Famous quotes containing the words national and/or bird:
“The American, if he has a spark of national feeling, will be humiliated by the very prospect of a foreigner’s visit to Congress—these, for the most part, illiterate hacks whose fancy vests are spotted with gravy, and whose speeches, hypocritical, unctuous, and slovenly, are spotted also with the gravy of political patronage, these persons are a reflection on the democratic process rather than of it; they expose it in its process rather than of it; they expose it in its underwear.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)
“As the bird trims her to the gale,
I trim myself to the storm of time,
I man the rudder, reef the sail,
Obey the voice at eve obeyed in prime:
“Lowly faithful, banish fear,
Right onward drive unharmed;
The port, well worth the cruise, is near,
And every wave is charmed.””
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)