Men Quotes by John Ruskin

The wisest men are wise to the full in death.

— John Ruskin

When men are rightly occupied, their amusement grows out of their work.

— John Ruskin

They are the weakest-minded and the hardest-hearted men that most love change.

— John Ruskin

Conceit may puff a man up, but never prop him up.

— John Ruskin

Man's only true happiness is to live in hope of something to be won by him.

— John Ruskin

All great art is the expression of man's delight in God's work, not his own.

— John Ruskin

Race is precisely of as much consequence in man as it is in any animal

— John Ruskin

An infinitude of tenderness is the chief gift and inheritance of all truly great men.

— John Ruskin

Men were not intended to work with the accuracy of tools, to be precise and perfect in all their actions.

— John Ruskin

Great art is precisely that which never was, nor will be taught, it is preeminently and finally the expression of the spirits…

— John Ruskin

It is a matter of the simplest demonstration, that no man can be really appreciated but by his equal or superior.

— John Ruskin

I fear uniformity. You cannot manufacture great men any more than you can manufacture gold.

— John Ruskin

Greatness is not a teachable nor gainable thing, but the expression of the mind of a God-made great man.

— John Ruskin

Multitudes think they like to do evil; yet no man ever really enjoyed doing evil since God made the world.

— John Ruskin

The Training which Makes Men Happiest in themselves ... also Makes Them Most Serviceable to Others

— John Ruskin

The constant duty of every man to his fellows is to ascertain his own powers and special gifts, and to strengthen them…

— John Ruskin

When men do not love their hearth, nor reverence their thresholds, it is a sign that they have dishonoured both ... Our…

— John Ruskin

What is really desired, under the name of riches, is essentially, power over men ... this power ... is in direct proportion…

— John Ruskin

No lying knight or lying priest ever prospered in any age, but especially not in the dark ones. Men prospered then only…

— John Ruskin

A man is known to his dog by the smell, to his tailor by the coat, to his friend by the smile;…

— John Ruskin

The man who can see all gray, and red, and purples in a peach, will paint the peach rightly round, and rightly…

— John Ruskin

In health of mind and body, men should see with their own eyes, hear and speak without trumpets, walk on their feet,…

— John Ruskin

The more readily we admit the possibility of our own cherished convictions being mixed with error, the more vital and helpful whatever…

— John Ruskin

... A power of obtaining veracity in the representation of material and tangible things, which, within certain limits and conditions, is unimpeachable,…

— John Ruskin

No changing of place at a hundred miles an hour will make us one whit stronger, or happier, or wiser. There was…

— John Ruskin

The great cry that rises from our manufacturing cities, louder than their furnace blast, is all in very deed for this, that…

— John Ruskin

There are, indeed, two forms of discontent: one laborious, the other indolent and complaining. We respect the man of laborious desire, but…

— John Ruskin

Superstition, in all times and among all nations, is the fear of a spirit whose passions are those of a man, whose…

— John Ruskin

And thus, in full, there are four classes: the men who feel nothing, and therefore see truly; the men who feel strongly,…

— John Ruskin

All are to be men of genius in their degree,--rivulets or rivers, it does not matter, so that the souls be clear…

— John Ruskin

Depend upon it, the first universal characteristic of all great art is Tenderness, as the second is Truth. I find this more…

— John Ruskin

If men lived like men indeed, their houses would be temples -- temples which we should hardly dare to injure, and in…

— John Ruskin

Ship of the line is the most honourable thing that man, as a gregarious animal, has ever produced.

— John Ruskin

The great cry that rises from all our manufacturing cities, louder than the furnace blast, is all in very deed for this…

— John Ruskin

Science studies the relations of things to each other: but art studies only their relations to man.

— John Ruskin

How false is the conception, how frantic the pursuit, of that treacherous phantom which men call Liberty.

— John Ruskin

Whether we force the man's property from him by pinching his stomach, or pinching his fingers, makes some difference anatomically; morally, none…

— John Ruskin

Why is one man richer than another? Because he is more industrious, more persevering and more sagacious.

— John Ruskin

The question is not what man can scorn, or disparage, or find fault with, but what he can love, and value, and…

— John Ruskin

The art of nations is to be accumulative, just as science and history are; the work of living men not superseding, but…

— John Ruskin