Ambrose Bierce on patriotism

Patriotism, n.  Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name. In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit it is the first.

~ Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary (1906)