innocence

See Also: HARMLESSNESS

1. Green as apples —Sumner Locke Elliott
2. Guileless as old Huck —Richard Ford
3. Guiltless forever, like a tree —Robert Browning
4. Innocence is like an umbrella: when once we’ve lost it we must never hope to see it back again —Punch
5. (Catherine’s) innocence shone like an icon —Rita Mae Brown
6. Innocent and affectionate as a child —W. H. Hudson
7. Innocent and artless, like the growth of a flower —Isak Dinesen
8. Innocent as a baby —Anon
9. Innocent as a child unborn —Anon

   Jonathan Swift who used the phrase in Directions to Servants is often credited as its author.

10. (I was a neophyte about as) innocent as a choirboy being asked to conduct a solemn mass at the Vatican —Alistair Cooke, New York Times interview, January 19, 1986
11. Innocent as a curl —Clarence Major
12. Innocent as a devil of two years old —Jonathan Swift
13. Innocent as a game —Frank Tuohy
14. Innocent as a new-laid egg —W. S. Gilbert
15. Innocent as a snowflake —Anne Sexton
16. (Gaze as) innocent as a teddy bear —Babs H. Deal
17. Innocent as a tourist’s Kodak —William Mcllvanney
18. Innocent, like a hornet that has been disarmed —Jean Stafford
19. (Sat there as) innocently as small boys confiding to each other the names of toy animals —Henry James
20. Innocuous as flowers afloat in a pond —John Updike
21. Perennial innocence like a chicken in a pen —William Faulkner
22. She was like a young tree whose branches had never been touched by the ruthless hand of man —Katherine Mansfield