John Ruskin Quotes
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I would rather teach drawing that my pupils may learn to love nature, than teach the looking at nature that they may learn to draw.
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Hope- the recognition, by true foresight, of better things to be reached here after.
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I believe that the first test of a great man is his humility. I don't mean by humility, doubt of his power. But really great men have a curious feeling that the greatness is not of them, but through them. And they see something divine in every other man and are endlessly, foolishly, incredibly merciful.
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Disorder in a drawing-room is vulgar; in an antiquary's study, not; the black battle-stain on a soldier's face is not vulgar, but the dirty face of a housemaid is.
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The time is probably near when a new system of architectural laws will be developed, adapted entirely to metallic construction.
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He is the greatest artist who has embodied, in the sum of his works, the greatest number of the greatest ideas.
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It is written on the arched sky; it looks out from every star. It is the poetry of Nature; it is that which uplifts the spirit within us.
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To know anything well involves a profound sensation of ignorance.
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God intends no man to live in this world without working, but it seems to me no less evident that He intends every man to be happy in his work.
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It is far better to give work that is above a person, than to educate the person to be above their work.
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No divine terror will ever be found in the work of the man who wastes a colossal strength in elaborating toys; for the first lesson that terror is sent to teach us is, the value of the human soul, and the shortness of mortal time.
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Punishment is the last and the least effective instrument in the hands of the legislator for the prevention of crime.
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Science is the knowledge of constant things, not merely of passing events, and is properly less the knowledge of general laws than of existing facts.
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Come, ye cold winds, at January's call, On whistling wings, and with white flakes bestrew The earth.
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Beauty deprived of its proper foils and adjuncts ceases to be enjoyed as beauty, just as light deprived of all shadows ceases to be enjoyed as light.
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There is no action so slight or so mean but it may be done to a great purpose, and ennobled thereby.
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In my house there is no attempt whatever to secure harmonies of colour, or form, or furniture.... I am entirely independent for daily happiness upon the sensual qualities of form or colour-when I want them I take them either from the sky or from the fields.
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Drawing is a means of obtaining and communicating knowledge.
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You cannot hammer a girl into anything. She grows as a flower does, she will wither without sun; she will decay in her sheath as a narcissus will if you do not give her air enough; she might fall and defile her head in dust if you leave her without help at some moments in her life; but you cannot fetter her; she must take her own fair form and way if she take any.
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God alone can finish.
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One of the prevailing sources of misery and crime is in the generally accepted assumption, that because things have been wrong a long time, it is impossible they will ever be right.
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To be taught to read—what is the use of that, if you know not whether what you read is false or true? To be taught to write or to speak—but what is the use of speaking, if you have nothing to say? To be taught to think—nay, what is the use of being able to think, if you have nothing to think of? But to be taught to see is to gain word and thought at once, and both true.
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Order and system are nobler things than power.
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Human work must be done thoroughly and honourably because we are now men; whether we ever expect to be angels, or ever were slugs, being practically no matter.