“A pen is certainly an excellent instrument to fix a man's attention and to inflame his ambition.”
“I will insist that the Hebrews have done more to civilize man than any other nation.”
“I consider a decent respect for Christianity among the best recommendations for public service.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“The people "have a right, an indisputable, unalienable, indefeasible, divine right to that most dreaded and envied kind of knowledge- I mean of the character and conduct of their rulers."”
“The destiny of America is to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ to all men everywhere.”
“The executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them, to the end that it may be a government of laws and not of men.”
Source: The Political Writings of John Adams: Representative Selections
“When economic power became concentrated in a few hands, then political power flowed to those possessors and away from the citizens, ultimately resulting in an oligarchy or tyranny.”
“Griefs upon griefs! Disappointments upon disappointments. What then? This is a gay, merry world notwithstanding.”
“The most sensible and jealous people are so little attentive to government that there are no instances of resistance until repeated, multiplied oppressions have placed it beyond a doubt that their rulers had formed settled plans to deprive them of their liberties; not to oppress an individual or a few, but to break down the fences of a free constitution, and deprive the people at large of all share in the government, and all the checks by which it is limited.”
“It is an observation of one of the profoundest inquirers into human affairs that a revolution of government is the strongest proof that can be given by a people of their virtue and good sense.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: Autobiography (cont.) Diary. Notes of a debate in the Senate of the United States. Essays: On private revenge. On self-delusion. On private revenge. Dissertation on the canon and the feudal law. Instructions of the town of Braintree to their representative, 1765. The Earl of Clarendon to William Pym. Governor Winthrop to Governor Bradford. Instructions of the town of Boston to their representatives, 1768. Instructions of the town of
“An honest, sensible, humane man, . . . laboring to do good rather than be rich, to be useful rather than make a show, living in modest simplicity . . . is really the most respectable man in society, [and] makes himself and all about him most happy.”
“Let frugality and industry be our virtues.”
Source: The Book of Abigail and John: Selected Letters of the Adams Family, 1762-1784
“Oh! the wisdom, the foresight and the hindsight and the rightsight and the leftsight, the northsight and the southsight, and the eastsight and the westsight that appeared in that august assembly.”
“I must not write a word to you about politics, because you are a woman.”
Source: The Letters of John and Abigail Adams
“My History of the Jesuits is in four volumes.... This society has been a greater calamity to mankind than the French Revolution, or Napoleon's despotism or ideology. It has obstructed progress of reformation and the improvement of the human mind in society much longer and more fatally.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“My history of the Jesuits is not elegantly written, but is supported by unquestionable authorities, is very particular and very horrible. Their restoration is indeed "a step toward darkness," cruelty, perfidy, despotism, death and I wish we were out of danger of bigotry and Jesuitism.”
“One useless man is a shame, two is a law firm, and three is a Congress.”
“I didn't grow up imagining myself as an opera composer. Only once in my entire adolescence did I attend an opera. I went and saw Aida at the old Met, didn't understand a thing about it, and thought it was pretty awful. But I think I had it in my genes without even realising it.”
“Twenty times, in the course of my late reading, have I been on the point of breaking out, 'this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!' But in this exclamation, I should have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion, this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in public company-I mean hell.”
Source: John Adams: a biography in his own words
“I must study war and politics so that my children shall be free to study commerce, agriculture and other practicalities, so that their children can study painting, poetry and other fine things.”
“If the Christian religion, as I understand it, or as you understand it, should maintain its ground, as I believe it will, yet Platonic, Pythagoric, Hindoo, and cabalistical Christianity, which is Catholic Christianity, and which has prevailed for 1500 years, has received a mortal wound, of which the monster must finally die. Yet so strong is his constitution, that he may endure for centuries before he expires.”
“I would define liberty to be a power to do as we would be done by. The definition of liberty to be the power of doing whatever the law permits, meaning the civil laws, does not seem satisfactory.”
“Had I been chosen President again, I am certain I could not have lived another year.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“I request that they may be considered in confidence, until the members of Congress are fully possessed of their contents, and shall have had opportunity to deliberate on the consequences of their publication; after which time, I submit them to your wisdom.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“We should begin by setting conscience free. When all men of all religions shall enjoy equal liberty, property, and an equal chance for honors and power we may expect that improvements will be made in the human character and the state of society.”
Source: The Works of John Adams Vol. 8: Letters and State Papers 1782 - 1799
“. . . Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“Admit that the press transferred the pontificate of Rome to Henry VIII-Admit that the press demolished in some sort the feudal system, and set the serfs and villains free; admit that the press demolished the monasteries, nunneries, and religious houses; into whose hands did all these alienated baronies, monasteries, and religious houses and lands fall? Into the hands of the democracy? Into the hands of serfs and villains? Serfs and villains were the only real democracy in those time. No. They fell into the hands of other aristocrats. . . .”
“In every society where property exists there will ever be a struggle between rich and poor. Mixed in one assembly, equal laws can never be expected; they will either be made by the member to plunder the few who are rich, or by the influence to fleece the many who are poor.”
Source: The Political Writings of John Adams: Representative Selections
“Numberless have been the systems of iniquity contrived by the great for the gratification of this passion in themselves; but in none of them were they ever more successful than in the invention and establishment of the canon and the feudal law.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“By the former of these (canon law), the most refined, sublime, extensive, and astonishing constitution of policy that ever was conceived by the mind of man was framed by the Romish clergy for the aggrandizement of their own order.”
Source: The Political Writings of John Adams: Representative Selections
“I never engaged in public affairs for my own interest, pleasure, envy, jealousy, avarice or ambition, or even the desire of fame”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“I desire no other inscription over my gravestone than: 'Here lies John Adams, who took upon himself the responsibility of peace with France in the year 1800'.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“I sometimes, in my sprightly moments, consider myself, in my great chair at school, as some dictator at the head of a commonwealth. In this little state I can discover all the great geniuses, all the surprising actions and revolutions of the great world in miniature. I have several renowned generals but three feet high, and several deep-projecting politicians in petticoats. I have others catching and dissecting flies, accumulating remarkable pebbles, cockleshells, etc., with as ardent curiosity as any virtuoso in the Royal Society.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“This is a revolution, damn it! We're going to have to offend somebody!”
“Property must be secured, or liberty cannot exist.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“We electors have an important constitutional power placed in our hands; we have a check upon two branches of the legislature.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“I had heard my father say that he never knew a piece of land run away or break.”
Source: Diary and Autobiography: Diary, 1782-1804. Autobiography to October 1776
“The appearance of religion only on Sunday proves that it is only an appearance.”
“If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?”
“I would quarrel with both parties, and with every individual of each, before I would subjugate my understanding, or prostitute my tongue or pen to either.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“It may be the will of Heaven that America shall suffer calamities still more wasting, and distresses yet more dreadful. If this is to be the case, it will have the good effect at least. It will inspire us with many virtues, which we have not, and correct many errors, follies and vices. But I must submit all my hopes and fears to an overruling Providence, in which, unfashionable as the faith may be, I firmly believe.”
“Rulers are no more than attorneys, agents, and trustees, for the people; and if the cause, the interest and trust, is insidiously betrayed, or wantonly trifled away, the people have a right to revoke the authority that they themselves have deputed, and to constitute abler and better agents, attorneys, and trustees.”
Source: The Political Writings of John Adams: Representative Selections
“We are in the the very midst of a revolution, the most complete, unexpected and remarkable of any in the history of nations.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“We hold that each man is the best judge of his own interest.”
“Those who trade liberty for security have neither.”
“Public affairs go on pretty much as usual: perpetual chicanery and rather more personal abuse than there used to be.”
Source: The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence Between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams
“Every problem is an opportunity in disguise.”
“Several country towns, within my observation, have at least a dozen taverns. Here the time, the money, the health and the modesty, of most that are young and of many old, are wasted. Here diseases, vicious habits, bastards and legislators are frequently spawned.”
“You are a Virginian, and a Virginian ought to appear at the head of this business. I am obnoxious, suspected and unpopular; you are very much otherwise. And you can write ten times better than I can.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: With a Life of the Author, Notes and Illustrations
“During the whole time I sat with him in Congress, I never heard him utter three sentences together.”
Source: The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States: Diary, with passages from an autobiography. Notes of debates in the Continental Congress, in 1775 and 1776. Autobiography
