Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. on patriotism

I don’t generally feel anything until noon, then it’s time for my nap.

Without wearing any mask we are conscious of, we have a special face for each friend.

A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.

Ask not what your country can do for you⁠—ask what you can do for your country.

John F. Kennedy1917–1963John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address (1961)

‘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’.

G. K. Chesterton1874–1936The Defendant (1901), “A Defence of Patriotism”

Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.

Oscar Wilde1854–1900