The Russian people truly have freedom of spirit, which is given only to those who are not too absorbed in the thirst for earthly profit and earthly well-being. Russia is a country of everyday freedom, unknown to the advanced peoples of the West, enslaved by philistine norms. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

The Russian person, in many ways extremely attractive, is unable to settle on something definite. Therefore, he has always been and, I think, will always be a victim of this or that bureaucracy. John Galsworthy

You don't need to be Russian: you just need to think in order to read with curiosity the legends of the people who, with courage and courage, gained dominance over the ninth part of the world, discovered countries that were unknown to anyone hitherto, bringing them into the general system of Geography and History. Nikolay Mikhailovich Karamzin

Imperialism in the Western and bourgeois sense of the word is alien to the Russian people, but it dutifully devoted its energies to the creation of imperialism, in which his heart was not interested. The secret of Russian history and the Russian soul is hidden here. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

The Russian people are the most apolitical people who have never been able to organize their land. All genuinely Russian, our national writers, thinkers, publicists - all were stateless, a kind of anarchists. Anarchism is a phenomenon of the Russian spirit, it was inherent in our extreme left and our extreme right in different ways. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

For a Russian, material values \u200b\u200band the principles behind them mean too little, and feelings and their expression are too much. John Galsworthy

The Russian intelligentsia has always treated nationalism with disgust and abhorred it like an evil spirits. She professed exclusively supranational ideals. And no matter how superficial, no matter how banal the cosmopolitan doctrines of the intelligentsia were, they still, at least distortedly, reflected the supranational, all-human spirit of the Russian people. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

The Great Russian is a natural historian: he understands his past better than his future; he will not always guess what needs to be foreseen, but he will always understand that he has not. He's smarter when he discusses what he's done than when he thinks about what needs to be done. He has more looking back than prudence, more humility than insolence. Vasily Osipovich Klyuchevsky

Russians have always been underestimated, and yet they know how to keep secrets not only from enemies, but also from friends. Winston Churchill

Russians harness for a long time, but they drive fast. Otto von Bismarck

The Russian people seem to enjoy their suffering. Fedor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky

At the heart of Russian history lies a significant legend about the vocation of the Varangians-foreigners to rule the Russian land, since "our land is great and abundant, but there is no order in it." How typical this is for the fatal inability and unwillingness of the Russian people to establish order in their own land! The Russian people seem to want not so much a free state, freedom in the state, as freedom from the state, freedom from worries about the earthly order. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

Our love must always be stronger than our hatred. You need to love Russia and the Russian people more than hate the revolution and the Bolsheviks. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

State power has always been an external, not an internal principle for the stateless Russian people; she was not built out of him, but came as if from outside, like a groom comes to a bride. And that is why so often the power gave the impression of a foreign, some kind of German rule. Russian radicals and Russian conservatives alike thought that the state was "they" and not "we." Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

The Russians most admire strength, and there is nothing for which they have less respect than for military weakness. Winston Churchill

The Russian character, if one can speak of it as something unified in a country inhabited by many peoples, is practically indifferent to the value of time and place; the main thing for him is feelings, and even more, perhaps, the expression of feelings, so that he does not have time to achieve his goals before new waves of feelings wash them away. John Galsworthy

The Russian people are a highly polarized people, that is, a combination of opposites. He can be fascinated and disappointed, you can always expect surprises from him, he is supremely capable of instilling strong love and strong hatred in himself. Nikolay Alexandrovich Berdyaev

Russia is the most non-chauvinistic country in the world. Nationalism in our country always gives the impression of something non-Russian, superficial, some kind of unremarkable. Germans, British, French are chauvinists and nationalists in the mass, they are full of national self-confidence and complacency. Russians are almost ashamed of being Russian; they are alien to national pride and often even - alas! - national dignity is alien. The Russian people are not at all characterized by aggressive nationalism, inclination of violent Russification. Russian does not advance, does not exhibit, does not despise others. In the Russian element, there is truly some kind of national disinterestedness, sacrifice, unknown to Western peoples.

Quotes about the Russian people.

“The Russian peasant knows no obstacles ... Armed with an ax, he turns into a wizard and regains cultural benefits for you in the wilderness and forest thickets. He will repair the carriage for you, he will replace the broken wheel with a felled tree, tied at one end to the axis of the wagon, and the other end dragging along the ground. If your cart finally refuses to serve, he in the blink of an eye will build you a new one from the wreckage of the old. If you want to spend the night in the forest, he will put together a hut for you in a few hours and, making you as cozy and comfortable as possible, will wrap himself in his sheepskin coat and fall asleep on the threshold of an impromptu overnight stay, guarding your sleep, like a faithful sentry, or sit down near a hut under a tree and , dreamily looking upward, will begin to entertain you with melancholic tunes, so in harmony with the best movements of your heart, for innate musicality is one of the gifts of this chosen race "- Marquis Astolphe de Custin (1790-1857) - french writer, traveler.

“The Russian and Slavs in general tend to strive for freedom, not only for freedom from the yoke of foreign people, but also for freedom from the shackles of everything that is transitory and perishable. Among Europeans, the poor never look at the rich without envy; among Russians, the rich often look at the poor with shame. In Russian there is a vivid feeling that property owns us, and not we own it, that ownership means belonging to something that suffocates spiritual freedom in wealth ”- Walter von Schubart - German philosopher (XX century).

“Muscovites very much scold short Italian, French, Spanish and Germanic clothing, because it leaves exposed those parts of the body that should be hidden the most. For the sake of gravity, they themselves dress in two or three dresses almost to the toes. They wear long sleeves, so you can't even see your hands when they are doing something ”- Antonio Possevino (1534-1611) - Italian diplomat.

“[The Russian people] is one of all Europeans who have a direct relationship to the soul of their neighbor. Therefore, it is easy to make acquaintances among Russian people: in an hour, it seems that they have known each other almost all their lives ”- Kaiserling - Count, German traveler (XX century)

This is how K. D. Ushinsky said about Russia:

“We call Russia Fatherland because our fathers and grandfathers have lived in it from time immemorial. We call her MOTHER because we were BORN in her, they speak in her MOTHER language and everything is KIND for us. A mother - because she fed us with her bread, gave us drink with her waters, learned her language, like a mother, she protects and protects us from all enemies. There are many other good states and lands in the world besides Russia, but a person has one mother - one is his RODina. ”

We recall the brightest and most famous quotes, thoughts, aphorisms of prominent people about Russia and its people.

Alexander III Peacemaker - Emperor of All Russia, Tsar of Poland and Grand Duke of Finland (1845-1894).

In the whole world we have only two loyal allies - our army and navy. All the rest, at the first opportunity, themselves will turn against us.

When the Russian Tsar is fishing, Europe can wait.

Russia - for Russians and in Russian.

Nikolay Berdyaev -Great Russian philosopher (1874-1948)

The Russian people created the most powerful state in the world, the greatest empire. Russia has consistently and stubbornly gathered from Ivan Kalita and has reached dimensions that stagger the imagination of all peoples of the world.

Without initial and spontaneous love for Russia, no creative historical path is possible. Our love for Russia, like any love, is arbitrary; it is not love for qualities and dignity, but this love should be a source of creative creation of the qualities and dignities of Russia. Love for your people should be creative love, a creative instinct. And least of all it means enmity and hatred towards other peoples. The path to universal humanity for each of us lies through Russia.

An infinitely difficult task faced the Russian people - the task of formalizing and organizing their vast land. The immensity of the Russian land, the absence of borders and limits were expressed in the structure of the Russian soul. The landscape of the Russian soul corresponds to the landscape of the Russian land: the same infinity, formlessness, aspiration to infinity, breadth.

Nikolay Gogol -Great Russian writer and playwright (1809-1852).

First of all, thank God for being Russian. This path is now open to the Russian, and this path is Russia itself. If only he loves Russian Russia, he will love everything that is in Russia. God Himself is now leading us to this love.

You still do not love Russia: you only know how to be sad and irritated by rumors about everything bad, whatever is happening in it, in you all this produces only one callous annoyance and despondency. No, this is not love yet, you are far from love, this is perhaps just one too distant portent of it.

If there is only one farm for the Russians, then Russia will be revived.

Anton Denikin - Front Commander, General Staff, Lieutenant General; later Acting supreme ruler of Russia on the part of the White movement (1872-1947).

A Russian is not one who bears a Russian surname, but one who loves Russia and considers it his fatherland.

When the world rests over our poor country, and the all-healing time turns the bloody reality into the distant past, the Russian people will remember those who were the first to rise to defend Russia from the red scourge.

This is Russian, for Russians. When Russia is free, I will give everything to her.

Fedor Dostoevsky -Great Russian writer (1821-1881).

Really, here too, they will not allow and will not allow the Russian organism to develop nationally, by its organic strength, and certainly impersonally, servilely imitating Europe? But what to do with the Russian organism then? Do these gentlemen understand what an organism is? Separation, “split off” from their country leads to hatred, these people hate Russia, so to speak, naturally, physically: for the climate, for the fields, for the forests, for the order, for the liberation of the peasant, for Russian history, in a word, for everything, for everything they hate.

The purpose of the Russian man is, undoubtedly, all-European and universal. To become a real Russian, to become completely Russian, perhaps, and that only means - to become a brother of all people, a universal human being, if you like. Our destiny is universality, and not acquired by the sword, but by the power of brotherhood and our fraternal striving for the reunification of people.

The highest and most characteristic feature of our people is a sense of justice and a thirst for it.

Mikhail Lomonosov -The world famous scientist-encyclopedist, rector of the Academic University, academician of the Imperial Academy of Sciences and Arts in St. Petersburg (1711-1765).

The greatness, power and wealth of the entire state consists in the preservation and reproduction of the Russian people.

The beauty, greatness, strength and richness of the Russian language are quite evident from the books written in past centuries, when not only did our ancestors know any rules for writing, but they hardly thought that there were or could be.

For the general benefit, and especially for the establishment of the sciences in the fatherland, and against my own father, I do not set myself to rebel for sin ... I dedicated myself to this, so that to my grave with the enemies of Russian sciences to fight, as I have been fighting for twenty years, stood for them from a young age, in old age I will not leave.

Fyodor Tyutchev - Great Russian poet and diplomat (1803-1873).

Russia cannot be understood with the mind, cannot be measured with a common yardstick: She has a special become - You can only believe in Russia.

If you meet a veteran of the Napoleonic army, remind him of his glorious past and ask who among all the opponents who fought with him on the battlefields of Europe was the most worthy of respect, who, after individual defeats, retained a proud look: you can put ten against one, what he will name you a Russian soldier. Walk through the departments of France, where an alien invasion left its mark in 1814, and ask the inhabitants of these provinces which soldier in the units of the enemy troops constantly showed the greatest humanity, the highest discipline, the least hostility to civilians, unarmed citizens - you can put one hundred against one what they will call you a Russian soldier. And if you want to know who was the most unbridled and most predatory - oh, this is no longer a Russian soldier.

Peter I the Great - The last Tsar of All Russia and the first Emperor of All Russia (1672-1725).

I have a presentiment that the Russians someday, or perhaps during our lifetime, will shame the most enlightened peoples with their successes in the sciences, tirelessness in their labors and the majesty of solid and loud glory.

Russian is the one who loves Russia and serves it!

Alexander Pushkin -Great Russian poet (1799-1837)

Disrespect for ancestors is the first sign of savagery and immorality. It is not only possible to be proud of the glory of one's ancestors, but also must; not respecting it is shameful cowardice.

I am far from admiring everything that I see around me; ... but I swear on my honor that for nothing in the world I would not want to change my homeland or have another history, except for the history of our ancestors, the way God gave it to us.

Alexander Suvorov -Great Russian commander (1730-1800).

He who loves his Fatherland sets the best example of love for humanity.

Nature has produced only one Russia. She has no rivals. We are Russians, we will overcome everything.

The fortress is strong, the garrison is a whole army. But nothing can stand against Russian weapons - we are strong and confident in ourselves.

The Russian is distinguished by faith, loyalty and reason. All of Europe will move in vain to Russia: she will find Thermopylae, Leonidas and her own coffin there.

It seems to me that we began to forget how to talk about Russia. For the last 25 years we have got used to listening to Alfred Koch, who called Russia a bankrupt country that no one needs, and Tatyana Tolstaya, who called Russia nothing more than a “stagnant fat-ass fool”.

However - here's a paradox - people who left a significant mark in the history of Russia spoke completely different words about our country. I present to your attention a new article on Rukspert, "quotes about Russia":

Russian statements

Alexander III

Russia has no friends, they are afraid of our vastness ... Russia has only two reliable allies - its army and its navy. (link)

Nikolay Berdyaev

The Russian people created the most powerful state in the world, the greatest empire. Russia has consistently and stubbornly been going from Ivan Kalita and has reached dimensions that stagger the imagination of all peoples of the world. (link)

Nikolay Gogol

First of all, thank God for being Russian. This path is now open to the Russian, and this path is Russia itself. If only he loves Russian Russia, he will love everything that is in Russia. God himself is now leading us to this love. (Link)

You do not yet love Russia: you only know how to be sad and irritated by rumors about everything bad, whatever is happening in it, in you all this produces only one callous vexation and despondency. No, this is not love yet, you are far from love, this is perhaps only one too distant portent of it. ()

No, if you really fall in love with Russia, then by itself that short-sighted thought that has arisen now in many honest and even very intelligent people, that is, as if in the present time they can no longer do anything for Russia and as if they already not needed at all; on the contrary, then only with all your strength will you feel that love is omnipotent and that everything can be done with it. (link)

Eh, three! bird three, who invented you? To know, you could only be born to a lively people, in that land that does not like to joke, and scattered about half the world evenly, and go count miles until it hits you in your eyes. (link)

If there is only one farm for the Russians, then Russia will be revived. (link)

But are there such fires, such torments and such a force in the world that would overpower the Russian force! (link)

Anton Denikin

A Russian is not one who bears a Russian surname, but one who loves Russia and considers it his fatherland. (link)

Fedor Dostoevsky

In order to judge the moral strength of the people and what they are capable of in the future, one must take into account not the degree of ugliness to which they temporarily and even at least for the most part can humiliate themselves, but one must take into account only that height of spirit , which he can climb when the time comes. For ugliness is a temporary misfortune, always almost dependent on the circumstances that preceded and transient, from slavery, from age-old oppression, from rudeness, and the gift of magnanimity is an eternal gift, an elemental gift, born together with the people and all the more honored, if in the course of centuries slavery, hardship and poverty, he still will survive intact, in the heart of this people. (link)

The purpose of the Russian person is indisputably all-European and universal. To become a real Russian, to become completely Russian, perhaps, and it only means - to become a brother of all people, an all-man, if you like. (Link)

Catherine II

The Russian people are a special people in the world, which is distinguished by guesswork, intelligence, strength. (link)

Strength alone strengthens independence. Only if you are ready to fight can you instill respect for yourself and find allies instead of patrons. (link)

Mikhail Lomonosov

The greatness, power and wealth of the entire state consists in the preservation and reproduction of the Russian people. (link)

Christopher Minich

The Russian state has the advantage over others that it is controlled directly by God himself, otherwise it is impossible to understand how it exists. (link)

Konstantin Paustovsky

Many Russian words radiate poetry by themselves, just as precious stones radiate a mysterious brilliance. (Link)

Vladimir Putin

Alexander Pushkin

It is not only possible to be proud of the glory of your ancestors, but also should, not to respect it is shameful cowardice. (Link)

Konstantin Simonov

Russians are a stubborn people, and if it once occurred to them a good idea, sooner or later they will realize it on a truly Russian scale! (link)

Pyotr Stolypin

You gentlemen need great upheavals; we need a great Russia. (link)

Alexander Suvorov

He who loves his Fatherland sets the best example of love for humanity. (link)

Nature has produced only one Russia. She has no rivals. We are Russians, we will overcome everything. (link)

The fortress is strong, the garrison is a whole army. But nothing can stand against Russian weapons - we are strong and self-confident. (link)

The Russian is distinguished by faith, loyalty and reason. All of Europe will move to Russia in vain: she will find Thermopylae, Leonidas and her own coffin there. (Link)

We are Russians! What a delight!

Where the deer will pass, the Russian soldier will also pass there. Where a deer does not pass, a Russian soldier will still pass. (Link)

Ivan Turgenev

Russia can do without each of us, but none of us can do without it. (Link)

Take care of the purity of the language as a shrine! Never use foreign words. The Russian language is so rich and flexible that we have nothing to take from those who are poorer than us. (Link)

Foreign statements

Otto von Bismarck

Do not expect that once you take advantage of Russia's weakness, you will receive dividends forever. Russians always come for their money. And when they come, do not rely on the Jesuit agreements you signed, supposedly justifying you. They are not worth the paper they are written on. Therefore, it is worth playing with the Russians either honestly, or not playing at all. (Link)

Even the most favorable outcome of the war will never lead to the decay of the main force of Russia, which is based on millions of Russians ... These latter, even if they are dismembered by international treatises, rejoin each other as quickly as particles of a cut piece of mercury ... (link)

Charles de Gaulle

Russian people will never be happy knowing that injustice is happening somewhere. (Link)

Dalai Lama

Alexandr Duma

Russian people work tirelessly to transform themselves and those around them from humanity to Humanity! (Link)

Karl Clausewitz

Russia is not a country that can be really conquered, that is, occupied; at least this cannot be done ... by the forces of modern European states ... Such a country can only be defeated by internal weakness and the action of internal strife. (link)

Friedrich Nietzsche

Strongest and most amazing of all, willpower is manifested in the huge middle kingdom, where Europe seems to be returning to Asia - Russia. There the power to want has long been postponed and accumulated, there the will awaits - it is not known whether the will of denial or the will of affirmation - waits in a threatening way for, according to the favorite expression of today's physicists, to free itself. (Link)

For the emergence of any kind of institution, there must be a will that impels an instinct, anti-liberal to the point of brilliance - the will to tradition, to authority, to responsibility for whole centuries, to the solidarity of past and future generations ... (link)

If this will is there, then something like the Roman Empire, or like Russia, arises - the only country that currently has a future ... (link)

Russia is the opposite of the pitiful nervousness of small European states, for which, with the founding of the "German Empire", a critical time has come. (link)

Theodore Roosevelt

I foresee a huge future for Russia. Of course, she will have to go through certain shake-ups and, perhaps, severe shocks, but all this will pass, and after that Russia will rise and become a stronghold of all of Europe, the most powerful, perhaps, in the whole world power. (Link)

Adam Smith

For the sake of a righteous idea, Russian people happily work, even being in prison, and then they do not feel like prisoners, they gain freedom. (Link)

Albert Schweitzer

Russian people do not need the materialistic "values" of the West, do not need the dubious achievements of the East in the sphere of abstract spirituality, which has nothing to do with reality. (link)

PS... Quotes from our liberals - about Russia, about Russians, about patriots and about oppositionists - are here.

I cannot predict Russia's actions. She is a riddle wrapped in mystery and immersed in mystery. But maybe the key still exists. This key is Russia's national interests ...

Winston Churchill

№ 12228

"If I fall asleep and wake up in a hundred years and they ask me what is happening in Russia now, I will answer - DRINK AND STEAL."

Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin

№ 12164

For us, Russians with a soul, one Russia is original, one Russia truly exists; everything else is only an attitude towards it, thought, Providence. We can think, dream in Germany, France, Italy, and do business only in Russia.

Nikolay Karamzin

№ 11958

Not the disorderly distribution of land, not the pacification of the riot with handouts - the riot is extinguished by force, but the recognition of the inviolability of private property and, as a consequence, the creation of small personal land property ... - these are the tasks the implementation of which the government considered and considers a question of the existence of the Russian state.

Pyotr Stolypin

№ 11795

A Russian is not one who bears a Russian surname, but one who loves Russia and considers it his fatherland.

Anton Denikin

№ 10478

On top of all Russia there is one unforgettable Russia. Above all love there is one universal human love. Above all beauties there is one beauty that leads to the cognition of the Cosmos.

Nicholas Roerich

№ 10075

Give the state twenty years of peace, internal and external, and you will not recognize today's Russia.

Pyotr Stolypin

№ 10060

The Russian is bursting abroad in a kind of intoxication - his heart is wide open, his tongue is untied, - the Prussian gendarme in Lauzagen seems to us a man, Konigsberg is a free city.

Alexander Herzen

№ 10041

The essence of the Russian person is determined, on the one hand, by the expectation of a miracle, and on the other hand, by the conviction that everything is decided not by force, but by compassion, kindness, contemplation, responsiveness.

Nikita Mikhalkov

№ 10033

Russia abruptly moved from slavery to imaginary freedoms. We shit in the same place where we live. In the entrances - dirt, in the elevators - urine. Perhaps this attitude forms our serf thinking.

Oleg Yankovsky

№ 10011

Russia is a great country with an unpredictable past!

Mikhail Zadornov

№ 9999

The system under which we live has no name at all.

Mikhail Zadornov

№ 9967

Why is everyone calling us Eurasia? Eurasia is when there is more Europe than Asia. And we have more Asia than Europe. Therefore, we are not Eurasia, we are Asiopa.

Mikhail Zadornov

№ 9959

All Russia is a drinking Hamlet.

Fazil Iskander

№ 9619

They say that there is such an amazing country in the world that used to be a breadwinner, but now has become a feeding trough.

№ 9514

Russian life is dirty and weak, but somehow sweet. Here is the last thing and you are afraid to lose, otherwise it would be “all for a smack”. Afraid of losing something unique and that will not happen again. The best will be repeated, not this. And I want "this" ...