770 Quotes by John Ruskin

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.

The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it.

... no human actions ever were intended by the Maker of men to be guided by balances of expediency, but by balances of justice.

Music when healthy, is the teacher of perfect order, and when depraved, the teacher of perfect disorder.

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 are no such things as Flowers there are only gladdened Leaves.

You cannot get anything out of nature or from God by gambling; only out of your neighbor.

A thing is worth what it can do for you, not what you choose to pay for it.

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.