ENGLAND

Related Subjects: Europe, Ireland, Island, London, Scotland

1. Sir Roger made several reflections on the greatness of the British Nation; as, that one Englishman could beat three Frenchmen; that we could never be in danger of Popery so long as we took care of our fleet; that the Thames was the noblest river in Europe . . . with many other honest prejudices, which naturally cleave to the heart of a true Englishman.—ADDISON, The Spectator
   

2. The royal navy of England hath ever been its greatest defence and ornament; it is its ancient and natural strength,—the floating bulwark of our island.—SIR WILLIAM BLACKSTONE, Commentaries
   

3. O England! long, long may it be ere the sun of thy glory sink beneath the wave of darkness! Though 'gloomy and portentous clouds are now gathering rapidly around thee, still, still may it please the Almighty to disperse them, and to grant thee a futurity longer in duration and still brighter in renown than thy past! Or, if thy doom be at hand, may that doom be a noble one, and worthy of her who has been styled the Old Queen of the waters! May thou sink, if thou dost sink, amidst blood and flame, with a mighty noise, causing more than one nation to participate in thy downfall!—GEORGE BORROW, The Bible in Spain
   

4. If I should die, think only this of me:
   That there's some corner of a foreign field
   That is forever England.—RUPERT BROOKE, The Soldier
   

5. Oh, to be in England,
   Now that April's there.—BROWNING, Home—Thoughts from Abroad
   

6. England is a paradise for women and hell for horses; Italy a paradise for horses, hell for women, as the diverb goes.—ROBERT BURTON, Anatomy of Melancholy
   

7. Ye mariners of England,
   That guard our native seas;
   Whose flag has braved, a thousand years,
   The battle and the breeze!—THOMAS CAMPBELL, Ye Mariners of England
   

8. Britannia needs no bulwarks,
   No towers along the steep;
   Her march is o'er the mountain waves,
   Her home is on the deep.—THOMAS CAMPBELL, Ye Mariners of England

9. Be England what she will,
   With all her faults she is my country still.—CHARLES CHURCHILL, The Farewell
   

10. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us. Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science.—WINSTON CHURCHILL, Blood, Sweat & Tears
    

11. Today is Trinity Sunday. Centuries ago words were written to be a call and a spur to the faithful servants of Truth and Justice: "Arm yourselves and be ye men of valor, and be in readiness for the conflict for it is better for us to perish in battle than to look upon the outrage of our nation and our altar."—WINSTON CHURCHILL, Blood, Sweat & Tears
    

12. Dash the bomb on the dome of Paul's—
    Deem ye the fame of the Admiral falls?
    Pry the stone from the chancel floor,—
    Dream ye that Shakespeare shall live no more?
    Where is the giant shot that kills
    Wordsworth walking the old green hills?—HELEN G. CONE, A Chant of Love for England

13. For Englishmen especially, of all the races of the earth, a task, any task, undertaken in an adventurous spirit acquires the merit of romance.JOSEPH CONRAD, A Personal Record
    

14. England, with all thy faults I love thee still,
    My country!—COWPER, The Task
    

15. Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs
    Receive our air, that moment they are free!
    They touch our country, and their shackles fall.—COWPER, The Task
    

16. You have only got to look at the pages of British imperial history to hide your head in shame that you are British.—SIR STAFFORD CRIPPS
    

17. Nay, nay sweet England, do not grieve!
    Not one of these poor men who died
    But did within his soul believe
    That death for thee was glorified.—WALTER DE LA MARE, How Sleep the Brave
    

18. Things they don't understand always cause a sensation among the English.—ALFRED DE MUSSET, The White Blackbird
    

19. Vain, mightiest fleets of iron framed;
    Vain, those all-shattering guns;
    Unless proud England keep, untamed,
    The strong heart of her sons.—SIR F. H. DOYLE, The Private of the Buffs
    

20. The Englishman's reverence for the individual's rights goes beyond the Frenchman's, for in France there is a tendency to subordinate the individual to the family, and in England the interests of the individual predominate.—HAVELOCK ELLIS, The Task of Social Hygiene
    

21. I find the Englishman to be him of all men who stands firmest in his shoes.—EMERSON, English Traits
    

22. Materialism is a rock on which to build any edifice, even a temple of dreams. On materialism Englishmen. . . . built the British Empire.—O. ST. J. GOGARTY
    

23. An Englishman is a man who lives on an island in the North Sea governed by Scotsmen.—PHILIP GUEDALLA, Supers & Supermen
    

24. "The English," says Froissart, "amused themselves sadly after the fashion of their country." They have indeed a way of their own. Their mirth is a relaxation from gravity, a challenge to dull care to be gone; and one is not always clear at first, whether the appeal is successful.—HAZLITT, Merry England
    

25. The stately homes of England!
    How beautiful they stand,
    Amidst their tall ancestral trees,
    O'er all the pleasant land!—MRS. HEMANS, The Homes of England
    

26. I shall examine with some suspicion any proposals that may be made for the distribution of the British Empire among foreign countries, whatever their birthrate, insolence or inefficiency.—A. P. HERBERT
    

27. Oh England is a pleasant place for them that's rich and high,
    But England is a cruel place for such poor folks as I.—CHARLES KINGSLEY, The Last Buccaneer
    

28. Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
    By singing—"Oh, how beautiful!" and sitting in the shade.—KIPLING, The Glory of the Garden
    

29. For what there is of it—for such as it is—and for what it may be worth—will you drink to England and the English?—KIPLING
    

30. Mr. Baldwin has the Englishman's genius for appearing an amateur in a game in which, in fact, he is a superb professional.—HAROLD J. LASKI
    

31. A certain incomprehensible reticence of soul which is peculiar to the English.—WILLIAM MCFEE, Command
    

32. We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality.—MACAULAY, On Moore's Life of Lord Byron
    

33. English nationalism was a creed which defined Americans as cads, Frenchmen as libertines, and the rest of the European races as a great deal worse—with the possible exceptions of Germans, who were regarded merely as dangerous rivals in trade.—C. R. W. NEVINSON
    

34. I attended endless divine services—listened to strange sermons delivered by doctors of divinity in which Englishmen were confused with God, Nelson with Jesus Christ, Lady Hamilton with the Virgin Mary.—C. R. W. NEVINSON

35. There'll Always Be an England.—Ross PARKER & HUEY CHARLES, Title of Song
    

36. When Good Friday falls in a lady's lap, to England will happen some mishap.—Proverb
    

37. When the sand doth feed the clay, England woe and well a day; but when the clay doth feed the sand, then it's well with old England.—Proverb
    

38. He that would England win, must with Ireland first begin.—Proverb
    

39. A famine in England begins at the horse-manger.—Proverb
    

40. England is the paradise of individuality, eccentricity, heresy, anomalies, hobbies, and humours.—SANTAYANA, Soliloquies in England
    

41. It was always yet the trick of our English nation, if they have a good thing, to make it too common.—SHAKESPEARE, Henry IV
    

42. O England ! model to thy inward greatness,
    Like little body with a mighty heart,
    What mightst thou do, that honour would thee do,
    Were all thy children kind and natural!—SHAKESPEARE, Henry V
    

43. I thought upon one pair of English legs
    Did march three Frenchmen.—SHAKESPEARE, Henry V
    

44. That island of England breeds very valiant creatures: their mastiffs are of unmatchable courage.—SHAKESPEARE, Henry V
    

45. Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
    Or close the wall up with our English dead!—SHAKESPEARE, Henry V
    

46. Let us be back'd with God and with the seas
    Which he hath given for fence impregnable,
    And with their helps only defend ourselves;
    In them and in ourselves our safety lies.—SHAKESPEARE, Henry VI
    

47. There shall be in England seven half-penny loaves sold for a penny; the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops; and I will make it felony to drink small beer.—SHAKESPEARE, Henry VI
    

48. This England never did, nor never shall,
    Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror.—SHAKESPEARE, King John
    

49. Come the three corners of the world in arms,
    And we shall shock them. Nought shall make us rue,
    If England to itself do rest but true.—SHAKESPEARE, King John
    

50. Heaven take my soul, and England keep my bones.—SHAKESPEARE, King John
    

51. This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
    This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
    This other Eden, demi-paradise,
    This fortress built by Nature for herself
    Against infection and the hand of war,
    This happy breed of men, this little world,
    This precious stone set in the silver sea,
    Which serves it in the office of a wall
    Or as a moat defensive to a house,
    Against the envy of less happier lands,
    This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.—SHAKESPEARE, Richard II
    

52. We don't bother much about dress and manners in England, because, as a nation we don't dress well and we've no manners.—BERNARD SHAW, You Never Can Tell
    

53. In England we always let an institution strain itself until it breaks.—BERNARD SHAW, Getting Married
    

54. The whole strength of England lies in the fact that the enormous majority of the English people are snobs.—BERNARD SHAW, Getting Married
    

55. There are only two classes in good society in England: the equestrian classes and the neurotic classes.—BERNARD SHAW, Heartbreak House
    

56. Hector: and this ship we are all in? This soul's prison we call England?
    
    Capt. Shotover: The captain is in his bunk, drinking bottled ditch-water; and the crew is gambling in the forecastle. She will strike and split and sink. Do you think the laws of God will be suspended in favor of England because you were born in it?—BERNARD SHAW, Heartbreak House
    

57. There is nothing so bad or so good that you will not find an Englishman doing it: but you will never find an Englishman in the wrong.
    
    He does everything on principles; he robs you on business principles; he enslaves you on imperial principles.—BERNARD SHAW, The Man of Destiny
    

58. War with the world, and peace with England.—Spanish Proverb
    

59. Gorgonized me from head to foot,
    With a stony British stare.—TENNYSON, Maud
    

60. Rule, Britannia! Britannia rules the waves!
    Britons never shall be slaves.—JAMES THOMSON, Alfred
    

61. Fee, fi, f o, f um!
    I smell the blood of an Englishman.
    Be he live or be he dead
    I'll grind his bones to make my bread.Traditional, Jack and the Bean Stalk
    

62. In England we have come to rely upon a comfortable time-lag of fifty years or a century intervening between the perception that something ought to be done and a serious attempt to do it.—H. G. WELLS, The Work, Wealth & Happiness of
    Mankind
    

63. Those who say that this war is a war between two great Empires, each fighting for the right to rule and exploit other peoples without the latter's consent, are speaking of a war that is past. They are, to be exact, speaking of Mr. Chamberlain's war. Mr. Chamberlain lost that war. It is over. We are now engaged on quite a different struggle, and it is time we woke up to that fact, and made it clear to the whole world.—TOM WINTRINGHAM, New Ways of War
    

64. We will stick by whatever we find to do or are told to do, in spite of invasion, bombardment, wounds, hunger or whatever may be the price of victory. We will take all that comes courageously; and we will not do anything that may endanger victory.—TOM WINTRINGHAM, New Ways of War
    

65. Whatever the future may hold we will continue our war for liberty by every means, open or secret, that we can use; we shall go on, stubbornly and doggedly, until we have overthrown Fascism, with the aid of all free men who seek freedom anywhere across the earth.—TOM WINTRINGHAM, New Ways of War
    

66. Those comfortably padded lunatic asylums which are known, euphemistically, as the stately homes of England.—VIRGINIA WOOLF, The Common Reader
    

67. Oh, it's a snug little island!
    A right little, tight little island.—WORDSWORTH, The Snug Little Island
    

68. They called thee Merry England in old time;
    A happy people won for thee that name
    With envy heard in many a distant clime.—WORDSWORTH, They Called Thee Merry England
    

69. A Briton, even in love, should be
    A subject, not a slave!—WORDSWORTH, Ere With Cold Beads of Midnight
    

70. We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
    That Shakespeare spake; the faith and morals hold
    Which Milton held.—WORDSWORTH, It is Not to be Thought Of See