Quotes from John Ruskin

What we think, or what we know, or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do.

There is no wealth but life. Life, including all its powers of love, of joy, and of admiration.

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

We are always in these days endeavoring to separate intellect and manual labor; we want one man to be always thinking, and another to be always working, and we call one a gentleman, and the other an operative; whereas the workman ought often to be thinking, and the thinker often to be working, and both should be gentlemen in the best sense.

It does not much matter that an individual loses two or three hundred pounds in buying a bad picture, but it is to be regretted that a nation should lose two or three hundred thousand in raising a ridiculous building.

The more I think of it, the more I find this conclusion impressed upon me, that the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something and tell what it saw in a plain way.

Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives… Quality also marks the search for an ideal after necessity has been satisfied and mere usefulness achieved.

Quality is never an accident. It is always the result of intelligent effort.

you never will love art well, till you love what she mirrors better

The greatest minds are marked by nothing more distinctly than an inconceivable humility, and acceptance of work or instruction in any form and from any quarter. They will learn from everybody, and do anything that anybody asks of them so long as it involves only toil, or what other men might think degradation.

So then, men may let their great powers lie dormant, while they employ their mean and petty powers on mean and petty objects; but it is physically impossible to employ a great power, except on a great object.

A little thought and a little kindness are often worth more than a great deal of money.

The true work of a critic is not to make his hearer believe him, but agree with him.

Lo que creamos o lo que pensemos, al final no tiene mayor importancia. Lo único que realmente importa es lo que hacemos

A man never stood so tall as when he stooped to help a child.

If you do not wish for His kingdom, don't pray for it. But if you do, you must do more than pray for it, you must work for it.

One can't be angry when one looks at a Penguin

Of all the mean and wicked things a landlord can do, shutting up his footpath is the nastiest.

It can be met only by a right understanding, on the part of all classes, of what kinds of labor are good for men, raising them, and making them happy; by a determined sacrifice of such convenience, or beauty, or cheapness as is to be got only by the degradation of the workman; and by equally determined demand for the products and results of healthy and ennobling labor.

Therefore, to every spirit which Christianity summons to her service, her exhortation is: Do what you can, and confess frankly what you are unable to do; neither let your effort be shortened for fear of failure, nor your confession silenced for fear of shame.

If you want to write a practical history of the Middle Ages, and to trace the real reasons of the things that actually happened, investigate first the history of the money; and then of the quarrels for office and territory.

Anything which elevates the mind is sublime, and elevation of mind is produced by the contemplation of greatness of any kind, whether of matter, space, power, beauty or virtue.

My own literary work, on the contrary, was always done as quietly and methodically as a piece of tapestry. I knew exactly what I had got to say, put the words firmly in their places like so many stitches, hemmed the edges of the chapters round with what seemed to me graceful flourishes, touched them finally with my cunningest points of colour, and read the work to papa and mamma at breakfast next morning, as a girl shows her sampler. Praeterita, Volume 2

It being the privilege of the fishes, as it is of rats and wolves, to live by the laws of demand and supply; but the distinction of humanity, to live by those of right.