My country is the world; my countrymen are mankind.1
ATTRIBUTION:
Prospectus of the Public Liberator, 1830.
Note 1. Socrates said he was not an Athenian or a Greek, but a citizen of the world.—Plutarch: On Banishment. Diogenes, when asked from what country he came, replied, “I am a citizen of the world.”—Diogenes Laertius. My country is the world, and my religion is to do good.—Thomas Paine: Rights of Man, chap. v. This famous motto of Garrison’s appears in several different forms. On the first number of the Liberator in 1831, the my was changed to our. In the Prospectus of December 15, 1837, it read: Our country is the world; our countrymen are all mankind. [back]
