Author: John Ruskin
Pages: 59
Format: Paperback
Published: 1864
Publisher: Penguin Classics
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Date Completed: June 13, 2025
My rating: 
Thoughts
This is a couple essays from the 1800s. Although he can be quite rambling at times, both essays still stand up in some ways today. In “Traffic,” Ruskin challenges the priorities and moral foundations of his audience, arguing that architecture – and all art – reflects the values of the society that creates it. So the style of a building is meaningless if the society has no guiding moral or spiritual vision. He claims the modern England that he’s speaking to worships success and self-interest, rather than other spiritual and moral values such as truth, beauty, and virtue. I might argue the same can be said of much of today’s modern world.
In “The Root of Honour,” Ruskin has more thoughts that are quite relevant today. That economics must be rooted in morality and justice; the employer-employee relationship should be honorable and personal, not transactional; society suffers when profit is pursued without regard to human well-being; and that we cannot separate economic success from ethical responsibility.
Although these aren’t the easiest essays to read, what with their run-on sentences and all, it’s amazing how timeless they are. People, especially those in positions of power, would do well by reading these.
