You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have read more

You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer

There ought to be a system of manners in every nation which a well-formed mind would be disposed to relish. read more

There ought to be a system of manners in every nation which a well-formed mind would be disposed to relish. To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely.

My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the read more

My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing to watch over, and care for, and be loyal to institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death.

How can a man be said to have a country when he has not right of a square inch of read more

How can a man be said to have a country when he has not right of a square inch of it.

The chief foundations of all states... are good laws and good arms. And as there cannot be good laws where read more

The chief foundations of all states... are good laws and good arms. And as there cannot be good laws where there are not good arms... where there are good arms there must be good laws...

I have no country to fight for: my country is the earth, and I am a citizen of the world.

I have no country to fight for: my country is the earth, and I am a citizen of the world.

Canada is the essence of not being. Not English, not American, it is the mathematic of not being. And a read more

Canada is the essence of not being. Not English, not American, it is the mathematic of not being. And a subtle flavour - we're more like celery as a flavour.

Official dignity tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the office is held.

Official dignity tends to increase in inverse ratio to the importance of the country in which the office is held.

There is no greater sign of a general decay of virtue in a nation, than a want of zeal in read more

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.