By Other Notable Americans 01
(Stevenson, Hale, Vaughan, Twain, Curtis, Darrow, Nathan, Emerson)

Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.

When an American says that he loves his country, he means not only that he loves the New England hills, the prairies glistening in the sun, the wide and rising plains, the great mountains, and the sea.  He means that he loves an inner air, an inner light in which freedom lives and in which a man can draw the breath of self-respect.

Nathan Hale

I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.

Bill Vaughan

A real patriot is the fellow who gets a parking ticket and rejoices that the system works.

Mark Twain

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 me label you as they may.

George William Curtis

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.

Clarence Darrow

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

George Jean Nathan

Patriotism is often an arbitrary veneration of real estate above principles.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, "The Poet," Essays, Second Series, 1844

Yet America is a poem in our eyes; its ample geography dazzles the imagination, and it will not wait long for metres.

More Patriotic Quotes by Presidents and Other Notable Americans