Men were not intended to work with the accuracy of tools, to be precise and perfect in all their actions. - John Ruskin
Whereas it has long been known and declared that the poor have no right to the property of the rich, I wish it also to be known and declared that the rich have no right to the property of the poor. - John Ruskin
The work of science is to substitute facts for appearances, and demonstrations for impressions. - John Ruskin
The child who desires education will be bettered by it; the child who dislikes it disgraced. - John Ruskin
No lying knight or lying priest ever prospered in any age, but especially not in the dark ones. Men prospered then only in following an openly declared purpose, and preaching candidly beloved and trusted creeds. - John Ruskin
I have not written in vain if I have heretofore done anything towards diminishing the reputation of the Renaissance landscape painting. - John Ruskin
You may either win your peace or buy it: win it, by resistance to evil; buy it, by compromise with evil. - John Ruskin
The art which we may call generally art of the wayside, as opposed to that which is the business of men's lives, is, in the best sense of the word, Grotesque. - John Ruskin
All great and beautiful work has come of first gazing without shrinking into the darkness. - John Ruskin
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
Modern travelling is not travelling at all; it is merely being sent to a place, and very little different from becoming a parcel. - John Ruskin
Large fortunes are all founded either on the occupation of land, or lending or the taxation of labor. - John Ruskin
We require from buildings two kinds of goodness: first, the doing their practical duty well: then that they be graceful and pleasing in doing it. - John Ruskin
It is in this power of saying everything, and yet saying nothing too plainly, that the perfection of art consists. - John Ruskin
Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. - John Ruskin
Modern education has devoted itself to the teaching of impudence, and then we complain that we can no longer control our mobs. - John Ruskin
Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; peacocks and lilies for instance. - John Ruskin
I believe the right question to ask, respecting all ornament, is simply this; was it done with enjoyment, was the carver happy while he was about it? - John Ruskin