251To Thomas Jefferson from John Adams, 15 October 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
I have long entertained scruples about writing this letter, upon a subject of some delicacy. But old age has over come at last. You remember the four Ships, ordered by Congress to be built, and the four Captains appointed by Washington—Talbot & Truxton & Barry & ca to carry an Ambassador to Algiers and protect our Commerce in the Mediterranean. I have always imputed this measure to you: for...
252From John Adams to Joseph T. Buckingham, 13 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
Accept my best thanks for your vol of collections from the public Journals. Unable to read myself, I have not found a reader for more than three or four pieces in it The first has penetrated into an aking void in my heart where are inexstinguishable sorrows & griefs, which even resignation itself can not assuage this second The third is a memorable example of the morality of le the legitimate...
253From John Adams to Alexander Coffin, 13 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have received your letters and copies of the papers inclosed & immediately transmitted them to Wm. Thomas Esqr Editor of the old colony memorial gazette published at Plymouth who has printed them all in that paper of 5 Oct 5. As they are now in the possession of the public, they will contribute largely to diffuse a more correct knowledge of the importance of the fisheries to our wealth...
254From John Adams to Stephen Mack, 10 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
I should sooner have answered your letter of the 20th Ulto if I could. My disposition is very good to assist as far as I can with truth & Justice any claims of my fellow citizens on the Justice or favour of their country But the claim of Mr Young is so very ancient & so many things have passed through my mind since, that I cannot depend on my memory for so remote a transaction. If Mr Young has...
255From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 10 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have received your letter of the 23d ulto. & your father’s letter & octavo volume mentioned in it The book will answer for itself wherever it goes & I hope will satisfy the world. If you take the “Old Colony Memorial” you will see some ancient documents concerning the fisheries, if you do not take that paper I hope you will subscribe for it, for it is of great importance to the history of...
256From John Adams to Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, 8 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
David Hinckley Esqr of Boston a Gentleman of ample Fortune & respectable Character is about to travel in France with his amiable Daughter for the benefit of his health and the Gratification of his curiosity and the improvement of their knowledge of the World. Are extremely desirous of paying their respects to their illustrious fellow Citizen one of the Heroes of the American Revolution and...
257From John Adams to John Adams Smith, 8 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
David Hinckley Esqr of Boston and his amiable Daughter are about to travel in England. I earnestly recommend them to your particular and assiduous attention especially the accomplished Miss Ann and I pray you to introduce them in my Name as well as Your own to the Excellent American Minister and his Lady They will furnish you with ample details of all the News current in this Country Your...
258From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 7 October 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for the present of your Book and your kind letter of the 24th. September. It was wisely done to collect all those papers together and arrange them in order that posterity might see them in one view without ransacking twenty libraries for the newspapers and the pamphlets of the day. Without this prudent precaution they would probably have never been all read by any one individual....
259From John Adams to John Adams, 30 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for a pretty volume of Poetic effusions; for want of sight I have not read them, but in those which have been read to me, I perceive nothing inconsistent with morals, on the contrary, a social spirit of charity humanity, and benevolence, Of the Poetical merit I pretend not to be a critical judge. From your name I conjecture that you are a bee, from one of the six swarms , that...
260From John Adams to William Thomas, 26 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
The inclosed papers are old Colony Memorials and therefore very proper to be inserted in your Paper, in which if you will be so good as to insert them word for word, / you will oblige your friend and / humble Servant MHi : Adams Family Papers, Letterbooks.
261From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 20 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
Your beautiful letter of the 8th has given me great pleasure I call it beautiful because the style is handsome and handwriting marvellous for you. You cannot be in a better school than when writing for Your Father. You will return to Your Studies with greater pleasure after having written for him George! I have read I believe in Anacharsis a law of one of the democratic republics of Greece I...
262From John Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, Jr., 20 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have received much satisfaction from the reports of your conduct since you left me. I have received still more pleasure from the constancy & punctuality of your correspondence with your parents, sister & Brother: & your letter to me of 12 crowns all. I thank you for the pamphlet you sent me containing the journal of your excursion to Concord which is very particular entertaining &...
263From John Adams to Alexander Coffin, 14 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
I rejoice to learn, from your letter of the 9th Instant, that you still live; sand I hope in health, wealth and honour—Your letter is a Cordial to me—I shall be greatly obliged to you, for a fair and full Copy of Mr Thaxter’s letter to you, when you were at Amsterdam, in 1783—And still more, for a similar Copy of your answer to him in Paris, the same year; concerning the Whale and Cod...
264From John Adams to Theron Metcalf, 8 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
I wish I could give you a satisfactory answer to your obliging favour of August 31 but from the 17 Nov. 1779 to 1788 I was absent in Europe and was not well informed of what passed in the US. I am not minutely informed of the history rise & progress of banks those enormous con corrupters of the people—Mr Maese of Philadelphia has written the life of Mr Robert Morris in which he has given an...
265From John Adams to Edward Livingston, 5 September 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have once heard read your report made to the general assembly of the state of Louisiana on the plan of a Penal Code, and the general opinion impression left upon my mind is unmingled satisfaction and delight, in the spirit of Liberty humanity and benevolence which runs through the whole Book, and less admiration of the depth of thought the extent of views, and the patient labour and...
266From John Adams to Joseph Thaxter, 28 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Your letter from Edgarton of the 21st: instant, gave me great pleasure. The sight of your name excited recollections of an antient and pleasant acquaintance, and some little modern resentments for your having made several visits to this part of the Country, without coming to see me. I agree with you in your opinions of the modern Crusade. Superstition and enthusiasm are excited and enkindled...
267From John Adams to Ward Nicholas Boylston, 24 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
I will not loose a second before acknowledgeing your favour of the 21st. which I received this minute—I wish I could send you a Copy of all the papers, that is the Deeds by which I have given to the Town of Quincy one hundred and sixty five Acres of Land. And my Library. For the purpose of building a Stone Temple, and a Stone Academy, that Academy to be built over the Cellar of the House in...
268From John Adams to William Thomas, 12 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Let me add a few hints to my former letter. Please to search in the publications after the Treaty of Peace for a letter of Monsieur de Marbois, Secretary of Legation to the Chevalier de la Luzern—and records and files of Congress during that period; and an Octavo Volume in french entitled, “Politique de touf les Cabineto del Europe” published by the French Government during the Revolution; in...
269From John Adams to Ward Nicholas Boylston, 12 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Badinage Avaunt!!! I must now be very serious. I have recollected all I can of Homer Virgil and Shakespear—for you know I can read neither and I can recollect nothing comparable to your idea of a stone edifice on the top of Waychusetts Hill as an asylum for men and women in despair—it is in Milton only that I can find any thing approaching it, in sublimity. In humanity it has no competitor...
270From John Adams to William Thomas, 11 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Let me add a few hints to my former letter. Please to search in the publications after the treaty of peace for a letter of monsieur de Marbois, secretary of the legation, to the Chevalier de la Luzerne, and records and files of congress during that period; and an ’octavo volume in French, entitled, "Politique de tous les cabinets de 1’ Europe," published by the French government during the...
271From John Adams to William Thomas, 10 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
The grounds and principles on which the “3third article of the Treaty of 83. was contended for on our part and finally yielded on the part of the British” were these. First, that the Americans and the adventurers to America were the first discoverers and the first practisers of the fisheries. 2dly That New England and especially Massachusetts, had done more in defence of them, than all the...
272From John Adams to MA Town of Quincy, 10 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
KNOW all Men by these Presents, That I, John Adams, of Quincy, in the County of Norfolk, Esquire, in further consideration of the motives and reasons enumerated in my two former Deeds, do hereby give, grant convey and confirm to the inhabitants of the town of Quincy in their corporate capacity, and their successors, the fragments of my Library, which still remain in my possession, excepting a...
273From John Adams to Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams, 8 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Oh! that I could visit Philadelphia! and run about as I did Forty Eight years ago—to Roman Catholic Churches, Quaker meetings Anabaptist Churches, Methodistical Churches, Swedenborgian Churches—and Presbyterian Churches Not one Congregational Church could I find. Nor of a Unitarian Church was the possibility conceived by any one in that City. Tell Mrs Powell however, that I would now visit her...
274From John Adams to Timothy Pickering, 6 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
Your favour of the 2d instant has prescribed a dismal plan, which I was never very well calculated to execute, but am now wholly incapable. I can write nothing which will not be suspected of personal vanity, local prejudice or Provincial & State partiality. However, as I hold myself responsible, at this age, to one only tribunal in the Universe, I will give you a few hints at all hazards. As...
275From John Adams to Edward Livingston, 1 August 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have feel myself highly honored by your polite & obliging letter of the 19th. of May which I received this Morning by the Mail. I will not omit a Moment to acknowledge the receipt of it.—Though I cannot see to read—or feel to write yet fortunately I can hear, my auditory nerves are the only sound ones that remain to me, I will have read to me as soon as possible your report made to the...
276From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 27 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have mislay’d your letter and therefore cannot refer to it. I hope Mr Russell has his fill, your Father’s rejoinder is as some of the Southern papers express it, like the waters of the Mississippi, without “o’er-flowing full” There is but one vocce in this part of the world, and that is of disapprobation of Mr Russell’s conduct. The testimony’s of Mr. Brent and Mr Bailey are clenchers, and...
277From John Adams to MA Town of Quincy, 25 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
Know all Men by these Presents,—That I John Adams of Quincy in the County of Norfolk Esquire, In consideration of the kindness with which my former conveyance dated the twenty fifth of June 1822, has been accepted, and in further consideration of all the motives enumerated in that instrument and of various other causes—not necessary to be stated particularly, Do hereby give, grant, and convey,...
278From John Adams to Daniel Davis, 24 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have just received your favor of the 20th. I shall be glad to see you any day, or hour this week, or any other week at Quincy.— I cannot write, otherwise I would write what occurs to me, I can only give you a few hints now, for your further enquiries,—Before my time all the lawyers that I have heard of, were John Reid, Robert Auchmuty the Elder, Paul Dudley, Governor Shirley, Mr Overing, Mr...
279From John Adams to John C. Gray, 24 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
My Friendship for your family must be my apology for neglecting so long to acknowledge the receipt of your Oration, I presume to reckon among my friends, your Grand Father Mr Chipman of Marble Head—he was a Brother barrester at law, And I spent a week with him in the year 1764 in the same house and at the same Court in Pownalborough and found him an able lawyer, and an amiable Man; though we...
280From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 24 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
At the request of our worthy friend and excellent Neighbour Dr Amos Holbrook; I transmit you the inclosed papers, praying you to convey them to the Superintendent of the Patent Office, If I knew Dr Thornton was there I would have transmitted them to him. But I think I have heard some other Gentleman was there, and that he was in some other station—My Compliments to him, if you please— It is...
281From John Adams to Mrs. Derby, 23 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
Mr Adams’s Compliments to Mrs Derby and thanks her for the lone of Mr Coffins Journal, which has afforded him a rich entertainment, it is written extremely well and contains much important information, it is fit for publication would do honor to the traveller be a valuable addition to American literature, and promote the Commercial and political interests of the Country—Mr Adams respects to Mr...
282From John Adams to Andrew Dunlap, 22 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for your Oration of the fourth of July 1822. It is so intelligent, eloquent, and pathetick that no ancient eyes can read it without being suffused with tears, and no ancient ears could hear it without a throbing bosom. I remember not to have read any one with more delight; you have made one mistake however Jefferson and Adams were never rivals, it was Hamilton that was the rival of...
283From John Adams to William Taylor Barry, 21 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I know not that I ever received a letter with more pleasure than yours of the 30 June last except the circular from your committee which I received some days before. The wisdom & liberality generosity of your Legislature in making a liberal appropriation of money for the benefit of schools Academies colleges & the university is an equal honor to them & their constituents—a proof of their...
284From John Adams to Thomas Greenleaf, 15 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
The resolutions of the Town of Quincy passed on the same day and presented to me by you in their Name are perfectly satisfactory and demand my affectionate gratitude. The harmony and unanimity with which the Town have accepted the instrument of conveyance, and their approbation of the restrictions, limitations, and conditions expressed in it, is very gratifying to me and receives my best...
285From John Adams to Andrew Dunlap, 13 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for your Oration of the fourth of July 1822. It is so intelligent, eloquent, and pathetick that no ancient eyes can read it without being suffused with tears, and no ancient ears could hear it without a throbing bosom. I remember not to have read any one with more delight; you have made one mistake however Jefferson and Adams were never rivals, it was Hamilton that was the rival of...
286From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 12 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
Yours of the 27th. June is received with pleasure, for the free air of it delights me. Your number of 1267. letters in a year, does not surprise me; I have no list of mine, and I could not make one without a weeks research, and I do not believe I ever received one quarter part of your number. And I very much doubt whether I received in the same year one twelfth part; There are reasons enough...
287John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 12 July 1822 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours of the 27 th June is received with pleasure, for the free air of it delights me. Your number of 1267. letters in a year, does not surprise me; I have no list of mine, and I could not make one without a weeks research, And I do not believe I ever received one quarter part of your number. And I very much doubt whether I received in the same year one twelfth part; There are reasons enough...
288From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 11 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I agree with you in your number 34. that the quarterly is guilty of damning Stuart, and Reid, with faint praise, or rather with insidious praise; but they may say what they will, they can never destroy the reputation of either, as a profound investigator of the science of the human mind; both have added to the stock of human knowledge, and cleared up many perplexing points and questions; They...
289From John Adams to Susanna Boylston Adams Clark Treadway, 8 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
If I could write I should sooner, have answered your letter of the 10th June. I am very much pleased with all your letters, they discover an attentive observation and proper reflection. you have great opportunities to see the fashionable World and I hope you will not be too much fascinated with its delights and Charmes, Moral and intellectual beauties are the only ones that never fade;...
290From John Adams to Caroline Amelia Smith De Windt, 8 July 1822 (Adams Papers)
I am as much delighted with answering your pritty Letter, of June 3d. as you was with writing it, though I have necessarily neglected it so long. I am much pleased with your account of your studies which are all very proper for you and I hope you will hereafter learn the french language, and the Grammars, at least, in the Greek and Latin, for this will teach you English Grammar better than the...
291From John Adams to William Tudor, Jr., 30 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
In answer to yours, of the 15. June and to the first question in it, I am not able from memory to satisfy your curiosity, but if you can ascertain the time when Coll. Otis was appointed chief Justice of the inferior court for the county of Barnstable, a few months before that was the period you seek, and if I remember right Hutchinsons choice to the agency of the Province was during the same...
292From John Adams to Samuel B.H. Judah, 25 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have heard read your horrible Odofriede; although there are marks of genius and talents, which in so young a man, if hereafter carefully cultivated and applied to more proper subjects, may produce something agreeable and useful, yet I can neither applaud or approve this kind of composition in prose or verse. They serve only to continue in the minds of men chimerical fantasies, which never...
293From John Adams to MA Town of Quincy, 25 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
Know all Men by these presents, That I John Adams of Quincy in the County of Norfolk, Esqr. in consideration of the veneration I feel for the residence of my ancestors and the place of my nativity, and of the habitual affecction, I bear to the Inhabitants with whom I have so happily lived for more than eighty six years, and of my sincere desire, to promote their happiness, and the instruction...
294From John Adams to Samuel B.H. Judah, 24 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I have heard read your horrible Odo friede; although there are marks of genius & talents, which in so young man; if hereafter carefully cultivated and applied to more proper subjects, may produce something agreeable and useful, yet I can neither applaud or approve this kind of compositions in prose or verse They serve only to continue in the minds of men chimerical fantasies, which never...
295From John Adams to Samuel L. Knapp, 24 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for the vol you sent me containing the trial of Lt Abbot. I am too blind to read it myself and have not yet found a friend of sufficient leisure to read it to me. It grieves me to the heart to see such publications & to read in the newspapers so many accounts of courts martial and courts of inquiry. However necessary they may be they can not fail to excite & perpetuate incurable...
296From John Adams to Samuel L. Knapp, 24 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for the Vol. you sent me containing the trial of Lt Abbot. I am too blind to read it myself and have not yet found a friend of sufficient leisure to read it to me. It grieves me to the heart to see such publications and to read in the Newspapers so many accounts of Courts Martial and Courts of enquiry. However necessary they may be they cannot fail to excite and perpetuate...
297From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 24 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
Your No 33. has pleased me much and I beg you to continue your observations on the cavilling and chicanery of the quarterly review. I grow more and more every day in love with Stuart and the Scottish school. I have had read to me three volumes of Browns lectures on Metaphysics and ethics and I recommend them to your careful perusal as well as to your brothers. They are a rich mine and mass of...
298From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 15 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I am well pleased with your No. 31 & 32 I hope you will continue the subject. I see nothing in the quarterly reviews but the Johnsonian antipathy to Scotland. That Mr Locke has had greater influence on the intellectual moral & political world than any man of the last century I believe; but to deny that Reid, and Stuart, have made no improvements, upon Locke appears to me uniniquitous...
299From John Adams to Hiram Haines, 12 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
The curiosity you express in your letter of the 4th June is commendable, and I am sorry it is not in my power to gratify it. Copperplate Engravings and Miniature likenesses of myself I have none. Specimens of my hand-writing I cannot give, for I cannot write a line.—You will want no other moral maxims or sentiments for your government in this World and all future Worlds, than the Sermon on the...
300From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 12 June 1822 (Adams Papers)
I am well pleased with your No’s: 31. 32 & hope you will continue the subject. I see nothing on the quarterly review but the Johnsonian antipathy to Scotland. That Mr. Locke has had greater influence on the intellectual moral & political world than any man of the last century I believe; but to deny that Reid & Stuart have made no improvements a upon Locke appears to me an iniquitous partiality...