John Lubbock Quotes & Sayings

In truth, people can generally make time for what they choose to do; it is not really the time but the will that is wanting. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

Many a blessing has been recognized too late. — John Lubbock

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

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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. — John Lubbock

Do what you will, only do something. — John Lubbock

The whole value of solitude depends upon oneself; it may be a sanctuary or a prison, a haven of repose or a place of punishment, a heaven or a hell, as we ourselves make it. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

If we succeed in giving the love of learning, the learning itself is sure to follow. — John Lubbock

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

Happiness is a condition of mind not a result of circumstances. — John Lubbock

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

Rest is by no means a waste of time. — John Lubbock

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

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We profit little by books we do not enjoy. — John Lubbock

Men are more helped by sympathy than by service. — John Lubbock

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

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

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

There are temptations which strong exercise best enables us to resist — John Lubbock

What we see depends mainly on what we look for. — John Lubbock

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

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

What we do see depends mainly on what we look for ... In the same field the farmer will notice the crop, the geologists the fossils, botanists the flowers, artists the colouring, sportmen the cover for the game. Though we may all look at the same things, it does not all follow that we should see them. — John Lubbock

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. — John Lubbock

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

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."- Biologist John Lubbock. — John Lubbock

I cannot, however, 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 cheerful as we can, if only because to be happy ourselves is a most effectual contribution to the happiness of others. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

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

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. — John Lubbock

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

Our ambition should be to rule ourselves, the true kingdom for each one of us; and true progress is to know more, and be more, and to do more. — John Lubbock

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. — John Lubbock

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