1John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 12 September 1796 (Adams Papers)
I have received, my amiable friend, your letters of the 19 th: and 28 th: of last month, and am properly grateful for the readiness with which you consent to accompany my rambling destinies. The sacrifice which you will be obliged to make in quitting your paternal roof, is so great, that it gives me not a little anxiety. To give you a substitute for it, I cannot expect. That you should ever...
2John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 12 May 1797 (Adams Papers)
And is it possible that my charming friend should feel an uneasy sentiment a sentiment of fear in sitting down to write to me: to me, the friend of her Heart, who would rather suffer a thousand torments than give her a moment of pain?— I am really ashamed of myself for having by morose expressions chilled the feelings of a breast which was formed for the reception of none but warm and kind,...
3John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 31 May 1797 (Adams Papers)
I have received my kind friend’s letters of 3 d , 16 th: and 19 th: of May, and am impatiently waiting to hear from you and your father again. I am going this day on a tour to Amsterdam, where I shall make the arrangements for my immediate departure; so that I shall probably not remain here long enough to receive your reply to this Letter. There are many difficulties in the way of any...
4John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 6 June 1797 (Adams Papers)
“Our difficulties ended”!— Be it so.— But Faith is not one of the articles of which I possess a remarkable store.— I wish you may never have reason to consider as the commencement of difficulties, what you now regard as their termination. We shall have the means of conveyance to Lisbon.— Such as will perfectly well suit me; and such as you are willing to take up with.— But I do not like [to...
5John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 20 February 1797 (Adams Papers)
I hope we shall never get into a habit of writing to one another angry and kind Letters alternately, for it would be far from promoting the happiness of either. Your obliging favour of the 7 th: inst t: came to me yesterday. It gave me great pleasure which I will not mingle, with other sentiments by dwelling upon a topic necessarily disagreeable.— I wish it were in my power to write you always...
6John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 6 May 1797 (Adams Papers)
Upon receiving this morning your Letter of the 21 st: of last month, I recurred to mine of the 7 th: in answer to which it was written. I was not conscious of being displeased at your reading Chesterfield’s Letters, or at your having mentioned it to me.— But in reading over my own letter again, I am not surprized at your having taken it in that light.— No, my ever dear, and valued friend, I am...
7John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 20 December 1796 (Adams Papers)
I have this morning received your two Letters of Nov r: 29. and December 6. The pain which the prospect of an inevitable continuance to our separation has given you I readily believe, and I know too well from my own experience its force. At the same time I rejoyce in finding that you have the fortitude to support it; you have seldom as you say been taught in the school of disappointment: your...
8John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 12 October 1796 (Adams Papers)
After reading your letter of the 30 th: of last month which I received this morning, I looked at your picture, and methought it looked unusually cool. — I read the letter a second time, and upon again turning to the picture, it seemed to look severe — Upon a third reading, I dared not again consult the portrait; I feared to find it disdainful — Between us two, my lovely friend let there be...
9John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 7 April 1797 (Adams Papers)
Just after writing my last Letter I received your kind one of March 20; by which I find your departure is postponed until July. As it continues to us the opportunity of hearing frequently and regularly from each other it is an agreeable circumstance; it would be still more so, if it could secure to us the means of meeting again in Europe, which will however I apprehend be impossible. You...
10John Quincy Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson, 31 January 1797 (Adams Papers)
The day after I wrote you my last Letter, which was on the 28 th: I received your Letter of the 17 th: — It has given me as much pain as you expected, and more than I hope you intended. It has never been my intention to speak in an “authoritative,” a “commanding,” an “unkind” a “harsh” or a “peremptory” stile to you, and it distresses me to find that you think my letter of Dec r: 20. deserving...