1Will of Deacon John Adams, with Comments by His Son John, 8 January 1760; 10 July 1761; 29 April 1774 (Adams Papers)
In the Name of God Amen. The Eighth day of January in the year of our Lord one Thousand Seven hundred and Sixty, and in the thirty third year of his Majestys Reign King George the Second &c. I John Adams of Braintree in the County of Suffolk in the Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New England Gentleman, being in Health of Body and of Perfect mind and Memory thanks be given to God therefor....
2From John Adams to Samuel Quincy, October – November 1758 (Adams Papers)
Braintree, October–November? 1758. Printed: JA, Earliest Diary The Earliest Diary of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1966. , p. 66–67 Printed : ( JA, Earliest Diary The Earliest Diary of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1966. , p. 66–67 ).
3From John Adams to Josiah Quincy, 17 May 1759 (Adams Papers)
Braintree, post 17 May 1759. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:113 , from a draft of a letter perhaps not sent. On Col. Josiah Quincy (1710–1784) and JA ’s early relations with him, see JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others,...
4A Dissertation upon Office-Seekers, 26 December 1765 (Adams Papers)
26 December 1765. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:277 . Fragment of an unpublished newspaper letter warning Massachusetts freeholders to beware of politicians who openly solicit their votes on election day and, even more reprehensible, seek employment from the Crown. Printed ( JA, Diary...
5Notes on the Opening of the Courts, 19 December 1765 (Adams Papers)
Common Law is common Right, 1. Inst. 142.a. Cokes Proem to 2d Inst. The Law is the Subjects best Birthright. 2. Inst. 56. Want of Right and Want of Remedy is all one, for where there is no Remedy, there is no Right, 1. Inst. 95.b. The Law provides a Remedy for every Wrong. 1. Inst. 197.b. 2. Inst. 55. 56. 4 05. but see 1. Inst. 199.b. The Law hath a Delight in giving of Remedy. Lit. 323. 1....
6I. Adams’ Original Draft, 24 September 1765 (Adams Papers)
In all the Calamities, which have ever befallen this our dear native Country, since our the first settlement within the Memory of the oldest of Us all, We have never felt So great and sincere a Grief, and Concern or So many Allarming Fears and Apprehensions, as at the present Time. We have many of Us lived to see, both Pestilence and Scarcity, and the Encroachments And Depredations,...
7From John Adams to Robert Treat Paine, 6 December 1759 (Adams Papers)
I was too much gratified with the Proposal you made me of writing to you, to neglect it long. For as Nature and Fortune have conspired to strip me of all other means of Pleasure I cannot think it either Vanity or Virtue to acknowledge, that the Acquisition and Communication of Knowledge, are the sole Entertainment of my Life. I should therefore be inattentive to my object, and stupidly forget...
8From John Adams to Jonathan Sewall, February 1760 (Adams Papers)
I am very willing to join with you, in renouncing the Reasoning of some of our last Letters. There is but Little Pleasure, which Reason can approve to be received from the Noisy applause, and servile Homage that is paid to any Officer from the Lictor to the Dictator, or from the sexton of a Parish to the sovereign of a Kingdom: And Reason will despize equally, a blind undistinguishing...
9From John Adams to Jonathan Sewall, 10 September 1760 (Adams Papers)
You have perhaps expected from me (according to the Custom of the World) some Expressions of my Condolance, in your unfortunate loss of Judge Sewal. —To be plain, I always feel extreamly awkward, whenever I attempt, by Writing or in Person, to console the sorrowful, or to rejoice with those that do rejoice. I had rather conceal my own Sympathy fellow feeling in their Joys or Griefs, at the...
10Genealogical Note, 7 August 1773 (Adams Papers)
Mr Henry Adams before the year 1640, I cant Say how long before, came from Bristol in England, with Eight Sons, and fixed himself at Braintree, in an House nearly opposite to the present Parsonage House of the Church of England, near the late Dr and the present Major Millers—being a Maltster by Trade he Set up a Malt House there upon a Piece of Land between the Brook on the North a Rivulet...
11From John Adams to Samuel Holden Parsons, 5 December 1760 (Adams Papers)
I presume upon the Merits of a Brother, both in the Academical and legal family, to give you this Trouble and to ask the favour of your correspondence. The Science which we have bound ourselves to study for Life, you know to be immensely voluminous, perhaps intricate and involved, so that an arduous application to Books at Home, a critical observation of the Course of Practice, and the Conduct...
12From John Adams to Nathan Webb, 1 September 1755 (Adams Papers)
The Favour you granted me on aug. 12 was unluckily packeted with a number of Letters and carried to Leicester, but a certain kind Gentleman has just brought it to hand. I will not lessen the pleasure it gave by a Description. But one detestable quality that usually attends your Letters, I find has stain’d it. I think Phylosophers call it, brevity. But, on second reflection I am not surpriz’d....
13Draft of a New Year’s Address to His Nieces, January 1761 (Adams Papers)
Braintree, January? 1761. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:193–196 . The letter is of course pseudonymous; at this time JA had no nieces. Printed : ( JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:193–196 ).
Braintree, May 1761. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:212–215 . Fourth and last in the series of newspaper communications on this subject. See entry for the earliest draft in the series, 29 May 1760 , above, and references there. Printed : ( JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and...
15II. To the Boston Gazette, 18 January 1773 (Adams Papers)
It has been said already, that the common law of England has not determined the judges to have an estate for life in their offices provided they behaved well. The authorities of Lord Coke and Lord Holt have been produced, relative to the judges of the King’s bench. And indeed authorities, still more ancient than Coke might have been adduced. For example, the learned Chancellor Fortescue, in...
All that part of Creation that lies within our observation is liable to Change. Even mighty States and kingdoms, are not exempted. If we look into History we shall find some nations rising from contemp tible beginnings, and spreading their influence, ’till the whole Globe is subjected to their sway. When they have reach’d the summit of Grandeur, some minute and unsuspected Cause commonly...
Braintree, March? 1761. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:204–206 . Third in the series of (unpublished) newspaper contributions on this subject. See entry for the earliest draft in the series, 29 May 1760 , above, and references there. Printed : ( JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and...
18IV. To the Boston Gazette, 25 January 1773 (Adams Papers)
Another observation which occurred to me upon reading General Brattle’s first publication, was upon these words, “That by the charter and common law of England, there is no necessity of having any commission at all; a nomination and appointment are the words of the charter, a commission for them not so much as mentioned in it. Their commission is only declarative of their nomination and...
19From John Adams to the Reverend Jacob Bailey, January 1756 (Adams Papers)
I receiv’d your favour of Decr. 29. about 3 or 4 Days after it was wrote. The bearer left it at the Tavern and proceeded on his journey, so that I despair’d of ever getting an opportunity of answering it, till this moment. I heartily sympathize with you in your affliction, which I am the better qualified to do as I am confined myself to a like place of Torment. When I compare The gay, the...
“Ignorance and Inconsideration,” (says Dr. Tillotson) “are the two great Causes of the Ruin of Mankind.” This excellent observation, was made by that great Prelate, in the Way of his own Profession, with Relation to the Interest of his fellow Men; in a future and immortal state. But it is of equal Truth and Importance, when applied to the Happiness of Men, on this side the Grave. In the early...
21Draft of a Letter to All Young Gentlemen on the Evils of Factionalism, February 1763 (Adams Papers)
Braintree, February 1763. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:242–243 . Incomplete and evidently not published contemporaneously, this satirical fragment anticipates one of the themes developed in JA ’s newspaper pieces signed “Humphry Ploughjogger”; see the following entry . Printed : ( JA,...
22VI. To the Boston Gazette, 8 February 1773 (Adams Papers)
Two or three anecdotes, were omitted in my last, for want of room, which may be here inserted, in order to shew that General Brattle’s “rule of the common law of England” originated in the reign of King Charles the first. I say originated, because the example of Hubert de Burgo, is so ancient and so uncertain, that it is even doubted by Baron Gilbert, whether he was ever chief justiciary or...
23I. To J Philanthrop, 9 December 1766 (Adams Papers)
I confess I was in Hopes, that after the Repeal of the ever memorable Stamp Act, The People of this Province would have had a little Respite from the Teasings of that restless grasping turbulent Crew of Villains who have been for many Years past planning their Destruction.—This infamous set of Banditti, in the Course of the glorious Struggles of America for her Freedom received So many...
24Suffolk County Bar Book, 3 January 1770 – 26 July 1774 (Adams Papers)
Boston,3 January 1770 – 26 July 1774. MS book containing 138 numbered pages ( MHi ). Printed: MHS, Procs. Massachusetts Historical Society, Collections and Proceedings. , 1st ser., 19 (1881–1882): 147–179. The first 16 pages (of which p. 13–14 are blank) contain entries in JA ’s hand for meetings of the Suffolk co. bar, 1770–1774. The remaining pages, carrying entries in various other hands,...
25From John Adams to Catharine Macaulay, 9 August 1770 (Adams Papers)
Boston9 August 1770. Printed: JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:360–361 . For Mrs. Macaulay’s reply, see 19 July 1771 , below. Printed ( JA, Diary and Autobiography Diary and Autobiography of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1961; 4 vols. , 1:360–361 ).
26From John Adams to Richard Cranch, 29 August 1756 (Adams Papers)
I am set down with a Design of writing to you.—But the narrow Sphere I move in, and the lonely unsociable Life I lead, can furnish a Letter with little more than Complaints of my hard fortune. I am condemnd to keep School two Years longer. This I sometimes consider as a very grievous Calamity and almost sink under the Weight of Woe.—But shall I dare to complain and to murmur against Providence...
THUS accomplished were many of the first Planters of these Colonies. It may be thought polite and fashionable, by many modern fine Gentlemen perhaps, to deride the Characters of these Persons, as enthusiastical, superstitious and republican: But such ridicule is founded in nothing but foppery and affectation, and is grosly injurious and false. Religious to some degree of enthusiasm it may be...
28VIII. To the Boston Gazette, 22 February 1773 (Adams Papers)
In all General Brattle’s researches hitherto, aided and assisted as he has been by mine, we have not been able to discover, either that the judges at common law had their commissions quam diu se bene gesserint, or for life, or that the crown had authority to grant them in that manner. Let us now examine and see, whether estates for life, determinable only on misbehaviour or the demise of the...
29From John Adams to Richard Cranch, 18 October 1756 (Adams Papers)
In my last you remember I desired your sincere Opinion of the new Resolution I had taken, but as you have not yet been so kind as to send it, I must beg your patience while I tell you my sincere opinion of it. The Law, I take to be a very difficult and a very extensive Science and to acquire any considerable degree of knowledge in the Theory and of skill in the Practice, a serene head, a large...
30From John Adams to William Crawford, October 1758 (Adams Papers)
Braintree, October? 1758. Printed: JA, Earliest Diary The Earliest Diary of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1966. , p. 91 , with identifying note on the recipient at p. 92 . Printed : ( JA, Earliest Diary The Earliest Diary of John Adams , ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1966. , p. 91 ).