Quotes about island
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“It is surely delightful, Sir, to look forward to that period when a series of liberal and prudent measures shall have delivered islands, so highly favoured by the bounty of Providence, from the curse inflicted on them by the frantic rapacity of man. Then the peasant of the Antilles will no longer crawl in listless and trembling dejection round a plantation from whose fruits he must derive no advantage, and a hut whose door yields him no protection; but, when his cheerful and voluntary labour is performed, he will return with the firm step and erect brow of a British citizen from the field which is his freehold to the cottage which is his castle.”

Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay (1800–1859) British historian and Whig politician

Speech to a meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society held at Freemasons' Tavern (25 June 1824), quoted in Report of the Committee of the Society for the Mitigation and Gradual Abolition of Slavery Throughout the British Dominions, Volume I (1824), p. 77
1820s

“Individuals are responsible for their actions. And yet . . .No man is an island. We are all subject to influences, good and bad.”

Jay Nordlinger (1963) American journalist

"Thoughts on El Paso" https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/thoughts-on-el-paso/ (August 2019), National Review <br class="br">2010s

Bad luck

“And the day of physical adventure is over. The day of the bold Phoenician, the fearless trader who with his caravan threaded his way into unknown lands; the day when the early English merchant-sailor trusted and risked his fortune in one small boat, and sought out markets and trading points in undiscovered corners of the earth—these days are gone for ever. The earth has all been "discovered," its lands and peoples are known, and its oceans charted. The merchant who desires to transact business abroad has at his call every detail of information regarding every country, island, or people.”

Harry Gordon Selfridge (1858–1947) America born English businessman

The Romance of Commerce (1918), A Representative Business of the Twentieth Century

People, Way, Business, Country

“For the unbroken life of the English nation over a thousand years and more is a phenomenon unique in history. ... Institutions which elsewhere are recent and artificial creations, appear in England almost as works of nature, spontaneous and unquestioned. The deepest instinct of the Englishman—how the word “instinct” keeps forcing itself in again and again!—is for continuity; he never acts more freely nor innovates more boldly than when he most is conscious of conserving or even of reacting. From this continuous life of a united people in its island home spring, as from the soil of England, all that is peculiar in the gifts and the achievements of the English nation, its laws, its literature, its freedom, its self-discipline. ... And this continuous and continuing life of England is symbolised and expressed, as by nothing else, by the English kingship. English it is, for all the leeks and thistles and shamrocks, the Stuarts and the Hanoverians, for all the titles grafted upon it here and elsewhere, “her other realms and territories”, Headships of Commonwealths, and what not. The stock that received all these grafts is English, the sap that rises through it to the extremities rises from roots in English earth, the earth of England's history.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Speech to the Royal Society of St George (22 April 1961), quoted in A Nation Not Afraid. The Thinking of Enoch Powell (1965), pp. 145–146

Life, People, Law, Home

“[I]n dealing with such money as you possess, I have no doubt that here in Brighton you will not differ from me that the first claim is the naval defence of England. (Loud and continued cheers.) ... It is our business to be quite sure in respect to this island-home of ours, whose inaccessibility is the source of our greatness, that no improvement of foreign fleets and no combination of foreign alliances should be able for a moment to threaten its safety.”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Source: Defending increased naval expenditure; speech in Brighton (19 November 1895), quoted in The Times (20 November 1895), p. 7

Money, Home, Business

“The beauty of the forests of Indiana in the rich and lovely month of May surpasses all description. The rivers, swollen by the rains, flow through long lanes of verdure, caressing the islands they seem to carry with them in their course and which look like floating nosegays. The trees raise their straight trunks to the height of more than a hundred and twenty feet and are crowned with tops of admirable beauty. The magnolia, the dog-wood, the catalpa, covered with white flowers, the permed snow of the springtime, intermingle with the delicate green of the other trees.”

Théodore Guérin (1798–1856) Catholic saint and nun from France

Third Journal of Travel (1844-1845)

Love, Making love, Beauty, Dogs

“The truth is that the connection of Ireland with England has been full of trouble, and I fear there is no remedy. ... It is a chronic disease, and even if it is not to be cured we have proved in the past that we can get on with it and yet carry on our Empire to a vast pitch of prosperity. What has been done in the past can be done in the future. ... [D]o not let us attempt to cure it by a measure which will put this island into a condition which never during 700 years of our history has existed—which will hand over those who have had the courage to defend us to the maltreatment of their worst enemies, and which will establish at our very doors a post—a hostile post—which will be at the pleasure of any foreign power which may sometimes be hostile to us.”

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (1830–1903) British politician

Speech to a banquet of the Merchant Taylors' Company, London (10 May 1886), quoted in The Times (11 May 1886), p. 12
1880s

Hostility, Pleasure, Truth, Fear

“Strategy should never be an island unto itself, it functions best when fully integrated.”

Julian Cole (1985) Strategy Consultant

https://www.irishtimes.com/advertising-feature/inside-marketing/mastering-strategy-crucial-for-business-success-1.4394295

“We will not shy away from engaging in the hard work to take on the damaging legacy of slavery and our treatment of Native Americans, or from doing the daily work of addressing systemic racism and violence against Black, Native, Latino, Asian American and Pacific Islander, and other communities of color.”

Joe Biden (1942) 47th Vice President of the United States (in office from 2009 to 2017)

21 March 2021 https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/03/21/statement-by-president-biden-on-the-international-day-for-the-elimination-of-racial-discrimination/ <br class="br">2021, March 2021

Color, Communication

“True friendship multiplies the good in life and divides its evils. Strive to have friends, for life without friends is like life on a desert island... to find one real friend in a lifetime is good fortune; to keep him is a blessing.”

Baltasar Gracián (1601–1658) Spanish Jesuit and baroque prose writer and philosopher

Life, Friendship, Evil, Friendship

“While we have significant relations on almost every level with Communist countries 10,000 miles away such as China and Vietnam, we have almost no relations with the 11 million souls on an island 90 miles off our southern coast where all this dynamism is beginning to show.”

Lawrence Wilkerson (1945) Chief of Staff to Colin Powell

Source: U.S. Cuba Policy: Ending 50 Years of Failure, Prepared Testimony to the Committee on Finance United States Senate (11 December 2007)

Soul, Country

“You imagine Pacific islands, the tropical nature of the place and the bright colour of the sands and beaches. It's all very grey and dull because of the ash that just blankets the entire land.”

Peeni Henare (1980) New Zealand politician

Tonga <br class="br">Source: Peeni Henare (2022) cited in: " Tonga airport runway being cleared of ash as Australian planes ready to depart https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/20/tonga-airport-runway-being-cleared-of-ash-as-australian-planes-ready-to-depart" in The Guardian, 19 January 2022.

Imagination, Nature

“This positive case teaches us that the threat of COVID-19 is real. As a small island, we need to be prepared and remain vigilant.”

Alida Francis Dutch civil servant

Source: Alida Francis (2021) cited in: " Reporter tests positive for coronavirus in St. Eustatius https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/reporter-tests-positive-for-coronavirus-in-st-eustatius" in The Daily Herald, 6 August 2021.

“We had cruise ships tell us that they wouldn't come in (to United States Virgin Islands) if we had (COVID-19) positivity rates over 3%. And now we have a 20% positivity rate and they still want to come in. We are more of a danger to them than they are to us.”

Albert Bryan (1968) Governor of the United States Virgin Islands

Source: Albert Bryan (2022) cited in: " Diverted cruise ships means loss of revenue for V.I. businesses http://www.virginislandsdailynews.com/news/diverted-cruise-ships-means-loss-of-revenue-for-v-i-businesses/article_2127974d-4e20-5b00-a104-704d85c93c34.html" in The Virgin Islands Daily News, 11 January 2022.

“We just don't have the facility to give proper care for all of our patients (in the Northern Mariana Islands), and that's the reason why we have this medical referral program, to send our patients out.”

Ralph Torres (1979) an American Republican politician from Saipan, Northern Mariana Islands

Source: Ralph Torres (2021) cited in: " Torres: At least $10M needed for medical referral program https://www.postguam.com/news/cnmi/torres-at-least-10m-needed-for-medical-referral-program/article_8005ba4e-c681-11eb-bd3d-3f3499b70b2e.html" in The Guam Daily Post, 7 June 2021.