John Lubbock Quotations

What we see depends mainly on what we look for.

A day of worry is more exhausting than a week of work.

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time.

Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books.

Our duty is to believe that for which we have sufficient evidence, and to suspend our judgment when we have not.

Happiness is a thing to be practiced, like the violin.

Sunsets are so beautiful that they almost seem as if we were looking through the gates of Heaven.

The important thing is not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child should be given the wish to learn.

A wise system of education will at last teach us how little man yet knows, how much he has still to learn.

When we have done our best, we should wait the result in peace.

Your character will be what you yourself choose to make it.

If we are ever in doubt about what to do, it is a good rule to ask ourselves what we shall wish on the morrow that we had done.

We often hear of people breaking down from overwork, but in nine out of ten they are really suffering from worry or anxiety.

We must not sit still and look for miracles; up and doing, and the Lord will be with thee.

When we have done our best, we should wait the results in peace

If we succeed in giving the love of learning, the learning itself is sure to follow

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time

To do something, however small, to make others happier and better, is the highest ambition, the most elevating hope, which can inspire a human being

Do not be afraid of showing your affection. Be warm and tender, thoughtful and affectionate. Men are more helped by sympathy, than by service; love is more than money, and a kind word will give more pleasure than a present.

Art is unquestionably one of the purest and highest elements in human happiness. It trains the mind through the eye, and the eye through the mind. As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life.

If you have written a clever and conclusive, but scathing letter, keep it back till the next day, and it will very often never go at all.

In truth, people can generally make time for what they choose to do; it is not really the time but the will that is lacking

I can but think that the world would be better and brighter if our teachers would dwell on the duty of happiness as well as the happiness of duty; for we ought to be as bright and genial as we can, if only because to be cheerful ourselves is a most effectual contribution to the happiness of others.

We profit little by books we do not enjoy.

To be happy ourselves is a most effectual contribution to the happiness of others.

The world would be better and brighter if people were taught the duty of being happy as well as the happiness of doing their duty.

We are all great landed proprietors, if we only knew it. What we lack is not land, but the power to enjoy it. Moreover, this great inheritance has the additional advantage that it entails no labor, requires no management. The landlord has the trouble, but the landscape belongs to everyone who has eyes to see it.

Exercise of the muscles keeps the body in health, and exercise of the brain brings peace of mind.

Happy indeed is the naturalist: to him the seasons come round like old friends; to him the birds sing: as he walks along, the flowers stretch out from the hedges, or look up from the ground, and as each year fades away, he looks back on a fresh store of happy memories.

We must be careful what we read, and not, like the sailors of Ulysses, take bags of wind for sacks of treasure.

Fresh air is as good for the mind as for the body. Nature always seems trying to talk to us as if she had some great secret to tell. And so she has.

A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. C. S. LEWIS, Out of the Silent Planet True pleasures are paid for in advance; false pleasures afterwards, with heavy and compound interest.

To render ourselves insensible to pain we must forfeit also the possibilities of happiness.

We often hear of bad weather, but in reality, no weather is bad. It is all delightful, though in different ways. Some weather may be bad for farmers or crops, but for man all kinds are good. Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating. As Ruskin says, "There is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather.

Savages have often been likened to children, and the comparison is not only correct but also highly instructive. Many naturalists consider that the early condition of the individual indicates that of the race,-that the best test of the affinities of a species are the stages through which it passes. So also it is in the case of man; the life of each individual is an epitome of the history of the race, and the gradual development of the child illustrates that of the species.

Here are the three great questions which in life we have over and over again to answer: Is it right or wrong? Is it true or false? Is it beautiful or ugly? Our education ought to help us to answer these questions.

Many of the greatest men have owed their success to industry rather than to cleverness.

Our own happiness ought not to be our main objective in life.

A Cheerful friend is like a sunny day, which sheds its brightness on all around.

There are temptations which strong exercise best enables us to resist

Everyone must have felt that a cheerful friend is like a sunny day, which sheds its brightness on all around; and most of us can, as we choose, make of this world either a palace or a prison.

Great battles are really won before they are actually fought. To control our passions we must govern our habits, and keep watch over ourselves in the small details of everyday life.

Art trains the mind through the eye, and the eye through the mind. As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life.

Be cautious, but not too cautious; do not be too much afraid of making a mistake; a man who never makes a mistake will make nothing.

A poor woman from Manchester, on being taken to the seaside, is said to have expressed her delight on seeing for the first time something of which there was enough for everybody.

Before buying anything, it is well to ask if one could do without it.

Try to realize all the blessings you have, and you will find perhaps that they are more than you suppose.

Reading and writing, arithmetic and grammar do not constitute education, any more than a knife, fork and spoon constitute a dinner.

Though it is a great mistake to make friends of the wicked and foolish, it is unwise to make enemies of them, for they are very numerous.

Do what you will, only do something.

If you have the least doubt about it, do not marry.

It is sad, indeed, to see how man wastes his opportunities. How many could be made happy, with the blessings which are recklessly wasted or thrown away.

The veil is slowly rising, but as regards innumerable questions we must be content to remain in ignorance.

Men are more helped by sympathy than by service.

A man who is not a good friend to himself cannot be so to any one else.

Many a blessing has been recognized too late.

A kind word will give more pleasure than a present.

Rest is by no means a waste of time.

There can be no merit in believing something which you can neither explain nor understand.

A crowd is not necessarily company, but neither need it necessarily prevent thought or disturb peace of mind.

False pleasures come from without and are imperfect: happiness is internal and our own.

Many savage nations worship trees, and I really think my first feeling would be one of delight and interest rather than of surprise, if some day when I am alone in the woods one of the trees were to speak to me.

Do not lay things too much to heart. No one is ever really beaten unless he is discouraged.

The idle man does not know what it is to enjoy rest, for he has not earned it.

Cultivate all your faculties; you must either use them or lose them

Our great mistake in education is ... the worship of book-learning-the confusion of instruction and education. We strain the memory instead of cultivating the mind. ... We ought to follow exactly the opposite course with children-to give them a wholesome variety of mental food, and endeavour to cultivate their tastes, rather than to fill their minds with dry facts.

Happiness is a condition of mind not a result of circumstances.

In this world we do not see things as they are. We see them as we are, because what we see depends mainly on what we are looking for.

When important decisions have to be taken, the natural anxiety to come to a right decision will often keep you awake. Nothing, however, is more conducive to healthful sleep than plenty of open air.

Those who have not distinguished themselves at school need not on that account be discouraged. the greatest minds do not necessarily ripen the quickest.

It always seems to be raining harder than it really is when you look at the weather through the window.

It would be a great thing if people could be brought to realize that they can never add to the sum of their happiness by doing wrong.

Life is a great gift, and as we reach years of discretion, most of us naturally ask ourselves what should be the main object of our existence.

Endurance is a much better test of character than any single act of heroism, however noble.

All those who love Nature she loves in return, and will richly reward, not perhaps with the good things, as they are commonly called, but with the best things of this world-not with money and titles, horses and carriages, but with bright and happy thoughts, contentment and peace of mind.

We may sit in our library and yet be in all quarters of the earth.

How little our libraries cost us as compared with our liquor cellars.

Time is a trust, and for every minute of it you will have to account.

Love seems to beautify and inspire all nature. It raises the earthly caterpillar into the ethereal butterfly, it paints the feathers in spring, it lights the glowworm's lamp, it wakens the song of birds, and inspires the poet's lay. Even inanimate Nature seems to feel the spell, and flowers glow with the richest colours.

Don't be afraid of showing affection. Be warm and tender, thoughtful and affectionate. Men are more helped by sympathy than by service. Love is more than money, and a kind word will give more pleasure than a present.

However vexed you may be overnight, things will often look very different in the morning.