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Make me true lover of fair field and farm,
Of streams in dewy vales, of rivers broad
And lonely forests, far from pomp and fame.

[Rura mihi et rigui placeant in vallibus amnes,
Flumina amem sylvasque inglorius.]

Virgil the Poet
Virgil (70-19 BC) Roman poet [b. Publius Vergilius Maro; also Vergil]
Georgics [Georgica], Book 2, l. 485ff (2.485) (29 BC) [tr. Williams (1915)]
    (Source)

Praying to his Muse to find joy in a bucolic setting, if fear turns him back from more exotic realms of nature.

(Source (Latin)). Alternate translations:

Then I'le delight in vales, nere pleasant floods,
And unrenown'd, haunt rivers, hils, and woods.
[tr. Ogilby (1649)]

My next Desire is, void of Care and Strife,
To lead a soft, secure, inglorious Life.
A Country Cottage near a Crystal Flood, ⁠
A winding Vally, and a lofty Wood.
[tr. Dryden (1709), l. 687ff]

May rural scenes, thro' meads rills sparkling please,
And woods, and rivers, in inglorious ease.
[tr. Nevile (1767), l. 543ff]

Oh may I yet, by fame forgotten, dwell
By gushing fount, wild wood, and shadowy dell!
[tr. Sotheby (1800)]

Let fields and streams gliding in the valleys be my delight; inglorious may I court the rivers and woods.
[tr. Davidson (1854)]

At least permit me to indulge my dream
Of meads, and valleys, and the mazy stream:
Be woods and waves my unambitious love.
[tr. Blackmore (1871), l. 578ff]

May the country and the rills that water the vales be my delight; careless of fame, may I love the streams and the woodlands!
[tr. Wilkins (1873)]

Then be fields
And stream-washed vales my solace, let me love
Rivers and woods, inglorious.
[tr. Rhoades (1881)]

Then let the fields and running streams delight
My unambitious verse, and charm my sight.
[tr. King (1882), l. 492ff]

Let fields and streams that run among the hills be my delight; though unknown to fame, may I be content with the rivers and the woods.
[tr. Bryce (1897)]

May the country and the streams that water the valleys content me, and lost to fame let me love stream and woodland.
[tr. Mackail (1899)]

Dear to me then be the fields, be the streams through the valleys that flow,
My fameless love upon rivers be set, and on forests.
[tr. Way (1912)]

Let my delight be the country, and the running streams amid the dells -- may I love the waters and the woods, though I be unknown to fame.
[tr. Fairclough (Loeb) (1916)]

Then let the country charm me, the rivers that channel its valleys,
Then may I love its forest and stream, and and let fame go hang.
[tr. Day-Lewis (1940)]

Still, let me relish the country, humbly revere Streams that glide through glades, the woods, the rivers.
[tr. Bovie (1956)]

May the countryside and cool streams in valleys please me; may I love rivers and forests -- inglorious though I may be.
[tr. Miles (1980)]

Then will I pray that I may find fulfilment
In the country and the streams that water valleys,
Love rivers and woods, unglamorous.
[tr. Wilkinson (1982)]

Let the country
and the flowing streams in the valleys please me,
let me love the rivers and the woods, unknown.
[tr. Kline (2001)]

May rural land and streams rushing in its valleys please me.
May I, unrecognized, love its woods and waters!
[tr. Lembke (2004)]

Then let me be satisfied with rural beauty, streams bustling through the glens; let me love woods and running water -- though I'll have failed.
[tr. Fallon (2006)]

Let the land be my delight, the streams that irrigate the vales,
the rills and forests let me love unsung.
[tr. Johnson (2009)]

Then may I find delight in the rural fields
And the little brooks that make their way through valleys,
And in obscurity love the woods and rivers.
[tr. Ferry (2015)]

 
Added on 23-Aug-23 | Last updated 25-Oct-23
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Mere politicians wish the country to do something for them; true patriots desire to do something for their country.

Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, agnostic, orator
Decoration Day Speech, Academy of Music, New York City (29 May 1882)
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Added on 15-Jul-22 | Last updated 15-Jul-22
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I also think living in the country gives you faith. All you have to do is get up and look at the mountains and look at the other animals to realize that your problems are mostly made up or exacerbated by humans. But human life isn’t necessarily life. There’s so much more out there.

Rita Mae Brown (b. 1944) American author, playwright
Interview in OutSmart (Jan 1998)
    (Source)
 
Added on 30-Oct-17 | Last updated 30-Oct-17
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Nations are never virtuous, though they might sometimes think they are.

Ian McEwan (b. 1948) English novelist and screenwriter
Solar (2010)
 
Added on 2-Aug-16 | Last updated 2-Aug-16
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“The trouble with this country is,” observed Herndon, “that there’re too many people going about saying: ‘The trouble with this country is –‘”

Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) American novelist, playwright
Dodsworth, ch. 10 (1929)
    (Source)
 
Added on 25-Aug-15 | Last updated 25-Aug-15
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Every major industrialized nation has A BEER (you can’t be a Real Country unless you have A BEER and an airline — it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need A BEER).

Frank Zappa (1940-1993) American singer-songwriter
The Real Frank Zappa Book, ch. 12 “America Drinks & Goes Marching” (1989) [with Peter Occhiogrosso]
    (Source)
 
Added on 20-Feb-15 | Last updated 14-Jul-22
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A self-righteous country soon forgets its righteousness and remembers only the self.

George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) British playwright and critic
Remark (1940s)

To the author, in Stephen Winsten, Days with Bernard Shaw, ch. 25 (1949)
 
Added on 19-Jan-15 | Last updated 19-Jan-15
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So long as men worship the Caesars and Napoleons, Caesars and Napoleons will duly rise and make them miserable.

Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) English novelist, essayist and critic
Ends and Means (1937)
 
Added on 31-Dec-14 | Last updated 31-Dec-14
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HAYWOOD: There are those in our own country, too, who today speak of the protection of country, of survival. A decision must be made, in the life of every nation, at the very moment when the grasp of the enemy is at its throat, when it seems the only way to survive is to use the means of the enemy, to rest survival upon what is expedient. To look the other way. Only the answer to that is: Survival as what?

Abby Mann (1927-2008) American screenwriter, producer [a.k.a. Abraham Goodman, Ben Goodman]
Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)
 
Added on 1-Feb-04 | Last updated 6-Dec-14
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