"Canada is free and freedom is its nationality." - Wilfred Laurier

Laurier was a great believer in individual freedom, and in separation of church and state. There are some who think he was an atheist, but there doesn't seem to be any real evidence of that.

When I was around ten, I used to regularly encounter a very elderly neighbour who liked to tell me anecdotes about local and national history. It was he who told me and my friend where to look along the creek bank and in the adjacent field for coins or buttons and other bits dropped there by the English overland assault force on Louisbourg when they camped there for a few days.

Once he told me about being brought as a child, by his father to meet Laurier, and how kindly Laurier spoke to a shy little boy. He very much admired Laurier, and thought him to have been our greatest PM.