51From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 8 January 1808 (Adams Papers)
The distance between Us, the total retirement in which I live and the Want of Facts, render a Correspondence between Us, upon public affairs of very little use to you, though it is a great pleasure to me. The Storm that has agitated the Elements for twenty Years in Europe must be drawing towards a Conclusion, and the last blasts may be the fiercest of all. We have been favoured by Providence...
52From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 28 December 1807 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for your printed lecture on the humanity Economy and other virtues, which require of us, more attention to our domestick animals, and especially to their diseases. We see our horses, horned cattle, sheep, swine and other species, as well as our cats and dogs, sick or wounded and no body knows what to do with them or for them, so that a broken bone or a fit of sickness is almost...
53From John Adams to Robert Smith, 28 December 1807 (Adams Papers)
I have received with pleasure, the letter you did me the honor to write me, on the fifteenth of this month: and pray you to accept my thanks for the impression of a medal, presented to the late Commodore Edward Preble in pursuance of the resolution of Congress of the third of March, one thousand eight hundred and five. This medal, in honor of the Commodore and in commemoration of a Splendid...
54From John Adams to William Heath, 14 December 1807 (Adams Papers)
As I did not wish to oppress you with my Letters I have not acknowledged the receipt of your favour of the 18th of May, though I received it in due Season and esteemed it very highly. I have seen lately in the Chronicle, that like the good Steward you bring out of your Treasury Things new and old, and in very good Season. The Military Countryman written five or six and thirty years ago I have...
55From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 14 December 1807 (Adams Papers)
Knowing very well by too long Experience the nature of your Employment, I wish you to understand that I never expect or desire any answers to my Letters except when I expressly request Information, more than a bare Acknowledgment of the Recipt of them. I Say this however upon a very patriotic and Self denying Principle because every Line from you is a cordial to my Spirit. Mr John Smith of...
56From John Adams to François Adriaan Van der Kemp, 1 December 1807 (Adams Papers)
I sympathize with you in all your Expressions of grief in your favour of Nov. 1st. at the melancholly Catastrophy of so many worthy persons your friends at Leyden and elsewhere. You derive consolation from the only source from which it can be drawn.—If I knew of any other I would joyfully administer it to you, as well as to myself.— Hunc solem et Stellas et decedentia certis Tempora momentis,...
57From John Adams to Amos J. Cook, 30 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I have received the favour of your letter of the 21st. day of this month, and have complied with your request so far as to inclose with this letter, a Copy in my hand writing, of some Latin Verses, which I copied into my Pencil Book, in December 1779 from an inscription over the Door of the Cell of a Monk in Corunna in Spain.—The moral is so good, that they are worth the attention of the young...
58From John Adams to Abiel Holmes, 14 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I am Sorry it is not in my power to give you much information relative to General Oglethorpe in complyance with your desire in your favour of the Eleventh of this Month. Recovering from a great Sickness in Paris in the Fall of the year after the Signature of the Definitive Treaty of Peace in 1783 I was advised by my Phesicians to take a Passage to Bath in England, for the purpose of Using the...
59From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 12 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I have not written to you, though I have received two kind Letters from you, Since your departure, giving me very pleasing accounts of your comforts in your Travels. Soon after you left Us, I took the resolution instead of Sending George to Atkinson by the Stage or any other accidental and precarious conveyance to convey him myself. Accordingly We Set out, your Mother your Son and myself, and...
60From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 11 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I have, long before the receipt of your favour of the 31 of October, supposed that either you were gazing at the Comet or curing the Influenza: and in either case, that you was much better employed than in answering my idle Letters. Pray! have our Astronomers at Phyladelphia, observed that Stranger in the Heavens? Have they noted its Bearings and Distances, its Course and progress! whence it...
61From John Adams to Rev. John Disney, 9 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I was agreably surprised, the last week on receiving a very kind and obliging letter from you, dated at the Hide near Inglestone the 24th. of Augst. a seat where I had formerly passed many agreable hours with a Gentleman whom I esteemed as a man of sense and letters and as a Friend of Liberty and Humanity.—It is true that several Letters have passed between me and Mr. Brand Hollis: I have but...
62From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, September 1807 (Adams Papers)
I want to write an Essay.—Whom Shall I choose for a Model?—Plutarch, old Montaigne, Lord Bacon, Addison, Johnson, or Franklin? The last, if he had devoted his Life to the Study might have equalled Montaine in Essays or La Fontaine in Fables: for he was fitter more fitted for either or both than to conduct a Nation like Prony or Colbert. I am however too round about, to imitate the close,...
63From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 1 September 1807 (Adams Papers)
It is rare, that a Letter of yours remains so long upon my Table unacknowledged as has that of July 9th. Crudens Apophthagm is well worthy of your Remembrance and that of your Posterity for forty times forty years more. It is the only Clue to the Labyrinth of the World, the only key to the Riddle of the Universe. “Some Crimes are punished to prove a Providence; others escape to teach a future...
64From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 19 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
“Pride of Talents and much Ambition were undoubtedly combined in the Character of the President, who immediately Succeeded General Washington” and these are represented as the most prominent features of his Character. Vol. 3. p. 393. Permit me Madam to ask the favour of you, to point out the Act or Word, which appeared to you to evince this Pride of Talents. I know not that I ever felt any...
65From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 17 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
In the 306 page of your first Volume there are certain Traits that I had overlooked. “Richard Henry Lee Esq. was the first who dared explicitly to propose a Declaration of Independence. The Proposal Spread a Sudden dismay. A Silent Astonishment, Seemed to prevade the Assembly” &c. These Expressions, Madam, could only have arisen from Misinformation, or perhaps I shall express myself more...
66From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 15 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
In order to give you all the Authentic Documents necessary to explain the Remarks I have made upon your History, I have omitted to give you Copies of one or two Commissions which I intended to have transcribed in their Places. One of them is in these Words. The United States of America in Congress assembled To all to whom these Presents Shall come Send Greeting. Whereas these United States,...
67From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 8 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
More demonstrations of your Friendship for Mr Adams appear in the 229 page of the third Volume. The Same disposition to wink him out of Sight, to represent him in an odious light, to lessen and degrade him below his Station, which runs through every part of your history in which he appears, is very visible here again. “Mr John Adams had left Holland and joined the Plenipotentiaries of the...
68From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 3 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
In your third Volume page 169, you say that “on the twenty Second of April 1782, Mr. Adams was admitted at the Hague and with the Usual Ceremonies received as Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States of America. ” This mistake of a few days in Chronology is Scarcely worth a Remark, but I suppose you would wish to be correct. It was on the Nineteenth day of April, not the twenty Second....
69From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 30 July 1807 (Adams Papers)
Had I really been disgusted and mortified at my Treatment by Congress which in fact I was not, but was Satisfied as Soon as it was explained to me, the mortification would have been more than compensated by the Commissions I received on the fourth of November, 1779 unquestionably the more confidential Commissions that Congress had ever issued. The Commission to General Washington as Commander...
70From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 28 July 1807 (Adams Papers)
In the 135th. Page of your Second Volume, you State that in 1778 Mr John Adams of the State of Massachusetts was chosen to Succeed Mr Deane as Commissioner in behalf of the United States at the Court of France: an inaccuracy however of so little importance that it was Scarcely worth a Correction. In the 139th. page you say that within a few Months after Congress made a new Arrangement of...
71From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 27 July 1807 (Adams Papers)
In the 131 and 132 page of the first Volume of your History, you are pleased to say that John Adams, one of the Negatived Counsellors a Barrister at Law of rising Abilities, his Appearance on the Theatre of Politicks commenced at this Period, that is in 1774. This is of very little Importance, and would not be worthy of much Attention if it did not dis betray a Malignity of heart and a...
72From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 20 July 1807 (Adams Papers)
In the 392 Page of the third Volume of your History you say that “After Mr Adams’s return from England, he was implicated, by a large portion of his Countrymen, as having relinquished the Republican System, And forgotten the Principles of the American Revolution, which he had advocated for near twenty years.” I am somewhat at a loss for the meaning of the Word implicated in this place. If it...
73From John Adams to Mercy Otis Warren, 11 July 1807 (Adams Papers)
As it is neither consistent with my Principles, Disposition or habits, upon any misunderstanding with an ancient Friend, to conceive Resentment and hostility to be changed into an Enemy, I shall still continue my old Style of address to Mrs. Warren. I have read much if not all your history of the Rise Progress and termination of the American Revolution. I am not about to write a review of it....
74From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 25 June 1807 (Adams Papers)
John Bunjan, if he had written my last Letter to you would have called it an history of Gods Judgments against Lyars and Libellers. Such indeed it seems to be. A great Number of others might have been added, and two or three at least ought to have been. Phillip Freneau is one of the Number: but I know not in what Light to consider him. A Libeller, he certainly was not only against me but...
75From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 23 June 1807 (Adams Papers)
I have received your favour of the ninth of this Month, and conveyed to Dr Tufts your Letter to him, who desireses me to express to you the high sense he has of your Benevolence And Humanity to Mr John Loude. The Doctor will write you, as soon as he can find means of conveying to the Parents of that unfortunate youth the money you enclosed. What Shall We Say, my Friend? A pious and virtuous...
76From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 20 June 1807 (Adams Papers)
Inclosed is the Certificate of forty Shares in the Fire and Marine Insurance Company. The third part of the Capital which is to be paid off, you will please to receive in shares of the Boston Bank, if you approve of it, and hold them as you propose. I am your affectionate / Father MHi : Winthrop Family Papers.
77From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 23 May 1807 (Adams Papers)
I received at an Exhibition of Musick in our polite Village of Mount Woollaston, on thursday, your Letter relative to Mr Loude, and sent it immediately to Dr Tufts by his Lady, that the Young Gentlemans Friends might be informed of his Situation. I lament the untimely decline of a Youth, although I never Saw him, who has been represented to me, as one who injured his health by too intense an...
78From John Adams to Benjamin Rush, 21 May 1807 (Adams Papers)
I return you, the Letter of Edward Smith. Time may or may not unriddle this whimsical Mystery. It might however in the mean time to put Us on our guard against Intrigues. My not preserving a Copy of my Letter to Dr Nathan Webb (for he was a Physician) is no Wonder: for I never kept a Copy of any Letter, till I became a Member of Congress in 1774. The observation of your Son Richard is very...
79From John Adams to William Heath, 11 May 1807 (Adams Papers)
I read in the Chronicle some time ago, two Speculations with the signature of a military Countryman, and I read them with great pleasure for two very Substantial reasons, one of which is that I cordially approved and coincided with every Sentiment and every expression in them: the other was that I knew at once that General Heath was the Writer of them. How did you know that? you will ask. I...
80From John Adams to Abiel Holmes, 6 May 1807 (Adams Papers)
I am under a great obligation to you for the two volumes of the your American Annals, and am ashamed that I have not acknowledged long ago the Receipt of the first of them They are a work of great Labour, care and Industry, and the Execution of the plan appears to me to be as ingenious as it is judicious The Style is Elegant as well as clear and concise. With great satisfaction I observe that...