How does the writer spend his time while he travels? Give reasons for his choice? "National Prejudice"
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Answer:
Irish poet, essayist, and dramatist Oliver Goldsmith is best known for the comic play "She Stoops to Conquer," the long poem "The Deserted Village," and the novel "The Vicar of Wakefield."
In his essay "On National Prejudices" (first published in the British Magazine in August 1760), Goldsmith argues that it is possible to love one's own country "without hating the natives of other countries." Compare Goldsmith's thoughts on patriotism with Max Eastman's extended definition in "What Is Patriotism?" and with Alexis de Tocqueville's discussion of patriotism in Democracy in America (1835).
On National Prejudices
by Oliver Goldsmith
As I am one of that sauntering tribe of mortals, who spend the greatest part of their time in taverns, coffee houses, and other places of public resort, I have thereby an opportunity of observing an infinite variety of characters, which, to a person of a contemplative turn, is a much higher entertainment than a view of all the curiosities of art or nature. In one of these, my late rambles, I accidentally fell into the company of half a dozen gentlemen, who were engaged in a warm dispute about some political affair; the decision of which, as they were equally divided in their sentiments, they thought proper to refer to me, which naturally drew me in for a share of the conversation.
Amongst a multiplicity of other topics, we took occasion to talk of the different characters of the several nations of Europe; when one of the gentlemen, cocking his hat, and assuming such an air of importance as if he had possessed all the merit of the English nation in his own person, declared that the Dutch were a parcel of avaricious wretches; the French a set of flattering sycophants; that the Germans were drunken sots, and beastly gluttons; and the Spaniards proud, haughty, and surly tyrants; but that in bravery, generosity, clemency, and in every other virtue, the English excelled all the world.