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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

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John Ruskin
Age: 80 †
Born: 1819
Born: February 8
Died: 1900
Died: January 20
Aesthetician
Architect
Art Critic
Art Historian
Journalist
Literary Critic
Painter
Philosopher
Poet
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
London
England
Kata Phusin
Rŏsŭkʻin
J. Ruskin
John Rosukin
Jon Rasukin
Dzhon Rëskin
Ruskin
Ideals
Literature
Existent
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Visionary
Art
Visionaries
True
Makers
Greek
Ideal
False

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Death is not a journey into an unknown land it is a voyage home. We are going, not to a strange country, but to our fathers house.
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A little thought and a little kindness are often worth more than a great deal of money.
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Labour without joy is base. Labour without sorrow is base. Sorrow without labour is base. Joy without labour is base.
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I believe that there is no test of greatness in periods, nations or men more sure than the development, among them or in them, of a noble grotesque, and no test of comparative smallness or limitation, of one kind or another, more sure than the absence of grotesque invention, or incapability of understanding it.
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Science deals exclusively with things as they are in themselves.
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I cannot but think it an evil sign of a people when their houses are built to last for one generation only.
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The only way to understand these difficult parts of the Bible, or even to approach them with safety, is first to read and obey the easy ones.
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We may live without her, and worship without her, but we cannot remember without her. How cold is all history, how lifeless all imagery, compared to that which the living nation writes, and the uncorrupted marble bears!
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What do you suppose makes all men look back to the time of childhood with so much regret (if their childhood has been, in any moderate degree, healthy or peaceful)? That rich charm, which the least possession had for us, was in consequence of the poorness of our treasures.
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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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Government and cooperation are in all things the laws of life. Anarchy and competition, the laws of death.
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No one can explain how the notes of a Mozart melody, or the folds of a piece of Titian's drapery, produce their essential effects. If you do not feel it, no one can by reasoning make you feel it.
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Surely our clergy need not be surprised at the daily increasing distrust in the public mind of the efficacy of prayer.
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In great countries, children are always trying to remain children, and the parents want to make them into adults. In vile countries, the children are always wanting to be adults and the parents want to keep them children.
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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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My mother's influence in molding my character was conspicuous. She forced me to learn daily long chapters of the Bible by heart. To that discipline and patient, accurate resolve I owe not only much of my general power of taking pains, but of the best part of my taste for literature.
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Morality does not depend on religion.
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The Bible is the one Book to which any thoughtful man may go with any honest question of life or destiny and find the answer of God by honest searching.
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The child who desires education will be bettered by it the child who dislikes it disgraced.
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A man is known to his dog by the smell, to his tailor by the coat, to his friend by the smile each of these know him, but how little or how much depends on the dignity of the intelligence. That which is truly and indeed characteristic of the man is known only to God.
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