Adams Papers

From John Adams to Jean Luzac, 13 September 1794

To Jean Luzac

Quincy near Boston Septr. 13. 1794

Dear Sir

Your young Friend my Son John Quincy Adams, accompanied by his youngest Brother Thomas Boylston Adams, will deliver you this Letter.1 They are to reside at the Hague and I hope will behave to your Satisfaction.

What shall I say of the affairs of the World? Silence I believe is Wisdom. For Heaven’s Sake let Us Americans be neutral. We can do nothing but mischief by intermeddling with any Side. I am / and shall be till Death your / Sincere Friend

John Adams.

RC (private owner, 1957); internal address: “Mr Luzac.”

1Luzac met JQA and CA in 1781 when they attended Leyden University. JQA and TBA dined with Luzac on 27 and 28 Nov. 1794, shortly after landing in the Netherlands (JQA, Diary description begins Diary of John Quincy Adams, ed. David Grayson Allen, Robert J. Taylor, and others, Cambridge, 1981– . description ends , 1:86; AFC description begins Adams Family Correspondence, ed. L. H. Butterfield, Marc Friedlaender, Richard Alan Ryerson, Margaret A. Hogan, Sara Martin, Hobson Woodward, and others, Cambridge, 1963– . description ends , 11:91).

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