Patriotism² is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.

Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970)

The contest, for ages, has been to rescue Liberty from the grasp of executive power.

Daniel Webster (1782 - 1852), Speech in the Senate, May 27, 1834

"My country, right or wrong," is a thing that no patriot¹ would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, "My mother, drunk or sober."

G. K. Chesterton (1874 - 1936)

Liberty also means responsibility. That is why most men dread³ it.

George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950), Maxims⁴ for Revolutionists

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

George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)

You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.

George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950), "Misalliance"

Patriotism is often an arbitrary veneration⁵ of real estate above principles.

George Jean Nathan (1882 - 1958)

Don't be a fool and die for your country. Let the other sonofabitch die for his.

George S. Patton (1885 - 1945), (attributed)

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 (1880 - 1956), A Mencken Chrestomathy

It is not unseemly for a man to die fighting in defense⁶ of his country.

Homer (800 BC - 700 BC), The Iliad

The single best augury⁷ is to fight for one's country.

Homer (800 BC - 700 BC), The Iliad

We would rather starve than sell our national honor.

Indira Gandhi (1917 - 1984), Remark in election meeting in Nagpur, India 1967

Our obligations to our country never cease but with our lives.

John Adams (1735 - 1826), Letter to Benjamin Rush, 18 April 1808

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.

John F. Kennedy (1917 - 1963), Inaugural⁸ address, January 20, 1961

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 foe⁹ to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

John F. Kennedy (1917 - 1963), Inaugural address, January 20, 1961

How beautiful is death, when earn'd by virtue¹⁰!

Who would not be that youth? What pity is it

That we can die but once to serve our country!

Joseph Addison (1672 - 1719), "Cato", Act 4, Scene 4, 1713

You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it.

Malcolm X (1925 - 1965)

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

Nathan Hale (1755 - 1776), last words, 22 September 1776 (attributed)

When a whole nation is roaring Patriotism at the top of its voice, I am fain to explore the cleanness of its hands and purity of its heart.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882), Journals, 1824

True patriotism sometimes requires of men to act exactly contrary, at one period, to that which it does at another, and the motive¹¹ which impels¹² themthe desire to do rightis precisely¹³ the same.

Robert E. Lee (1807 - 1870), Letter to General P. G. T. Beauregard, October 3, 1865

Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.

Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784), quoted in Boswell's Life of Johnson

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.

Sir Winston Churchill (1874 - 1965)

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniencies attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.

Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826), Letter to Archibald Stuart, December 23, 1791

It behoves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others; or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own.

Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826), Letters to Benjamin Rush, April 21, 1803

The flag is the embodiment, not of sentiment, but of history.

Woodrow Wilson (1856 - 1924)

The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it.

Woodrow Wilson (1856 - 1924), Address to the New York Press Club, September 9, 1912