Curiosity is a gift, a capacity of pleasure in knowing, which if you destroy, you make yourself cold and dull. John Ruskin More Quotes by John Ruskin More Quotes From John Ruskin Multitudes think they like to do evil; yet no man ever really enjoyed doing evil since God made the world. John Ruskin evil men thinking No picture can be good which deceives by its imitation, for the very reason that nothing can be beautiful which is not true. John Ruskin deceiving reason beautiful In one point of view, Gothic is not only the best, but the only rational architecture, as being that which can fit itself most easily to all services, vulgar or noble. John Ruskin gothic noble views When men are rightly occupied, their amusement grows out of their work, as the colour-petals out of a fruitful flower; when they are faithfully helpful and compassionate, all their emotions become steady, deep, perpetual, and vivifying to the soul as the natural pulse to the body. But now, having no true business, we pour our whole masculine energy into the false business of money-making; and having no true emotion, we must have false emotions dressed up for us to play with, not innocently, as children with dolls, but guiltily and darkly. John Ruskin flower men children All are to be men of genius in their degree,--rivulets or rivers, it does not matter, so that the souls be clear and pure; not dead walls encompassing dead heaps of things, known and numbered, but running waters in the sweet wilderness of things unnumbered and unknown, conscious only of the living banks, on which they partly refresh and partly reflect the flowers, and so pass on. John Ruskin wall running sweet There is but one question ultimately to be asked respecting every line you draw, Is it right or wrong? If right, it most assuredly is not a "free" line, but an intensely continent, restrained and considered line; and the action of the hand in laying it is just as decisive, and just as "free" as the hand of a first-rate surgeon in a critical incision. John Ruskin lines hands firsts If you can draw the stone rightly, everything within reach of art is also within yours. John Ruskin draws stones art I do not believe that ever any building was truly great, unless it had mighty masses, vigorous and deep, of shadow mingled with its surface. John Ruskin building shadow believe The world is full of vulgar Purists, who bring discredit on all selection by the silliness of their choice; and this the more, because the very becoming a Purist is commonly indicative of some slight degree of weakness, readiness to be offended, or narrowness of understanding of the ends of things. John Ruskin weakness understanding choices The greatest reward is not what we receive for our labor, but what we become by it. John Ruskin rewards labor In general, when the imagination is at all noble, it is irresistible, and therefore those who can at all resist it ought to resist it. Be a plain topographer if you possibly can; if Nature meant you to be anything else, she will force you to it; but never try to be a prophet. John Ruskin noble imagination trying The constant duty of every man to his fellows is to ascertain his own powers and special gifts, and to strengthen them for the help of others. John Ruskin special helping men It is not possible to find a landscape, which if painted precisely as it is, will not make an impressive picture. No one knows, till he has tried, what strange beauty and subtle composition is prepared to his hand by Nature. John Ruskin landscape strange hands Every duty we omit obscures some truth we should have known. John Ruskin known duty should-have It is not so much in buying pictures as in being pictures, that you can encourage a noble school. The best patronage of art is not that which seeks for the pleasures of sentiment in a vague ideality, nor for beauty of form in a marble image, but that which educates your children into living heroes, and binds down the flights and the fondnesses of the heart into practical duty and faithful devotion. John Ruskin hero children art No day is without its innocent hope. John Ruskin innocent If the thing is impossible, you need not trouble yourselves about it; if possible, try for it. John Ruskin impossible trying needs That man is always happy who is in the presence of something which he cannot know to the full, which he is always going on to know. John Ruskin always-happy knows men The wisest men are wise to the full in death. John Ruskin wisest-man wise men No nation can last which has made a mob of itself, however generous at heart. John Ruskin lasts made heart
