J

John Ruskin

61 quotes

John Ruskin (1819–1900) was an English art critic, social thinker, and philanthropist whose ideas about art, architecture, and society profoundly influenced the Victorian and Edwardian eras. His passionate advocacy for beauty, craftsmanship, and social justice inspired movements ranging from the Arts and Crafts to early environmentalism.

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“The strength and power of a country depends absolutely on the quantity of good men and women in it.”

— John Ruskin

Men

All Quotes by John Ruskin

“The first condition of education is being able to put someone to wholesome and meaningful work.”

— John Ruskin

Education

“Give a little love to a child, and you get a great deal back.”

— John Ruskin

Family

“Men cannot not live by exchanging articles, but producing them. They live by work not trade.”

— John Ruskin

Work

“The sky is the part of creation in which nature has done for the sake of pleasing man.”

— John Ruskin

Nature

“No human being, however great, or powerful, was ever so free as a fish.”

— John Ruskin

Great

“I believe the first test of a truly great man is in his humility.”

— John Ruskin

Great

“Men don't and can't live by exchanging articles, but by producing them. They don't live by trade, but by work. Give up that foolish and vain title of Trades Unions and take that of laborers Unions.”

— John Ruskin

Men

“The first duty of government is to see that people have food, fuel, and clothes. The second, that they have means of moral and intellectual education.”

— John Ruskin

Education

“To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion all in one.”

— John Ruskin

Poetry

“Fine art is that in which the hand, the head, and the heart of man go together.”

— John Ruskin

Art

“Modern education has devoted itself to the teaching of impudence, and then we complain that we can no longer control our mobs.”

— John Ruskin

Education

“Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts - the book of their deeds, the book of their words and the book of their art.”

— John Ruskin

Art

“An architect should live as little in cities as a painter. Send him to our hills, and let him study there what nature understands by a buttress, and what by a dome.”

— John Ruskin

Nature

“There is never vulgarity in a whole truth, however commonplace. It may be unimportant or painful. It cannot be vulgar. Vulgarity is only in concealment of truth, or in affectation.”

— John Ruskin

Truth

“No art can be noble which is incapable of expressing thought, and no art is capable of expressing thought which does not change.”

— John Ruskin

Art

“Art is not a study of positive reality, it is the seeking for ideal truth.”

— John Ruskin

Art

“The principle of all successful effort is to try to do not what is absolutely the best, but what is easily within our power, and suited for our temperament and condition.”

— John Ruskin

Best

“The first test of a truly great man is his humility. By humility I don't mean doubt of his powers or hesitation in speaking his opinion, but merely an understanding of the relationship of what he can say and what he can do.”

— John Ruskin

Great

“No architecture is so haughty as that which is simple.”

— John Ruskin

Architecture

“To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education.”

— John Ruskin

Education