Patriotism And Nationalism Quotes

• My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.

  John F. Kennedy

  Inspirational, Inspiring, Country

  Inaugural Address, 20 Jan. 1961

  95 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  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.

  Mark Twain

  Change, Thank You, Memorial Day

  Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.351, Courier Corporation

  67 Copy quote

  Show source

• Patriotism is proud of a country's virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies; it also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues. The pride of nationalism, however, trumpets its country's virtues and denies its deficiencies, while it is contemptuous toward the virtues of other countries. It wants to be, and proclaims itself to be, "the greatest," but greatness is not required of a country; only goodness is.

  Sydney J. Harris

  Country, Humility, Pride

  "Pieces of Eight". Book by Sydney J. Harris, 1982.

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first.

  Charles de Gaulle

  Integrity, Hate, Patriotic

  Life Magazine, May 9, 1969.

  133 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else.

  Clarence Darrow

  Memorial Day, Peace, Hate

  111 Copy quote

• 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.

  Sydney J. Harris

  Country, Attitude, War

  Sydney J. Harris (1953). “Strictly personal”

  84 Copy quote

  Show source

• The love of one's country is a splendid thing. But why should love stop at the border?

  Pablo Casals

  Inspirational, Spiritual, Country

  "Joys and Sorrows : Reflections‎ by Pablo Casals as told to Albert E. Kahn". Book by Albert E. Kahn, 1974.

  71 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people.

  Howard Zinn

  Peace, War, Patriotic

  Howard Zinn (1993). “Failure to Quit: Reflections of an Optimistic Historian”, p.118, South End Press

  60 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  Patriotism consists not in waving the flag, but in striving that our country shall be righteous as well as strong.

  James Bryce

  Country, Memorial Day, Peace

  51 Copy quote

• Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.

  Oscar Wilde

  Funny, Sarcastic, Patriotic

  Oscar Wilde (2007). “Epigrams of Oscar Wilde”, p.144, Wordsworth Editions

  37 Copy quote

  Show source

• Men in authority will always think that criticism of their policies is dangerous. They will always equate their policies with patriotism, and find criticism subversive.

  Henry Steele Commager

  Patriotic, Men, Thinking

  "The Problem of Dissent". "Saturday Review" Magazine, Volume 48, December 1965.

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.

  Mark Twain

  Sarcastic, Sarcasm, Knowing

  Mark Twain, Louis J. Budd (1992). “Collected tales, sketches, speeches, & essays: 1891-1910”

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.

  Albert Einstein

  Love, Inspirational, Life

  Albert Einstein (2010). “The Ultimate Quotable Einstein”, p.293, Princeton University Press

  96 Copy quote

  Show source

• 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 nobler, better, grander, more intelligent than those 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.

  Emma Goldman

  Patriotic, Fighting, Intelligent

  "What is Patriotism?". Emma Goldman's Speech in San Francisco, California, awpc.cattcenter.iastate.edu. April 26, 1908.

  81 Copy quote

  Show source

• Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others because you were born in it.

  George Bernard Shaw

  Funny, Wisdom, Country

  41 Copy quote

• 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 happy to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Pride, Racism, Teeth

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2007). “Parerga and Paralipomena: A Collection of Philosophical Essays”, p.60, Cosimo, Inc.

  127 Copy quote

  Show source

• Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn't. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your
  country, let men label you as they may.

  Mark Twain

  Country, Integrity, 4th Of July

  44 Copy quote

• There is a higher form of patriotism than nationalism, and that higher form is not limited by the boundaries of one's country; but by a duty to mankind to safeguard the trust of civilization.

  Oscar Straus

  Country, Civilization, Patriotism

  10 Copy quote

• He loves his country best who strives to make it best.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Country, 4th Of July, Patriotic

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1952). “Life and Letters”

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Can anything be stupider than that a man has the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of a river and his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have not quarrelled with him?

  Blaise Pascal

  Peace, Men, Rivers

  9 Copy quote

• Men love their country, not because it is great, but because it is their own.

  Seneca the Younger

  Country, 4th Of July, Patriotic

  4 Copy quote

• A man's country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.

  George William Curtis

  Loyalty, Country, Memorial Day

  George William Curtis (1894). “On the principles and character of American institutions, and the duties of American citizens, 1856-1891”

  25 Copy quote

  Show source

• Conceit, arrogance, and egotism are the essentials of patriotism.

  Emma Goldman

  Patriotic, Arrogance, Patriotism

  Emma Goldman (2015). “Anarchism and Other Essays”, p.97, Library of Alexandria

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• A Canadian is somebody who knows how to make love in a canoe.

  Pierre Berton

  Making Love, Canada, Know How

  Quoted in The Canadian, 22 Dec. 1973

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• During times of war, hatred becomes quite respectable even though it has to masquerade often under the guise of patriotism.

  Howard Thurman

  Peace, War, Hatred

  Howard Thurman (2012). “Jesus and the Disinherited”, p.74, Beacon Press

  102 Copy quote

  Show source