, Sir, how should you like, though conscious of your innocence, to be tried before a jury for a capital crime, once a week.

- Samuel known as Dr Johnson Johnson
  Remark, 3  Apr. Quoted in  James Boswell  The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), vol.3.

Never such innocence, Never before or since, As changed itself to past Without a wordthe men Leaving the gardens tidy, The thousands of marriages Lasting a little while longer: Never such innocence again.

- Philip Arthur Larkin
  'MCMXI V'.

Fair quiet, have I found thee here, And Innocence thy Sister dear! Mistaken long, I sought you then In busy companies of men.

- Andrew Marvell
c.1650^1652  'The Garden' (published1681).

Nay, droop not, fellows; innocence should be bold.

- Philip Massinger
  The Roman  Actor, act1, sc.1.

Nor turned I ween Adam from his fair spouse, nor Eve the rites Mysterious of connubial love refused: Whatever hypocrites austerely talk Of purity and place and innocence, Defaming as impure what God declares Pure, and commands to some, leaves free to all.

-John Milton
  Paradise Lost (published1667), bk.4, l.741^7.

When the parish priest rebuked him for his celibacy, saying it would lead him into debaucheryand sin, hesaid that a man who had to be muzzled bya wife as a protection against debauchery was not worthy of the joy of innocence. After that people began to treat him with priestly respect.

- Liam O'Flaherty
'The Mermaid'.

The genius of American culture and its integrity comes from fidelity to the light. Plain as day, we say. Happy as the day is long. Early to bed, early to rise. American virtues are daylight virtues: honesty, integrity, plain speech.We say yes when we mean yes and no when we mean no, and all else comes from the evil one. America presumes innocence and even the right to happiness.

- Richard Rodriguez
  Frontiers,'Night and Day'.

For I had expected always Some brightness to hold in trust, Some final innocence To save from dust

- Sir Stephen Harold Spender
  'What I Expected,Was'.

It had never occurred to Giles that there was something perfectly sensible about wanting to hold onto innocence. He had alwaysgone in for the idea that since we only pass this way once, experience counts for everything.

- A(ndrew) N(orman) Wilson
  WiseVirgins, ch.6.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. SeeAchebe 2:18.

-W(illiam) B(utler) Yeats
  'The Second Coming', l.1^8. Collected in Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921).