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Patriotism

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Patriotism means equipped forces and a prepared citizenry. Moral stamina means more energy and more productivity, on the farm and in the factory. Love of liberty means the guarding of every resource that makes freedom possible--from the sanctity of our families and the wealth of our soil to the genius of our scientists. ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower
Patriotism, not nationalism, should inspire the citizen. The ethnic nationalist who wants a linguistically and culturally uniform nation is akin to the racist who is intolerant toward those who look and behave differently. The patriot is a "diversitarian"; he is pleased, indeed proud of the variety within the borders of his country; he looks for loyalty from all citizens. And he looks up and down, not left and right. ~ Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
To be a good patriot, a man must consider his countrymen as God's creatures, and himself as accountable for his acting towards them. ~ George Berkeley

Patriotism or national pride is the feeling of love, devotion and sense of attachment to a homeland and alliance with other citizens who share the same sentiment.

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A

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  • Patriotism is in political life what faith is in religion.
    • Lord Acton, "Nationality", The Home and Foreign Review (July 1862).
  • The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend -them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors. They purchased them for us with toil, and danger, and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men. Of the latter, we are in most danger at present. Let us therefore be aware of it. Let us contemplate our forefathers and posterity, and resolve to maintain the rights bequeathed to us from the former for the sake of the latter. Instead of sitting down satisfied with the efforts we have already made, which is the wish of our enemies, the necessity of the times more than ever calls for our utmost circumspection, deliberation, fortitude, and perseverance. Let us remember that "if we suffer tamely a lawless attack upon our liberty, we encourage it, and involve others in our doom!" It is a very serious consideration, which should deeply impress our minds, that millions yet unborn may be the miserable sharers in the event!
    • Samuel Adams, written as "Candidus" in The te (14 October 1771), later published in The Life and Public Services of Samuel Adams (1865) by William R. Vincent Wells, p. 425.
  • Who would not be that youth? What pity is it
    That we can die but once to save our country!
  • There is no greater sign of a general decay of virtue in a nation, than a want of zeal in its inhabitants for the good of their country. This generous and publick-spirited passion has been observed of late years to languish and grow cold in this our Island; where a party of men have made it their business to represent it as chimerical and romantic, to destroy in the minds of the people the sense of national glory, and to turn into ridicule our natural and ancient Allies, who are united to us by the common interests both of religion and policy. It may not therefore be unseasonable to recommend to this present generation the practice of that virtue, for which their ancestors were particularly famous, and which is called The love of one's country. This love to our country, as a moral virtue, is a fixed disposition of mind to promote the safety, welfare, and reputation of the community in which we are born, and of the constitution under which we are protected.
    • Joseph Addison, The Freeholder, No. 5 (6 January 1716), quoted in The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison, Esq; Volume the Fourth (1721), p. 371
  • Pugnate pro patria, fight for you country, your dearest country, wherein you have been bred, born, nourished and brought up, toward which you ought to be as inwardly affected, as you are naturally moved to your mothers. It is your native soil, and therefore most sweet; for what may be dearer or sweeter than your Country?
    • William Averell, A Mervalious Combat of Contrarieties (1588), quoted in Bertrand T. Whitehead, Brags and Boasts: Propaganda in the Year of the Armada (1994), pp. 83-84

B

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  • We cannot without damage to our soul's health destroy the roots which bind us to the land and language of our birth. The love of country is a deep and universal instinct, freighted with ancient memories and subtle associations. Men who deny their national spiritual heritage in exchange for a vague and watery cosmopolitanism become less than men; they starve and dwarf their personalities; they turn into a sort of political eunuch.
  • To be a good patriot, a man must consider his countrymen as God's creatures, and himself as accountable for his acting towards them.
    • Bishop Berkeley, reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 442
  • Patriotism, n. Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name. In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit it is the first.
  • The service of our country is no chimerical, but a real duty. He who admits the proofs of any other moral duty, drawn from the constitution of human nature, or from the moral fitness and unfitness of things, must admit them in favour of this duty, or be reduced to the most absurd inconsistency.
    • Lord Bolingbroke, 'On the Spirit of Patriotism' (1736), quoted in Letters, on the Spirit of Patriotism: On the Idea of a Patriot King: And On the State of Parties, at the Accession of King George the First (1749), pp. 27-28
  • Neither Montaigne in writing his essays, nor DesCartes in building new worlds, nor Burnet in framing an antedeluvian earth, no nor Newton in discovering and establishing the true laws of nature on experiment and a sublimer geometry, felt more intellectual joys; than he feels who is a real patriot, who bends all the force of his understanding, and directs all his thoughts and actions, to the good of his country.
    • Lord Bolingbroke, 'On the Spirit of Patriotism' (1736), quoted in Letters, on the Spirit of Patriotism: On the Idea of a Patriot King: And On the State of Parties, at the Accession of King George the First (1749), p. 31
  • If modern youth has realized, as I believe it has, that to live for one's country is a finer type of patriotism than to die for it, then the youth of my generation will not, after all, have laid down the best of its life in vain.
    • Vera Brittain, "Youth and War", 13 December 1934. Quoted in Paul Berry and Mark Bostridge, Vera Brittain: A Life. Chatto and Windus, 1995. (p. 305)
  • The unbought grace of life, the cheap defence of nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise, is gone!
    • Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), Volume III, p. 331

C

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  • But this I would say, standing as I do in the view of God and Eternity — I realise that patriotism is not enough. I must have no bitterness or hatred towards anyone.
    • Edith Cavell (October 11, 1915), the evening before her execution by a German firing squad. S. Theodore Felstead, Edith Cavell: The Crime That Shook the World (London: George Newnes, 1950), pp. 185–6.
  • “My country, right or wrong”, is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, “My mother, drunk or sober”.
  • When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home.
  • [W]hen with a rational spirit you have surveyed the whole field, there is no social relation among them all more close, none more dear than that which links each one of us with our country. Parents are dear; dear are children, relatives, friends; but one native land embraces all our loves; and who that is true would hesitate to give his life for her, if by his death he could render her a service? So much the more execrable are those monsters who have torn their fatherland to pieces with every form of outrage and who are and have been engaged in compassing her utter destruction.
    • Cicero, De Officiis, 1.57 (44 BC), quoted in De officiis. With an English translation by Walter Miller (1913), pp. 59, 61
  • My education was built up upon ruthlessly hard-and-fast ideas crowned by a patriotism that nothing could shake. In the insurrection of Vendée, allied with the foreigner against Revolutionary France, the two qualities of patriot and republican were so merged in one another that the Ghouans called us patauds, an insult that my forbears were proud of. The fatherland was, and could only be, everybody's home, where energies were developed in common. To renounce one's country had neither sense nor meaning. You might as well have expected the child to want to leave the shelter of its mother's wing. The home, the country, this was no theory; it was a natural phenomenon that had been realized from the very earliest ages of mankind. Animals had a temporary home in their lairs, man a permanent one in his country.
  • The Nation has need of all that can be contributed to it through the best efforts of all its citizens. The colored people have repeatedly proved their devotion to the high ideals of our country. They gave their services in the war with the same patriotism and readiness that other citizens did. The records of the selective draft show that somewhat more than 2,250,000 colored men were registered. The records further prove that, far from seeking to avoid participation in the national defense, they showed that they wished to enlist before the selective service act was put into operation, and they did not attempt to evade that act afterwards.
  • The propaganda of prejudice and hatred which sought to keep the colored men from supporting the national cause completely failed. The black man showed himself the same kind of citizen, moved by the same kind of patriotism, as the white man. They were tempted, but not one betrayed his country. Among well-nigh 400,000 colored men who were taken into the military service, about one-half had overseas experience. They came home with many decorations and their conduct repeatedly won high commendation from both American and European commanders.

D

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  • Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it.
  • Befitting acts are all those which reason prevails with us to do; and this is the case with honouring one's parents, brothers and country, and intercourse with friends. Unbefitting, or contrary to duty, are all acts that reason deprecates, e.g. to neglect one's parents, to be indifferent to one's brothers, not to agree with friends, to disregard the interests of one's country, and so forth.
    • Diogenes Laërtius, Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, VII.108, quoted in Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, Vol. II, translated by Robert Drew Hicks (1925; 1995), p. 215
  • [T]he principle of patriotism, which is the soul of free communities.
    • Benjamin Disraeli, speech to the annual meeting of the Royal and Central Bucks Agricultural Association in Aylesbury (20 September 1876), quoted in The Times (21 September 1876), p. 6
  • [T]he noblest of human sentiments, now decried by philosophers—the sentiment of patriotism.
    • Benjamin Disraeli, speech at the Guildhall, London (9 November 1879), quoted in William Flavelle Monypenny and George Earle Buckle, The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield. Volume II. 1860–1881 (1929), p. 1367

E

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  • No matter that patriotism is too often the refuge of scoundrels. Dissent, rebellion, and all-around hell-raising remain the true duty of patriots.
    • Barbara Ehrenreich "Family Values," The Worst Years of Our Lives: Irreverent Notes from a Decade of Greed (1991).
  • Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism— how passionately I hate them!
    • Albert Einstein, Ideas and opinions, p. 10, chapter: "The world as I see it", translated by Sonja Bargmann from Mein Weltbild edited by Varl Seeling. Wings Books (New York), ISBN 978-0517003930.
  • I am against any nationalism, even in the guise of mere patriotism. Privileges based on position and property have always seemed to me unjust and pernicious, as did any exaggerated personality cult.
  • Patriotism means equipped forces and a prepared citizenry. Moral stamina means more energy and more productivity, on the farm and in the factory. Love of liberty means the guarding of every resource that makes freedom possible—from the sanctity of our families and the wealth of our soil to the genius of our scientists.

F

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  • America now is stumbling through the darkness of hatred and divisiveness. Our values, our principles, and our determination to succeed as a free and democratic people will give us a torch to light the way. And we will survive and become the stronger—not only because of a patriotism that stands for love of country, but a patriotism that stands for love of people.
    • Gerald R. Ford, address to the state conference of the Order of DeMolay, Grand Rapids, Michigan (September 7, 1968); in Michael V. Doyle, ed., Gerald R. Ford, Selected Speeches (1973), p. 77.
  • Nationalism is our form of incest, is our idolatry, is our insanity. "Patriotism" is its cult. It should hardly be necessary to say, that by "patriotism" I mean that attitude which puts the own nation above humanity, above the principles of truth and justice; not the loving interest in one's own nation, which is the concern with the nation's spiritual as much as with its material welfare—never with its power over other nations. Just as love for one individual which excludes the love for others is not love, love for one's country which is not part of one's love for humanity is not love, but idolatrous worship.
  • There are two Americas. One is the America of Lincoln and Adlai Stevenson; the other is the America of Teddy Roosevelt and the modern superpatriots. One is generous and humane, the other narrowly egotistical; one is self-critical, the other self-righteous; one is sensible, the other romantic; one is good-humored, the other solemn; one is inquiring, the other pontificating; one is moderate, the other filled with passionate intensity; one is judicious and the other arrogant in the use of great power.
  • If you think in terms of people divided up into countries, you won't follow me. The idea of countries is going by the boards. Young people are getting wonderfully uprooted and they're too strong to get sucked into this 'country' crap.

G

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  • That public virtue, which among the ancients was denominated patriotism, is derived from a strong sense of our own interest, in the preservation and prosperity of the free government of which we are members. Such a sentiment, which had rendered the legions of the republic almost invincible, could make but a very feeble impression on the mercenary servants of a despotic prince; and it became necessary to supply that defect by other motives, of a different, but not less forcible nature; honour and religion.
  • It should be the work of a genuine and noble patriotism to raise the life of the nation to the level of its privileges; to harmonize its general practice with its abstract principles; to reduce to actual facts the ideals of its institutions; to elevate instruction into knowledge; to deepen knowledge into wisdom; to render knowledge and wisdom complete in righteousness; and to make the love of country perfect in the love of man.
    • Henry Giles, reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 442.
  • Conceit, arrogance, and egotism are the essentials of patriotism. … Patriotism assumes that our globe is divided into little spots, each one surrounded by an iron gate. Those who have had the fortune of being born on some particular spot, consider themselves better, nobler, grander, more intelligent than the living beings inhabiting any other spot. It is, therefore, the duty of everyone living on that chosen spot to fight, kill, and die in the attempt to impose his superiority upon all the others.
  • We Americans claim to be a peace-loving people. We hate bloodshed; we are opposed to violence. Yet we go into spasms of joy over the possibility of projecting dynamite bombs from flying machines upon helpless citizens. We are ready to hang, electrocute, or lynch anyone, who, from economic necessity, will risk his own life in the attempt upon that of some industrial magnate. Yet our hearts swell with pride at the thought that America is becoming the most powerful nation on earth, and that she will eventually plant her iron foot on the necks of all other nations. Such is the logic of patriotism.
  • Thinking men and women the world over are beginning to realize that patriotism is too narrow and limited a conception to meet the necessities of our time.
  • When we have undermined the patriotic lie, we shall have cleared the path for the great structure where all shall be united into a universal brotherhood — a truly free society.
  • Leo Tolstoy … defines patriotism as the principle that will justify the training of wholesale murderers.
    • Emma Goldman in a speech titled What is patriotism? delivered in 1908.

H

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  • I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.
    • Nathan Hale, last words before being hanged by the British as a spy, (September 22, 1776), according to the account by William Hull based on reports by British Captain John Montresor who was present and who spoke to Hull under a flag of truce the next day:
‘On the morning of his execution,’ continued the officer, ‘my station was near the fatal spot, and I requested the Provost Marshal to permit the prisoner to sit in my marquee, while he was making the necessary preparations. Captain Hale entered: he was calm, and bore himself with gentle dignity, in the consciousness of rectitude and high intentions. He asked for writing materials, which I furnished him: he wrote two letters, one to his mother and one to a brother officer.’ He was shortly after summoned to the gallows. But a few persons were around him, yet his characteristic dying words were remembered. He said, ‘I only regret, that I have but one life to lose for my country.’
Some speculation exists that Hale might have been repeating or paraphrasing lines from Joseph Addison's play Cato, Act IV, Scene IV:
How beautiful is death when earned by virtue. Who would not be that youth? What pity is it that we can die but once to serve our country.
See George Dudley Seymour, Captain Nathan Hale, Major John Palsgrave Wyllys, A Digressive History, (1933), p. 39.
Another early variant of his last words exists, as reported in the Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser (17 May 1781):
I am so satisfied with the cause in which I have engaged, that my only regret is, that I have not more lives than one to offer in its service.
  • The difference between patriotism and nationalism is that the patriot is proud of his country for what it does, and the nationalist is proud of his country no matter what it does; the first attitude creates a feeling of responsibility, but the second a feeling of blind arrogance that leads to war.
Oh come on, I don't love states. I love my wife.
~ Gustav Heinemann
  • Oh come on, I don't love states. I love my wife. That's it!
    • Original: Ach was, ich liebe keine Staaten, ich liebe meine Frau; fertig!
    • Gustav Heinemann, President of West Germany (1969-74), cited by Hermann Schreiber in Der Spiegel (13 January 1969)
  • Gentlemen may cry, Peace, peace! But there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!
  • I was over in Australia, and I was asked, 'Are you proud to be an American?' And I was like, 'Um, I don't know, I didn't have a lot to do with it. You know, my parents fucked there, that's about all. You know, I was in the spirit realm at that time. "Fuck in Paris! Fuck in Paris!" but they couldn't hear me, cos I didn't have a mouth. I was a spirit without lungs or mouth or vocal cords.' They fucked here. OK, I'm proud. I hate patriotism. I can't stand it, man. Makes me fuckin' sick. It's a round world last time I checked, OK? You know what I mean. I hate patriotism. In fact, that's how we could stop patriotism, I think. Instead of putting stars and stripes on our flags, we should put pictures of our parents fucking.
  • Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.
    • It is sweet and honourable to die for one's country.
    • Horace, Odes, Book III, ode ii, line 13
  • The Protestant way of reconciling the commandments of Christ with those human activities that appealed to them was to declare any reconciliation to be impossible. … We must love our enemies. But whether this means burning the heretic and the witch, sending children to work before they can read, making bombs and blessing them, or whether it means the opposite, each believer has to decide for himself without even suspecting what the true will of God might be. A guiding light, though a deceptive one, is provided by the interest of the fatherland, of which there is little mention in the Gospels. In the last few centuries, an incomparably greater number of believers have staked their lives for their country than for the forbidden love of its enemies. The idealists from Fichte to Hegel have also taken an active part in this development. In Europe, faith in God has now become faith in one’s own people. The motto, “Right or wrong, my country,” together with the tolerance of other religions with similar views, takes us back into that ancient world from which the primitive Christians had turned away.
    • Max Horkheimer, “Theism and Atheism” (1963), in Critique of Instrumental Reason (1974).
  • I have written for all, with a profound love for my own country, but without being engrossed by France more than by any other nation. In proportion as I advance in life, I grow more simple, and I become more and more patriotic for humanity.

I

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  • Patriotism varies, from a noble devotion to a moral lunacy.
    • William Ralph Inge, in "Our Present Discontents" (August 1919) in Outspoken Essays (1919), p. 2.
  • Who fears to speak of Ninety-eight?
    Who blushes at the name?
    When cowards mock the patriot's fate,
    Who hangs his head for shame?

J

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  • Our Union: It must be preserved.
    • Andrew Jackson, toast at a Jefferson Day dinner (April 13, 1830). Marquis James, Andrew Jackson: Portrait of a President (1937), p. 235. The account by James emphasizes the shocked reaction of Jackson's vice president, John C. Calhoun, to this toast, since it was clear he had lost Jackson's support of the Southern cause of nullification. When Calhoun's turn came, his toast was: "The Union, next to our liberty, most dear. May we all remember that it can only be preserved by respecting the rights of the States and by distributing equally the benefits and burdens of the Union" (pp. 235–36). According to Martin Van Buren, Autobiography (1920, reprinted 1973), vol. 2, p. 415, at the urging of General Hayne, Jackson altered his toast to "Our Federal Union" before it was given to the newspapers, and it was reported in this form in many sources including James Parton, Life of Andrew Jackson (1860), vol. 3, p. 283, and Thomas Hart Benton, Thirty Years View (1854, reprinted 1883), vol. 1, p. 148.
  • I'm no second-class citizen either and no man here is, unless he thinks like one and reasons like one and performs like one. This is my country and I believe in her, and I will serve her, and I'll contribute to her welfare whenever and however I can. If she has any ills, I'll stand by her until in God's given time, through her wisdom and her consideration for the welfare of the entire nation, she will put them right.
    • Daniel James Jr., as quoted in The Right to Fight: A History of African Americans in The Military (1998), by Gerald Astor, De Capo Press, pp. 440–443
  • The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.
Patriotism having become one of our topicks, Johnson suddenly uttered, in a strong determined tone, an apophthegm, at which many will start: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." But let it be considered, that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotism which so many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak of self-interest.

K

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  • I never felt so near the glory of Patriotism, the glory of making by any means a country happier.
    • John Keats (July 1, 1818) in a letter to Thomas Keats (June 29 - July 2, 1818). Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends, edited by Sidney Colvin (London: Macmillan, 1891), p. 117.
    • Usually quoted in the form "Patriotism is the glory of making by any means a country happier," e.g. by Elizabeth Goudge in The Castle on the Hill (1942), chapters VI.i and XIV.ii.
  • Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
  • And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.
    My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.
  • It is of the very essence of true patriotism to be earnest and truthful, to scorn the flatterer’s tongue, and strive to keep its native land in harmony with the laws of national thrift and power. It will tell a land of its faults, as a friend will counsel a companion; it will speak as honestly as the physician advises a patient; and if occasion requires, an indignation will flame out of its love, like that which burst from the lips of Moses when he returned from the mountain, and found the people to whom he had revealed the holy and austere Jehovah, and for whom he would cheerfully have sacrificed his life, worshipping a calf.
  • Patriotism, not nationalism, should inspire the citizen. The ethnic nationalist who wants a linguistically and culturally uniform nation is akin to the racist who is intolerant toward those who look (and behave) differently. The patriot is a "diversitarian"; he is pleased, indeed proud of the variety within the borders of his country; he looks for loyalty from all citizens. And he looks up and down, not left and right.

L

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  • All should unite in honest efforts to obliterate the effects of war, and to restore the blessings of peace. They should remain, if possible, in the country; promote harmony and good feeling; qualify themselves to vote; and elect to the State and general Legislatures wise and patriotic men, who will devote their abilities to the interests of the country, and the healing of all dissensions. I have invariably recommended this course since the cessation of hostilities, and have endeavored to practice it myself.
    • Robert E. Lee, in a letter to former Virginia governor John Letcher (28 August 1865), as quoted in Personal Reminiscences, Anecdotes, and Letters of Gen. Robert E. Lee (1875) by John William Jones, p. 203.
  • True patriotism sometimes requires of men to act exactly contrary, at one period, to that which it does at another, and the motive which impels them — the desire to do right — is precisely the same.

M

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  • Faith and patriotism are the two great thaumaturges of this world. Both are divine; all their actions are prodigies. Do not go to them talking of examination, choice, or discussion; they will say that you blaspheme. They know only two words: submission and belief; with these two levers they raise the world. Even their errors are sublime. These two children of Heaven prove their origin to all eyes by creating and conserving; but if they unite, join their forces, and together take possession of a nation, they exalt it, they divinize it, and they increase its forces a hundred-fold.
  • Patriotism has served, at different times, as widely different ends as a razor, which ought to be used to keep your face clean and yet may be used to cut your own throat or that of some more innocent person.
    • C. E, Montague, The Right Place (1924), quoted in Murphy, Edward F. Webster's treasury of Relevant Quotations , Greenwich House, New York, 1983 (pg. 466).
  • In uniform patriotism can salute one flag only, embrace but the first circle of life—one's own land and tribe. In war that is necessary, in peace it is not enough.
    • Bill Moyers, "At Large", speech at the Peace Corps twenty-fifth anniversary memorial service (21 September 1986), published in Moyers on Democracy (2008), p. 26.

N

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  • I have no patriotism, for patriotism, as I see it, is often an arbitrary veneration of real estate above principles.

O

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  • By 'nationalism'... I mean the habit of identifying oneself with a single nation or other unit, placing it beyond good and evil and recognising no other duty than that of advancing its interests. Nationalism is not to be confused with patriotism. Both words are normally used in so vague a way that any definition is liable to be challenged, but one must draw a distinction between them, since two different and even opposing ideas are involved.
  • By 'patriotism' I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force on other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseparable from the desire for power. The abiding purpose of every nationalist is to secure more power and more prestige, not for himself but for the nation or other unit in which he has chosen to sink his own individuality.

P

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  • THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman
  • I would sooner receive injustice in the Queen's courts than justice in a foreign court. I hold that man or woman to be a scoundrel who goes abroad to a foreign court to have the judgments of the Queen's courts overturned, the actions of her Government countermanded or the legislation of Parliament struck down.
    • Enoch Powell, Speech in Ilford (13 March 1982), from Simon Heffer, Like the Roman. The Life of Enoch Powell (Phoenix, 1999), p. 853.
  • Madam (Jessica Tan), we should not inspire love of our symbols and our country by counterpoising our nation against another and cultivating resentment towards other countries. For it is said – that patriotism is the love of one's people, nationalism is the hatred of others. I hope that ours can be a patriotism that does not seek to validate itself through juxtaposition against some "other" nation. Hatred is a form of energy that can bind a nation, but to the wrong end.
    • Leon Perera, Singapore Parl Debates; Vol 95, Sitting No 68; 13 September 2022, during the second reading of National Symbols Bill.

R

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  • 1914 showed the disaster which followed when hundreds of millions of people gave the old responses to the old stimuli. Soldiers, and later civilians, saw that 'Honour', 'Courage', 'Patriotism', as they understood them, led to cruelty, lying, and blood-lust on a scale so gigantic that the foundations of civilisation were threatened.
  • National pride is to countries what self-respect is to individuals: a necessary condition for self-improvement.
  • [Patriotism is the] willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
  • Patriots always talk of dying for their country, and never of killing for their country.

S

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  • To me, it seems a dreadful indignity to have a soul controlled by geography.
    • George Santayana, letter (16 August 1914) to Mary Williams Winslow. The Letters of George Santayana, Book Two 1910–1920, edited by William G. Holzberger (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2001), p. 192.
  • Patriotism, when it wants to make itself felt in the domain of learning, is a dirty fellow who should be thrown out of doors.
    • Arthur Schopenhauer, Parerga and Paralipomena (1851) Counsels and Maxims Vol. 2, Ch. 21, § 255.
  • The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last resource, pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.
    • Arthur Schopenhauer, The Wisdom of Life, translated by Thomas Bailey Saunders, Chapter IV, Section 2. Pride
  • Patriotism is an extension of the natural love of home... The term suggests that the sentiment is conceived on the model of love from child to parent, presumably because it is held to be a kind of piety, not reducible to any rescindable agreement or acquired affection. That would not make patriotism irrational, any more than love of parents is irrational, but it would do something to explain why the patriot himself may be able to give no reasoned basis for his emotion.
    • Roger Scruton, A Dictionary of Political Thought (1982; 2nd ed., 1996), p. 409
  • No one loves his country for its size or eminence, but because it is his own.
    • Seneca the Younger, Letters to Lucilius (1st Century), translated by E. Phillips Barker (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1932), p. 221.
  • Patriotism is, fundamentally, a conviction that a particular country is the best in the world because you were born in it.
    • George Bernard Shaw in The World (15 November 1893). Cited in Not Bloody Likely!: And Other Quotations from Bernard Shaw (1996), p. 142
  • this was what patriotism meant to me-
    to be at home inside my own head long enough
    to accept its infinite freedom
    and move forward anywhere, to mysteries coming.
  • That is a true sentiment which makes us feel that we do not love our country less, but more, because we have laid up in our minds the knowledge of other lands and other institutions and other races, and have had enkindled afresh within us the instinct of a common humanity, and of the universal beneficence of the Creator.
    • Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, reported in Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 442.
  • What do we mean by patriotism in the context of our times? … A patriotism that puts country ahead of self; a patriotism which is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.
    • Adlai Stevenson, speech in New York City (27 August 1952), quoted in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations (1955), Boston: Little, Brown and Co., p. 986.

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  • The shift in emphasis is related to popular notions of "independence", patriotism, and the Englishman's "birthright". The Gordon Rioters of 1780 and the "Church and King" rioters in Birmingham in 1791 had this in common: they felt themselves, in some obscure way, to be defending the "Constitution" against alien elements who threatened their "birthright". They had been taught for so long that the Revolution settlement of 1688, embodied in the Constitution of King, Lords and Commons, was the guarantee of British independence and liberties, that the reflex had been set up — Constitution equals Liberty—upon which the unscrupulous might play. And yet it is likely that the very rioters who destroyed Dr. Priestley's precious library and laboratory were proud to regard themselves as "free-born Englishmen". Patriotism, nationalism, even bigotry and repression, were all clothed in the rhetoric of liberty. Even Old Corruption extolled British liberties; not national honour, or power, but freedom was the coinage of patrician, demagogue and radical alike. In the name of freedom Burke denounced, and Paine championed, the French Revolution: with the opening of the French Wars (1793), patriotism and liberty occupied every poetaster: "Thus Britons guard their ancient fame, Assert their empire o'er the sea, And to the envying world proclaims, One nation still is brave and free— Resolv'd to conquer or to die, True to their KING, their LAWS, their LIBERTY."
  • Patriotism … for rulers is nothing else than a tool for achieving their power-hungry and money-hungry goals, and for the ruled it means renouncing their human dignity, reason, conscience, and slavish submission to those in power. … Patriotism is slavery.
  • Those attacks upon language and religion in Poland, the Baltic provinces, Alsace, Bohemia, upon the Jews in Russia, in every place that such acts of violence occur—in what name have they been, and are they, perpetrated? In none other than the name of that patriotism which you defend.
    Ask our savage Russifiers of Poland and the Baltic provinces, ask the persecutors of the Jews, why they act thus. They will tell you it is in defence of their native religion and language; they will tell you that if they do not act thus, their religion and language will suffer—the Russians will be Polonised, Teutonised, Judaised.
  • If patriotism is good, then Christianity, which gives peace, is an idle dream, and the sooner this teaching is eradicated, the better. But if Christianity really gives peace, and if we really want peace, then patriotism is a leftover from barbarous times, which must not only not be evoked and taught, as we now do, but which must be eradicated by all means of preaching, persuasion, contempt, and ridicule. If Christianity is the truth, and if we wish to live in peace, then we must not only have no sympathy for the power of our country, but must even rejoice in its weakening and contribute to it.
  • I have already several times expressed the thought that in our day the feeling of patriotism is an unnatural, irrational, and harmful feeling, and a cause of a great part of the ills from which mankind is suffering, and that, consequently, this feeling – should not be cultivated, as is now being done, but should, on the contrary, be suppressed and eradicated by all means available to rational men. Yet, strange to say – though it is undeniable that the universal armaments and destructive wars which are ruining the peoples result from that one feeling – all my arguments showing the backwardness, anachronism, and harmfulness of patriotism have been met, and are still met, either by silence, by intentional misinterpretation, or by a strange unvarying reply to the effect that only bad patriotism (Jingoism or Chauvinism) is evil, but that real good patriotism is a very elevated moral feeling, to condemn which is not only irrational but wicked.
    What this real, good patriotism consists in, we are never told; or, if anything is said about it, instead of explanation we get declamatory, inflated phrases, or, finally, some other conception is substituted for patriotism – something which has nothing in common with the patriotism we all know, and from the results of which we all suffer so severely.
  • It will be said, "Patriotism has welded mankind into states, and maintains the unity of states." But men are now united in states; that work is done; why now maintain exclusive devotion to one's own state, when this produces terrible evils for all states and nations? For this same patriotism which welded mankind into states is now destroying those same states. If there were but one patriotism say of the English only then it were possible to regard that as conciliatory, or beneficent. But when, as now, there is American patriotism, English, German, French, Russian, all opposed to one another, in this event, patriotism no longer unites, but disunites.
  • At the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America, and through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other. When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice. The Bible tells us, "How good and pleasant it is when God's people live together in unity." We must speak our minds openly, debate our disagreements honestly, but always pursue solidarity. When America is united, America is totally unstoppable. There should be no fear: We are protected, and we will always be protected. We will be protected by the great men and women of our military and law enforcement, and most importantly, we will be protected by God.
  • If this organization is to have any hope of successfully confronting the challenges before us, it will depend, as President Truman said some 70 years ago, on the "independent strength of its members." If we are to embrace the opportunities of the future and overcome the present dangers together, there can be no substitute for strong, sovereign, and independent nations: nations that are rooted in their histories and invested in their destinies; nations that seek allies to befriend, not enemies to conquer; and most important of all, nations that are home to patriots, to men and women who are willing to sacrifice for their countries, their fellow citizens, and for all that is best in the human spirit. In remembering the great victory that led to this body's founding, we must never forget that those heroes who fought against evil also fought for the nations that they loved. Patriotism led the Poles to die to save Poland, the French to fight for a free France, and the Brits to stand strong for Britain. Today, if we do not invest ourselves, our hearts, and our minds in our nations, if we will not build strong families, safe communities, and healthy societies for ourselves, no one can do it for us. We cannot wait for someone else, for faraway countries or far-off bureaucrats—we can't do it. We must solve our problems, to build our prosperity, to secure our futures, or we will build vulnerable to decay, domination, and defeat. The true question for the United Nations today, for people all over the world who hope for better lives for themselves and their children, is a basic one: Are we still patriots? Do we love our nations enough to protect their sovereignty and to take ownership of their futures? Do we revere them enough to defend their interests, preserve their cultures, and ensure a peaceful world for their citizens?
  • America is governed by Americans. We reject the ideology of globalism, and we embrace the doctrine of patriotism. Around the world, responsible nations must defend against threats to sovereignty not just from global governance, but also from other, new forms of coercion and domination.
  • Like my beloved country, each nation represented in this hall has a cherished history, culture, and heritage that is worth defending and celebrating and which gives us our singular potential and strength. The free world must embrace its national foundations. It must not attempt to erase them or replace them. Looking around and all over this large, magnificent planet, the truth is plain to see: If you want freedom, take pride in your country. If you want democracy, hold on to your sovereignty. And if you want peace, love your nation. Wise leaders always put the good of their own people and their own country first. The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to sovereign and independent nations who protect their citizens, respect their neighbors, and honor the differences that make each country special and unique.
  • I would throw out the old maxim, ‘My country, right or wrong,’ etc., and instead I would say, ‘My country when she is right.’ Because patriotism is supporting your country all the time, but your government only when it deserves it.
    • Mark Twain, Address to the Male Teachers Association of the City of New York (March 16, 1901), as reported in New York Times, March 17, 1901.
    • Compare "The modern patriotism, the true patriotism, the only rational patriotism is loyalty to the Nation all the time, loyalty to the Government when it deserves it."
      • Mark Twain, in the essay "The Czar's Soliloquy", The North American Review, No. DLXXX (March 1905), p. 324.
  • In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.
  • The soul and substance of what customarily ranks as patriotism is moral cowardice — and always has been.
  • Patriotism always exists in the greatest degree in rude nations, and in an early period of society.

W

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Citizens by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations. ~ George Washington
  • Citizens by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of AMERICAN, which belongs to you, in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation derived from local discriminations.
    • George Washington, farewell address (September 19, 1796); in John C. Fitzpatrick, ed., The Writings of George Washington (1940), vol. 35, p. 219–20.
  • Our patriotism comes straight from the Romans. This is why French children are encouraged to seek inspiration for it in Corneille. It is a pagan virtue, if these two words are compatible. The word pagan, when applied to Rome, really possesses the significance charged with horror which the early Christian controversialists gave it. The Romans really were an atheistic and idolatrous people; not idolatrous with regard to images made of stone or bronze, but idolatrous with regard to themselves. It is this idolatry of self which they have bequeathed to us in the form of patriotism.
  • "Every national border in Europe," El Eswad added ironically, "marks the place where two gangs of bandits got too exhausted to kill each other anymore and signed a treaty. Patriotism is the delusion that one of these gangs of bandits is better than all the others."
    • Robert Anton Wilson, The Earth Will Shake: The History of the Early Illuminati (The Historical Illuminatus Chronicles Vol. 1) (1982).
  • Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of the government. The history of liberty is a history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it.
    • Woodrow Wilson, Speech at New York Press Club (9 September 1912), in The papers of Woodrow Wilson, 25:124.
  • Patriotism is the vice of nations.
    • Oscar Wilde, Phrases and Philosophies for the Use of the Young (1894).
  • Patriotism is love and defense of one's own country, ordinarily considered a high virtue. The national flag is a sacred symbol; hearts quicken at the sound of martial bands. Celebrated in language, music, and the visual arts, patriotism leads us to some of our greatest acts of heroism. It gives us national holidays and justifies the purest kind of sacrifice. Patriotism can look fine and glamorous—at least in the abstract. Stripped of its ape essence, patriotism is male defense of the community, gloried among humans and surely enjoyed among chimpanzees and bonobos. For all the cultural determinists' efforts to persuade us that it's an arbitrary choice, patriotism seems such a fundamental aspect of being human that one can hardly imagine how things might be different.

Y

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  • What is patriotism but love of the good things we ate in our childhood?
    • Lin Yutang, The Importance of Living (1937) Ch. IV : On Having A Stomach

Z

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  • If patriotism were defined, not as blind obedience to government, nor as submissive worship to flags and anthems, but rather as love of one's country, one's fellow citizens (all over the world), as loyalty to the principles of justice and democracy, then patriotism would require us to disobey our government, when it violated those principles.
    • Howard Zinn, Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology (1991).

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

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Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 584-87.
  • The die was now cast; I had passed the Rubicon. Swim or sink, live or die, survive or perish with my country was my unalterable determination.
    • John Adams, Works, Volume IV, p. 8. In a conversation with Jonathan Sewell (1774). (Peele in Edward I [1584?] used the phrase "Live or die, sink or swim.").
  • Our ships were British oak,
    And hearts of oak our men.
  • From distant climes, o'er wide-spread seas we come,
    Though not with much éclat or beat of drum;
    True patriots all; for be it understood
    We left our country for our country's good.
    No private views disgraced our generous zeal,
    What urged our travels was our country's weal.
    • George Barrington, prologue for the Opening of the Playhouse at Sydney, New South Wales, Jan. 16, 1796. Dr. Young's Revenge was played by convicts.
  • Be Briton still to Britain true,
    Among oursel's united;
    For never but by British hands
    Maun British wrangs be righted.
  • Again to the battle, Achaians!
    Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance!
    Our land, the first garden of liberty's tree—
    It has been, and shall yet be, the land of the free.
  • God save our gracious king,
    Long live our noble king,
    God save the king.
  • I realize that patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred toward any one.
    • Edith Cavell. Quoted by the Newspapers as her last words before she was shot to death by the Germans in Brussels, Oct. 12, 1915.
  • "My country, right or wrong," is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, "My mother, drunk or sober."
  • We join ourselves to no party that does not carry the flag and I keep step to the music of the Union.
    • Rufus Choate, Letter to a Worcester Whig Convention. Oct. 1, 1855.
  • Patria est communis omnium parens.
    • Our country is the common parent of all.
    • Cicero, Orationes in Catilinam. I. 7.
  • I have heard something said about allegiance to the South: I know no South, no North, no East, no West, to which I owe any allegiance.
  • I hope to find my country in the right: however I will stand by her, right or wrong.
    • John J. Crittenden, in Congress, when President Polk sent a message after the defeat of the Mexican General Arista by General Taylor. May, 1846.
  • Our country! In her intercourse with foreign nations, may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong.
    • Stephen Decatur, toast given at Norfolk, April, 1816. See Mackenzie's Life of Stephen Decatur, Chapter XIV.
  • I wish I was in de land ob cotton,
    Ole times dar am not forgotten,
    Look-a-way! Look-a-way! Look-a-way, Dixie Land!
    * * * * *
    Den I wish I was in Dixie, Hooray! Hooray!
    In Dixie Land I'll take my stand
    To lib and die in Dixie.
    • Daniel D. Emmett, Dixie Land. See account in Century, Aug., 1887. A Southern version was written by Albert Pike.
  • 'Twas for the good of my country that I should be abroad. Anything for the good of one's country—I'm a Roman for that.
  • Liberté, égalité, fraternité.
    • Liberty, equality, fraternity.
    • Watchword of French Revolution.
  • And bold and hard adventures t' undertake,
    Leaving his country for his country's sake.
  • Our country is the world—our countrymen are all mankind.
    • William Lloyd Garrison, Motto of the Liberator, 1837–1839. "My country" originally—later changed to "Our country".
  • Such is the patriot's boast, where'er we roam,
    His first best country ever is at home.
  • Strike—for your altars and your fires;
    Strike—for the green graves of your sires;
    God—and your native land!
  • And have they fixed the where, and when?
    And shall Trelawny die?
    Here's thirty thousand Cornish men
    Will know the reason why!
    • Robert Stephen Hawker, Song of the Western Men. Mr. Hawker asserts that he wrote the ballad in 1825, all save the chorus and the last two lines, which since the imprisonment by James II, 1688, of the seven Bishops, have been popular throughout Cornwall. (Trelawny was Bishop of Bristol.) First appearance in the Royal Devonport Telegram and Plymouth Chronicle, Sept. 2, 1826. Story of the ballad in Macaulay's History of England. Footnote for Hawker.
  • He serves his party best who serves the country best.
  • I am not a Virginian but an American.
  • One flag, one land, one heart, one hand,
    One Nation evermore!
  • He serves me most who serves his country best.
    • Homer, The Iliad, Book X, line 206. Pope's translation.
  • And for our country 'tis a bliss to die.
    • Homer, The Iliad, Book XV, line 583. Pope's translation.
  • That man is little to be envied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain of Marathon, or whose piety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Iona.
  • Pater patriæ.
    • Father of his country.
    • Juvenal, Satire VIII, 244. Title bestowed on Cicero (B.C. 64) after his consulship, "a mark of distinction which none ever gained before." Plutarch—Life of Cicero. Pliny, Book VII, calls Cicero "Parens patriæ." Title conferred on Peter the Great by the Russian Senate. (1721). See Post-Boy, Dec. 28–30, 1721. Also applied to Augustus Cæsar and Marius.
  • Je meurs content, je meurs pour la liberté de mon pays.
    • I die content, I die for the liberty of my country.
    • Attributed to Le Pelletier, also to Marshal Lannes.
  • The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
  • Is it an offence, is it a mistake, is it a crime to take a hopeful view of the prospects of your own country? Why should it be? Why should patriotism and pessimism be identical? Hope is the mainspring of patriotism.
  • 'Twere sweet to sink in death for Truth and Freedom!
    Yes, who would hesitate, for who could bear
    The living degradation we may know
    If we do dread death for a sacred cause?
  • Our spirit is … to show ourselves eager to work for, and if need be, to die for the Irish Republic. Facing our enemy we must declare an attitude simply…. We ask for no mercy and we will make no compromise.
    • Terence McSwiney, Lord Mayor of Cork. From a document in his possession when he was sentenced, in August, 1920.
  • Vox diversa sonat: populorum est vox tamen una,
    Cum verus PATRIÆ diceris esse PATER.
    • There are many different voices and languages; but there is but one voice of the peoples when you are declared to be the true "Father of your country."
    • Martial, De Spectaculis, III. 11.
  • We, that would be known
    The father of our people, in our study
    And vigilance for their safety, must, not change
    Their ploughshares into swords, and force them from
    The secure shade of their own vines, to be
    Scorched with the flames of war.
  • Nescio qua natale solum dulcedine captos
    Ducit, et immemores non sinit esse sui.
    • Our native land charms us with inexpressible sweetness, and never allows us to forget that we belong to it.
    • Ovid, Epistolæ Ex Ponto, I. 3. 35.
  • Omne solum forti patria est.
    • The whole earth is the brave man's country.
    • Ovid, Fasti, I. 501.
  • Patria est, ubicunque est bene.
    • Our country is wherever we are well off.
    • Pacuvius, quoted by Cicero, Tusculan. Disputations. V. 37. Aristophanes. Plautus. Euripides, Fragmenta Incerta. Phipiskus—Dion Cassius. I. 171.
  • My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.
  • They know no country, own no lord,
    Their home the camp, their law the sword.
    • Free rendering of passage in Silvio Pellico's Enfernio de Messina, Act V, scene 2.
  • Millions for defence, but not one cent for tribute.
    • Attributed to Charles C. Pinckney when Ambassador to the French Republic (1796). Denied by him. Said to have been "Not a penny—not a sixpence." Attributed also to Robert Goodloe Harper, of South Carolina. "I have ten thousand for defense, but none to surrender; if you want our weapons, come and get them." The response of an ancient General.
  • If I were an American, as I am on Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country I never would lay down my arms, never! never! never!
  • Socrates said he was not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.
  • Patria est ubicumque vir fortis sedem elegerit.
    • A brave man's country is wherever he chooses his abode.
    • Quintus Curtius Rufus, De Rebus Gestis Alexandri Magni, VI, 4, 13.
  • "patriotism," i.e., a willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
  • Patriots always talk of dying for their country, and never of killing for their country.
  • Our country, right or wrong! When right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right!
  • The truth is plain to see - if you want freedom, take pride in your country; if you want democracy, hold onto your sovereignty, and if you want peace, love your nation. Wise leaders always put the good of their own people and their own country first. The future does not belong to globalists. The future belongs to patriots. The future belongs to sovereign and independent nations who protect their citizens, respect their neighbors, and honor the differences that make each country special and unique.
  • Where's the coward that would not dare
    To fight for such a land?
  • Servare cives, major est virtus patriæ patri.
    • To preserve the life of citizens, is the greatest virtue in the father of his country.
    • Seneca the Younger, Octavia, 444.
  • Had I a dozen sons,—each in my love alike, * * * I had rather have eleven die nobly for their country, than one voluptuously surfeit out of action.
  • I do love
    My country's good with a respect more tender,
    More holy and profound, than mine own life.
  • He held it safer to be of the religion of the King or Queen that were in being, for he knew that he came raw into the world, and accounted it no point of wisdom to be broiled out of it.
  • A saviour of the silver-coasted isle.
  • Put none but Americans on guard tonight.
    • Attributed to George Washington. The only basis for this order seems to be found in Washington's circular letter to regimental commanders, dated April 30, 1777, regarding recruits for his body guard. "You will therefore send me none but natives." A few months before, Thomas Hickey, a deserter from the British army, had tried to poison Washington, had been convicted and hanged.
  • Hands across the sea,
    Feet on English ground,
    The old blood is bold blood, the wide world round.
  • Let our object be, our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country.
    • Daniel Webster, address at the Laying of the Corner-Stone of the Bunker Hill Monument (June 17, 1825).
  • Thank God, I—I also—am an American!
  • Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand and heart to this vote.
  • I was born an American; I live an American; I shall die an American!
  • Patriotism has become a mere national self assertion, a sentimentality of flag-cheering with no constructive duties.
  • The lines of red are lines of blood, nobly and unselfishly shed by men who loved the liberty of their fellowmen more than they loved their own lives and fortunes. God forbid that we should have to use the blood of America to freshen the color of the flag. But if it should ever be necessary, that flag will be colored once more, and in being colored will be glorified and purified.
  • Our country—whether bounded by the St. John's and the Sabine, or however otherwise bounded or described, and be the measurements more or less;—still our country, to be cherished in all our hearts, and to be defended by all our hands.
    • Robert C. Winthrop, toast at Faneuil Hall (July 4, 1845). "Our country, however bounded." Toast founded on the speech of Winthrop.
  • There are no points of the compass on the chart of true patriotism.
  • Our land is the dearer for our sacrifices. The blood of our martyrs sanctifies and enriches it. Their spirit passes into thousands of hearts. How costly is the progress of the race. It is only by the giving of life that we can have life.
    • Rev. E. J. Young, Lesson of the Hour, in Magazine of History, Extra. No. 43. Originally pub. in Monthly Religious Mag., Boston (May, 1865).
  • America is the crucible of God. It is the melting pot where all the races are fusing and reforming … these are the fires of God you've come to…. Into the crucible with you all. God is making the American.

Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1989)

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  • We would rather starve than sell our national honor.
    • Indira Gandhi, prime minister of India, remark at election meeting in Nagpur, India, as reported by The New York Times, January 23, 1967, p. 1. India had accepted trade restrictions with North Vietnam and Cuba to get grain from the United States. Prime Minister Gandhi said this did not compromise the country's honor because India had not been trading with North Vietnam, and her trade with Cuba was limited to the selling of jute products, which was not objected to by the United States.
  • With earnest prayers to all my friends to cherish mutual good will, to promote harmony and conciliation, and above all things to let the love of our country soar above all minor passions, I tender you the assurance of my affectionate esteem and respect.
    • Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Hollins (May 5, 1811); in Andrew A. Lipscomb, ed., The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 13 (1903), p. 58–59.
  • Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
    • Samuel Johnson, James Boswell, Life of Johnson, entry for Friday, April 7, 1775, p. 615 (1970). "In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer, I beg to submit that it is the first". Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, at entry for patriotism, The Collected Writings of Ambrose Bierce, p. 323 (1946, reprinted 1973). H. L. Mencken added this to Johnson's dictum: "But there is something even worse: it is the first, last, and middle range of fools". The World, New York City, November 7, 1926, p. 3E
  • True patriotism sometimes requires of men to act exactly contrary, at one period, to that which it does at another, and the motive which impels them—the desire to do right—is precisely the same.
    • Robert E. Lee, letter to General P. G. T. Beauregard, October 3, 1865. John William Jones, Life and Letters of Robert Edward Lee, Soldier and Man, p. 390 (1906).
  • Intellectually I know America is no better than any other country; emotionally I know she is better than every other country.
    • Sinclair Lewis, radio interview in Berlin, Germany, December 29, 1930, as reported by The New York Times, December 30, 1930, p. 5.
  • Whenever you hear a man speak of his love for his country it is a sign that he expects to be paid for it.
    • H. L. Mencken, A Mencken Chrestomathy, chapter 30, p. 616 (1949).
  • Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
    Who never to himself hath said,
    This is my own, my native land!
    Whose heart hath ne'er within him burn'd,
    As home his footsteps he hath turn'd,
    From wandering on a foreign strand!
    • Sir Walter Scott, The Lay of the Last Minstrel, ed. Margaret A. Allen, canto sixth, 1, lines 1–6, p. 123 (1915).
  • I venture to suggest that what we mean is a sense of national responsibility which will enable America to remain master of her power—to walk with it in serenity and wisdom, with self-respect and the respect of all mankind; a patriotism that puts country ahead of self; a patriotism which is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime. These are words that are easy to utter, but this is a mighty assignment. For it is often easier to fight for principles than to live up to them.
    • Adlai Stevenson, Governor of Illinois, speech to the American Legion convention, New York City, August 27, 1952. Speeches of Adlai Stevenson, p. 81 (1952).

See also

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