Clever quotes
1.3K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Browse quotes that often appear alongside clever — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"Civilization rests on a set of promises; if the promises are broken too often, the civilization dies, no matter how rich it may be, or how mechanically clever. Hope and faith depend on the promises; if hope and faith go, everything goes."
"If your children want to alter society, listen to their reasons and the idealism behind them. Don't crush them with some clever remark straight away."
"If all the good people were clever And all the clever people were good The world would be nicer than ever We thought that it possibly could. But somehow, 'tis seldom or ner The two hit it off as they should The good are so harsh to the clever The clever so rude to the good!"
"The problem is, is when your focus is created by a crisis, then the frontal lobe shuts down essentially, the frontal cortex which is your intuitive intelligence. So you get very clever and very stupid in a crisis. Also, you pump adrenalin into your body from what you - physiologically you'll crash."
"Dissimulation is innate in woman, and almost as much a quality of the stupid as of the clever."
"Read as little as possible of literary criticism - such things are either partisan opinions, which have become petrified and meaningless, hardened and empty of life, or else they are just clever word-games, in which one view wins today, and tomorrow the opposite view. Works of art are of an infinite solitude, and no means of approach is so useless as criticism."
"I once used henna to dye my hair brown for an audition, thinking I was being clever as it's all natural."
"A clever general... avoids an army when its spirit is keen, but attacks it when it is sluggish and inclined to return. This is the art of studying moods. Disciplined and calm, he awaits the appearance of disorder and hubbub among the enemy. This is the art of retaining self-possession."
"Things that would have made fame of a less clever man seemed tricks in his hands. It is a mistake to do things too easily."
"We study history not to be clever in another time, but to be wise always."
"We are not fond of praising, and never praise any one except from interested motives. Praise is a clever, concealed, and delicate flattery, which gratifies in different ways the giver and the receiver. The one takes it as a recompense of his merit, and the other bestows it to display his equity and discernment."
"It's not that I'm so clever, it is that others are so stupid."
"Grass probably helped me as much as it hurt me. Especially as a performer. When you're high, it's easy to kid yourself about how clever certain mediocre pieces of material are. But, on the other hand, pot opens windows and doors that you may not be able to get through any other way."
"There are some situations from which one can only escape by acting like a devil or a lunatic."
"Why should death make a man truthful, or even clever? The dead are likely dull fellows, full of tedious complaints - the ground's too cold, my gravestone should be larger, why does he get more worms than I do."
"Half the American population no longer reads newspapers: plainly, they are the clever half."
"What a man misses mostly in heaven is company."
"Sometimes you have to be clever."
"Clever people, people who are cunning, do not know what love is because their minds are so sharp, because they are so clever, because they are so superficial - which means to be on the surface, and love is not a thing that exists on the surface."
"They hit you at school, they hate you if your clever, and they despise a fool."
