58 Naivete Quotes

Following is our list of naivete quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about .

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Famous Naivete Quotes

It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't. - Mignon McLaughlin

It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't. — Mignon McLaughlin

There is something splendid about innocence; but what is bad about it, in turn, is that it cannot protect itself very well and is easily seduced. — Immanuel Kant

... pure and intelligent women can be deceived and misled by the baser sort, their very innocence and experience making them credulous and the helpless tools of the guilty and bold. — Catharine Beecher

Innocence always calls mutely for protection when we would be so much wiser to guard ourselves against it: innocence is like a dumb leper who has lost his bell, wandering the world, meaning no harm. — Graham Greene

Youth is easily deceived because it is quick to hope. — Aristotle

Innocence is like a dumb leper who has lost his bell, wandering the world, meaning no harm. — Graham Greene

There's a confidence that comes from youth and not knowing better. — Kiefer Sutherland

Nothing looks so like innocence as an indiscretion. — Oscar Wilde

One is easily fooled by that which one loves. — Moliere

Stupidity has a certain charm - ignorance does not. - Frank Zappa

Stupidity has a certain charm - ignorance does not. — Frank Zappa

A little credulity helps one on through life very smoothly. — Elizabeth Gaskell

There is nothing can pay one for that invaluable ignorance which is the companion of youth, those sanguine groundless hopes, and that lively vanity which makes all the happiness of life. — Mary Wortley Montagu

A noble heart cannot suspect in others the pettiness and malice that it has never felt. — Jean Racine

There is an innocence in admiration; it is found in those to whom it has never yet occurred that they, too, might be admired some day. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Subtlety may deceive you; integrity never will. - Oliver Cromwell

Subtlety may deceive you; integrity never will. — Oliver Cromwell

Short Naivete Quotes

  • I like peasants-they are not sophisticated enough to reason speciously. — Baron de Montesquieu
  • The cemetery is full of people who thought they could change themselves tomorrow. — Boonaa Mohammed
  • I gravitated to acting out of a mixture of instinct, naivete and opportunity. — Jeffrey Combs
  • Knowingness is sexy. The opposite of sexy is naivete. — Fran Lebowitz

Naivete Image Quotes

Being Naive Quotes

It would be extremely naive to expect the dominant classes to develop a type of education that would enable subordinate classes to perceive social injustices critically. — Paulo Freire

I look for the good in people. Sometimes I get hurt for it, but it's rare and it's worth it. You may hear me say optimistic things that sound naive. I'm not naive. I've read too much history to be naive. I just think love wins out over the darker parts of human nature in the end. — Lex Fridman

Let's not be naive, we're not talking about a simple political battle; it is a destructive pretension against the plan of God. We are not talking about a mere bill, but rather a machination of the Father of Lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God. — Pope Francis

Help each other to live and to grow in the Christian faith so as to be valiant witnesses of the Lord. Be united, but not closed. Be humble, but not fearful. Be simple, but not naive. Be thoughtful, but not complicated. Enter into dialogue with others, but be yourselves. — Pope Benedict XVI

Dare to be naive. — Richard Buckminster Fuller

I think it's taken me this long to really trust myself, but now I do, I really do. Thanks to my experience and wisdom, I've learned not to be so naive and trusting. Today I question everything and listen to my instincts. — Deborra-Lee Furness

Every true genius is bound to be naive. — Friedrich Schiller

We are more naive than those of the Middle Ages, and more frightened, for we can be made to believe almost anything. — Neil Postman

It's a naive domestic Burgundy without any breeding, but I think you'll be amused by its presumption. — James Thurber

In a restaurant one is both observed and unobserved. Joy and sorrow can be displayed and observed "unwittingly," the writer scowling naively and the diners wondering, What the hell is he doing? — David Mamet

People Writing About Naivete

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Read quotes by Graham Greene

Graham Greene
quotes on writing, love

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Read quotes by Mignon McLaughlin

Mignon McLaughlin
quotes on education, life and love

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Read quotes by Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant
quotes on love, ethics and god

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Read quotes by Catharine Beecher

Catharine Beecher
quotes on education

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Read quotes by Aristotle

Aristotle
quotes on life, love and success

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Read quotes by Kiefer Sutherland

Kiefer Sutherland
quotes on love, life and leadership

68 400

More Naivete Quotes

Sometimes a good idea comes to you when you are not looking for it. Through an improbable combination of coincidence, naivete and lucky mistakes. — Kary Mullis

You study, you learn, but you guard the original naivete. It has to be within you, as desire for drink is within the drunkard or love is within the lover. — Henri Matisse

Nothing is beautiful, only man: on this piece of naivete rests all aesthetics, it is the first truth of aesthetics. Let us immediately add its second: nothing is ugly but degenerate man - the domain of aesthetic judgment is therewith defined. — Friedrich Nietzsche

I don't know if it's naivete or just narcissism, but I start out with this notion that I can do anything. It's not until I get into it that I realize what I've thrown myself into, and then I will do anything not to humiliate myself. And that, I think, is the secret to my success. — Michelle Pfeiffer

Naivete in grownups is often charming; but when coupled with vanity it is indistinguishable from stupidity. — Eric Hoffer

Reality is cruel. All of the naivete is going to be removed. Reality is always changing, and it is always unpredictable. All of the balance is going to be destroyed. — Hideki Yukawa

There were dreams once upon a time, dreams now all but forgotten. On sad days I dust them off and fondle them nostalgically, with a patronizing wonder at the naivete of the youth who dreamed them. — Glen Cook

I feel like I've survived so much, and been through so much. And sometimes I miss the innocence of those times. Life was different. New York was different. The music business was different. I miss the simplicity of it, the naivete of everyone around me. — Madonna Ciccone

I felt the naivete of a child in my dancing. I cherished that feeling. I had what I call a knowledgeable naivete, and it worked for me. — Judith Jamison

The childlike, gum-chewing naivete, the glamour rooted in despair, the self-admiring carelessness, the perfected otherness, the wispiness, the shadowy, voyeuristic, vaguely sinister aura, the pale, soft-spoken magical presence, the skin and bones . . . — Andy Warhol

I'm guilty of extraordinary naivete, I suppose. But it's a naivete that I really don't want to abandon, not even now. — Jock Sturges

The style of writing required in the great world is distinguished by a free and daring grace, a careless security, a fine and sharp polish, a delicate and perfect taste; while that fitted for the people is characterized by a vigorous natural fulness, a profound depth of feeling, and an engaging naivete. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Amaryllis in Blueberry is a rich, evocative story about an unusual family that will sweep readers away to another place and time. Amaryllis's voice is a spellbinding and unique blend of naivet and wisdom. A perfect melding of family saga, murder mystery and a meditation on faith, loyalty and love, this novel will both haunt and entertain you. — Susan Wiggs

In recent years, we have seen the United States back away from pressuring the Castro regime, under the misguided view that placating them with an open hand would yield progress. That naivete has invited only more cruelty and oppression in return. — Mitt Romney

I think there's a lot of naivete and hubris within our mix of personalities. That's probably our worst crime. I keep wondering what a "mature" record means. — Ian Williams

It's very important to distinguish between innocence and naivete. The innocent do not deserve to be the victims of violence. But only the naive refuse to think about the origins of violence and to pursue the possibility that the genesis of that hatred could be addressed. — Barbara Kingsolver

What I liked about it is in the world of children, there are very, very different rules and a kind of naivete and innocence and sweetness that's been beautifully captured, I think, by this film as you can even see gesturing toward the film's poster on display nearby from this gorgeous artwork. — Russell Brand

Chinese were bornwith an accumulated wisdom, a natural sophistication, an intelligent naivete, and unless they were transplanted too young, these qualities ripened in them.... If ever I am homesick for China, now that I am home in my own country, it is when I discover here no philosophy. Our people have opinions and creeds and prejudices and ideas but as yet no philosophy. — Pearl S. Buck

I didn't come from a wealthy family. I had no money. Maybe it goes back to naivete which is your greatest asset when you're young. If I was starting in comedy today and if it didn't work the first time, I'd probably quit. But I kept at it, kept at it. — Steve Martin

Highfalutin moral principles are impossible guides to foreign policy. At worst, they reflect hypocrisy; at best, extreme naivete. — Charles Krauthammer

If it so happened that I had once written a best-seller, this was a pure accident, due to inattention and naivete, and I would take very good care never to do the same again. If I had a message for my contemporaries, I said, it was surely this: Be anything you like, be madmen, drunks, and bastards of every shape and form, but at all costs avoid one thing: success. — Thomas Merton

Alfred Russel Wallace, the codiscoverer of the theory of natural selection. Following their twin announcements of the theory in 1858, both Darwin and Wallace struggled like Laocoöns with the serpentine problem of human evolution and its encoiling difficulty of consciousness. But where Darwin clouded the problem with his own naivete, seeing only continuity in evolution, Wallace could not do so. — Julian Jaynes

It is hard to think of any work of art of which one can say 'this saved the life of one Jew, one Vietnamese, one Cambodian'. Specific books, perhaps; but as far as one can tell, no paintings or sculptures. The difference between us and the artists of the 1920's is that they they thought such a work of art could be made. Perhaps it was a certain naivete that made them think so. But it is certainly our loss that we cannot. — Robert Hughes

Emotional discomfort, when accepted, rises, crests and falls in a series of waves. Each wave washes a part of us away and deposits treasures we never imagined. Out goes naivete, in comes wisdom; out goes anger, in comes discernment; out goes despair, in comes kindness. No one would call it easy, but the rhythm of emotional pain that we learn to tolerate is natural, constructive and expansive... The pain leaves you healthier than it found you. — Martha Beck

Doubt, or the absence of faith and naivete, is a vice peculiar to this age, for no one is obedient nowadays; and naivete, which means the dominance of temperament in the manner, is a gift from God, possessed by very few. — Charles Baudelaire

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