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Religion, charity, pure benevolence, and morals, mingled up with superstitious rites and ferocious cruelty, form in their combination institutions the most powerful and the most pernicious that have ever afflicted mankind.

John Quincy Adams

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John Quincy Adams
Age: 80 †
Born: 1767
Born: July 11
Died: 1848
Died: February 23
6Th U.S. President
Diarist
Diplomat
Lawyer
Politician
Statesperson
Braintree
Massachusetts
John Q. Adams
President Adams
John Adams
J. Q. Adams
J. Adams
JQA
Pure
Superstitious
Moral
Benevolence
Powerful
Morals
Rites
Religion
Cruelty
Mingled
Form
Combination
Ferocious
Ever
Charity
Afflicted
Institutions
Rite
Mankind
Pernicious

More quotes by John Quincy Adams

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But America is a great, unwieldy Body. Its Progress must be slow... Like a Coach and six - the swiftest Horses must be slackened and the slowest quickened, that all may keep an even Pace.
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Occasional war is one of the rigorous instruments in the hands of Providence to give tone to the character of nations.
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The Law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code.
John Quincy Adams
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The Constitution had provided that all the public functionaries of the Union...should be under oath or affirmation for its support. The homage of religious faith was thus superadded to all the obligations of temporal law to give it strength.
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Individual liberty is individual power, and as the power of a community is a mass compounded of individual powers, the nation which enjoys the most freedom must necessarily be in proportion to its numbers the most powerful nation.
John Quincy Adams
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To believe that everyone is honest is folly, but to believe that no one is honest is worse.
John Quincy Adams
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Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.
John Quincy Adams
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Those who take oaths to politically powerful secret societies cannot be depended on for loyalty to a democratic republic.
John Quincy Adams
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The Sermon on the Mount commands me to lay up for myself treasures, not upon earth, but in Heaven. My hopes of a future life are all founded upon the Gospel of Christ.
John Quincy Adams
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Whether to the nation or to the state, no service can be or ever will be rendered by a more able or a more faithful public servant.
John Quincy Adams
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A barbarian who could not write a sentence of grammar and hardly could spell his own name.... One of our tribe of great men who turn disease to commodity...he craves the sympathy for sickness as a portion of his glory.
John Quincy Adams
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I say women exhibit the most exalted virtue when they depart from the domestic circle and enter on the concerns of their country, of humanity, and of their G-d!
John Quincy Adams
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All the public business in Congress now connects itself with intrigues, and there is great danger that the whole government will degenerate into a struggle of cabals.
John Quincy Adams
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When (an advocate) is not thoroughly acquainted with the real strength and weakness of his cause, he knows not where to choose the most impressive argument. When the mark is shrouded in obscurity, the only substitute for accuracy in the aim is in the multitude of the shafts.
John Quincy Adams
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My stern chase after time is, to borrow a simile from Tom Paine, like the race of a man with a wooden leg after a horse.
John Quincy Adams
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I have for many years made it a practice to read through the Bible once every year.
John Quincy Adams
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Every temptation is an opportunity of our getting nearer to God.
John Quincy Adams
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I want a warm and faithful friend, To cheer the adverse hour Who ne'er to flatter will descend, Nor bend the knee to power,- A friend to chide me when I'm wrong, My inmost soul to see And that my friendship prove as strong For him as his for me.
John Quincy Adams
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The American continents, by the free and independent condition that they have assumed and maintain, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonisation byany European powers? In the wars of the Europeanpowers inmattersrelating to ourselves, we have never taken any part nor does it comport with our policy to do so.
John Quincy Adams
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Civil liberty can be established on no foundation of human reason which will not at the same time demonstrate the right of religious freedom.
John Quincy Adams