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He is too illiterate, unread, unlearned for his station and reputation.
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
Illiterate
Station
Stations
Reputation
Government
Unread
Unlearned
More quotes by John Adams
Whenever serious art loses track of its roots in the vernacular, then it begins to atrophy.
John Adams
Ambition is the subtlest beast of the intellectual and moral field. It is wonderfully adroit in concealing itself from its owner.
John Adams
Resistance to sudden violence, for the preservation not only of my person, my limbs, and life, but of my property, is an indisputable right of nature which I have never surrendered to the public by the compact of society, and which perhaps, I could not surrender if I would.
John Adams
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
The law no passion can disturb. 'Tis void of desire and fear, lust and anger. 'Tis mens sine affectu, written reason, retaining some measure of the divine perfection. It does not enjoin that which pleases a weak, frail man, but, without any regard to persons, commands that which is good and punishes evil in all, whether rich or poor, high or low.
John Adams
I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in providence, for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth.
John Adams
They shall not be expected to acknowledge us until we have acknowledged ourselves.
John Adams
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
It is weakness rather than wickedness which renders men unfit to be trusted with unlimited power.
John Adams
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
Mystery is made a convenient Cover for absurdity.
John Adams
The only way to form an army to be confided in, was a systematic discipline, by which means all men may be made heroes.
John Adams
I shall have liberty to think for myself without molesting others or being molested myself.
John Adams
One useless man is a shame, two is a law firm, and three is a Congress.
John Adams
No good government but what is republican... the very definition of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.'
John Adams
All great changes are irksome to the human mind, especially those which are attended with great dangers and uncertain effects.
John Adams
The rights of Englishmen are derived from God, not from king or Parliament, and would be secured by the study of history, law, and tradition.
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
Before any great things are accomplished, a memorable change must be made in the system of education...to raise the lower ranks of society nearer to the higher.
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
