banker, politician, philanthropist, scientist & polymath (1834-1913)
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
Do what you will, only do something.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
Endurance is a much better test of character than any single act of heroism, however noble.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
Do not lay things too much to heart. No one is ever really beaten unless he is discouraged.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
We must be careful what we read, and not, like the sailors of Ulysses, take bags of wind for sacks of treasure.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Pleasures of Life
A day of worry is more exhausting than a week of work.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
A man who is not a good friend to himself cannot be so to any one else.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Beauties of Nature
A kind word will give more pleasure than a present.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
Happiness is a thing to be practiced, like the violin.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Beauties of Nature
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
What we see depends mainly on what we look for.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Beauties of Nature
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Pleasures of Life
If you have the least doubt about it, do not marry.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life
A crowd is not necessarily company, but neither need it necessarily prevent thought or disturb peace of mind.
JOHN LUBBOCK
Peace and Happiness
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.
JOHN LUBBOCK
The Use of Life