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Quotes by John Ruskin
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.— filed under Christian Service
God is a kind Father. He sets us all in the place where He wishes us to be employed; and that employment is truly "our Father's business." He chooses work for every creature which will be delightful to them, if they do it simply and humbly. He gives us always strength enough, and sense enough, for what He wants us to do; if we either tire ourselves, or puzzle ourselves, it is our own fault. And we may always be sure, whatever we are doing, that we cannot be pleasing Him, if we are not happy ourselves.— filed under Christian Service
Christian faith is a grand cathedral, with divinely pictured windows. Standing without you see no glory, nor can possibly imagine any. Nothing is visible but the merest outline of dusky shapes. Standing within all is clear and defined; every ray of light reveals an army of unspeakable splendors.— filed under Christianity
I believe that the root of almost every schism and heresy from which the Christian church has ever suffered, has been the effort of men to earn, rather than to receive, their salvation.— filed under Church
All you have really to do is to keep your back as straight as you can; and not think about what is upon it. The real and essential meaning of "virtue" is that straightness of back.— filed under Cross Bearing
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.— filed under Duty
There is nothing so small but that we may honor God by asking His guidance of it, or insult Him by taking it into our own hands.— filed under God's Guidance
Through all our work and care and woe; Through all the dizzy joys we know, Through the "dark valley" where we go, Guide us Love's dearest light, To-day, to-night. Like His emblem the sun, He has a fullness of light in Himself. Were a thousand million more creatures to crowd the earth, that sun has light and heat for them all; and in God there is a fullness of good infinitely greater than the whole creation or the most capacious of His creatures can require. He is a sun and shield; He will give grace and glory; "no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly." How can man understand God, since he does not yet understand his own mind, with which he endeavors to understand Him? The infinity of God is not mysterious, it is only unfathomable - not concealed, but incomprehensible. It is a clear infinity - the darkness of the pure, unsearchable sea.— filed under God's Guidance
If you want to work for the kingdom of God, and to bring it, and enter into it, there is just one condition to be first accepted. You must enter into it as children, or not at all.— filed under God's Kingdom
I never heard my father's or mother's voice once raised in any question with each other; nor saw any angry or even slightly hurt or offended glance in the eyes of either. I never heard a servant scolded, nor even suddenly, passionately, or in any severe manner, blamed; and I never saw a moment's trouble or disorder in any household matter.— filed under Home
I believe the first test of a truly great man is his humility.— filed under Humility
But if, indeed, there be a nobler life in us than in these strangely moving atoms; if, indeed, there is an eternal difference between the fire which inhabits them, and that which animates us, it must be shown, by each of us in his appointed place, not merely in the patience, but in the activity of our hope, not merely by our desire, but our labor, for the time when the dust of the generations of men shall be confirmed for foundations of the gates of the city of God.— filed under Man
"The work of men - and what is that? Well, we may any of us know very quickly, on the condition of being wholly ready to do it. But many of us are for the most part thinking, not of what we are to do, but of what we are to get; and the best of us are sunk into the sin of Ananias, and it is a mortal one we want to keep back part of the price; and we continually talk of taking up our cross, as if the only harm in a cross was the weight of it as if it was only a thing to be carried, instead of to be - crucified upon. They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh, with the affections and lusts." ،،— filed under Manliness
Levi's station in life was the receipt of custom; and Peter's, the shore of Galilee; and Paul's, the antechambers of the High- Priest, which " station in life" each had to leave, with brief notice.— filed under Occupation
Not without design does God write the music of our lives. Be it ours to learn the time, and not be discouraged at the rests. If we say sadly to ourselves, "There is no music in a rest," let us not forget "there is the making of music in it." The making of music is often a slow and painful process in this life. How patiently God works to teach us! How long He waits for us to learn the lesson!— filed under Patience
In moderating, not in satisfying desires, lies peace. 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.— filed under Peace
Faithful prayer always implies correlative exertion; and no man can ask honestly and hopefully to be delivered from temptation, unless he has himself honestly and firmly determined to do the best he can to keep out of it.— filed under Prayer
He only is advancing in life whose heart is getting softer, whose blood warmer, whose brain quicker, whose spirit is entering into living peace. And the men who have this life in them are the true lords or kings of the earth - they, and they only.— filed under Spiritual Progress
A youth thoughtless! when the career of all his days depends on the opportunity of a moment! A youth thoughtless! when all the happiness of his home forever depends on the chances or the passions of an hour! A youth thoughtless! when his every act is a foundation-stone of future conduct, and every imagination a fountain of life or death! Be thoughtless in any after years, rather than now - though indeed there is only one place where a man may be nobly thoughtless - his death-bed. No thinking should be ever left to be done there.— filed under Youth