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No good government but what is republican... the very definition of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.'
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
Definitions
Laws
Republican
Law
America
Empire
Government
Empires
Good
Republic
Men
Definition
More quotes by John Adams
In days of yore, the poet's pen From wing of bird was plunder'd, Perhaps of goose, but now and then, From Jove's own eagle sunder'd. But now, metallic pens disclose Alone the poet's numbers In iron inspiration glows, Or with the poet slumbers.
John Adams
[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
[L]iberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood.
John Adams
Ambition is one of the ungovernable passions of the human heart. The love of power is insatiable and uncontrollable.
John Adams
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
John Adams
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.
John Adams
Borrowed eloquence, if it contains as good stuff, is as good as own eloquence
John Adams
I am determined to control events, not be controlled by them.
John Adams
Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.
John Adams
A government of laws, and not of men.
John Adams
Popularity, next to virtue and wisdom, ought to be aimed at for it is the dictate of wisdom, and is necessary to the practice of virtue inmost.
John Adams
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.
John Adams
Negro slavery is an evil of colossal magnitude.
John Adams
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
Thomas Jefferson survives.
John Adams
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
The consequences arising from the continual accumulation of public debts in other countries ought to admonish us to prevent their growth in our own.
John Adams
The right of a nation to kill a tyrant, in cases of necessity, can no more be doubted, than to hang a robber, or kill a flea. But killing one tyrant only makes way for worse, unless the people have sense, spirit and honesty enough to establish and support a constitution guarded at all points against the tyranny of the one, the few, and the many.
John Adams
The destiny of America is to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ to all men everywhere.
John Adams
The proposition that the people are the best keepers of their own liberties is not true. They are the worst conceivable, they are no keepers at all they can neither judge, act, think, or will, as a political body.
John Adams
