Background Image

...

He Who Has Once Stood Beside The Grave, To Look Back Upon The Companionship Which Has Been Forever Closed, Feeling How Impotent There Are The Wild Love, Or The Keen Sorrow, To Give One Instant's Pleasure To The Pulseless Heart, Or Atone In The Lowest Measure To The Departed Spirit For The Hour Of Unkindness, Will Scarcely For The Future Incur That Debt To The Heart Which Can Only Be Discharged To The Dust.

-John Ruskin

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

He Who Has Once

John Ruskin

...

He Who Has Once Stood Beside The Grave, To Look Back Upon The Companionship Which Has Been Forever Closed, Feeling How Impotent There Are The Wild Love, Or The Keen Sorrow, To Give One Instant's Pleasure To The Pulseless Heart, Or Atone In The Lowest Measure To The Departed Spirit For The Hour Of Unkindness, Will Scarcely For The Future Incur That Debt To The Heart Which Can Only Be Discharged To The Dust.

Views: 4

Topic

More From John Ruskin

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.

The Only Absolutely And Unapproachably Heroic Element In The Soldier's Work Seems To Be-that He Is Paid Little For It-and Regularly.

Better The Rudest Work That Tells A Story Or Records A Fact, Than The Richest Without Meaning.

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.

And Thus, In Full, There Are Four Classes: The Men Who Feel Nothing, And Therefore See Truly; The Men Who Feel Strongly, Think Weakly, And See Untruly (second Order Of Poets); The Men Who Feel Strongly, Think Strongly, And See Truly (first Order Of Poets); And The Men Who, Strong As Human Creatures Can Be, Are Yet Submitted To Influences Stronger Than They, And See In A Sort Untruly, Because What They See Is Inconceivably Above Them. This Last Is The Usual Condition Of Prophetic Inspiration.

Every Increased Possession Loads Us With A New Weariness.

The Child Who Desires Education Will Be Bettered By It; The Child Who Dislikes It Disgraced.

Likes And Dislikes

There Is Never Vulgarity In A Whole Truth, However Commonplace. It May Be Unimportant Or Painful. It Cannot Be Vulgar. Vulgarity Is Only In Concealment Of Truth, Or In Affectation.

The Training Which Makes Men Happiest In Themselves ... Also Makes Them Most Serviceable To Others

What Do We, As A Nation, Care About Books? How Much Do You Think We Spend Altogether On Our Libraries, Public Or Private, As Compared With What We Spend On Our Horses?

Architecture ... The Adaptation Of Form To Resist Force.

Another Of The Strange And Evil Tendencies Of The Present Day Is The Decoration Of The Railroad Station... There Was Never More Flagrant Nor Impertinent Folly Than The Smallest Portion Of Ornament In Anything Connected With The Railroads... Railroad Architecture Has Or Would Have A Dignity Of Its Own If It Were Only Left To Its Work.

Some Slaves Are Scoured To Their Work By Whips, Others By Their Restlessness And Ambition.

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.

All Great Art Is The Expression Of Man's Delight In God's Work, Not His Own.

Inspirational Life

The Question Is Not What Man Can Scorn, Or Disparage, Or Find Fault With, But What He Can Love, And Value, And Appreciate.

Make Yourselves Nests Of Pleasant Thoughts. None Of Us Knows What Fairy Palaces We May Build Of Beautiful Thought-proof Against All Adversity. Bright Fancies, Satisfied Memories, Noble Histories, Faithful Sayings, Treasure Houses Of Precious And Restful Thoughts, Which Care Cannot Disturb, Nor Pain Make Gloomy, Nor Poverty Take Away From Us.

The Purest And Most Thoughtful Minds Are Those Which Love Colour The Most.

You Cannot Get Anything Out Of Nature Or From God By Gambling; Only Out Of Your Neighbor.

If There Be Any One Principle More Widely Than Another Confessed By Every Utterance, Or More Sternly Than Another Imprinted On Every Atom Of The Visible Creation, That Principle Is Not Liberty, But Law.

The Names Of Great Painters Are Like Passing-bells: In The Name Of Velasquez You Hear Sounded The Fall Of Spain; .in The Name Of Titian, That Of Venice; In The Name Of Leonardo, That Of Milan; In The Name Of Raphael, That Of Rome. And There Is Profound Justice In This, For In Proportion To The Nobleness Of The Power Is The Guilt Of Its Use For Purposes Vain Or Vile; And Hitherto The Greater The Art, The More Surely Has It Been Used, And Used Solely, For The Decoration Of Pride Or The Provoking Of Sensuality.

The Wisest Men Are Wise To The Full In Death.

It Is Better To Lose Your Pride With Someone You Love Rather Than To Lose That Someone You Love With Your Useless Pride.

Someone You Love

Imperfection Is In Some Sort Essential To All That We Know Of Life. It Is The Sign Of Life In A Mortal Body, That Is To Say, Of A State Of Progress And Change. Nothing That Lives Is, Or Can Be Rigidly Perfect; Part Of It Is Decaying, Part Nascent.

Progress And Change

The Whole Difference Between A Man Of Genius And Other Men, It Has Been Said A Thousand Times, And Most Truly, Is That The First Remains In Great Part A Child, Seeing With The Large Eyes Of Children, In Perpetual Wonder, Not Conscious Of Much Knowledge--conscious, Rather Of Infinite Ignorance, And Yet Infinite Power; A Fountain Of Eternal Admiration, Delight, And Creative Force Within Him Meeting The Ocean Of Visible And Governable Things Around Him.

A Great Thing Can Only Be Done By A Great Person; And They Do It Without Effort.

No Person Who Is Not A Great Sculptor Or Painter Can Be An Architect. If He Is Not A Sculptor Or Painter, He Can Only Be A Builder.

The Force Of The Guinea You Have In Your Pocket Depends Wholly On The Default Of A Guinea In Your Neighbour's Pocket. If He Did Not Want It, It Would Be Of No Use To You.

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, The Cumulative Experience Of Many Masters Of Craftsmanship. Quality Also Marks The Search For An Ideal After Necessity Has Been Satisfied And Mere Usefulness Achieved.

Wherever Men Are Noble, They Love Bright Colour; And Wherever They Can Live Healthily, Bright Colour Is Given Them—in Sky, Sea, Flowers, And Living Creatures.

I Wish They Would Use English Instead Of Greek Words. When I Want To Know Why A Leaf Is Green, They Tell Me It Is Coloured By "chlorophyll," Which At First Sounds Very Instructive; But If They Would Only Say Plainly That A Leaf Is Coloured Green By A Thing Which Is Called "green Leaf," We Should See More Precisely How Far We Had Got.

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.

The Virtue Of The Imagination Is Its Reaching, By Intuition And Intensity, A More Essential Truth Than Is Seen At The Surface Of Things.

On The Whole, It Is Patience Which Makes The Final Difference Between Those Who Succeed Or Fail In All Things. All The Greatest People Have It In An Infinite Degree, And Among The Less, The Patient Weak Ones Always Conquer The Impatient Strong.

Engraving Then, Is, In Brief Terms, The Art Of Scratch.

Will You Not Covet Such Power As This, And Seek Such Throne As This, And Be No More Housewives, But Queens? There Is No Putting By That Crown; Queens You Must Always Be; Queens To Your Lovers; Queens To Your Husbands And Sons; Queens Of Higher Mystery To The World Beyond. . . . But Alas! You Are Too Often Idle And Careless Queens, Grasping At Majesty In The Least Things, While You Abdicate It In The Greatest.

The Higher A Man Stands, The More The Word Vulgar Becomes Unintelligible To Him.

All The Best Things And Treasures Of This World Are Not To Be Produced By Each Generation For Itself; But We Are All Intended, Not To Carve Our Work In Snow That Will Melt, But Each And All Of Us To Be Continually Rolling A Great White Gathering Snow-ball, Higher And Higher, Larger And Larger, Along The Alps Of Human Power.

To Be Able To Ask A Question Clearly Is Two-thirds Of The Way To Getting It Answered.

Answering Questions

The Art Of Becoming 'rich', In The Common Sense, Is Not Absolutely Nor Finally The Art Of Accumulating Much Money For Ourselves, But Also Of Contriving That Our Neighbour Shall Have Less. In Accurate Terms, It Is 'the Art Of Establishing The Maximum Inequality In Your Own Favour'.

Not Without Design Does God Write The Music Of Our Lives.

The Relative Majesty Of Buildings Depends More On The Weight And Vigour Of Their Masses Than Any Other Tribute Of Their Design.

Science Lives Only In Quiet Places, And With Odd People, Mostly Poor.

The Noble Grotesque Involves The True Appreciation Of Beauty.

Remember That The Most Beautiful Things In The World Are The Most Useless; Peacocks And Lilies For Instance.

Whatever Merit There Is In Anything That I Have Written Is Simply Due To The Fact That When I Was A Child My Mother Daily Read Me A Part Of The Bible And Daily Made Me Learn A Part Of It By Heart.

Do Justice To Your Brother (you Can Do That, Whether You Love Him Or Not), And You Will Come To Love Him. But Do Injustice To Him Because You Don't Love Him, And You Will Come To Hate Him.

Cheerfulness Is As Natural To The Heart Of A Man In Strong Health As Color To His Cheek; And Wherever There Is Habitual Gloom There Must Be Either Bad Air, Unwholesome Food, Improperly Severe Labor, Or Erring Habits Of Life.

Sky Is The Part Of Creation In Which Nature Has Done More For The Sake Of Pleasing Man, More For The Sole And Evident Purpose Of Talking To Him And Teaching Him, Than In Any Other Of Her Works, And It Is Just The Part In Which We Least Attend To Her.

Living Without An Aim, Is Like Sailing Without A Compass.

God Has Lent Us The Earth For Our Life; It Is A Great Entail. It Belongs As Much To Those Who Are To Come After Us, And Whose Names Are Already Written In The Book Of Creation, As To Us; And We Have No Right, By Anything That We Do Or Neglect, To Involve Them In Unnecessary Penalties, Or Deprive Them Of Benefits Which It Was In Our Power To Bequeath.

When A Man Is Wrapped Up In Himself, He Makes A Pretty Small Package.

It Is Not How Much One Makes But To What Purpose One Spends.

Let Every Dawn Of Morning Be To You As The Beginning Of Life, And Every Setting Sun Be To You As Its Close: — Then Let Every One Of These Short Lives Leave Its Sure Record Of Some Kindly Thing Done For Others — Some Goodly Strength Or Knowledge Gained For Yourselves.

To Use Books Rightly, Is To Go To Them For Help; To Appeal To Them When Our Own Knowledge And Power Fail; To Be Led By Them Into Wider Sight And Purer Conception Than Our Own, And To Receive From Them The United Sentence Of The Judges And Councils Of All Time, Against Our Solitary And Unstable Opinions.

Knowledge And Power

Every Hue Throughout Your Work Is Altered By Every Touch You Add In Other Places.

The Fact Of Our Deriving Constant Pleasure From Whatever Is A Type Or Semblance Of Divine Attributes, And From Nothing But That Which Is So, Is The Most Glorious Of All That Can Be Demonstrated Of Human Nature; It Not Only Sets A Great Gulf Of Specific Separation Between Us And The Lower Animals, But It Seems A Promise Of A Communion Ultimately Deep, Close, And Conscious, With The Being Whose Darkened Manifestations We Here Feebly And Unthinkingly Delight In.

He Who Offers God A Second Place Offers Him No Place.

The More Readily We Admit The Possibility Of Our Own Cherished Convictions Being Mixed With Error, The More Vital And Helpful Whatever Is Right In Them Will Become; And No Error Is So Conclusively Fatal As The Idea That God Will Not Allow Us To Err, Though He Has Allowed All Other Men To Do So.

All Men Who Have Sense And Feeling Are Being Continually Helped; They Are Taught By Every Person They Meet, And Enriched By Everything That Falls In Their Way. The Greatest, Is He Who Has Been Oftenest Aided. Originality Is The Observing Eye.

It Is A Strange Thing How Little In General People Know About The Sky. It Is The Part Of Creation In Which Nature Has Done More For The Sake Of Pleasing Man.

Every Human Action Gains In Honor, In Grace, In All True Magnificence, By Its Regard To Things That Are To Come. It Is The Far Sight, The Quiet And Confident Patience, That, Above All Other Attributes, Separate Man From Man, And Near Him To His Maker; And There Is No Action Nor Art, Whose Majesty We May Not Measure By This Test.

A Man Is Born An Artist As A Hippopotamus Is Born A Hippopotamus; And You Can No More Make Yourself One Than You Can Make Yourself A Giraffe.

It Is Strange That Of All The Pieces Of The Bible Which My Mother Taught Me, That Which Cost Me The Most To Learn, And Which Was To My Childish Mind The Most Repulsive - Psalm 119 - Has Now Become Of All The Most Precious To Me In Its Overflowing And Glorious Passion Of Love For The Law Of God.

Disorder In A Drawing-room Is Vulgar; In An Antiquary's Study, Not; The Black Battle-stain On A Soldier's Face Is Not Vulgar, But The Dirty Face Of A Housemaid Is.

It Is Excellent Discipline For An Author To Feel That He Must Say All That He Has To Say In The Fewest Possible Words, Or His Readers Is Sure To Skip Them.

To Make Your Children Capable Of Honesty Is The Beginning Of Education.

The Divine Mind Is As Visible In Its Full Energy Of Operation On Every Lowly Bank And Mouldering Stone As In The Lifting Of The Pillars Of Heaven, And Settling The Foundation Of The Earth.

I Know Well That Happiness Is In Little Things.

It Is A Good And Safe Rule To Sojourn In Every Place As If You Meant To Spend Your Life There, Never Omitting An Opportunity Of Doing A Kindness, Or Speaking A True Word, Or Making A Friend.

Cookery Means…english Thoroughness, French Art, And Arabian Hospitality; It Means The Knowledge Of All Fruits And Herbs And Balms And Spices; It Means Carefulness, Inventiveness, And Watchfulness.

Success By The Laws Of Competition Signifies A Victory Over Others By Obtaining The Direction And Profits Of Their Work. This Is The Real Source Of All Great Riches.

You Cannot Hammer A Girl Into Anything. She Grows As A Flower Does, She Will Wither Without Sun; She Will Decay In Her Sheath As A Narcissus Will If You Do Not Give Her Air Enough; She Might Fall And Defile Her Head In Dust If You Leave Her Without Help At Some Moments In Her Life; But You Cannot Fetter Her; She Must Take Her Own Fair Form And Way If She Take Any.

Labor Rids Us Of Three Great Evils; Tediousness, Vice, And Poverty.

Let Every Dawn Be To You As The Beginning Of Life, And Every Setting Sun Be To You As Its Close.

Race Is Precisely Of As Much Consequence In Man As It Is In Any Animal.

All Great Art Is The Work Of The Whole Living Creature, Body And Soul, And Chiefly Of The Soul.

Much Of The Character Of Everyman May Be Read In His House.

Cursing Is Invoking The Assistance Of A Spirit To Help You Inflict Suffering. Swearing On The Other Hand, Is Invoking, Only The Witness Of A Spirit To An Statement You Wish To Make.

World Suffering

To Follow Art For The Sake Of Being A Great Man, And Therefore To Cast About Continually For Some Means Of Achieving Position Or Attracting Admiration, Is The Surest Way Of Ending In Total Extinction.

Ornamentation Is The Principal Part Of Architecture, Considered As A Subject Of Fine Art.

Conceit May Puff A Man Up, But Never Prop Him Up.

We Need Examples Of People Who, Leaving Heaven To Decide Whether They Are To Rise In The World, Decide For Themselves That They Will Be Happy In It, And Have Resolved To Seek Not Greater Wealth, But Simpler Pleasure; Not Higher Fortune, But Deeper Felicity; Making The First Of Possessions, Self-possession; And Honouring Themselves In The Harmless Pride And Calm Pursuits Of Peace.

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.

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.

No Individual Rain Drop Ever Considers Itself Responsible For The Flood.

There's No Music In Rest, But There's The Making Of Music In It. And People Are Always Missing That Part Of The Life Melody, Always Talking Of Perseverance And Courage And Fortitude; But Patience Is The Finest And Worthiest Part Of Fortitude, And The Rarest, Too.

... No Human Actions Ever Were Intended By The Maker Of Men To Be Guided By Balances Of Expediency, But By Balances Of Justice.

No Amount Of Pay Ever Made A Good Soldier, A Good Teacher, A Good Artist, Or A Good Workman.

Perfect Taste Is The Faculty Of Receiving The Greatest Possible Pleasure From Those Material Sources Which Are Attractive To Oar Moral Nature In Its Purity And Perfection.

If A Great Thing Can Be Done, It Can Be Done Easily, But This Ease Is Like The Of Ease Of A Tree Blossoming After Long Years Of Gathering Strength.

A Forest Of All Manner Of Trees Is Poor, If Not Disagreeable, In Effect; A Mass Of One Species Of Tree Is Sublime.

Butforme, Thealps And Their Peoplewerealikebeautiful In Their Snow, And Their Humanity; And I Wanted, Neither For Them Nor Myself, Sight Of Any Thrones In Heaven But The Rocks, Or Of Any Spirits In Heaven But The Clouds.

Every Noble Life Leaves The Fibre Of It Interwoven Forever In The Work Of The World.

It Ought To Be Quite As Natural And Straightforward A Matter For A Labourer To Take His Pension From His Parish, Because He Has Deserved Well Of His Parish, As For A Man In Higher Rank To Take His Pension From His Country, Because He Has Deserved Well Of His Country.

Production Does Not Consist In Things Laboriously Made, But In Things Serviceably Consumable; And The Question For The Nation Is Not How Much Labour It Employs, But How Much Life It Produces.

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.

It Is Not The Weariness Of Mortality, But The Strength Of Divinity, Which We Have To Recognize In All Mighty Things; And That Is Just What We Now Never Recognize, But Think That We Are To Do Great Things By Help Of Iron Bars And Perspiration. Alas! We Shall Do Nothing That Way But Lose Some Pounds Of Our Own Weight.

Fine Art Is That In Which The Hand, The Head, And The Heart Of Man Go Together.

There Is No Climate, No Place, And Scarcely An Hour, In Which Nature Does Not Exhibit Color Which No Mortal Effort Can Imitate Or Approach. For All Our Artificial Pigments Are, Even When Seen Under The Same Circumstances, Dead And Lightless Beside Her Living Color; Nature Exhibits Her Hues Under An Intensity Of Sunlight Which Trebles Their Brilliancy.

He Who Can Take No Interest In What Is Small Will Take False Interest In What Is Great.

That Admiration Of The 'neat But Not Gaudy,' Which Is Commonly Reported To Have Influenced The Devil When He Painted His Tail Pea Green.

Repose Demands For Its Expression The Implied Capability Of Its Opposite,--energy.

To Watch The Corn Grow, And The Blossoms Set; To Draw Hard Breath Over Ploughshare Or Spade; To Read, To Think, To Love, To Hope, To Pray, — These Are The Things That Make Men Happy.

Childhood Often Holds A Truth With Its Feeble Finger, Which The Grasp Of Manhood Cannot Retain,--which It Is The Pride Of Utmost Age To Recover.

[for Men] To Feel Their Souls Withering Within Them, Unthanked, To Find Their Whole Being Sunk Into An Unrecognized Abyss, To Be Counted Off Into A Heap Of Mechanism Numbered With Its Wheels, And Weighed With Its Hammer Strokes - This, Nature Bade Not, - This, God Blesses Not, - This, Humanity For No Long Time Is Able To Endure.

You May Chisel A Boy Into Shape, As You Would A Rock, Or Hammer Him Into It, If He Be Of A Better Kind, As You Would A Piece Of Bronze. But You Cannot Hammer A Girl Into Anything. She Grows As A Flower Does.

Remember Always, In Painting As In Eloquence, The Greater Your Strength, The Quieter Will Be Your Manner, And The Fewer Your Words; And In Painting, As In All The Arts And Acts Of Life The Secret Of High Success Will Be Found, Not In A Fretful And Various Excellence, But In A Quiet Singleness Of Justly Chosen Aim.

He Who Is Not Actively Kind Is Cruel!

In The Utmost Solitudes Of Nature, The Existence Of Hell Seems To Me As Legibly Declared By A Thousand Spiritual Utterances As That Of Heaven.

Great Nations Write Their Autobiographies In Three Manuscripts The Book Of Their Deeds, The Book Of Their Words, And The Book Of Their Art. Not One Of These Books Can Be Understood Unless We Read The Two Others; But Of The Three, The Only Quite Trustworthy One Is The Last. The Acts Of A Nation May Be Triumphant By Its Good Fortune; And Its Words Mighty By The Genius Of A Few Of Its Children: But Its Art, Only By The General Gifts And Common Sympathies Of The Race.

I Have Not Written In Vain If I Have Heretofore Done Anything Towards Diminishing The Reputation Of The Renaissance Landscape Painting.

Landscape Painting

Value Is The Life-giving Power Of Anything; Cost, The Quantity Of Labour Required To Produce It; Its Price, The Quantity Of Labourwhich Its Possessor Will Take In Exchange For It.

... The Weakest Among Us Has A Gift, However Seemingly Trivial, Which Is Peculiar To Him, And Which, Worthily Used, Will Be A Gift Also To His Race Forever.

No One Can Become Rich By The Efforts Of Only Their Toil, But Only By The Discovery Of Some Method Of Taxing The Labor Of Others.

It Is, Indeed, Right That We Should Look For, And Hasten, So Far As In Us Lies, The Coming Of The Day Of God; But Not That We Should Check Any Human Effort By Anticipations Of Its Approach. We Shall Hasten It Best By Endeavoring To Work Out The Tasks That Are Appointed For Us Here; And, Therefore, Reasoning As If The World Were To Continue Under Its Existing Dispensation, And The Powers Which Have Just Been Granted To Us Were To Be Continued Through Myriads Of Future Ages.

If You Do Not Wish For His Kingdom Do Not Pray For It. But If You Do You Must Do More Than Pray For It, You Must Work For It.

To Be Taught To Read—what Is The Use Of That, If You Know Not Whether What You Read Is False Or True? To Be Taught To Write Or To Speak—but What Is The Use Of Speaking, If You Have Nothing To Say? To Be Taught To Think—nay, What Is The Use Of Being Able To Think, If You Have Nothing To Think Of? But To Be Taught To See Is To Gain Word And Thought At Once, And Both True.

I Will Not Kill Or Hurt Any Living Creature Needlessly, Nor Destroy Any Beautiful Thing, But Will Strive To Save And Comfort All Gentle Life, And Guard And Perfect All Natural Beauty Upon The Earth.

Candlesticks And Incense Not Being Portable Into The Maintop, The Sailor Perceives These Decorations To Be, On The Whole, Inessential To A Maintop Mass. Sails Must Be Set And Cables Bent, Be It Never So Strict A Saint's Day; And It Is Found That No Harm Comes Of It. Absolution On A Lee-shore Must Be Had Of The Breakers, It Appears, If At All; And They Give Plenary And Brief Without Listening To Confession.

How Long Most People Would Look At The Best Book Before They Would Give The Price Of A Large Turbot For It?

See! This Our Fathers Did For Us.

Greatness Is Not A Teachable Nor Gainable Thing, But The Expression Of The Mind Of A God-made Great Man.

There Is No Solemnity So Deep, To A Right-thinking Creature, As That Of Dawn.

Books Are Divided Into Two Classes, The Books Of The Hour And The Books Of All Time.

When Men Are Rightly Occupied, Their Amusement Grows Out Of Their Work.

The Man Who Accepts The Laissez-faire Doctrine Would Allow His Garden To Grow Wild So That Roses Might Fight It Out With The Weeds And The Fittest Might Survive.

When We Build ... Let It Not Be For Present Delights Nor For Present Use Alone. Let It Be Such Work As Our Descendants Will Thank Us For, And Let Us Think ... That A Time Is To Come When These Stones Will Be Held Sacred Because Our Hands Have Touched Them, And That Men Will Say As They Look Upon The Labor, And The Wrought Substance Of Them, See! This Our Fathers Did For Us!

Multitudes Think They Like To Do Evil; Yet No Man Ever Really Enjoyed Doing Evil Since God Made The World.

Courage, So Far As It Is A Sign Of Race, Is Peculiarly The Mark Of A Gentleman Or A Lady; But It Becomes Vulgar If Rude Or Insensitive, While Timidity Is Not Vulgar, If It Be A Characteristic Of Race Or Fineness Of Make. A Fawn Is Not Vulgar In Being Timid, Nor A Crocodile "gentle" Because Courageous.

So Long As We See The Stones And Joints, And Are Not Deceived As To The Points Of Support In Any Piece Of Architecture, We May Rather Praise Than Regret The Dexterous Artifices Which Compel Us To Feel As If There Were Fibre In Its Shafts And Life In Its Branches.

All The Other Passions Do Occasional Good, But Whenever Pride Puts In Its Word, Everything Goes Wrong, And What It Might Really Be Desirable To Do, Quietly And Innocently, It Is Mortally Dangerous To Do, Proudly.

There Is No Law Of History Any More Than Of A Kaleidoscope.

Your Honesty Is Not To Be Based Either On Religion Or Policy. Both Your Religion And Policy Must Be Based On It. Your Honesty Must Be Based, As The Sun Is, In Vacant Heaven; Poised, As The Lights In The Firmament, Which Have Rule Over The Day And Over The Night.

It Is Among Children Only, And As Children Only, That You Will Find Medicine For Your Healing And True Wisdom For Your Teaching.

No Divine Terror Will Ever Be Found In The Work Of The Man Who Wastes A Colossal Strength In Elaborating Toys; For The First Lesson That Terror Is Sent To Teach Us Is, The Value Of The Human Soul, And The Shortness Of Mortal Time.

When The Whole World Turns Clown, And Paints Itself Red With Its Own Hearts Blood Instead Of Vermilion, It Is Something Else Than Comic.

A Thing Is Worth What It Can Do For You, Not What You Choose To Pay For It.

Nothing Can Be Beautiful Which Is Not True.

Man's Only True Happiness Is To Live In Hope Of Something To Be Won By Him. Reverence Something To Be Worshipped By Him, And Love Something To Be Cherished By Him, Forever.

No Human Face Is Exactly The Same In Its Lines On Each Side, No Leaf Perfect In Its Lobes, No Branch In Its Symmetry. All Admit Irregularity As They Imply Change; And To Banish Imperfection Is To Destroy Expression, To Check Exertion, To Paralyze Vitality. All Things Are Literally Better, Lovelier, And More Beloved For The Imperfections Which Have Been Divinely Appointed, That The Law Of Human Life May Be Effort, And The Law Of Human Judgment, Mercy.

Without Mountains The Air Could Not Be Purified, Nor The Flowing Of The Rivers Sustained.

It Is In This Power Of Saying Everything, And Yet Saying Nothing Too Plainly, That The Perfection Of Art Consists.

Give An Earnest-hearted, Devoted Girl Any True Work That Will Make Her Active In The Dawn, And Weary At Night, With The Consciousness That Her Fellow-creatures Have Indeed Been The Better For Her Day, And The Powerless Sorrow Of Her Enthusiasm Will Transform Itself Into A Majesty Of Radiant And Beneficent Peace.

Borrowers Are Nearly Always Ill-spenders, And It Is With Lent Money That All Evil Is Mainly Done And All Unjust War Protracted.

An Artist Should Be Well Read In The Best Books, And Thoroughly High Bred, Both In Heart And Bearing. In A Word, He Should Be Fit For The Best Society, And Should Keef Out Of It.

The Measure Of Any Great Civilization Is Its Cities And A Measure Of A City's Greatness Is To Be Found In The Quality Of Its Public Spaces, Its Parks And Squares.

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!

The Sculptor Must Paint With His Chisel; Half His Touches Are Not To Realize, But To Put Power Into, The Form. They Are Touches Of Light And Shadow, And Raise A Ridge, Or Sink A Hollow, Not To Represent An Actual Ridge Or Hollow, But To Get A Line Of Light, Or A Spot Of Darkness.

In All Things That Live There Are Certain Irregularities, And Deficiencies Which Are Not Only Signs Of Life, But Sources Of Beauty. No Human Face Is Exactly The Same In Its Lines On Each Side, No Leaf Perfect In Its Lobes, No Branch In Its Symmetry.

No Architecture Is So Haughty As That Which Is Simple.

... Amongst All The Mechanical Poison That This Terrible Nineteenth Century Has Poured Upon Men, It Has Given Us At Any Rate One Antidote - The Daguerreotype. (1845)

I Believe That The Sight Is A More Important Thing Than The Drawing.

I Know Few Christians So Convinced Of The Splendor Of The Rooms In Their Father's House, As To Be Happier When Their Friends Are Called To Those Mansions... Nor Has The Church's Ardent "desire To Depart, And Be With Christ," Ever Cured It Of The Singular Habit Of Putting On Mourning For Every Person Summoned To Such Departure.

Mighty Of Heart, Mighty Of Mind, Magnanimous-to Be This Is Indeed To Be Great In Life.

Modern Education Has Devoted Itself To The Teaching Of Impudence, And Then We Complain That We Can No Longer Control Our Mobs.

Every Great Man Is Always Being Helped By Everybody, For His Gift Is To Get Good Out Of All Things And All Persons.

An Infinitude Of Tenderness Is The Chief Gift And Inheritance Of All Truly Great Men.

The Time Is Probably Near When A New System Of Architectural Laws Will Be Developed, Adapted Entirely To Metallic Construction.

The Step Between Practical And Theoretic Science, Is The Step Between The Miner And The Geologist, The Apocathecary And The Chemist.

I Would Rather Teach Drawing That My Pupils May Learn To Love Nature, Than Teach The Looking At Nature That They May Learn To Draw.

One Evening, When I Was Yet In My Nurse's Arms, I Wanted To Touch The Tea Urn, Which Was Boiling Merrily ... My Nurse Would Have Taken Me Away From The Urn, But My Mother Said "let Him Touch It." So I Touched It - And That Was My First Lesson In The Meaning Of Liberty.

Mountains Are To The Rest Of The Body Of The Earth, What Violent Muscular Action Is To The Body Of Man. The Muscles And Tendons Of Its Anatomy Are, In The Mountain, Brought Out With Force And Convulsive Energy, Full Of Expression, Passion, And Strength.

To Yield Reverence To Another, To Hold Ourselves And Our Lives At His Disposal, Is Not Slavery; Often, It Is The Noblest State In Which A Man Can Live In This World.

There Is In Every Animal's Eye A Dim Image And Gleam Of Humanity, A Flash Of Strange Light Through Which Their Life Looks Out And Up To Our Great Mystery Of Command Over Them, And Claims The Fellowship Of The Creature If Not Of The Soul.

I Am Far More Provoked At Being Thought Foolish By Foolish People, Than Pleased At Being Thought Sensible By Sensible People; And The Average Proportion Of The Numbers Of Each Is Not To My Advantage.

Men Are More Evanescent Than Pictures, Yet One Sorrows For Lost Friends, And Pictures Are My Friends. I Have None Others. I Am Never Long Enough With Men To Attach Myself To Them; And Whatever Feelings Of Attachment I Have Are To Material Things.

Morality Does Not Depend On Religion.

Imperfection Is In Some Sort Essential To All That We Know In Life.

Perfection And Imperfection

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.

A Little Thought And A Little Kindness Are Often Worth More Than A Great Deal Of Money.

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.

Know Thyself, For Through Thyself Only Thou Canst Know God.

Education Is The Leading Human Souls To What Is Best, And Making What Is Best Out Of Them; And These Two Objects Are Always Attainable Together, And By The Same Means; The Training Which Makes Man Happiest In Themselves Also Makes Them Most Serviceable To Others.

We Have Much Studied And Much Perfected, Of Late, The Great Civilized Invention Of The Division Of Labour; Only We Give It A False Name. It Is Not, Truly Speaking, The Labour That Is Divided; But The Men.

There Was Always More In The World Than Men Could See, Walked They Ever So Slowly; They Will See It No Better For Going Fast. The Really Precious Things Are Thought And Sight, Not Pace.

Walk While Ye Have The Light, Lest Darkness Come Upon You.

Punishment Is The Last And The Least Effective Instrument In The Hands Of The Legislator For The Prevention Of Crime.

God Shows Us In Himself, Strange As It May Seem, Not Only Authoritative Perfection, But Even The Perfection Of Obedience--an Obedience To His Own Laws; And In The Cumbrous Movement Of Those Unwieldiest Of His Creatures We Are Reminded, Even In His Divine Essence, Of That Attribute Of Uprightness In The Human Creature "that Sweareth To His Own Hurt And Changeth Not.

You May Assuredly Find Perfect Peace, If You Are Resolved To Do That Which Your Lord Has Plainly Required--and Content That He Should Indeed Require No More Of You--than To Do Justice, To Love Mercy, And To Walk Humbly With Him.

If Men Lived Like Men Indeed, Their Houses Would Be Temples -- Temples Which We Should Hardly Dare To Injure, And In Which It Would Make Us Holy To Be Permitted To Live; And There Must Be A Strange Dissolution Of Natural Affection, A Strange Unthankfulness For All That Homes Have Given And Parents Taught, A Strange Consciousness That We Have Been Unfaithful To Our Fathers Honor, Or That Our Own Lives Are Not Such As Would Make Our Dwellings Sacred To Our Children, When Each Man Would Fain Build To Himself, And Build For The Little Revolution Of His Own Life Only.

The Imagination Is Never Governed, It Is Always The Ruling And Divine Power.

If You Want Knowledge, You Must Toil For It; If Food, You Must Toil For It; And If Pleasure, You Must Toil For It: Toil Is The Law.

Drawing Is A Means Of Obtaining And Communicating Knowledge

Which Of Us?is To Do The Hard And Dirty Work For The Restand For What Pay? Who Is To Do The Pleasant And Clean Work, And For What Pay?

The Proof Of A Thing's Being Right Is That It Has Power Over The Heart; That It Excites Us, Wins Us, Or Helps Us.

An Unimaginative Person Can Neither Be Reverent Nor Kind.

You May Sell Your Work, But Not Your Soul.

You Were Made For Enjoyment, And The World Was Filled With Things Which You Will Enjoy, Unless You Are Too Proud To Be Pleased With Them, Or Too Grasping To Care For What You Can Not Turn To Other Account Than Mere Delight.

Without The Perfect Sympathy With The Animals Around Them, No Gentleman's Education, No Christian Education, Could Be Of Any Possible Use.

Wise Laws And Just Restraints Are To A Noble Nation Not Chains, But Chains Of Mail, -- Strength And Defense, Though Something Of An Incumbrance.

At Every Moment Of Our Lives We Should Be Trying To Find Out, Not In What We Differ With Other People, But In What We Agree With Them.

The Last Act Crowns The Play.

There Was A Rocky Valley Between Buxton And Bakewell?divine As The Vale Of Tempe; You Might Have Seen The Gods There Morning And Eveningapollo And The Sweet Muses Of The Light? You Enterprised A Railroad?you Blasted Its Rocks Away? And, Now, Every Fool In Buxton Can Be At Bakewell In Half-an-hour, And Every Fool In Bakewell At Buxton.

If You Can Draw The Stone Rightly, Everything Within Reach Of Art Is Also Within Yours.

If We Pretend To Have Reached Either Perfection Or Satisfaction, We Have Degraded Ourselves And Our Work. God's Work Only May Express That, But Ours May Never Have That Sentence Written Upon It, Behold It Was Very Good.

The Object Of True Education Is To Make People Not Merely Do The Right Things, But Enjoy Them

All Things Are Literally Better, Lovelier, And More Beloved For The Imperfections Which Have Been Divinely Appointed, That The Law Of Human Life May Be Effort, And The Law Of Human Judgment, Mercy.

The Anger Of A Person Who Is Strong, Can Always Bide Its Time.

There Is Nothing So Great Or So Goodly In Creation, But That It Is A Mean Symbol Of The Gospel Of Christ, And Of The Things He Has Prepared For Them That Love Him.

Trending Author

Francis Parkman

Walter Savage Landor

Category