51John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 22 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
D r Priestley , in a letter to M r Lindsey Northumberland Nov. 4. 1803 Says “ As you were pleased with my comparison of Socrates and Jesus , I have begun to carry the same comparison to all the heathen Moralists , and I have all the books that I want for the purpose, except
52John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, February–3 March 1814 (Jefferson Papers)
I was nibbing my pen and brushing my Faculties, to write a polite Letter of Thanks to M r Counsellor Barton for his valuable Memoirs of D r Rittenhouse though I could not account for his Sending it to me; when I received your favour of Jan. 24 th . I now most cordially indorse my Thanks over to you. The Book is in the modern American Style, an able imitation of Marshalls Washington, though far...
53John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 9 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Lord! Lord! What can I do, with So much Greek? When I was of your Age, young Man, i.e. 7 or 8 or 9 years ago I felt, a kind of pang of Affection, for one of the flames of my youth, and again paid my Addresses to Isocrates and Dionissius Hallicarnassensis &c &c &c I collected all my Lexicons and Grammers and Sat down to περι ενθε ς εως ονοματων &c. In this Way I amused myself for sometime: but...
54John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, with postscript by Abigail Adams, 20 June 1815 (Jefferson Papers)
The fit of recollection came upon both of Us, So nearly at the same time that I may, Sometime or other, begin to think there is Some thing in Priestleys and Hartleys vibrations. The day before Yesterday I Sent to the Post office a letter to you and last night I received your kind favour of the 10 th . The question before the human race is, Whether the God of nature Shall govern the World by...
55From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 19 December 1813 (Adams Papers)
Ridento dicere Verum, quid vetat. I must make you and myself merry or melancholly, by a little more Phylosophical Speculation about the formidable Subject of Aristocracy. Not long after General Dearborns return to Boston from the Army, a violent Alarm was excited and Spread in Boston and through the country, by a report at first only Secretly whispered in private circles that an Affair of Love...
56From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 15 July 1813 (Adams Papers)
Never mind it, my dear Sir, if I write four Letters to your one: your one is worth more than my four. It is true that I can Say and have Said nothing new on the Subject of Government. Yet I did Say in my Defence and in my Discourses on Davila, though in an uncouth Style, what was new to Lock, to Harrington, to Milton, to Hume, to Montesquieu to Roauseau, to Turgot, Condorcet, to Rochefaucault,...
57John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 3 May 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
Yours Ap. 8 has long Since been rec d J. “Would you agree to live your 80 Years over again”? A. “ Aye! And Sanse Phrases .” J. “Would you agree to live your Eighty Years over again forever”? A. I once heard our Acquaintance, Chew , of Philadelphia Say, “He Should like to go back to 25, to all Eternity”: but I own my Soul would Start and Shrink back on itself, at the Prospect of an endless...
58From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 25 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
Your favour of the 15th came to me Yesterday, and it is a pleasure to discover that We are only 9 days apart. Be not Surprised or alarmed. Lindsays Memoirs will do no harm to you or me. You have right and reason to feel and to resent the breach of Confidence. I have had enough of the same kind of Treachery and Perfidy practiced upon me, to know how to Sympathize with you. I will agree with...
59John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, [22] September 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Considering all things, I admire D r Priestleys last Effort for which I am entirely indebted to you. But as I think it is extreamly imperfect, I beg of you to pursue the investigation, according to your promise to D r Rush , and according to your Syllabus. It may be presumptuous in me to denominate any Thing of Dr Priestley imperfect: but I must avow, that among all the vast Exertions of his...
60From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 2 February 1816 (Adams Papers)
I know not what to say of your Letter of the 11th of Jan. but that it is one of the most consolatory, I ever received. To trace the commencement of the Reformation I suspect We must go farther back than Borgia, or even that Huss or Wickliff, and I want the Acta Sanctorum to assist me in this Research. That Stupendous Monument of human Hypocricy and Fanaticism the Church of St. Peter at Rome,...
61John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 25 December 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Answer my Lettr Letters at your Leisure. Give yourself no concern. I write as for a refuge and protection against Ennui. The fundamental Principle of all Phylosophy and all Christianity is “ Rejoice Always in all Things . Be thankfull at all times for all good and all that We call evil.” Will it not follow, that I ought to rejoice and be thankful that Priestley has lived? Aye! that Voltaire...
62John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 22 June 1815 (Jefferson Papers)
Can you give me any Information, concerning A. G. Camus ? Is he a Chateaubriand ? or a Marquis D’Argens ? Does he mean to abolish Christianity? or to restore the Inquisition, the Jesuits, the Pope and the Devil? Within a few days, I have received a thing as unexpected to me as an Apparition from the dead; “Rapport a L’Institut National, Par A. G. Camus, imprime par ordre de L’Institut,...
63From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 18 July 1813 (Adams Papers)
I have more to Say, on Religion. For more than Sixty Years I have been attentive to this great Subject. Controversies, between Calvinists and Arminians, Trinitarians and Unitarians, Deists and Christians, Atheists and both, have attracted my Attention, whenever the Singular Life, I have lead would admit, to all these questions. The History of this little Village of Quincy, if it were worth...
64John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 12 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I forgot in my last to remark, a very trifling Inaccuracy in yours of June 27 th . The Letter intercepted in Hichbournes Trunk which was reported to glance at M r Dickenson , was not in 1776. It was in the month of June 1775. Had it been June 1776, the English would not have printed it. The Nation had then too maturely reflected, on the necessity of Independence, and was too ripe and too hot...
65John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 12 October 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
I have a Curiosity to learn Something of the Character Life and death of a Gentleman, whose name was Wollaston , who came from England with a Company of a few dozens of Persons in the year 1622, took possession of an height on Massachusetts Bay built houses there for his People, and after looking about him and not finding the face of Nature Smiling enough for him, went to Virginia to seek a...
66John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 9 August 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
The Biography of M r Vander Kemp would require a Volume which I could not write if a Mil l ion were offered me as a Reward for the Work. After a learned and Scientific Education he entered the Army in Holland and Served as a Captain, with Reputation: but loving Books more than Arms he resigned his Commission and became a Preacher. My Acquaintance with him commenced at Leyden in 1780. He was...
67From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 4 November 1816 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of Oct. 14 has greatly obliged me. Tracys Analysis, I have read once; and wish to read it a Second time. It shall be returned to you. But I wish to be informed whether this Gentleman is of that Family of Tracys with which the Marquis La Fayette is connected by intermarriages? I have read not only the Analysis, but Eight Volumes out of 12 of The Origine de tous les Cultes, and if...
68John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 11 June 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I rec d yesterday your favour of may 27 th . I lament with you the loss of Rush . I know of no Character living or dead, who has done more real good in America . Robert Treat Paine Still lives, at 83 or 84, alert drol and witty though deaf . Floyd I believe, yet remains, Paine must be very great; Philosopher and Christian; to live under the Afflictions of his Family. Sons and Daughters with...
69John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 30 September 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
The Seconds of Life, that remain to me, are So few and So Short; (and they Seem to me Shorter and Shorter every minute) that I cannot Stand upon Epistolary Ettiquette: And though I have written two Letters , yet unnoticed I must write a third. Because I am not acquainted with any Man on this Side of Montecello , who can give me any Information upon Subjects that I am now analysing and...
70John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 13 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Let me allude, to one circumstance more, in one of your Letters to me, before I touch upon the Subject of Religion in your Letters to Priestley . The first time, that you and I differed in Opinion on any material Question; was after your arrival from Europe ; and that point was the french Revolution. you was well persuaded in your own mind that the Nation would Succeed in establishing a free...
71John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 2 February 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I will not wait for regular answers to my Letters, while I am engaged in this important occupation of giving you Some Account of Tom Moretons New Canaan; which is infinitely more entertaining and instructive to me, than our Friend Condorcets “ New Heaven ” was almost 30 years ago, or than Swedenborgs “ New Jerusalem ” is now. In his third Chapter is a curious History. Before the English came...
72From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 24 August 1815 (Adams Papers)
If I am neither deceived by the little Information I have, or by my Wishes for its truth, I Should Say that France is the most Protestant country of Europe at this time, though I cannot think it the most reformed . In consequence of these Reveries I have imagined that Camus and the Institute, meant, by the revival and continuance of the Acta Sanctorum, to destroy the Pope and the Catholic...
73From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 3 May 1812 (Adams Papers)
I wrote you on the first of this month acknowledging the receipt of your “Proceedings” &c and now repeat my thanks for it. It is as masterly a pamphlet as ever I have read; and every way worthy of the Mind that composed and the pen which commited it to writing. There is witt and fancy and delicate touches of Satyr enough in it to make it entertaining while the profusion of learning the close...
74From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 30 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
Before I proceed to the order of the day, which is the terrorism of a former day: I beg leave to correct an Idea that Some readers may infer from an expression in one of your Letters. No Sentiment or expression in any of my Answers to Addresses were obtruded or insinuated by any Person about me. Every one of them was written with my own hand. I alone am responsible for all the Mistakes and...
75From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 2 March 1816 (Adams Papers)
I cannot be Serious.! I am about to write you, the most frivolous letter you ever read. Would you go back to your Cradle and live over again your 70 years? I believe you would return me a New England Answer, by asking me another question “Would you live your 80 years over again”? If I am prepared to give you an explicit answer, the question involves So many considerations of Metaphysicks and...
76John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 15 September 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
My last Sheet , would not admit of an Observation that was material to my design. D r Price was “inclined to think” that infinite Wisdom and Goodness, could not permit infinite Power, to be inactive, from Eternity: but that, an infinite and eternal Universe, must have necessarily flowed from these Attributes. Plato’s System was “ Αγαθος ” was eternal, Self existent &c. His Ideas, his Word, his...
77John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 2 February 1817 (Jefferson Papers)
In our good old English language of Gratitude, I owe you and give you a thousand thanks, for Tracy ’s Review of Montesquieu which M r Dufief has Sent me by your order. I have read an hu n dred pages, and will read the rest. He is a Sensible Man and is easily understood. He is not an abstruse misterious incomprehensi ble Condorcet . Though I have banished the Subject from my thoughts for many...
78From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 28 June 1812 (Adams Papers)
I know not what, unless it were the Prophet of Tippacanoe had turned my Curiosity to inquiries after the metaphisical Science of the Indians, their ecclesiastical Establishments and theological Theories: but your Letter, written with all the Accuracy perspicuity and Elegance of your Youth and middle Age, as it has given me great Satisfaction, deserves my best Thanks. It has given me...
79John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, [ca. 4 October] 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
σὲ γὰρ πάντεσσι θέμις θνητοῖσι προσαυδᾶn . “It is not only permitted but enjoined upon all Mortals to address you.” Why should not our Divines translate it “It is our duty and our priviledge to address the Throne of thy grace and pray for all needed lawfull Blessings temporal and Spiritual,.” Θεμiς was the Goddess of honesty, Justice, Decency, and right; the Wife of Jove , another name for...
80John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 18 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I have more to Say, on Religion. For more than Sixty years I have been attentive to this great Subject. Controversies, between Calvinists and Arminians, Trinitarians and Unitarians, Deists and Christians, Atheists and both, have attracted my Attention, whenever the Singular Life, I have lead would admit, to all these questions. The History of this little Village of Quincy , if it were worth...
81John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 14 September 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
I owe you a thousand thanks for your favour of Aug. 22 and its Enclosures , and for D r Priestley’s “Doctrines of heathen Philosophy compared with those of Revelation.” your Letter to D r Rush , and the Sillabus Syllabus , I return inclosed with this, according to your Injunction; though with great reluctance. May I beg a copy of both? They will do you no harm: me and others much good. I hope...
82From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 20 June 1815 (Adams Papers)
The fit of recollection came upon both of Us, so nearly at the same time that I may, Sometime or other, begin to think there is some thing in Priestlys and Hartleys vibrations. The day before yesterday I sent to the Post office a letter to you and last night I received your kind favour of the 10th. The question before the human race is, Whether the God of nature Shall govern the World by his...
83From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 14 November 1813 (Adams Papers)
Accept my thanks for the comprehensive Syllabus, in your favour of Oct. 12. The Psalms of David, in Sublimity beauty, pathos and Originality, or in one Word, in poetry, are Superiour to all the Odes Hymns and Songs in any language. But I had rather read them in our prose translation, than in any version I have Seen. His Morality however, often Shocks me, like Tristram Shandy’s execrations....
84John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 14 June 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
In your Letter to D r Priestley of march 21. 1801 , you “tender him, the protection of those laws which were made for the wise and good, like him; and disclaim the legitimacy of that Libel on legislation , which, under the form of a Law, was for Sometime placed among them.” This Law, I presume was, the Alien Law, as it was called. As your name is Subscribed to that law, as Vice President, and...
85John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 3 February 1812 (Jefferson Papers)
Sitting at My Fireside, with my Daughter Smith , on the first of February My Servant brought me a Bundle of Letters and Newspapers from the Post office in this Town: one of the first Letters that Struck my Eye, had the Post Mark of Milton 23. Jan y 1812 . Milton is the next Town to Quincy and the Post office in it is but three Miles from my House. How could the Letter be So long in coming...
86John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 16 July 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
your Letters to Priestley , have encreased my Grief if that were possible, for the loss of Rush . Had he lived, I would have Stimulated him to insist on your promise to him to write him on the Subject of Religion. your Plan, I admire. In your Letter to Priestley of March 21. 1801 , dated at Washington you call “The Christian Philosophy, the most Sublime and benevolent, but the most perverted...
87From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 22 September 1813 (Adams Papers)
Considering all things, I admire Dr Priestleys last Effort for which I am entirely indebted to you. But as I think it is extremely imperfect, I beg of you to pursue the investigation according to your promise to Dr Rush, and according to your Syllabus. It may be presumptuous in me to denominate any Thing of Dr Priestley imperfect: but I must avow, that among all the vast Exertions of his...
88John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 4 November 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
Your Letter of Oct. 14 has greatly obliged me. Tracy s A a n alysis, I have read once; and wish to read it a Second time. It Shall be returned to you. But I wish to be informed whether this Gentleman is of that Family of Tracy s with which the Marquis La Fayette is connected by intermariages.? I have read, not only the Analysis, but Eight Volumes out of 12 of The origine de tous les Cultes,...
89John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, [ca. 14] August 1813, with Postscript, 16 August 1813 (Jefferson Papers)
Κριοùς μὲν καὶ ὄνοuς διζήμεθα, Κúρνε, καὶ ἵππους εὐγενέας· καί τις βούλεται ἐξ ἀγαθῶν κτήσασθαι. γῆμαι δὲ κακὴν κακοũ οὐ μελεδαίνει ἐςθλὸς ἀνὴρ, ἤν οἱ χρήματα πολλὰ διδῶ. Behold my translation “My Friend Curnis , When We want to purchace, Horses, Asses or Rams, We inquire for the Wellborn. And every one wishes to procure, from the good Breeds. A good Man, does not care to marry a Shrew, the...
90From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 3 February 1812 (Adams Papers)
Sitting at My Fireside, with my Daughter Smith, on the first of February My Servant brought me a Bundle of Letters and Newspapers from the Post office in this Town: one of the first Letters that Struck my Eye, had the Post Mark of Milton 23. Jany. 1812. Milton is the next Town to Quincy and the Post office in it is but three Miles from my House. How could the Letter be so long in coming three...
91From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 22 June 1815 (Adams Papers)
Can you give me any Information, concerning A. G. Camus? Is he a Chateaubriand? Or a Marquis D’Argens? Does he mean to abolish Christianity? Or to restore the Inquisition, the Jesuits, the Pope and the Devil? Within a few days, I have received a thing as unexpected to me as an Appartition from the dead; “Rapport a L’Institut National, Par A. G. Camus, imprime par ordre de L’Institut, Pluviose...
92John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 16 December 1816 (Jefferson Papers)
Your Letter dear Sir of Nov. 15 from Poplar Forrest was Sent to me from the Post Office the next day after I had Sent “ The Analysis ” with my Thanks to you. “3. Vol s of Idiology!” Pray explain to me this Neological Title! What does it mean? When Bonaparte used it, I was delig h ted with it, upon the Common Principle of delight in every Thing We cannot understand. Does it mean Idiotism? The...
93From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 15 November 1813 (Adams Papers)
I cannot appease my melancholly commiseration for our Armies in this furious Snow Storm, in any way So well as by Studying your Letter of Oct. 28. We are now explicitly agreed, in one important point, vizt That “there is a natural Aristocracy among men; the grounds of which are Virtue and Talents.” You very justly indulge a little merriment upon this Solemn Subject of Aristocracy. I often...
94From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 3 September 1816 (Adams Papers)
Dr James Freeman, is a learned, ingenious, honest and benevolent Man, who wishes to see President Jefferson, and request me to introduce him. If you would introduce Some of your Friends to me, I could with more confidence introduce mine to you. He is a Christian, but not a Pythagorean a Platonick or a Philonick Christian. You will ken him and he will ken you: but you may depend, he will never...
95From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 6 May 1816 (Adams Papers)
Neither Eyes Fingers or Paper held out, to dispatch all the Trifles I wished to write in my last Letter. In your favour of April 8th, You “wonder for what good End the Sensations of Grief could be intended”? You wish the Pathologists would tell Us, what the Use of Grief, in our Œconomy, and of what good it is the Cause proximate or remote.” When I approach Such questions as this, I consider...
96From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 16 August 1813 (Adams Papers)
Κριοùς μὲν ὄνοuς διζήμεθα, Κúρνε, καὶ ἵππους εὐγενέας· καί τις βούλεται ἐξ ἀγαθῶν κτήσασθαι. γῆμαι δὲ κακὴν κακοũ οὐ μελεδαίνει ἐςθλὸς ἀνὴρ, ἤν οἱ χρήματα πολλὰ διδῶ. Behold my translation “My Friend Curnis, When We want to purchace, Horses, Asses or Rams, we inquire for the Wellborn. And every one wishes to procure, from the good Breeds. A good Man, does not care to marry a Shrew, the...
97John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 28 October 1814 (Jefferson Papers)
I have great pleasure in giving this Letter to the Gentleman who requests it. The Rev d David Edward Everett , the Successor of M r Buckminster and Thatcher and
98From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 26 January 1813 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for your rich present of Dec. 28th. The Pettifogger of Furnivals Inn, or of Cliffords Inn, scarcely deserves the pains you have taken to enquire into his Biography. My Curiosity is selfish, personal and local. The Character of the Miscreant, however, is not wholly contemptible. It marks the Complextion of the Age in which he lived. How many Such Characters could you, and I...
99From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 14 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
In your Letter to Dr. Priestley of March 21. 1801, you “tender him, the protection of those laws which were made for the wise and good, like him; and disclaim the legitimacy of that Libel on legislation, which, under the form of a Law, was for Sometime placed among them.” This Law, I presume was, the Alien Law, as it was called. As your name is Subscribed to that law, as Vice President, and...
100From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 9 July 1813 (Adams Papers)
Lord! Lord! What can I do, with so much Greek? When I was of your Age, young Man, i.e. 7 or 8 or 9 years ago I felt, a kind of pang of Affection, for one of the flames of my youth, and again paid my Addresses to Isocrates and Dionissius Hallicarnassensis &c &c &c I collected all my Lexicons and Grammers and Sat down to περι ενθεςεως ονοματων &c. In this Way I amused myself for sometime: but I...