You might sooner get lightning out of incense smoke than true action or passion out of your modern English religion.
John RuskinIf some people really see angels where others see only empty space, let them paint the angels: only let not anybody else think they can paint an angel too, on any calculated principles of the angelic.
John RuskinWe require from buildings two kinds of goodness: first, the doing their practical duty well: then that they be graceful and pleasing in doing it.
John RuskinNo one can explain how the notes of a Mozart melody, or the folds of a piece of Titian's drapery, produce their essential effects. If you do not feel it, no one can by reasoning make you feel it.
John RuskinI 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.
John Ruskin