Quote

Posterity! You will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom! I hope you will make a good use of it.

John Adams

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

John Adams
Age: 90 †
Born: 1735
Born: October 19
Died: 1826
Died: July 4
2Nd U.S. President
Diplomat
Lawyer
Political Philosopher
Politician
Statesperson
Braintree
Massachusetts
President Adams
J. Adams
President John Adams
Never
Present
Freedom
Posterity
Hope
Patriotic
Use
Preserve
History
Preserves
Much
Generation
Make
Cost
Good
Generations

More quotes by John Adams

Image
Property is surely a right of mankind as real as liberty.
John Adams
Image
As the happiness of the people is the sole end of government, so the consent of the people is the only foundation of it.
John Adams
Image
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.
John Adams
Image
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.
John Adams
Image
The Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation: The doctrine of a supreme, intelligent sovereign of the universe, I believe to be the great essential principle of all morality, and consequently of all civilization.
John Adams
Image
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.
John Adams
Image
I shall have the liberty to think for myself.
John Adams
Image
But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
John Adams
Image
Always stand on principle even if you stand alone.
John Adams
Image
It is weakness rather than wickedness which renders men unfit to be trusted with unlimited power.
John Adams
Image
We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other.
John Adams
Image
Every measure of prudence, therefore, ought to be assumed for the eventual total extirpation of slavery from the United States ... I have, throughout my whole life, held the practice of slavery in ... abhorrence.
John Adams
Image
If the empire of superstition and hypocrisy should be overthrown, happy indeed will it be for the world but if all religion and morality should be over-thrown with it, what advantage will be gained?
John Adams
Image
The History of our Revolution will be one continued Lye from one End to the other. The Essence of the whole will be that Dr Franklins electrical Rod, Smote the Earth and out Spring General Washington. That Franklin electrified him with his Rod - and thence forward these two conducted all the Policy Negotiations Legislation and War.
John Adams
Image
Borrowed eloquence, if it contains as good stuff, is as good as own eloquence
John Adams
Image
It is much easier to pull down a government, in such a conjuncture of affairs as we have seen, than to build up, at such a season as the present.
John Adams
Image
[I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue.
John Adams
Image
Grief drives men into habits of serious reflection, sharpens the understanding, and softens the heart
John Adams
Image
Public business must always be done by somebody. It will be done by somebody or other. If wise man decline, others will not if honest man refuse it, others will not.
John Adams
Image
The government of the United States of America has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims.
John Adams