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There are only two creatures of value on the face of the earth: those with the commitment, and those who require the commitment of others.

John Adams

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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
Creatures
Value
Face
Values
Faces
Others
Two
Require
Earth
Commitment

More quotes by John Adams

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The idea of infidelity [a disbelief in the inspiration of the Scriptures or the divine origin of Christianity] cannot be treated with too much resentment or too much horror. The man who can think of it with patience is a traitor in his heart and ought to be execrated [denounced] as one who adds the deepest hypocrisy to the blackest treason.
John Adams
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What is to become of an independent statesman, one who will bow the knee to no idol, who will worship nothing as a divinity but truth, virtue, and his country? I will tell you he will be regarded more by posterity than those who worship hounds and horses and although he will not make his own fortune, he will make the fortune of his country.
John Adams
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Children should be educated and instructed in the principles of freedom. Aristotle speaks plainly to this purpose, saying, 'that the institution of youth should be accommodated to that form of government under which they live forasmuch as it makes exceedingly for the preservation of the present government, whatsoever it be.
John Adams
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We shall, by and by, want a world of hemp more for our own consumption.
John Adams
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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'.
John Adams
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Power in any Form . . . when directed only by human Wisdom and Benevolence is dangerous.
John Adams
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The furnace of affliction produces refinement in states as well as individuals. And the new Governments we are assuming in every part will require a purification from our vices, and an augmentation of our virtues, or there will be no blessings.
John Adams
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They worry one another like mastiffs, scrambling for rank and pay like apes for nuts.
John Adams
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Had I been chosen President again, I am certain I could not have lived another year.
John Adams
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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
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We Recognize No Sovereign but God, and no King but Jesus!
John Adams
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The whole people must take upon themselves the education of the whole people, and must be willing to bear the expenses of it. There should not be a district of one mile square, without a school in it, not founded by a charitable individual, but maintained at the public expense of the people themselves.
John Adams
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The frightful engines of ecclesiastical councils, of diabolical malice, and Calvinistical good-nature never failed to terrify me exceedingly whenever I thought of preaching.
John Adams
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Facts are stubborn things and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence: nor is the law less stable than the fact.
John Adams
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National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman, and that there is an obligation to perform such a duty absolutely irrespective of party politics or factional differences.
John Adams
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Borrowed eloquence, if it contains as good stuff, is as good as own eloquence
John Adams
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The destiny of America is to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ to all men everywhere.
John Adams
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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.
John Adams
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Honor is truly sacred, but holds a lower rank in the scale of moral excellence than virtue. Indeed the former is part of the latter, and consequently has not equal pretensions to support a frame of government productive of human happiness.
John Adams
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If we take a survey of the greatest actions...in the world...we shall find the authors of them all to have been persons whose Brains had been shaken out of their natural position.
John Adams