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.

“He that would be angry and sin not, must not be angry with anything but sin.”

— John Ruskin

Anger

All Quotes by John Ruskin

“Nearly all the powerful people of this age are unbelievers, the best of them in doubt and misery, the most in plodding hesitation, doing as well as they can, what practical work lies at hand.”

— John Ruskin

Age

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

— John Ruskin

Nature

“How long most people would look at the best book before they would give the price of a large turbot for it?”

— John Ruskin

Best

“A great thing can only be done by a great person and they do it without effort.”

— John Ruskin

Great

“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

“It is impossible, as impossible as to raise the dead, to restore anything that has ever been great or beautiful in architecture. That which I have insisted upon as the life of the whole, that spirit which is given only by the hand and eye of the workman, can never be recalled.”

— John Ruskin

Architecture

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

— John Ruskin

Art

“Man's only true happiness is to live in hope of something to be won by him. Reverence something to be worshipped by him, and love something to be cherished by him, forever.”

— John Ruskin

Happiness

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

— John Ruskin

Education

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

— John Ruskin

Architecture

“Some slaves are scoured to their work by whips, others by their restlessness and ambition.”

— John Ruskin

Work

“All that we call ideal in Greek or any other art, because to us it is false and visionary, was, to the makers of it, true and existent.”

— John Ruskin

Art

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

— John Ruskin

Education

“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

“The child who desires education will be bettered by it the child who dislikes it disgraced.”

— John Ruskin

Education

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

— John Ruskin

Great

“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.”

— John Ruskin

Nature

“Every great person is always being helped by everybody for their gift is to get good out of all things and all persons.”

— John Ruskin

Great

“Skill is the unified force of experience, intellect and passion in their operation.”

— John Ruskin

Experience

“All great and beautiful work has come of first gazing without shrinking into the darkness.”

— John Ruskin

Great