1From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 9 June 1813 (Adams Papers)
I enclose you sketches of Naval history and a letter from the Author Make what use of them you think probono publico. MHi : Adams Family Papers, Letterbooks.
2From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 6 April 1813 (Adams Papers)
Other parts of your letter of yesterday may be remembered hereafter; but “ Brimborion ” must not be delayed nor trifled with. I shall produce an authority or two. Deletanville’s Dictionary. Brimborion SM. A trifle, A thing of little value. Lallemonts Dictionary. Brimborions. S.M.PL. Bagatelles choses de peu de valeur. Apinæ arum. Crepundia orum Children’s Playthings. Baubles as Bells Rattles....
3From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 30 May 1815 (Adams Papers)
You made that Westphalian Couplet yourself, Sleeping or waking, nobody but you could have dreamed or thought of Hogs of Westphalia are a saving brood What one lets drop, the other takes for food. It so perfectly and summarily comprehends the whole Genius and history of Party and Faction from the Ipso dixit of Pythagoras to the disciples of the Scottish Creolian of Nevis. And does “Jonathan”...
4From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 27 July 1820 (Adams Papers)
I will not envy you but congratulate you on the pleasure you have had in your excursion to Washington But I covet the like pleasure so much that if I could do it with out stirring up an uproar, & hurly burly through the Contenent—Old as I am I would get into my Gig, & bend my course thitherward to morrow morning—. I regret most grievously that you did not Visit Cedar Grove—at Fishkill...
5From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 25 December 1817 (Adams Papers)
It was not friendly in you to involve me in your domestic & family Controversies Major Pierce Butler told me that he made a voyage to England from S Carolina to ask his fathers consent to marry a Lady, whom he was determined to marry, whether his father consented, or not. And I believe you ask my advice with the same resolution I have seen Fanaticism in all its forms. the fanaticism of honour,...
6From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 27 February 1817 (Adams Papers)
Are the works of Apuileus in Harvard College Library or in any other collection in America Have you read his Metamorphosis which he calls his Ass of Gold, his Assinus Aureus, or Asinus Runi.” Among these novels, fables, tales or whatever you please to call them, is his Amours of Cupid and Psyche. Have you read Molier’s Psyche? Have read La Fontaines Psyche? Have you seen a splendid translation...
7From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 31 March 1813 (Adams Papers)
“The History” is of no value, except on account of its date. It was written and printed in Edes and Gills Boston Gazette, in the Interval between the first Congress in 1774 and the Second Congress in 1775 under the Signature of Novanglus. In this View it is a Document; an historical Memoir. To me personally, it is of Some importance as it is a record of the Principles on which I engaged in the...
8From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 19 December 1817 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of the 13th. has touched my feelings. Deeply infected with a dangerous distemper you ask my advice as a Physician. The Faculty sometimes cure their Patients by relating facetious Anecdotes. I could give you a hundred within my own Experience and little reading but your Malady is two inveterate to be cured by Jocularity. It must be treated Seriously. I know not the Facts. Has the...
9From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 14 August 1817 (Adams Papers)
I fear I have not answered your letter of 20th of June. That of the 8th: of August, I certainly have not. I have been justly accused of Imbecility & Dotage for twenty years past. Yet I seem to be a Man of more consequence now, than I ever was before in my whole life. What a cloud of Reminiscences, has your last letter, exhailed in my old brain! Several of with whom I gazed through a telescope...
10From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 29 June 1806 (Adams Papers)
I rejoice to find by your Letter of the 26. and by my Sons Conversation, that his commencement of a residence at Cambridge has been agreable to you and to him. He could not in his present Circumstances have been So hapily situated as he is. Two such Men as Dr Waterhouse and J. Q. Adams will find in the society of each other, and in the sciences and Litterature an inexhaustible fund of...
11From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 6 August 1813 (Adams Papers)
The Talents and qualities of the Tumble Bugg, are Strength Industry, Patience, Foresight of Futurity, care to provide for Posterity and for individual Wants, at a future day. Now, which of these mental Faculties or bodily qualities, has this “the most enlightened, the best informed, the most Sagacious, and the most virtuous Nation on the Globe” discovered during the last 13 Years? A tumble...
12From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 1 July 1813 (Adams Papers)
The report that John Quincy Adams has written to his father, or any one else that “the war which the United States has declared, and is waging against England is in his opinion unjust and unnecessary;” whether fabricated in Halifax or Boston is altogether groundless. Mr Quincy’s resolve is slacking. Louis 14th Fistula drained his brain of vapours. Vide Talk of a tub. You have not acknowledged...
13From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 3 October 1805 (Adams Papers)
I duly recd your favour of the 21. Sept.—I Sent you two pretty large Packetts the first of Six sheets of Paper, another of five or Six more, and have written two or three Short Letters, besides. You have acknowledged the receipt of the first Packet, but the Second large one you have not mentioned. It related to the Kali and the Medusa &c. &c. I only wish to know that you have it. I return with...
14From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 4 June 1817 (Adams Papers)
Your pathetic Letter of the 2d. has filled my heart with Sympathy and Grief. Your Son, by all that I know, or have heard of him, would have been an ornament to Society. Your Sorrow at his loss must be exquisite. I can give you no better Advice for your Consolation, than to read your favourite Dr Barrow. It is the Lot of humanity! You are not alone! If I look back for Sixty years, what a long...
15From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 28 October 1814 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter of the 10th is too delicious, to be disgraced by Ceremonies and Apologies in my Answer. You might as rationally ascribe the Events of this Annus mirablis, or any Annee la plus chetive et meprisable to the Power of Animalcules in Cayan Pepper Water, as to the Power or Policy of Men. I see nothing in the History of Napoleon more wonderfull or inexplicable, than in that of Zingis, of...
16From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 12 January 1818 (Adams Papers)
In your Letter of the 21st. of October you Say that Mrs Knox said to you that “her husband was the parent of the American Navy.” It is interesting to enquire what Idea that Lady could have had in her Mind. Have you Seen Mathew Careys History of the Rise and Progress of the American Navy? If you have read it you have Seen that the American Navy was begotten and born and a System of Naval...
17From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 16 June 1820 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for Dr Ware’s letter to Dr Mc Load which I have read with pleasure, they are worthy of his Father, & his Father in Law—Mc Load’s choice of a Text is in the true Character of a Jesuitical Priest-hood whose maxim is, that it is lawful to lie for pious purposes You must at least have had a pleasant Eevening, on your return from Montezillo—And I rejoice to hear that none of your days...
18From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 11 February 1812 (Adams Papers)
In answer to your Letter of the Eighth I can only say that Societies Since as I have never been of any Use to any of our learned Societies Since their Institution, except perhaps in a present of Books to one of them. I should be extremely unhappy to have reason to suspect that I had done them any harm. My Course of Life and perpetual Avocations have been such that I never could turn my...
19From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 30 January 1818 (Adams Papers)
As “the accurate Jefferson” has made the Revolution a Game of Billiards, I will make it a Game of Shutle Cocks. Henry might give “the first impulse to the Ball” in Virgina but Otis’s Battle Lore had Struck the Shuttle cock up in air in Massachusetts and continued to keep it up for Several Years before Henrys Ball was touched. Jefferson was but a Boy at Colledge of 15, or 16 Years of Age at...
20From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 15 September 1811 (Adams Papers)
I receive no Letters with So much pleasure as yours and Rushes. The Shortest of them always contains Something new and Solid; Some thing witty and a good deal that his humerous. How many more hot Nutts for the Monkeys you will See, I know not. They will lie, and laugh and joke: but they will not make much Noise, because that might provoke Some of their own Party to peep at the Patriot which...
21From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 7 September 1820 (Adams Papers)
Captain Phillips’s letter is a Volume of News to me—That he Sailed without a Commission was never known, heard, or suspected, by me—and not one word of his Conversations with Mr Stoddard, were ever communicated to me—but at this distance of time, what can I do to sooth the feelings of Mr Phillips—Till I received your letter, I have never heard one word about him since his dismission— G. W. A...
22From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 5 February 1818 (Adams Papers)
Clarks History of the Navy is the Same with Mathew Careys. Wilkinsons History I have not Seen. I believe with you that the Battle of Bunkers Hill has never been faithfully recorded. It would require an hundred Volumes in Folio to investigate the “Roost Cock” who produced the Sacred mysterious Egg, to which you allude in your Letter of 17. Jan. The Antiquity of this Egg and its Universality...
23From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 9 May 1813 (Adams Papers)
Our Boston Rulers must be acknowledged to be profound Politicians. They appear to have Studied the Uses of Solomons Temple and its furniture, and the Rites and Ceremonies of the Hebrew Polity. The final Causes of the Temples and Altars of Jupiter, Bacchus and Venus &c and the Festivals in honour of Such Gods among the Greeks and Romans, appear to be well understood. The History of the Rise and...
24From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 25 January 1813 (Adams Papers)
I will join with Vice President Gerry and Lt. Governor Gray in any reasonable representation. But higher interests than yours or mine are at stake. What is your family & mine & twenty others to eight Million of people? How much less to mankind? The salvation of both, seems to be staked both by republicans and federalists, upon the opinion of Washington. the Boston junto of republicans appeal...
25From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 16 March 1813 (Adams Papers)
I have just recd your Favour of Yesterday. It has been a Rule of the Government from 1789 to this day to answer no Solicitations or Recommendations for Office. The necessity of this Rule must be obvious to evry enquiring Mind. The Hyperfederalists, or the Ultrafederalists, have a more exalted System, than the Simple Federalists. They dare not, openly and publickly avow or attempt to Support...
26From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 3 January 1806 (Adams Papers)
I have derived as much consolation in Life, from Horace as from Epictetus. I say Buvons, ecrivons, vivons, cher Horace, as well as that all our Happiness depends upon ourselves with the Stoick. I thank you for calling Horace to my Aid in your favour of Decr. 28. Alphius was Such a Philosopher as Seneca, who griped the Britons, or as Brutus who was So angry with Cicero when he was Governor of...
27From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 9 December 1817 (Adams Papers)
Oh! that I had Eyes and Fingers for a little Badinage! When you cannot keep your Chin above water, I advise you to apply to the Hospital for the Sane.—Vid Dr Rush passim, and a pritty thing in the North American Review, by young Mason—The great Docter Johnson and Rush agree that we are all a little cracked. This only a Few who can be denominted Sane, and those only quad hor—For these Mason has...
28From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 15 September 1812 (Adams Papers)
You ask my Opinion, (if I understand you) whether Duane or General Hull, be the fittest Man for Secretary of War. I answer. In my opinion, Wilkinson was fitter than either. But his Vanity and the Collisions of Faction have rendered his Appointment improper and impossible. Again, if you wish my Opinion, you Shall have it. I know that Colonel William Stevens Smith of Lebanon, in Smiths Valley on...
29From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 8 January 1807 (Adams Papers)
I received your favour of the Second of this month, yesterday. I dont do not understand your reason for calling our Forefathers Brownists. I Should call them rather, Robinsonians. But that our Forefathers resided twelve years at Leyden, and that they Worshipped in the Building, where I attended divine Service for Several months, I have no more doubt than I have of the Existence of a University...
30From John Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, 21 January 1807 (Adams Papers)
Robinson was not only a Man of Sense and learning but Piety and Virtue but of a Catholic tolerant Spirit and remarkable humanity. He resembled the two shepards one of whom was settled at Charleston and the other at Cambridge. Neither of the three were for renouncing Communion with the Church of England Brown was for excommunicating all, who differed from him in his most rigid notions. It is...