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Individuals have conquered themselves. Nations and large bodies of men, never.

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
Body
Never
Men
Conquered
Bodies
Individuals
Large
Nations
Individual

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The Christian religion is, above all the religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern times, the religion of wisdom, virtue, equity and humanity.
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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.
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I am quite content to come home and go to Farming, be a select Man, and owe no Man any Thing but good Will. There I can get a little health and teach my Boys to be Lawyers.
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[J]udges, therefore, should be always men of learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should not be distracted with jarring interests they should not be dependent upon any man, or body of men.
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I am determined to control events, not be controlled by them.
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America is destined to be peopled by one nation, speaking one language, professing one general system of religious and political principles, and accustomed to one general tenor of social usages and customs.
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They worry one another like mastiffs, scrambling for rank and pay like apes for nuts.
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Property is surely a right of mankind as real as liberty.
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When I was young, and addicted to reading, I had heard about dancing on the points of metaphysical needles but, by mixing in the world, I found the points of political needles finer and sharper than the metaphysical ones.
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Mr. Jefferson has reason to reflect upon himself. How he will get rid of his remorse in his retirement, I know not. He must know that he leaves the government infinitely worse than he found it, and that from his own error or ignorance.
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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.
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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.
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The destiny of America is to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ to all men everywhere.
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Power in any Form . . . when directed only by human Wisdom and Benevolence is dangerous.
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Ambition is one of the ungovernable passions of the human heart. The love of power is insatiable and uncontrollable.
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We hold that each man is the best judge of his own interest.
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All sober inquirers after truth, ancient and modern, pagan and Christian, have declared that the happiness of man, as well as his dignity, consists in virtue.
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A representative assembly, although extremely well qualified, and absolutely necessary, as a branch of the legislative, is unfit to exercise the executive power, for want of two essential properties, secrecy and dispatch.
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Let the human mind loose. It must be loose. It will be loose. Superstition and dogmatism cannot confine it.
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Vanity, I am sensible, is my cardinal vice and cardinal folly and I am in continual danger, when in company, of being led an ignis fatuus chase by it.
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