31To John Adams from James Searle, 10 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I was duely favoured with your obliging letter of the 15 th. of last Month and feel myself not a little gratified with the renewal of a correspondence with M r. Adams, a friend for whom I feel a most exalted respect and affection.— When I took the liberty to write to you last I mentioned my happy situation in business, and my independent feelings, but I hope I have not been misunderstood by M...
32To John Adams from James Sullivan, 10 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
The Communicating our Sentiments to men in power, when done with the respect due to their characters, and without a troublesome intrusion, is at all times a mark of Veneration and esteem. upon these ideas I Venture to address a letter to the Vice President of the United states, and which he will read, when his leisure will admit a moment of heedless employment. I am very deeply impressed with...
33To John Adams from C.W.F. Dumas, 13 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
L’affection dont vous m’avez honoré pendant votre séjour en Europe, & les sentimens inaltérables de mon attachement pour Votre Excellence, m’engagent à vous présenter l’expression de ma joie, à l’agréable nouvelle de l’important Poste auquel le Peuple le plus libre du monde vient de vous élire, & que votre zele pour la patrie vous a fait accepter. Puisse ce zele trouver sa récompense dans le...
34Abigail Adams to John Adams, 14 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I last Evening received your Letter of june 7th I will set of on Wednesday for Providence and embark in the first packet for New-york. pray get an oz of glober salts and half oz manna & take immediately, an oz of antimonial wine & take 30 drops three time a day. I will be with you however as soon as possible. Barnard got in on fryday. we had two days of voilent and incessant Rain, which tho...
35To John Adams from Joseph Mandrillon, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
Le tems peut sans doute avoir detruit le souvenir dont vous m’honoriez, lorsque les interêts del’Amérique vous appellerent dans differentes cours del’Europe, en quittant ces Provinces: mais quand la renomée ne m’auroit pas Sans cessé rappellé votre merite, et votre personne, il m’auroit suffit de penser à l’acceuil flateur dont vous m’avez honoré ici, et aux conversations intéressantes dont...
36To John Adams from Eliphalet Pearson, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
President Willard having resigned the office of corresponding secretary to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, your goodness will pardon his successor, in diverting your attention, for a moment, from more important objects, while I request a favor, with which the honor of the society may be connected. At our last meeting, & upon the recommendation of M r. Gardoqui, through General Knox,...
37To John Adams from Richard Peters, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I am honoured with yours of the 5 th. instant I thank you for your kind & polite Offers of Hospitality. Experience has convinced me of your Friendship on this Head— I find from the Reflexions occasioned by the just Observations in your Letter that I have expected too much & am therefore not entitled to the Right of complaining under Dissappointment. Tho’ placed in a new Situation, we are the...
38To John Adams from Benjamin Rush, 15 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have been so long accustomed to regard all your opinions upon goverment with reverence, that I was disposed upon reading your last letter, to suspend my belief in republican Systems of political happiness; but a little reflection led me again to adopt them, and upon this single principle, that they have Never had a fair tryal. Let us try what the influence of general science & religion...
39To John Adams from Jabez Bowen, 16 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I Returned yesterday from attending the Gen l Assembly, the great matters on which the in s. & outs differ were bro’t on. we lost the Convention by 11 Votes. The Repeal of the Tender by 9. on the whole we gain a little. but our progress is so slow that we shall never arive at our wish’d for point except something like M r Bensons motion in Congress, could be obtained. it was usual for us to...
40To John Adams from William Tudor, 21 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for correcting my careless Appellation of federal Republic as applied to the National Government. We are so used to Absurdities & indefinite Terms when speaking of the great Constitution, that I am now to ask your Indulgence in future for sometimes hastily adopting Expressions which are so often improperly used by our Massachusetts Politicians. And yet notwithstanding your just...
41To John Adams from Francis Dana, 26 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
When you was last at Cambridge at my house, in consideration of the weight of the business of my present office, and of the feeble state of my health, I was induced to suggest to you, that if any office under the United States, which your partiality for me might lead you to think me capable of filling, and the duties of which wou’d be less burthensome than those of my present one, shou’d be...
42John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 28 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
It has not been altogether from a neglect of my duties that I have hitherto omitted writing you; from situation as well as from inclination, I have been in a great measure secluded from such political information, as might afford you any entertainment, and from a proper modesty, I thought it best to forbear transmitting, any insignificant details concerning my own person.— Even now the same...
43To John Adams from James Boyd, 30 June 1789 (Adams Papers)
Your Excellency will pardon the freedom of my addressing you, when you are acquainted with my sufferings & my present Indigence. which is such as urges me to request your Influence with Congress respecting the resolv’s of this Court (relative to my sufferings) which was sent on to Congress, by Order of Government. bearing date Nov r. 10 th: 1786, Copy of which by the desire of the Hon be. M r....
44To John Adams from James Sullivan, 2 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
When I had the honor of addressing a Letter to your Excellency, upon a subject of allowed importance to the united States, I did not indulge a hope, that you would step aside from the important concerns in which you are engaged, to acknowledge the receipt of it. nor was I vain enough to imagine, that I was able to Suggest one thought, which was not fully possessed by the Learned body of...
45To John Adams from Stephen Higginson, 4 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
Since I had the honour of seeing you at your own house, I have been so unwell, & so much occupied with my private Business, when able to attend to it, that I have not had an opp y of writing to you, as you requested & I engaged to do. Nor can I now do more than just to inform you, that, as the British are coming fast into their old practice, of taking from hence the Rum necessary for their...
46To John Adams from Theophilus Parsons, 8 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
Conscious of the persecutions you would meet with, by applications for your influence in the appointment to offices, I had determined not to increase the number of them; but being just informed, that the President proposes to nominate as officers, for the collection of the national revenue, those persons who hold the like offices in the collection of the state revenues, unless complaint was...
47To John Adams from James Lovell, 9 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
altho’ this Letter is somewhat of a public Nature, yet I dare not address you in a consonant manner, ’till the Point is settled between his Excellency and John Adams. I apply to you, as I feel you in my Heart to be; satisfied that the Yeas & Nays of no public Body whatsoever concerning Epithets can in any measure alter Essences. Dear Sir, Sturgis Gorham of Barnstable is my Brother in Law,...
48To John Adams from William Tudor, 9 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
However you & I may have been taught by Civilians, & however History confirms the Maxim, that an Imperium in Imperio is a Solecism, this Country will continue to learn from its own limited School, & by the most expensive Experiments, those Truths which Statesmen, Legislators & enlightened Politicians have in vain pointed out to them.— Our present Confederacy is not very unlike the Monster of...
49To John Adams from Benjamin Lincoln, 14 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I had the pleasure a few days since of receiving your kind favor of the 19 th. ult o — When I first saw the new constitution I was very apprehensive that the President would not be able to maintain his ground and preserve such a stand, on the stage of our political theater, as to keep up that equilibrum essential to our enjoying all those blessings which are derived from a constitution in...
50To John Adams from Henry Marchant, 16 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have yet to acknowledge Your Politeness and Kindness in ranking me in the List of your Friends by your Letter of Invitation to an epistolary Correspondence previous to your embarking for Europe. It was truly flattering to my Pride. My leaving Congress, and being much out of the Circle of Information, whereby I might in some little Measure have repaid those Obligations which your Letters must...
51To John Adams from Jeremy Belknap, 18 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
It was a very singular pleasure to me to receive a Line from you approving the discourse which I did myself the honor to send to you; the good opinion of such a Gentleman as M r Adams & the very great honor w ch he has done me will not easily be effaced from my remembrance. Not till this Week have I met with the political annals of George Chalmers printed in London 1780 in one Vol 4 to. From...
52To John Adams from Samuel Mather, 19 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
My Friend Robert Young Esq r. of Warwick Court Holborn having lately published an Essay on the Powers and Mechanism of Nature, in which he has advanced some new and important Doctrines, which he wishes may be investigated by the Philosophers of America, has desired me to distribute a few of them to the Persons, whom I know to be the most eminent for their Learning and love of the Sciences—and...
53To John Adams from Edmund Randolph, 19 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
Your friendly answer to the letter, which I took the liberty of addressing to you in favor of Col o. Heath, has increased the attachment, which your civility to me in 1775, and your public conduct since, first produced My application in that gentleman’s behalf being founded on a conviction of his worth, I conceived, that it might not be improper to make that worth known to all those, who might...
54To John Adams from Robert Montgomery, 20 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
The honour I had of an Aquaintance with your Excellency Shortly after your arrival at the Court of Varsailles; and some friendly letters you was pleased to write me after my return to Alicante, together with my affection for the United States to which you have rendered so many signal services, Impel me to take the liberty of addressing you at this time with my Sincerest Congratulations on your...
55To John Adams from Roger Sherman, 20 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I was honored with your letters of the 17 th. & 18 Inst. And am much obliged to you for the observations they contain— The Subject of Government is an important one, and necessary to be well understood, by the citizens & especially by the legislators of these States. I Shall be happy to receive further light on the Subject, and to have any errors that I may have entertained corrected. I find...
56To John Adams from Benjamin Rush, 21 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
From an unfortunate concurrence of circumstances, I find myself under the influence of the same difficult command in corresponding with the Vice President of the United states, which the King of Syria gave to the Captains of his chariots.— “Fight ye not with small or great, save only with the King of Israel.”— The subjects upon which we differ are monarchy — titles —& the latin & greek...
57To John Adams from Jabez Bowen, 22 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I was honoured with your favour of the 18 th. of June for which I return you my Thanks, and was happy to hear of the safe arival of M rs Adams and family. our Rulers continue as obstinately opposed to the Federal Government as ever, and I have no Idea that they ever intend to call a Convention; they are striving to alienate the minds of the people at large by exagerating the amount of the...
58To John Adams from James Sullivan, 23 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I have to acknowledge the honor of receiving your Letter dated the 14th July. as to the subject respecting an opposition to the constitution of the united states, there are no doubt men in every society whose desperate Fortunes render them alike Enemies to all Government, but the people with very few exceptions, and these by no means important consider the Government of the united states as...
59To John Adams from John Brown Cutting, 24 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
By a vessel that departs from hence in half an hour bound for the Potowmack I send you some authentic papers which contain details of the late revolution in the government of France. M r Jefferson’s last letter to me is dated on the 16 th. He confirms most of the facts contained in the printed letter of M. Nairac and in the “Extrait d’une lettre de Paris”—and concludes by remarking that tho’...
60To John Adams from James Lovell, 26 July 1789 (Adams Papers)
I had often considered your Situation, before the Receipt of your Letter of the 16 th , and I had hoped you would “Possess yourself in Patience. ” If you already draw a Picture Teste di legno and talk of sharpening an Ax for Decapitation, what am I to look for in the Run of a Twelvemonth? I do not like your diminutive italien Idea. You who are said to be more than half british ought to have...