Roger Scruton Quotes

The goal of education is the advancement of knowledge and the dissemination of truth.

It is better, of course, to know useless things than to know nothing.

Useless knowledge can be made directly contributory to a force of sound and disinterested public opinion.

Men may be spoiled by education, even as they are spoiled by illiteracy. Education is the preparation of the mind for future work, hence men should be educated with special reference to the work.

Education is more than Pisa. Particularly musical education. We also need education and training for more than reasons of usefulness and marketability.

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education.

What is the purpose of education if not, at a minimum, to prepare people for work?

Each generation is inclined to educate its young so as to get along in the present world instead of with a view to the proper end of education: the promotion of the best possible realization of humanity as humanity.

All education in a country has got to be demonstrably in promotion of the progress of the country in which it is given.

She knows what is the best purpose of education: not to be frightened by the best but to treat it as part of daily life.

Since growth is the characteristic of life, education is all one with growing; it has no end beyond itself. The criterion of the value of school education is the extent in which it creates a desire for continuous growth and supplies means for making the desire effective in fact.

That education should be regulated by law and should be an affair of state is not to be denied, but what should be the character of this public education, and how young persons should be educated, are questions which remain to be considered. As things are, there is disagreement about the subjects. For mankind are by no means agreed about the things to be taught, whether we look to virtue or the best life. Neither is it clear whether education is more concerned with intellectual or with moral virtue.

It isn’t what the book costs. It’s what it will cost you if you don’t read it.

Women, like men, must be educated with a view to action, or their studies cannot be called education.

Learning isn't a means to an end; it is an end in itself.

Intelligence plus character-that is the goal of true education.

There are branches of learning and education which we must study merely with a view to leisure spent in intellectual activity, and these are to be valued for their own sake; whereas those kinds of knowledge which are useful in business are to be deemed necessary, and exist for the sake of other things.

But the ground of a man's culture lies in his nature, not in his calling. His powers are to be unfolded on account of their inherent dignity, not their outward direction. He is to be educated, because he is a man, not because he is to make shoes, nail, or pins.

What is the task of higher education? To make a man into a machine. What are the means employed? He is taught how to suffer being bored.

Reading is not an end to itself, but a means to an end.

History is valuable, to begin with, because it is true; and this, though not the whole of its value, is the foundation and condition of all the rest. That all knowledge, as such, is in some degree good, would appear to be at least probable; and the knowledge of every historical fact possesses this element of goodness, even if it posses no other.

Learning . . . is - also an end in itself.

All knowledge is of itself of some value. There is nothing so minute or inconsiderable, that I would not rather know it than not. In the same manner, all power, of whatever sort, is of itself desirable. A man would not submit to learn to hem a ruffle, of his wife, or his wife's maid; but if a mere wish could attain it, he would rather wish to be able to hem a ruffle.

Human beings are afraid of dying. They are always running after something: money, honor, and pleasure. But if you had to die now, what would you want?

The only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government is the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by means of the Bible.