Essays

by John Ruskin

by John Ruskin

1. In my inaugural lecture, [1] I stated that while holding this professorship I should direct you, in your practical exercises, chiefly to natural history and landscape.

28. In my last Lecture I laid before you evidence that the greatness of the master whom I wished you to follow as your only guide in landscape depended primarily on his studying from Nature always with the point; that is to say, in pencil or pen outline. To-day I wish to show you that his preëminence depends secondarily on his perfect rendering of form and distance by light and shade, before he admits a thought of color.

61. The distinctions between schools of art which I have so often asked you to observe are, you must be aware, founded only on the excess of certain qualities in one group of painters over another, or the difference in their tendencies; and not in the absolute possession by one group, and absence in the rest, of any given skill.

"A JOY FOR EVER";
(AND ITS PRICE IN THE MARKET):
BEING THE SUBSTANCE (WITH ADDITIONS) OF TWO LECTURES ON THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART
Delivered at Manchester, July 10th and 13th, 1857.

BY JOHN RUSKIN

Note, p. 18.—"Fatherly authority."

Oct. 14th, 1873.[22]

166. It is to be remembered that the giving of prizes can only be justified on the ground of their being the reward of superior diligence and more obedient attention to the directions of the teacher. They must never be supposed, because practically they never can become, indications of superior genius; unless in so far as genius is likely to be diligent and obedient, beyond the strength and temper of the dull.

A Lecture delivered at Manchester, July 10, 1857.