3951From John Adams to Arthur Lee, 6 September 1785 (Adams Papers)
I received Yesterday your Favour of 27. July. and wish it were in my Power to relieve your Anxiety by giving you any comfortable Hopes from this Country. The national Sense and public Voice is decidedly against Us in the Whale Trade and Ship trade, and there are as yet but feeble Parties for Us in the West India Trade and Colony Trade. I may Say to you that, if Ireland had not escaped from the...
3952From John Adams to François Adriaan Van der Kemp, 15 August 1808 (Adams Papers)
You have puzzled and confounded me, by your Letter of the 3 of Aug.—After allarming me with Some Suggestions or Suspicions of Infidelity in the Post office you Say “I Suppose the Crime is perpetrated in Massachusetts. Look at the inclosed Sealing. it is from you?” I thought this gave me a Right and made it my duty to open it, and Lo! a lovely Letter from your amiable Daughter to your worthy...
3953From John Adams to John Marshall, 13 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
In answer to yours of the 2d I have agreed to the appointment of Major David Hopkins to be Marshall of Maryland, according to the advice of Mr Stoddert, although it was a great disappointment & mortification to me to loose the only opportunity I shall ever have of testifying to the world, the high opinion I have of the merits of a great majistrate, by the appointment of his son to an office...
3954From John Adams to Timothy Pickering, 3 October 1798 (Adams Papers)
Inclosed is a Duplicate of a Letter from Miranda with some Estimates. Read it and think of it. A number of questions and considerations over . We are Friends with Spain. If We were Ennemies, would the Project be usefull to us.—It will not be in for me to answer the Letter. Will any Notice of it, in any manner be proper. I shall send it by Mr. Humphreys, with Mr. Gerrys Papers. I am &c. MHi :...
3955From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 29 July 1791 (Adams Papers)
Yesterday, at Boston, I received your friendly Letter of July 17 th. with great pleasure. I give full credit to your relation of the manner, in which your note was written and prefixed to the Philadelphia edition of M r Paine’s pamphlet on the rights of Man: but the misconduct of the person, who committed this breach of your confidence, by making it publick, whatever were his intentions, has...
39561780 January 8. Saturday. (Adams Papers)
Rode from San Juan Segun, to Paredese de Nava. We have passed thro a Village every League. The Villages are all built of Mud and Straw. They have no Timber nor Wood nor Stone. The Villages all appear going to decay. Every Village has Churches and Convents enough in it, to ruin it, and the whole Country round about it, even if they had nothing to pay to the King or the Landlord. But all three...
3957From John Adams to Henry Guest, 5 September 1809 (Adams Papers)
Your Grand Daughter writes so beautiful a hand that you need not be at a loss for an Amanuensis. I have received your favour of the 25th of August and had before received in its Season that in which you explained the Word Dormant. I never took any offence at that Word but if I had your Explanation would have cleared all up. I hope Hamilton reported and was forgiven. And I wish the Same could...
3958[Shakespeare’s Characters and Figurative Language, October–December 1758.] (Adams Papers)
Shakespeare, in the Character of Lady Mackbeth, and of Gertrude, the Wife of old Hamlet, and afterwards of King Claudius, and in the Character of Lady Anne in King Richard, has shewn a sense of the Weakness of Woman’s Reason, and strength of their Passions. The Horror of both divine and Human Vengeance, that attends guilty minds is strongly represented in the Characters of Mackbeth and his...
3959From John Adams to J.B. Binon, 7 February 1819 (Adams Papers)
I have received your polite favour of the 3d: of this month. I am afraid that you are engaged in speculations that will never be profitable to you. The age of sculpture & painting have not yet arrived in this country and I hope it will not arrive very soon. Artists have done what they pleased with my face & eyes head & shoulders, stature & figure and they have made of them monsters as fit for...
3960From John Adams to William Phillips, Jr., 1 November 1819 (Adams Papers)
Mr John Marston has requested me to write your Honour on a Subject in which I am very sensible I have no colour of right or pretentions to interfere, and on which I am not qualified to form a judgement.— All that I can say is, that I was acquainted with his Father, who had been an Officer in the Conquest of Louisbourg in one thousand seven hundred and forty five, that Mr Marston was himself in...