The "old man eloquent,”
after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home
district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his
death.
after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home
district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his
death.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v01 - A to Apu
The meeting of Au-
gust 19th had the character of a preconcerted duel.
The wind was blowing fresh from the northwest, with the sea
running high. Dacres backed his main topsail and waited. Hull
shortened sail, and ran down before the wind. For about an
hour the two ships wore and wore again, trying to get advantage
of position; until at last, a few minutes before six o'clock, they
came together side by side, within pistol shot, the wind almost
astern, and running before it, they pounded each other with all
their strength. As rapidly as the guns could be worked, the
Constitution poured in broadside after broadside, double-shotted
with round and grape; and without exaggeration, the echo of
these guns startled the world. "In less than thirty minutes from
the time we got alongside of the enemy,” reported Hull, she
was left without a spar standing, and the hull cut to pieces in
such a manner as to make it difficult to keep her above water. ”
That Dacres should have been defeated was not surprising;
that he should have expected to win was an example of British
arrogance that explained and excused the war. The length of the
Constitution was one hundred and seventy-three feet, that of the
Guerrière was one hundred and fifty-six feet; the extreme breadth
of the Constitution was forty-four feet, that of the Guerrière was
forty feet: or within a few inches in both cases. The Consti-
tution carried thirty-two long twenty-four-pounders, the Guerri.
ère thirty long eighteen-pounders and two long twelve-pounders;
the Constitution carried twenty thirty-two-pound carronades, the
Guerrière sixteen. In every respect, and in proportion of ten to
seven, the Constitution was the better ship; her crew was more
numerous in proportion of ten to six. Dacres knew this very
nearly as well as it was known to Hull, yet he sought a duel.
What he did not know was that in a still greater proportion
the American officers and crew were better and more intelligent
seamen than the British, and that their passionate wish to repay
old scores gave them extraordinary energy. So much greater
## p. 126 (#140) ############################################
126
JOHN ADAMS
was the moral superiority than the physical, that while the
Guerrière's force counted as seven against ten, her losses counted
as though her force were only two against ten.
Dacres's error cost him dear; for among the Guerrière's crew
of two hundred and seventy-two, seventy-nine were killed or
wounded, and the ship was injured beyond saving before Dacres
realized his mistake, although he needed only thirty minutes of
close fighting for the purpose. He never fully understood the
causes of his defeat, and never excused it by pleading, as he
might have done, the great superiority of his enemy.
Hull took his prisoners on board the Constitution, and after
blowing up the Guerrière sailed for Boston, where he arrived on
the morning of August 30th. The Sunday silence of the Puritan
city broke into excitement as the news passed through the quiet
streets that the Constitution was below in the outer harbor with
Dacres and his crew prisoners on board. No experience of his-
tory ever went to the heart of New England more directly than
this victory, so peculiarly its own: but the delight was not confined
to New England, and extreme though it seemed, it was still not
extravagant; for however small the affair might appear on the
general scale of the world's battles, it raised the United States
in one half-hour to the rank of a first class Power in the world.
Selections used by permission of Charles Scribner's Sons, Publishers.
JOHN ADAMS
(1735-1826)
OHN ADAMS, second President of the United States, was born
at Braintree, Mass. , October 19th, 1735, and died there July
4th, 1826, the year after his son too was inaugurated Presi-
dent. He was the first conspicuous member of an enduringly pow-
erful and individual family. The Adams race have mostly been
vehement, proud, pugnacious, and independent, with hot tempers and
strong wills; but with high ideals, dramatic devotion to duty, and the
intense democratic sentiment so often found united with personal
aristocracy of feeling. They have been men of affairs first, with large
practical ability, but with a deep strain of the man of letters which
in this generation has outshone the other faculties; strong-headed and
hard-working students, with powerful memories and fluent gifts of
expression.
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JOHN ADAMS
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JOHN ADAMS.
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JOHN ADAMS
127
All these characteristics went to make up John Adams; but their
enumeration does not furnish a complete picture of him, or reveal the
virile, choleric, masterful man. And he was far more lovable and far
more popular than his equally great son, also a typical Adams, from
the same cause which produced some of his worst blunders and mis-
fortunes,- a generous impulsiveness of feeling which made it impos-
sible for him to hold his tongue at the wrong time and place for
talking. But so fervid, combative, and opinionated a man was sure
to gain much more hate than love; because love results from compre-
hension, which only the few close to him could have, while hate —
toward an honest man—is the outcome of ignorance, which most of
the world cannot avoid. Admiration and respect, however, he had
from the majority of his party at the worst of times; and the best
encomium on him is that the closer his public acts are examined, the
more credit they reflect not only on his abilities but on his unselfish-
ness.
Born of a line of Massachusetts farmers, he graduated from Har-
vard in 1755. After teaching a grammar school and beginning to read
theology, he studied law and began practice in 1758, soon becoming
a leader at the bar and in public life. In 1764 he married the noble
and delightful woman whose letters furnish unconscious testimony to
his lovable qualities. All through the germinal years of the Revolu-
tion he was one of the foremost patriots, steadily opposing any
abandonment or compromise of essential rights. In 1765 he was
counsel for Boston with Otis and Gridley to support the town's
memorial against the Stamp Act. In 1766 he was selectman.
In 1768
the royal government offered him the post of advocate-general in the
Court of Admiralty, - a lucrative bribe to desert the opposition; but
he refused it. Yet in 1770, as a matter of high professional duty, he
became counsel (successfully) for the British soldiers on trial for the
« Boston Massacre. ) Though there was a present uproar of abuse,
Mr. Adams was shortly after elected Representative to the General
Court by more than three to one. In March, 1774, he contemplated
writing the “History of the Contest between Britain and America! »
On June 17th he presided over the meeting at Faneuil Hall to con-
sider the Boston Port Bill, and at the same hour was elected Repre-
sentative to the first Congress at Philadelphia (September 1) by the
Provincial Assembly held in defiance of the government. Returning
thence, he engaged in newspaper debate on the political issues till
the battle of Lexington.
Shortly after, he again journeyed to Philadelphia to the Congress
of May 5th, 1775; where he did on his own motion, to the disgust
of his Northern associates and the reluctance even of the Southern-
ers, one of the most important and decisive acts of the Revolution,-
## p. 128 (#146) ############################################
128
JOHN ADAMS
induced Congress to adopt the forces in New England as a national
army and put George Washington of Virginia at its head, thus
engaging the Southern colonies irrevocably in the war and securing
the one man who could make it a success. In 1776 he was a chief
agent in carrying a declaration of independence. He remained in
Congress till November, 1777, as head of the War Department, very
useful and laborious though making one dreadful mistake: he was
largely responsible for the disastrous policy of ignoring the just
claims and decent dignity of the military commanders, which lost the
country some of its best officers and led directly to Arnold's treason.
His reasons, exactly contrary to his wont, were good abstract logic
but thorough practical nonsense.
In December, 1777, he was appointed commissioner to France to
succeed Silas Deane, and after being chased by an English man-of-
war (which he wanted to fight) arrived at Paris in safety. There
he reformed a very bad state of affairs; but thinking it absurd to
keep three envoys at one court (Dr. Franklin and Arthur Lee were
there before him), he induced Congress to abolish his office, and
returned in 1779. Chosen a delegate to the Massachusetts constitu-
tional convention, he was called away from it to be sent again to
France. There he remained as Franklin's colleague, detesting and
distrusting him and the French foreign minister, Vergerines, embroil-
ing himself with both and earning a cordial return of his warmest
dislike from both, till July, 1780. He then went to Holland as volun-
teer minister, and in 1782 was formally recognized as from an inde-
pendent nation. Meantime Vergennes intrigued with all his might to
have Adams recalled, and actually succeeded in so tying his hands
that half the advantages of independence would have been lost but
for his contumacious persistence. In the final negotiations for peace,
he persisted against his instructions in making the New England fish-
eries an ultimatum, and saved them. In 1783 he was commissioned
to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain, and in 1785 was
made minister to that power. The wretched state of American affairs
under the Confederation made it impossible to obtain any advantages
for his country, and the vindictive feeling of the English made his
life a purgatory, so that he was glad to come home in 1788.
In the first Presidential election of that year he was elected Vice-
President on the ticket with Washington; and began a feud with
Alexander Hamilton, the mighty leader of the Federalist party and
Chief organizer of our governmental machine, which ended in the
overthrow of the party years before its time, and had momentous
personal and literary results as well. He was as good a Federalist
as Hamilton, and felt as much right to be leader if he could; Hamil-
ton would not surrender his leadership, and the rivalry never ended
## p. 129 (#147) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
129
till Hamilton's murder. In 1796 he was elected President against
Jefferson. His Presidency is recognized as one of the ablest and most
useful on the roll; but its personal memoirs are most painful and
scandalous. The cabinet were nearly all Hamiltonians, regularly laid
all the official secrets before Hamilton, and took advice from him to
thwart the President. They disliked Mr. Adams's overbearing ways
and obtrusive vanity, considered his policy destructive to the party
and injurious to the country, and felt that loyalty to these involved
and justified disloyalty to him. Finally his best act brought on an
explosion. The French Directory had provoked a war with this coun-
try, which the Hamiltonian section of the leaders and much of the
party hailed with delight; but showing signs of a better spirit, Mr.
Adams, without consulting his Cabinet, who he knew would oppose it
almost or quite unanimously, nominated a commission to frame a
treaty with France. The storm of fury that broke on him from his
party has rarely been surpassed, even in the case of traitors outright,
and he was charged with being little better. He was renominated
for President in 1800, but beaten by Jefferson, owing to the defections
in his own party, largely of Hamilton's producing. The Federalist
party never won another election; the Hamilton section laid its death
to Mr. Adams, and American history is hot with the fires of this
battle even yet.
Mr. Adams's later years were spent at home, where he was always
interested in public affairs and sometimes much too free in comments
on them; where he read immensely and wrote somewhat. He
heartily approved his son's break with the Federalists on the Em-
bargo. He died on the same day as Jefferson, both on the fiftieth
anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
As a writer, Mr. Adams's powers show best in the work which
can hardly be classed as literature, — his forcible and bitter political
letters, diatribes, and polemics. As in his life, his merits and defects
not only lie side by side, but spring from the same source, — his
vehemence, self-confidence, and impatience of obstruction. He writes
impetuously because he feels impetuously. With little literary grace,
he possesses the charm that belongs to clear and energetic thought
and sense transfused with hot emotion. John Fiske goes so far as to
say that “as a writer of English, John Adams in many respects sur-
passed all his American contemporaries. ” He was by no means with-
out humor, - a characteristic which shows in some of his portraits, —
and sometimes realized the humorous aspects of his own intense and
exaggerative temperament. His remark about Timothy Pickering,
that “under the simple appearance of a bald head and straight hair,
he conceals the most ambitious designs,” is perfectly self-conscious in
its quaint naiveté.
1-9
## p. 130 (#148) ############################################
130
JOHN ADAMS
His Life and Works,' edited by his grandson, Charles Francis
Adams, Sr. , in ten volumes, is the great storehouse of his writings.
The best popular account of his life is by John T. Morse, Jr. , in the
(American Statesmen ' series.
AT THE FRENCH COURT
From his Diary, June 7th, 1778, with his later comments in brackets
WENI
ENT to Versailles, in company with Mr. Lee, Mr. Izard
and his lady, Mr. Lloyd and his lady, and Mr. François.
Saw the grand procession of the Knights du Saint-Esprit,
or du Cordon Bleu. At nine o'clock at night, went to the grand
couvert, and saw the king, queen, and royal family, at supper;
had a fine seat and situation close by the royal family, and had
a distinct and full view of the royal pair.
[Our objects were to see the ceremonies of the knights, and
in the evening the public supper of the royal family. The
kneelings, the bows, and the courtesies of the knights, the
dresses and decorations, the king seated on his throne, his
investiture of a new created knight with the badges and orna-
ments of the order, and his majesty's profound and reverential
bow before the altar as he retired, were novelties and curiosities
to me, but surprised me much less than the patience and perse-
verance with which they all kneeled, for two hours together,
upon the hard marble of which the floor of the chapel was made.
The distinction of the blue ribbon was very dearly purchased at
the price of enduring this painful operation four times in a year.
The Count de Vergennes confessed to me that he was almost
dead with the pain of it. And the only insinuation I ever heard,
that the king was in any degree touched by the philosophy of
the age, was, that he never discovered so much impatience,
under any of the occurrences of his life, as in going through
those tedious ceremonies of religion, to which so many hours of
his life were condemned by the catholic church.
The queen was attended by her ladies to the gallery opposite
to the altar, placed in the centre of the seat, and there left alone
by the other ladies, who all retired. She was an object too
sublime and beautiful for my dull pen to describe. I leave this
enterprise to Mr. Burke. But in his description, there is more
of the orator than of the philosopher. Her dress was everything
that art and wealth could make it. One of the maids of honor
## p. 131 (#149) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
131
a
told me she had diamonds upon her person to the value of
eighteen millions of livres; and I always thought her majesty
much beholden to her dress, Mr. Burke saw her probably but
once. I have seen her fifty times perhaps, and in all the varie-
ties of her dresses. She had fine complexion, indicating
perfect health, and was a handsome woman in her face and
figure. But I have seen beauties much superior, both in counte-
nance and form, in France, England, and America.
After the ceremonies of this institution are over, there is a
collection for the poor; and that this closing scene may be as
elegant as any of the former, a young lady of some of the first
families in France is appointed to present the box to the knights.
Her dress must be as rich and elegant, in proportion, as the
Queen's, and her hair, motions, and curtsies must have as much
dignity and grace as those of the knights. It was a curious
entertainment to observe the easy air, the graceful bow, and the
conscious dignity of the knight, in presenting his contribution;
and the corresponding ease, grace, and dignity of the lady, in
receiving it, were not less charming. Every muscle, nerve, and
fibre of both seemed perfectly disciplined to perform its func-
tions. The elevation of the arm, the bend of the elbow, and
every finger in the hand of the knight, in putting his louis d'ors
into the box appeared to be perfectly studied, because it was
perfectly natural. How much devotion there was in all this I
know not, but it was a consummate school to teach the rising
generation the perfection of the French air, and external polite-
ness and good-breeding. I have seen nothing to be compared
to it in any other country.
At nine o'clock we went and saw the king, queen, and royal
family, at the grand couvert. Whether M. François, a gentleman
who undertook upon this occasion to conduct us, had contrived a
plot to gratify the curiosity of the spectators, or whether the
royal family had a fancy to see the raw American at their
leisure, or whether they were willing to gratify him with a con-
venient seat, in which he might see all the royal family, and all
the splendors of the place, I know not; but the scheme could
not have been carried into execution, certainly, without the
orders of the king. I was selected, and summoned indeed, from
all my company, and ordered to a seat close beside the royal
family. The seats on both sides of the hall, arranged like the
seats in a theatre, were all full of ladies of the first rank and
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132
JOHN ADAMS
fashion in the kingdom, and there was no room or place for me
but in the midst of them. It was not easy to make room for
one more person. However, room was made, and I was situated
between two ladies, with rows and ranks of ladies above and
below me, and on the right hand and on the left, and ladies
only. My dress was a decent French dress, becoming the station
I held, but not to be compared with the gold, and diamonds,
and embroidery, about me. I could neither speak nor under
stand the language in a manner to support a conversation, but I
had soon the satisfaction to find it was a silent meeting, and
that nobody spoke a word but the royal family to each other,
and they said very little. The eyes of all the assembly were
turned upon me, and I felt sufficiently humble and mortified, for
I was not a proper object for the criticisms of such a company.
I found myself gazed at, as we in America used to gaze at the
sachems who came to make speeches to us in Congress; but I
thought it very hard if I could not command as much power of
face as one of the chiefs of the Six Nations, and therefore deter-
mined that I would assume a cheerful countenance, enjoy the
scene around me, and observe it as coolly as an astronomer con-
templates the stars. Inscriptions of Fructus Belli were seen on
the ceiling and all about the walls of the room, among paint-
ings of the trophies of war; probably done by the order of
Louis XIV. , who confessed in his dying hour, as his successor
and exemplar Napoleon will probably do, that he had been too
fond of war. The king was the royal carver for himself and all
his family. His majesty ate like a king, and made a royal
supper of solid beef, and other things in proportion.
took a large spoonful of soup, and displayed her fine person and
graceful manners, in alternately looking at the company in vari-
ous parts of the hall, and ordering several kinds of seasoning to
be brought to her, by which she fitted her supper to her taste. )
The queen
THE CHARACTER OF FRANKLIN
From Letter to the Boston Patriot, May 15th, 1811
RANKLIN had a great genius, original, sagacious, and inventive,
ments in the fine arts and the mechanic arts. He had a
vast imagination, equal to the comprehension of the greatest
objects, and capable of a cool and steady comprehension of them.
## p. 133 (#151) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
133
He had wit at will. He had humor that when he pleased was
delicate and delightful. He had a satire that was good-natured
or caustic, Horace or Juvenal, Swift or Rabelais, at his pleasure.
He had talents for irony, allegory, and fable, that he could adapt
with great skill to the promotion of moral and political truth.
He was master of that infantine simplicity which the French call
naiveté, which never fails to charm in Phædrus and La Fontaine,
from the cradle to the grave. Had he been blessed with the
same advantages of scholastic education in his early youth, and
pursued a course of studies as unembarrassed with occupations
of public and private life as Sir Isaac Newton, he might have
emulated the first philosopher. Although I am not ignorant that
most of his positions and hypotheses have been controverted, I
cannot but think he has added much to the mass of natural
knowledge, and contributed largely to the progress of the human
mind, both by his own writings and by the controversies and
experiments he has excited in all parts of Europe. He had abil.
ities for investigating statistical questions, and in some parts of
his life has written pamphlets and essays upon public topics with
great ingenuity and success; but after my acquaintance with him,
which commenced in Congress in 1775, his excellence as a legis-
lator, a politician, or a negotiator most certainly never appeared.
No sentiment more weak and superficial was ever avowed by the
most absurd philosopher than some of his, particularly one that
he procured to be inserted in the first constitution of Pennsyl-
vania, and for which he had such a fondness as to insert it in
his will. I call it weak, for so it must have been, or hypocritical;
unless he meant by one satiric touch to ridicule his own republic,
or throw it into everlasting contempt.
I must acknowledge, after all, that nothing in life has morti.
fied or grieved me more than the necessity which compelled me
to oppose him so often as I have. He was a man with whom I
always wished to live in friendship, and for that purpose omitted
no demonstration of respect, esteem, and veneration in my power,
until I had unequivocal proofs of his hatred, for no other reason
under the sun but because I gave my judgment in opposition to
his in many points which materially affected the interests of our
country, and in many more which essentially concerned our
happiness, safety, and well-being. I could not and would not
sacrifice the clearest dictates of my understanding and the purest
principles of morals and policy in compliance to Dr. Franklin.
## p. 134 (#152) ############################################
134
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
( 1767-1848)
ate.
he chief distinction in character between John Adams and
his son is the strangest one imaginable, when one remem-
bers that to the fiery, combative, bristling Adams blood was
added an equal strain from the gay, genial, affectionate Abigail Smith.
The son, though of deep inner affections, and even hungering for good-
will if it would come without his help, was on the surface incom-
parably colder, harsher, and thornier than his father, with all the
socially repellent traits of the race and none of the softer ones. The
father could never control his tongue or his temper, and not always
his head; the son never lost the bridle of either, and much of his ter-
rible power in debate came from his ability to make others lose
theirs while perfectly keeping his own. The father had plenty of
warm friends and allies, - at the worst he worked with half a party;
the son in the most superb part of his career had no friends, no
allies, no party except the group of constituents who kept him in
Congress. The father's self-confidence deepened in the son to a soli-
tary and even contemptuous gladiatorship against the entire govern-
ment of the country, for long years of hate and peril. The father's
irritable though generous vanity changed in the son to
an icy
contempt or white-hot scorn of nearly all around him. The father's
spasms of acrimonious judgment steadied in the son to a constant
rancor always finding new objects. But only John Quincy Adams
could have done the work awaiting John Quincy Adams, and each of
his unamiable qualities strengthened his fibre to do it. And if a
man is to be judged by his fruits, Mr. Morse is justified in saying
that he was not only pre-eminent in ability and acquirements, but
more to be honored for profound, immutable honesty of pur-
pose, and broad, noble humanity of aims. ”
It might almost be said that the sixth President of the United
States was cradled in statesmanship. Born July uth, 1767, he was a
little lad of ten when he accompanied his father on the French miss-
ion. Eighteen months elapsed before he returned, and three months
later he was again upon the water, bound once more for the French
capital. There were school days in Paris, and other school days in
Amsterdam and in Leyden; but the boy was only fourteen, — the ma-
ture old child ! — when he went to St. Petersburg as private secretary
and interpreter to Francis Dana, just appointed minister plenipoten-
tiary to the court of the Empress Catherine. Such was his appren-
ticeship to a public career which began in earnest in 1794, and lasted,
even
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
135
with slight interruptions, for fifty-four years. Minister to the United
Netherlands, to Russia, to Prussia, and to England; commissioner to
frame the Treaty of Ghent which ended the war of 1812; State Sen-
ator, United States Senator; Secretary of State, a position in which
he made the treaty with Spain which conceded Florida, and enun-
ciated the Monroe Doctrine before Monroe and far more thoroughly
than he; President, and then for many years Member of the National
House of Representatives, - it is strange to find this man writing in
his later years, “My whole life has been a succession of disappoint-
ments. I can scarcely recollect a single instance of success to any-
thing that I ever undertook. ”
It is true, however, that his successes and even his glories always
had some bitter ingredient to spoil their flavor. As United States
Senator he was practically boycotted,” for years, even by his own
party members, because he was an Adams. In 1807 he definitely
broke with the Federalist party- for what he regarded as its slavish
crouching under English outrages, conduct which had been for years
estranging him— by supporting Jefferson's Embargo, as better than
no show of resistance at all; and was for a generation denounced by
the New England Federalists as a renegade for the sake of office and
a traitor to New England. The Massachusetts Legislature practically
censured him in 1808, and he resigned.
His winning of the Presidency brought pain instead of pleasure:
he valued it only as a token of national confidence, got it only as
a minority candidate in a divided party, and was denounced by the
Jacksonians as a corrupt political bargainer. And his later Congress-
ional career, though his chief title to glory, was one long martyrdom
(even though its worst pains were self-inflicted), and he never knew
the immense victory he had actually won.
The "old man eloquent,”
after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home
district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his
death. For a long time he bore the anti-slavery standard almost
alone in the halls of Congress, a unique and picturesque figure, rous-
ing every demon of hatred in his fellow-members, in constant and
envenomed battle with them, and more than a match for them all.
He fought single-handed for the right of petition as an indefeasible
right, not hesitating to submit a petition from citizens of Virginia
praying for his own expulsion from Congress as a nuisance. In 1836
he presented a petition from one hundred and fifty-eight ladies,
citizens of Massachusetts, "for, I said, I had not yet brought myself
to doubt whether females were citizens. " After eight years of per-
sistent struggle against the « Atherton gag law,” which practically
denied the right of petition in matters relating to slavery, he carried
a vote rescinding it, and nothing of the kind was again enacted. He
## p. 136 (#158) ############################################
136
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
had a fatal stroke of paralysis on the floor of Congress February
21st, 1848, and died two days later.
As a writer he was perspicuous, vigorous, and straightforward.
He had entered Harvard in the middle of the college course, and
been graduated with honors. He had then studied and practiced
law. He was Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard from
1806 to 1809, and was well drilled in the use of language, but was
too downright in his temper and purposes to spend much labor upon
artistic effects. He kept an elaborate diary during the greater part
of his life, - since published in twelve volumes of “Memoirs” by
his son Charles Francis Adams; a vast storehouse of material relat-
ing to the political history of the country, but, as published, largely
restricted to public affairs. He delivered orations on Lafayette, on
Madison, on Monroe, on Independence, and on the Constitution; pub-
lished essays on the Masonic Institution and various other matters;
a report on weights and measures, of enormous labor and permanent
value; Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory; a tale in verse on the Con-
quest of Ireland, with the title Dermot MacMorrogh'; an account of
Travels in Silesia; and a volume of Poems of Religion and Society. '
He had some facility in rhyme, but his judgment was not at fault in
informing him that he was not a poet. Mr. Morse says that “No
man can have been more utterly void of a sense of humor or an
appreciation of wit ”; and yet he very fairly anticipated Holmes in
his poem on (The Wants of Man,' and hits rather neatly a familiar
foible in the verse with which he begins Dermot MacMorrogh':-
«'Tis strange how often readers will indulge
Their wits a mystic meaning to discover;
Secrets ne'er dreamt of by the bard divulge,
And where he shoots a duck, will find a plover;
Satiric shafts from every line promulge,
Detect a tyrant where he draws a lover:
Nay, so intent his hidden thoughts to see,
Cry, if he paint a scoundrel —That means me. ) »
Selections from Letters and Memoirs used by permission of
J. B. Lippincott Company
LETTER TO HIS FATHER
(At the Age of Ten)
D
EAR SIR, - I love to receive letters very well; much better than
I love to write them. I make but a poor figure at compo-
sition, my head is too fickle, my thoughts are running after
birds eggs play and trifles, till I get vexed with myself. Mamma
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
137
has a troublesome task to keep me steady, and I own I am
ashamed of myself. I have but just entered the third volume of
Smollett, tho' I had designed to have got it half through by this
time. I have determined this week to be more diligent, as Mr.
Thaxter will be absent at Court, and I cannot pursue my other
studies. I have Set myself a Stent and determine to read the 3rd
volume Half out. If I can but keep my resolution, I will write
again at the end of the week and give a better account of myself.
I wish, Sir, you would give me some instructions, with regard to
my time, and advise me how to proportion my Studies and my
Play, in writing, and I will keep them by me, and endeavor to
follow them. I am, dear Sir, with a present determination of
growing better, yours.
P. S. — Sir, if you will be so good as to favor me with a Blank
Book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurances I meet
with in my reading, which will serve to fix them upon my mind.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
(At the Age of Eighteen)
A "
PRIL 26TH, 1785. — A letter from Mr. Gerry of Feb. 25th Says
that Mr. Adams is appointed Minister to the Court of
London.
I believe he will promote the interests of the United States,
as much as any man, but I fear his duty will induce him to make
exertions which may be detrimental to his health. I wish how-
ever it may be otherwise. Were I now to go with him, probably
my immediate satisfaction might be greater than it will be in
returning to America. After having been traveling for these
seven years almost all over Europe, and having been in the
World, and among company, for three; to return to spend one
or two years in the pale of a College, subjected to all the rules
which I have so long been freed from; then to plunge into the
dry and tedious study of the Law for three years; and afterwards
not expect (however good an opinion I may have of myself) to
bring myself into notice under three or four years more; if ever!
It is really a prospect somewhat discouraging for a youth of my
ambition (for I have ambition, though I hope its object is laud-
able). But still
“Oh! how wretched
Is that poor Man, that hangs on Princes' favors »
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138
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
or on those of anybody else. I am determined that so long as I
shall be able to get my own living in an honorable manner, I
will depend upon no one. My Father has been so much taken up
all his lifetime with the interests of the public, that his own for-
tune has suffered by it; so that his children will have to provide
for themselves, which I shall never be able to do, if I loiter away
my precious time in Europe and shun going home until I am
forced to it. With an ordinary share of Common sense which I
hope I enjoy, at least in America I can live independent and free;
and rather than live otherwise I would wish to die before the
time when I shall be left at my own discretion. I have before
me a striking example of the distressing and humiliating situation
a person is reduced to by adopting a different line of conduct,
and I am determined not to fall into the same error.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
JA
ANUARY 14TH, 1831. -I received a letter from John C. Calhoun,
now Vice-President of the United States, relating to his pres-
ent controversy with President Jackson and William H. Craw-
ford. He questions me concerning the letter of General Jackson
to Mr. Monroe which Crawford alleges to have been produced at
the Cabinet meetings on the Seminole War, and asks for copies,
if I think proper to give them, of Crawford's letter to me which
I received last summer, and of my answer. I answered Mr. Cal.
houn's letter immediately, rigorously confining myself to the direct
object of his inquiries. This is a new bursting out of the old and
rancorous feud between Crawford and Calhoun, both parties to
which, after suspending their animosities and combining together
to effect my ruin, are appealing to me for testimony to sustain
themselves each against the other. This is one of the occasions
upon which I shall eminently need the direction of a higher power
to guide me in every step of my conduct. I see my duty to dis-
card all consideration of their treatment of me; to adhere, in
everything that I shall say or write, to the truth; to assert noth-
ing positively of which I am not absolutely certain; to deny
nothing upon which there remains a scruple of doubt upon my
memory; to conceal nothing which it may be lawful to divulge,
and which may promote truth and justice between the parties.
With these principles, I see further the necessity for caution and
prudence in the course I shall take. The bitter enmity of all
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
139
three of the parties - Jackson, Calhoun, and Crawford — against
me, an enmity the more virulent because kindled by their own
ingratitude and injustice to me; the interest which every one of
them, and all their partisans, have in keeping up that load
of obloquy and public odium which their foul calumnies have
brought down upon me; and the disfavor in which I stand before
a majority of the people, excited against me by their artifices;-
their demerits to me are proportioned to the obligations to me -
Jackson's the greatest, Crawford's the next, Calhoun's the least of
positive obligation, but darkened by his double-faced setting him-
self up as a candidate for the Presidency against me in 1821, his
prevarications between Jackson and me in 1824, and his icy.
hearted dereliction of all the decencies of social intercourse with
me, solely from the terror of Jackson, since the 4th of March,
1829. I walk between burning ploughshares; let me be mindful
where I place my foot.
J"
FROM THE MEMOIRS
UNE 7TH, 1833. -The first seedling apple-tree that I had observed
on my return here just out of the ground was on the 22d
of April. It had grown slowly but constantly since, and had
put out five or six leaves. Last evening, after my return from
Boston, I saw it perfectly sound. This morning I found it broken
off, leaving one lobe of the seed-leaves, and one leaf over it. This
may have been the work of a bug, or perhaps of a caterpillar. It
would not be imaginable to any person free from hobby-horse or
fanciful attachments, how much mortification such an incident oc-
casions. St. Evremond, after removing into the country, returned
to a city life because he found himself in despair for the loss of
a pigeon. His conclusion was, that rural life induced exorbitant
attachment to insignificant objects. My experience is conformable
to this. My natural propensity was to raise trees, fruit and forest,
from the seed. I had it in early ġouth, but the course of my life
deprived me of the means of pursuing the bent of my inclina-
tion. One shellbark-walnut-tree in my garden, the root of which
I planted 8th October, 1804, and one Mazzard cherry-tree in the
grounds north of the house, the stone of which I planted about
the same time, are the only remains of my experiments of so
ancient a date. Had my life been spent in the country, and my
experiments commenced while I was at College, I should now
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140
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
have a large fruit garden, flourishing orchards of native fruit, and
very valuable forests; instead of which I have a nursery of about
half an acre of ground, half full of seedlings, from five years to
five days old, bearing for the first time perhaps twenty peaches,
and a few blossoms of apricots and cherries; and hundreds of
seedlings of the present year perishing from day to day before my
eyes.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
Spevening in the multitudinous whimses olevar disabled mind
EPTEMBER 9TH, 1833. — Cold and cloudy day, clearing off toward
In the multitudinous whimseys of a disabled mind
and body, the thick-coming fancies often come to me that
the events which affect my life and adventures are specially
shaped to disappoint my purposes. My whole life has been a
succession of disappointments. I can scarcely recollect a single
instance of success to anything that I ever undertook. Yet, with
fervent gratitude to God, I confess that my life has been equally
marked by great and signal successes which I neither aimed at
nor anticipated. Fortune, by which I understand Providence, has
showered blessings upon me profusely. But they have been
blessings unforeseen and unsought. «Non nobis Domine, non
nobis, sed nomini tuo da gloriam ! ” I ought to have been taught
by it three lessons:-1. Of implicit reliance upon Providence.
Of humility and humiliation; the thorough conviction of my
own impotence to accomplish anything. 3. Of resignation; and
not to set my heart upon anything which can be taken from me
or denied.
2.
THE MISSION OF AMERICA
A
From his Fourth of July Oration at Washington, 1821
ND now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned
philosophers of the older world, the first observers of nuta.
tion and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and
invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and shrapnel
shells, should find their hearts disposed to inquire, What has
America done for mankind ? let our answer be this:— America,
with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as
nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of
human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government.
America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among
a
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
141
them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them
the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous
reciprocity. She has uniformly spoken among them, though often
to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal
liberty, equal justice, and equal rights. She has, in the lapse of
nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the
independence of other nations, while asserting and maintaining
her own. She has abstained from interference in the concerns of
others, even when the conflict has been for principles to which
she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She
has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of
that Aceldama, the European World, will be contests between
inveterate power and emerging right. Wherever the standard of
freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there
will her heart, her benedictions, and her prayers be. But she
goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the
well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the
champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend
the general cause, by the countenance of her voice, and the
benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by
once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even
the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself,
beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and
intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume
the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental
maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to
force. The frontlet upon her brows would no longer beam with
the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its
stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in
false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and
power. She might become the dictatress of the world; she would
no longer be the ruler of her own spirit.
THE RIGHT OF PETITION
Quoted in Memoir by Josiah Quincy
IR, it is . . . well known that, from the time I entered this
house, down to the present day, I have felt it a sacred duty
to present any petition, couched in respectful language, from
any citizen of the United States, be its object what it may, - be
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
the prayer of it that in which I could concur, or that to which I
was utterly opposed. I adhere to the right of petition; and let
me say here that, let the petition be, as the gentleman from
Virginia has stated, from free negroes, prostitutes, as he supposes,
for he says there is one put on this paper, and he infers that
the rest are of the same description, — that has not altered my
opinion at all. Where is your law that says that the mean, the
low, and the degraded, shall be deprived of the right of petition,
if their moral character is not good? Where, in the land of free-
men, was the right of petition ever placed on the exclusive basis
of morality and virtue ? Petition is supplication - it is entreaty -
it is prayer! And where is the degree of vice or immorality
which shall deprive the citizen of the right to supplicate for a
boon, or to pray for mercy ? Where is such a law to be found ?
It does not belong to the most abject despotism. There is no
absolute monarch on earth who is not compelled, by the constitu-
tion of his country, to receive the petitions of his people, whoso-
ever they may be. The Sultan of Constantinople cannot walk
the streets and refuse to receive petitions from the meanest and
vilest in the land. This is the law even of despotism; and what
does your law say ? Does it say, that, before presenting a peti-
tion, you shall look into it and see whether it comes from the
virtuous, and the great, and the mighty? No, sir; it says no such
thing. The right of petition belongs to all; and so far from
refusing to present a petition because it might come from those
low in the estimation of the world, it would be an additional
incentive, if such an incentive were wanting.
NULLIFICATION
From his Fourth of July Oration at Quincy, 1831
N"
ULLIFICATION is the provocation to that brutal and foul contest
of force, which has hitherto baffled all the efforts of the
European and Southern American nations, to introduce
among them constitutional governments of liberty and order. It
strips us of that peculiar and unimitated characteristic of all our
legislation - free debate; it makes the bayonet the arbiter of law;
it has no argument but the thunderbolt. It were senseless to
imagine that twenty-three States of the Union would suffer their
laws to be trampled upon by the despotic mandate of one. The
act of nullification would itself be null and void. Force st be
-
-
-
-
--
---
## p. 143 (#165) ############################################
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
143
called in to execute the law of the Union. Force must be applied
by the nullifying State to resist its execution -
“Ate, hot from Hell,
Cries Havoc! and lets slip the dogs of war. ”
The blood of brethren is shed by each other. The citizen of
the nullifying State is a traitor to his country, by obedience to
the law of his State; a traitor to his State, by obedience to the law
of his country.
The scaffold and the battle-field stream alter-
nately with the blood of their victims. Let this agent but once
intrude upon your deliberations, and Freedom will take her flight
for heaven. The Declaration of Independence will become a phi-
losophical dream, and uncontrolled, despotic sovereignties will
trample with impunity, through a long career of after ages, at
interminable or exterminating war with one another, upon the
indefeasible and unalienable rights of man.
The event of a conflict of arms, between the Union and one
of its members, whether terminating in victory or defeat, would
be but an alternative of calamity to all. In the holy records of
antiquity, we have two examples of a confederation ruptured by
the severance of its members; one of which resulted, after three
desperate battles, in the extermination of the seceding tribe. And
the victorious people, instead of exulting in shouts of triumph,
<< came to the House of God, and abode there till even before
God; and lifted up their voices, and wept sore, and said, -0
Lord God of Israel, why is this come to pass in Israel, that there
should be to-day one tribe lacking in Israel ? ” The other was a
successful example of resistance against tyrannical taxation, and
severed forever the confederacy, the fragments forming separate
kingdoms; and from that day, their history presents an unbroken
series of disastrous alliances and exterminating wars- of assas-
sinations, conspiracies, revolts, and rebellions, until both parts of
the confederacy sunk in tributary servitude to the nations around
them; till the countrymen of David and Solomon hung their
harps upon the willows of Babylon, and were totally lost among
the multitudes of the Chaldean and Assyrian monarchies, the
most despised portion of their slaves. "
In these mournful memorials of their fate, we may behold
the sure, too sure prognostication of our own, from the hour
when force shall be substituted for deliberation in the settlement
of our Constitutional questions. This is the deplorable alternative
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144
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
1
race.
- the extirpation of the seceding member, or the never-ceasing
struggle of two rival confederacies, ultimately bending the neck of
both under the yoke of foreign domination, or the despotic sov-
ereignty of a conqueror at home. May Heaven avert the omen!
The destinies of not only our posterity, but of the human race,
are at stake.
Let no such melancholy forebodings intrude upon the festivi.
ities of this anniversary. Serene skies and balmy breezes are not
congenial to the climate of freedom. Progressive improvement
in the condition of man is apparently the purpose of a superin-
tending Providence. That purpose will not be disappointed. In
no delusion of national vanity, but with a feeling of profound
gratitude to the God of our Fathers, let us indulge the cheering
hope and belief, that our country and her people have been
selected as instruments for preparing and maturing much of the
good yet in reserve for the welfare and happiness of the human
Much good has already been effected by the solemn pro-
clamation of our principles, much more by the illustration of our
example. The tempest which threatens desolation, may be des-
tined only to purify the atmosphere. It is not in tranquil ease
and enjoyment that the active energies of mankind are displayed.
Toils and dangers are the trials of the soul. Doomed to the
first by his sentence at the fall, man, by his submission, converts
them into pleasures. The last are since the fall the condition of
his existence. To see them in advance, to guard against them
by all the suggestions of prudence, to meet them with the com-
posure of unyielding resistance, and to abide with firm resigna-
tion the final dispensation of Him who rules the ball, — these are
the dictates of philosophy — these are the precepts of religion –
these are the principles and consolations of patriotism; these re-
main when all is lost — and of these is composed the spirit of
independence - the spirit embodied in that beautiful personifica-
tion of the poet, which may each of you, my countrymen, to the
last hour of his life, apply to himself:
“Thy spirit, Independence, let me share,
Lord of the lion heart and eagle eye!
Thy steps I follow, with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky. ”
In the course of nature, the voice which now addresses you
must soon cease to be heard upon earth. Life and all which it
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SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
145
inherits, lose of their value as it draws toward its close. But for
most of you, my friends and neighbors, long and many years of
futurity are yet in store. May they be years of freedom — years
of prosperity — years of happiness, ripening for immortality! But,
were the breath which now gives utterance to my feelings, the
last vital air I should draw, my expiring words to you and your
children should be, INDEPENDENCE AND UNION FOREVER!
SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
(1805-1848)
T
His English poet, whose hymn, Nearer, my God, to Thee,' is
known wherever the English language is spoken, was born
at Great Harlow, Essex, England, in 1805. She was the
daughter of Benjamin Flower, who in 1799 was prosecuted for plain
speaking in his paper, the Cambridge Intelligencer. From the out-
come of his trial is to be dated the liberty of political discussion
in England. Her mother was Eliza Gould, who first met her future
husband in jail, whither she had gone on a visit to assure him of her
sympathy. She also had suffered for liberal opinions. From their
parents two daughters inherited a distinguished nobility and purity of
character. Eliza excelled in the composition of music for congrega-
tional worship, and arranged a musical service for the Unitarian
South Place Chapel, London. Sarah contributed first to the Monthly
Repository, conducted by W. J. Fox, her Unitarian pastor, in whose
family she lived after her father's death. In 1834 she married William
Bridges Adams. Her delicate health gave way under the shock of
her sister's death in 1846, and she died of decline in 1848.
Her poetic genius found expression both in the drama and in
hymns. Her play, Vivia Perpetua' (1841 ), tells of the author's rapt
aspiration after an ideal, symbolized in a pagan's conversion to Christ-
ianity. She published also “The Royal Progress,' a ballad (1845), on
the giving up of the feudal privileges of the Isle of Wight to Edward
I. ; and poems upon the humanitarian interests which the Anti-Corn-
Law League endeavored to further. Her hymns are the happiest
expressions of the religious trust, resignation, and sweetness of her
nature.
Nearer, my God, to Thee,' was written for the South Place
Chapel service. There are stories of its echoes having been heard
from a dilapidated log cabin in Arkansas, from a remote corner of
the north of England, and from the Heights of Benjamin in the Holy
1-10
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146
SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
Land. But even its devotion and humility have not escaped censure —
arising, perhaps, from denominational bias. The fault found with it
is the fault of Addison's (How are thy servants blessed, O Lord,'
and the fault of the Psalmody begun by Sternhold and Hopkins,
which, published in Geneva in 1556, electrified the congregation of
six thousand souls in Elizabeth's reign,- it has no direct reference
to Jesus. Compilers of hymn-books have sought to rectify what they
deem a lapse in Christian spirit by the substitution of a verse begin-
ing “Christ alone beareth me. ” But the quality of the interpolated
verse is so inferior to the lyric itself that it has not found general
acceptance. Others, again, with an excess of zeal, have endeavored
to substitute «the Cross” for “a cross” in the first stanza.
An even share of its extraordinary vogue must in bare justice be
credited to the tune which Dr. Lowell Mason has made an insepa-
rable part of it; though this does not detract in the least from its
own high merit, or its capacity to satisfy the feelings of a devout
soul.
gust 19th had the character of a preconcerted duel.
The wind was blowing fresh from the northwest, with the sea
running high. Dacres backed his main topsail and waited. Hull
shortened sail, and ran down before the wind. For about an
hour the two ships wore and wore again, trying to get advantage
of position; until at last, a few minutes before six o'clock, they
came together side by side, within pistol shot, the wind almost
astern, and running before it, they pounded each other with all
their strength. As rapidly as the guns could be worked, the
Constitution poured in broadside after broadside, double-shotted
with round and grape; and without exaggeration, the echo of
these guns startled the world. "In less than thirty minutes from
the time we got alongside of the enemy,” reported Hull, she
was left without a spar standing, and the hull cut to pieces in
such a manner as to make it difficult to keep her above water. ”
That Dacres should have been defeated was not surprising;
that he should have expected to win was an example of British
arrogance that explained and excused the war. The length of the
Constitution was one hundred and seventy-three feet, that of the
Guerrière was one hundred and fifty-six feet; the extreme breadth
of the Constitution was forty-four feet, that of the Guerrière was
forty feet: or within a few inches in both cases. The Consti-
tution carried thirty-two long twenty-four-pounders, the Guerri.
ère thirty long eighteen-pounders and two long twelve-pounders;
the Constitution carried twenty thirty-two-pound carronades, the
Guerrière sixteen. In every respect, and in proportion of ten to
seven, the Constitution was the better ship; her crew was more
numerous in proportion of ten to six. Dacres knew this very
nearly as well as it was known to Hull, yet he sought a duel.
What he did not know was that in a still greater proportion
the American officers and crew were better and more intelligent
seamen than the British, and that their passionate wish to repay
old scores gave them extraordinary energy. So much greater
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126
JOHN ADAMS
was the moral superiority than the physical, that while the
Guerrière's force counted as seven against ten, her losses counted
as though her force were only two against ten.
Dacres's error cost him dear; for among the Guerrière's crew
of two hundred and seventy-two, seventy-nine were killed or
wounded, and the ship was injured beyond saving before Dacres
realized his mistake, although he needed only thirty minutes of
close fighting for the purpose. He never fully understood the
causes of his defeat, and never excused it by pleading, as he
might have done, the great superiority of his enemy.
Hull took his prisoners on board the Constitution, and after
blowing up the Guerrière sailed for Boston, where he arrived on
the morning of August 30th. The Sunday silence of the Puritan
city broke into excitement as the news passed through the quiet
streets that the Constitution was below in the outer harbor with
Dacres and his crew prisoners on board. No experience of his-
tory ever went to the heart of New England more directly than
this victory, so peculiarly its own: but the delight was not confined
to New England, and extreme though it seemed, it was still not
extravagant; for however small the affair might appear on the
general scale of the world's battles, it raised the United States
in one half-hour to the rank of a first class Power in the world.
Selections used by permission of Charles Scribner's Sons, Publishers.
JOHN ADAMS
(1735-1826)
OHN ADAMS, second President of the United States, was born
at Braintree, Mass. , October 19th, 1735, and died there July
4th, 1826, the year after his son too was inaugurated Presi-
dent. He was the first conspicuous member of an enduringly pow-
erful and individual family. The Adams race have mostly been
vehement, proud, pugnacious, and independent, with hot tempers and
strong wills; but with high ideals, dramatic devotion to duty, and the
intense democratic sentiment so often found united with personal
aristocracy of feeling. They have been men of affairs first, with large
practical ability, but with a deep strain of the man of letters which
in this generation has outshone the other faculties; strong-headed and
hard-working students, with powerful memories and fluent gifts of
expression.
## p. 126 (#141) ############################################
the
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JOHN ADAMS
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JOHN ADAMS.
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JOHN ADAMS
127
All these characteristics went to make up John Adams; but their
enumeration does not furnish a complete picture of him, or reveal the
virile, choleric, masterful man. And he was far more lovable and far
more popular than his equally great son, also a typical Adams, from
the same cause which produced some of his worst blunders and mis-
fortunes,- a generous impulsiveness of feeling which made it impos-
sible for him to hold his tongue at the wrong time and place for
talking. But so fervid, combative, and opinionated a man was sure
to gain much more hate than love; because love results from compre-
hension, which only the few close to him could have, while hate —
toward an honest man—is the outcome of ignorance, which most of
the world cannot avoid. Admiration and respect, however, he had
from the majority of his party at the worst of times; and the best
encomium on him is that the closer his public acts are examined, the
more credit they reflect not only on his abilities but on his unselfish-
ness.
Born of a line of Massachusetts farmers, he graduated from Har-
vard in 1755. After teaching a grammar school and beginning to read
theology, he studied law and began practice in 1758, soon becoming
a leader at the bar and in public life. In 1764 he married the noble
and delightful woman whose letters furnish unconscious testimony to
his lovable qualities. All through the germinal years of the Revolu-
tion he was one of the foremost patriots, steadily opposing any
abandonment or compromise of essential rights. In 1765 he was
counsel for Boston with Otis and Gridley to support the town's
memorial against the Stamp Act. In 1766 he was selectman.
In 1768
the royal government offered him the post of advocate-general in the
Court of Admiralty, - a lucrative bribe to desert the opposition; but
he refused it. Yet in 1770, as a matter of high professional duty, he
became counsel (successfully) for the British soldiers on trial for the
« Boston Massacre. ) Though there was a present uproar of abuse,
Mr. Adams was shortly after elected Representative to the General
Court by more than three to one. In March, 1774, he contemplated
writing the “History of the Contest between Britain and America! »
On June 17th he presided over the meeting at Faneuil Hall to con-
sider the Boston Port Bill, and at the same hour was elected Repre-
sentative to the first Congress at Philadelphia (September 1) by the
Provincial Assembly held in defiance of the government. Returning
thence, he engaged in newspaper debate on the political issues till
the battle of Lexington.
Shortly after, he again journeyed to Philadelphia to the Congress
of May 5th, 1775; where he did on his own motion, to the disgust
of his Northern associates and the reluctance even of the Southern-
ers, one of the most important and decisive acts of the Revolution,-
## p. 128 (#146) ############################################
128
JOHN ADAMS
induced Congress to adopt the forces in New England as a national
army and put George Washington of Virginia at its head, thus
engaging the Southern colonies irrevocably in the war and securing
the one man who could make it a success. In 1776 he was a chief
agent in carrying a declaration of independence. He remained in
Congress till November, 1777, as head of the War Department, very
useful and laborious though making one dreadful mistake: he was
largely responsible for the disastrous policy of ignoring the just
claims and decent dignity of the military commanders, which lost the
country some of its best officers and led directly to Arnold's treason.
His reasons, exactly contrary to his wont, were good abstract logic
but thorough practical nonsense.
In December, 1777, he was appointed commissioner to France to
succeed Silas Deane, and after being chased by an English man-of-
war (which he wanted to fight) arrived at Paris in safety. There
he reformed a very bad state of affairs; but thinking it absurd to
keep three envoys at one court (Dr. Franklin and Arthur Lee were
there before him), he induced Congress to abolish his office, and
returned in 1779. Chosen a delegate to the Massachusetts constitu-
tional convention, he was called away from it to be sent again to
France. There he remained as Franklin's colleague, detesting and
distrusting him and the French foreign minister, Vergerines, embroil-
ing himself with both and earning a cordial return of his warmest
dislike from both, till July, 1780. He then went to Holland as volun-
teer minister, and in 1782 was formally recognized as from an inde-
pendent nation. Meantime Vergennes intrigued with all his might to
have Adams recalled, and actually succeeded in so tying his hands
that half the advantages of independence would have been lost but
for his contumacious persistence. In the final negotiations for peace,
he persisted against his instructions in making the New England fish-
eries an ultimatum, and saved them. In 1783 he was commissioned
to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain, and in 1785 was
made minister to that power. The wretched state of American affairs
under the Confederation made it impossible to obtain any advantages
for his country, and the vindictive feeling of the English made his
life a purgatory, so that he was glad to come home in 1788.
In the first Presidential election of that year he was elected Vice-
President on the ticket with Washington; and began a feud with
Alexander Hamilton, the mighty leader of the Federalist party and
Chief organizer of our governmental machine, which ended in the
overthrow of the party years before its time, and had momentous
personal and literary results as well. He was as good a Federalist
as Hamilton, and felt as much right to be leader if he could; Hamil-
ton would not surrender his leadership, and the rivalry never ended
## p. 129 (#147) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
129
till Hamilton's murder. In 1796 he was elected President against
Jefferson. His Presidency is recognized as one of the ablest and most
useful on the roll; but its personal memoirs are most painful and
scandalous. The cabinet were nearly all Hamiltonians, regularly laid
all the official secrets before Hamilton, and took advice from him to
thwart the President. They disliked Mr. Adams's overbearing ways
and obtrusive vanity, considered his policy destructive to the party
and injurious to the country, and felt that loyalty to these involved
and justified disloyalty to him. Finally his best act brought on an
explosion. The French Directory had provoked a war with this coun-
try, which the Hamiltonian section of the leaders and much of the
party hailed with delight; but showing signs of a better spirit, Mr.
Adams, without consulting his Cabinet, who he knew would oppose it
almost or quite unanimously, nominated a commission to frame a
treaty with France. The storm of fury that broke on him from his
party has rarely been surpassed, even in the case of traitors outright,
and he was charged with being little better. He was renominated
for President in 1800, but beaten by Jefferson, owing to the defections
in his own party, largely of Hamilton's producing. The Federalist
party never won another election; the Hamilton section laid its death
to Mr. Adams, and American history is hot with the fires of this
battle even yet.
Mr. Adams's later years were spent at home, where he was always
interested in public affairs and sometimes much too free in comments
on them; where he read immensely and wrote somewhat. He
heartily approved his son's break with the Federalists on the Em-
bargo. He died on the same day as Jefferson, both on the fiftieth
anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
As a writer, Mr. Adams's powers show best in the work which
can hardly be classed as literature, — his forcible and bitter political
letters, diatribes, and polemics. As in his life, his merits and defects
not only lie side by side, but spring from the same source, — his
vehemence, self-confidence, and impatience of obstruction. He writes
impetuously because he feels impetuously. With little literary grace,
he possesses the charm that belongs to clear and energetic thought
and sense transfused with hot emotion. John Fiske goes so far as to
say that “as a writer of English, John Adams in many respects sur-
passed all his American contemporaries. ” He was by no means with-
out humor, - a characteristic which shows in some of his portraits, —
and sometimes realized the humorous aspects of his own intense and
exaggerative temperament. His remark about Timothy Pickering,
that “under the simple appearance of a bald head and straight hair,
he conceals the most ambitious designs,” is perfectly self-conscious in
its quaint naiveté.
1-9
## p. 130 (#148) ############################################
130
JOHN ADAMS
His Life and Works,' edited by his grandson, Charles Francis
Adams, Sr. , in ten volumes, is the great storehouse of his writings.
The best popular account of his life is by John T. Morse, Jr. , in the
(American Statesmen ' series.
AT THE FRENCH COURT
From his Diary, June 7th, 1778, with his later comments in brackets
WENI
ENT to Versailles, in company with Mr. Lee, Mr. Izard
and his lady, Mr. Lloyd and his lady, and Mr. François.
Saw the grand procession of the Knights du Saint-Esprit,
or du Cordon Bleu. At nine o'clock at night, went to the grand
couvert, and saw the king, queen, and royal family, at supper;
had a fine seat and situation close by the royal family, and had
a distinct and full view of the royal pair.
[Our objects were to see the ceremonies of the knights, and
in the evening the public supper of the royal family. The
kneelings, the bows, and the courtesies of the knights, the
dresses and decorations, the king seated on his throne, his
investiture of a new created knight with the badges and orna-
ments of the order, and his majesty's profound and reverential
bow before the altar as he retired, were novelties and curiosities
to me, but surprised me much less than the patience and perse-
verance with which they all kneeled, for two hours together,
upon the hard marble of which the floor of the chapel was made.
The distinction of the blue ribbon was very dearly purchased at
the price of enduring this painful operation four times in a year.
The Count de Vergennes confessed to me that he was almost
dead with the pain of it. And the only insinuation I ever heard,
that the king was in any degree touched by the philosophy of
the age, was, that he never discovered so much impatience,
under any of the occurrences of his life, as in going through
those tedious ceremonies of religion, to which so many hours of
his life were condemned by the catholic church.
The queen was attended by her ladies to the gallery opposite
to the altar, placed in the centre of the seat, and there left alone
by the other ladies, who all retired. She was an object too
sublime and beautiful for my dull pen to describe. I leave this
enterprise to Mr. Burke. But in his description, there is more
of the orator than of the philosopher. Her dress was everything
that art and wealth could make it. One of the maids of honor
## p. 131 (#149) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
131
a
told me she had diamonds upon her person to the value of
eighteen millions of livres; and I always thought her majesty
much beholden to her dress, Mr. Burke saw her probably but
once. I have seen her fifty times perhaps, and in all the varie-
ties of her dresses. She had fine complexion, indicating
perfect health, and was a handsome woman in her face and
figure. But I have seen beauties much superior, both in counte-
nance and form, in France, England, and America.
After the ceremonies of this institution are over, there is a
collection for the poor; and that this closing scene may be as
elegant as any of the former, a young lady of some of the first
families in France is appointed to present the box to the knights.
Her dress must be as rich and elegant, in proportion, as the
Queen's, and her hair, motions, and curtsies must have as much
dignity and grace as those of the knights. It was a curious
entertainment to observe the easy air, the graceful bow, and the
conscious dignity of the knight, in presenting his contribution;
and the corresponding ease, grace, and dignity of the lady, in
receiving it, were not less charming. Every muscle, nerve, and
fibre of both seemed perfectly disciplined to perform its func-
tions. The elevation of the arm, the bend of the elbow, and
every finger in the hand of the knight, in putting his louis d'ors
into the box appeared to be perfectly studied, because it was
perfectly natural. How much devotion there was in all this I
know not, but it was a consummate school to teach the rising
generation the perfection of the French air, and external polite-
ness and good-breeding. I have seen nothing to be compared
to it in any other country.
At nine o'clock we went and saw the king, queen, and royal
family, at the grand couvert. Whether M. François, a gentleman
who undertook upon this occasion to conduct us, had contrived a
plot to gratify the curiosity of the spectators, or whether the
royal family had a fancy to see the raw American at their
leisure, or whether they were willing to gratify him with a con-
venient seat, in which he might see all the royal family, and all
the splendors of the place, I know not; but the scheme could
not have been carried into execution, certainly, without the
orders of the king. I was selected, and summoned indeed, from
all my company, and ordered to a seat close beside the royal
family. The seats on both sides of the hall, arranged like the
seats in a theatre, were all full of ladies of the first rank and
## p. 132 (#150) ############################################
132
JOHN ADAMS
fashion in the kingdom, and there was no room or place for me
but in the midst of them. It was not easy to make room for
one more person. However, room was made, and I was situated
between two ladies, with rows and ranks of ladies above and
below me, and on the right hand and on the left, and ladies
only. My dress was a decent French dress, becoming the station
I held, but not to be compared with the gold, and diamonds,
and embroidery, about me. I could neither speak nor under
stand the language in a manner to support a conversation, but I
had soon the satisfaction to find it was a silent meeting, and
that nobody spoke a word but the royal family to each other,
and they said very little. The eyes of all the assembly were
turned upon me, and I felt sufficiently humble and mortified, for
I was not a proper object for the criticisms of such a company.
I found myself gazed at, as we in America used to gaze at the
sachems who came to make speeches to us in Congress; but I
thought it very hard if I could not command as much power of
face as one of the chiefs of the Six Nations, and therefore deter-
mined that I would assume a cheerful countenance, enjoy the
scene around me, and observe it as coolly as an astronomer con-
templates the stars. Inscriptions of Fructus Belli were seen on
the ceiling and all about the walls of the room, among paint-
ings of the trophies of war; probably done by the order of
Louis XIV. , who confessed in his dying hour, as his successor
and exemplar Napoleon will probably do, that he had been too
fond of war. The king was the royal carver for himself and all
his family. His majesty ate like a king, and made a royal
supper of solid beef, and other things in proportion.
took a large spoonful of soup, and displayed her fine person and
graceful manners, in alternately looking at the company in vari-
ous parts of the hall, and ordering several kinds of seasoning to
be brought to her, by which she fitted her supper to her taste. )
The queen
THE CHARACTER OF FRANKLIN
From Letter to the Boston Patriot, May 15th, 1811
RANKLIN had a great genius, original, sagacious, and inventive,
ments in the fine arts and the mechanic arts. He had a
vast imagination, equal to the comprehension of the greatest
objects, and capable of a cool and steady comprehension of them.
## p. 133 (#151) ############################################
JOHN ADAMS
133
He had wit at will. He had humor that when he pleased was
delicate and delightful. He had a satire that was good-natured
or caustic, Horace or Juvenal, Swift or Rabelais, at his pleasure.
He had talents for irony, allegory, and fable, that he could adapt
with great skill to the promotion of moral and political truth.
He was master of that infantine simplicity which the French call
naiveté, which never fails to charm in Phædrus and La Fontaine,
from the cradle to the grave. Had he been blessed with the
same advantages of scholastic education in his early youth, and
pursued a course of studies as unembarrassed with occupations
of public and private life as Sir Isaac Newton, he might have
emulated the first philosopher. Although I am not ignorant that
most of his positions and hypotheses have been controverted, I
cannot but think he has added much to the mass of natural
knowledge, and contributed largely to the progress of the human
mind, both by his own writings and by the controversies and
experiments he has excited in all parts of Europe. He had abil.
ities for investigating statistical questions, and in some parts of
his life has written pamphlets and essays upon public topics with
great ingenuity and success; but after my acquaintance with him,
which commenced in Congress in 1775, his excellence as a legis-
lator, a politician, or a negotiator most certainly never appeared.
No sentiment more weak and superficial was ever avowed by the
most absurd philosopher than some of his, particularly one that
he procured to be inserted in the first constitution of Pennsyl-
vania, and for which he had such a fondness as to insert it in
his will. I call it weak, for so it must have been, or hypocritical;
unless he meant by one satiric touch to ridicule his own republic,
or throw it into everlasting contempt.
I must acknowledge, after all, that nothing in life has morti.
fied or grieved me more than the necessity which compelled me
to oppose him so often as I have. He was a man with whom I
always wished to live in friendship, and for that purpose omitted
no demonstration of respect, esteem, and veneration in my power,
until I had unequivocal proofs of his hatred, for no other reason
under the sun but because I gave my judgment in opposition to
his in many points which materially affected the interests of our
country, and in many more which essentially concerned our
happiness, safety, and well-being. I could not and would not
sacrifice the clearest dictates of my understanding and the purest
principles of morals and policy in compliance to Dr. Franklin.
## p. 134 (#152) ############################################
134
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
( 1767-1848)
ate.
he chief distinction in character between John Adams and
his son is the strangest one imaginable, when one remem-
bers that to the fiery, combative, bristling Adams blood was
added an equal strain from the gay, genial, affectionate Abigail Smith.
The son, though of deep inner affections, and even hungering for good-
will if it would come without his help, was on the surface incom-
parably colder, harsher, and thornier than his father, with all the
socially repellent traits of the race and none of the softer ones. The
father could never control his tongue or his temper, and not always
his head; the son never lost the bridle of either, and much of his ter-
rible power in debate came from his ability to make others lose
theirs while perfectly keeping his own. The father had plenty of
warm friends and allies, - at the worst he worked with half a party;
the son in the most superb part of his career had no friends, no
allies, no party except the group of constituents who kept him in
Congress. The father's self-confidence deepened in the son to a soli-
tary and even contemptuous gladiatorship against the entire govern-
ment of the country, for long years of hate and peril. The father's
irritable though generous vanity changed in the son to
an icy
contempt or white-hot scorn of nearly all around him. The father's
spasms of acrimonious judgment steadied in the son to a constant
rancor always finding new objects. But only John Quincy Adams
could have done the work awaiting John Quincy Adams, and each of
his unamiable qualities strengthened his fibre to do it. And if a
man is to be judged by his fruits, Mr. Morse is justified in saying
that he was not only pre-eminent in ability and acquirements, but
more to be honored for profound, immutable honesty of pur-
pose, and broad, noble humanity of aims. ”
It might almost be said that the sixth President of the United
States was cradled in statesmanship. Born July uth, 1767, he was a
little lad of ten when he accompanied his father on the French miss-
ion. Eighteen months elapsed before he returned, and three months
later he was again upon the water, bound once more for the French
capital. There were school days in Paris, and other school days in
Amsterdam and in Leyden; but the boy was only fourteen, — the ma-
ture old child ! — when he went to St. Petersburg as private secretary
and interpreter to Francis Dana, just appointed minister plenipoten-
tiary to the court of the Empress Catherine. Such was his appren-
ticeship to a public career which began in earnest in 1794, and lasted,
even
## p. 134 (#153) ############################################
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## p. 134 (#156) ############################################
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## p. 135 (#157) ############################################
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
135
with slight interruptions, for fifty-four years. Minister to the United
Netherlands, to Russia, to Prussia, and to England; commissioner to
frame the Treaty of Ghent which ended the war of 1812; State Sen-
ator, United States Senator; Secretary of State, a position in which
he made the treaty with Spain which conceded Florida, and enun-
ciated the Monroe Doctrine before Monroe and far more thoroughly
than he; President, and then for many years Member of the National
House of Representatives, - it is strange to find this man writing in
his later years, “My whole life has been a succession of disappoint-
ments. I can scarcely recollect a single instance of success to any-
thing that I ever undertook. ”
It is true, however, that his successes and even his glories always
had some bitter ingredient to spoil their flavor. As United States
Senator he was practically boycotted,” for years, even by his own
party members, because he was an Adams. In 1807 he definitely
broke with the Federalist party- for what he regarded as its slavish
crouching under English outrages, conduct which had been for years
estranging him— by supporting Jefferson's Embargo, as better than
no show of resistance at all; and was for a generation denounced by
the New England Federalists as a renegade for the sake of office and
a traitor to New England. The Massachusetts Legislature practically
censured him in 1808, and he resigned.
His winning of the Presidency brought pain instead of pleasure:
he valued it only as a token of national confidence, got it only as
a minority candidate in a divided party, and was denounced by the
Jacksonians as a corrupt political bargainer. And his later Congress-
ional career, though his chief title to glory, was one long martyrdom
(even though its worst pains were self-inflicted), and he never knew
the immense victory he had actually won.
The "old man eloquent,”
after ceasing to be President, was elected in 1830 by his home
district a Representative in Congress, and regularly re-elected till his
death. For a long time he bore the anti-slavery standard almost
alone in the halls of Congress, a unique and picturesque figure, rous-
ing every demon of hatred in his fellow-members, in constant and
envenomed battle with them, and more than a match for them all.
He fought single-handed for the right of petition as an indefeasible
right, not hesitating to submit a petition from citizens of Virginia
praying for his own expulsion from Congress as a nuisance. In 1836
he presented a petition from one hundred and fifty-eight ladies,
citizens of Massachusetts, "for, I said, I had not yet brought myself
to doubt whether females were citizens. " After eight years of per-
sistent struggle against the « Atherton gag law,” which practically
denied the right of petition in matters relating to slavery, he carried
a vote rescinding it, and nothing of the kind was again enacted. He
## p. 136 (#158) ############################################
136
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
had a fatal stroke of paralysis on the floor of Congress February
21st, 1848, and died two days later.
As a writer he was perspicuous, vigorous, and straightforward.
He had entered Harvard in the middle of the college course, and
been graduated with honors. He had then studied and practiced
law. He was Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard from
1806 to 1809, and was well drilled in the use of language, but was
too downright in his temper and purposes to spend much labor upon
artistic effects. He kept an elaborate diary during the greater part
of his life, - since published in twelve volumes of “Memoirs” by
his son Charles Francis Adams; a vast storehouse of material relat-
ing to the political history of the country, but, as published, largely
restricted to public affairs. He delivered orations on Lafayette, on
Madison, on Monroe, on Independence, and on the Constitution; pub-
lished essays on the Masonic Institution and various other matters;
a report on weights and measures, of enormous labor and permanent
value; Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory; a tale in verse on the Con-
quest of Ireland, with the title Dermot MacMorrogh'; an account of
Travels in Silesia; and a volume of Poems of Religion and Society. '
He had some facility in rhyme, but his judgment was not at fault in
informing him that he was not a poet. Mr. Morse says that “No
man can have been more utterly void of a sense of humor or an
appreciation of wit ”; and yet he very fairly anticipated Holmes in
his poem on (The Wants of Man,' and hits rather neatly a familiar
foible in the verse with which he begins Dermot MacMorrogh':-
«'Tis strange how often readers will indulge
Their wits a mystic meaning to discover;
Secrets ne'er dreamt of by the bard divulge,
And where he shoots a duck, will find a plover;
Satiric shafts from every line promulge,
Detect a tyrant where he draws a lover:
Nay, so intent his hidden thoughts to see,
Cry, if he paint a scoundrel —That means me. ) »
Selections from Letters and Memoirs used by permission of
J. B. Lippincott Company
LETTER TO HIS FATHER
(At the Age of Ten)
D
EAR SIR, - I love to receive letters very well; much better than
I love to write them. I make but a poor figure at compo-
sition, my head is too fickle, my thoughts are running after
birds eggs play and trifles, till I get vexed with myself. Mamma
## p. 137 (#159) ############################################
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
137
has a troublesome task to keep me steady, and I own I am
ashamed of myself. I have but just entered the third volume of
Smollett, tho' I had designed to have got it half through by this
time. I have determined this week to be more diligent, as Mr.
Thaxter will be absent at Court, and I cannot pursue my other
studies. I have Set myself a Stent and determine to read the 3rd
volume Half out. If I can but keep my resolution, I will write
again at the end of the week and give a better account of myself.
I wish, Sir, you would give me some instructions, with regard to
my time, and advise me how to proportion my Studies and my
Play, in writing, and I will keep them by me, and endeavor to
follow them. I am, dear Sir, with a present determination of
growing better, yours.
P. S. — Sir, if you will be so good as to favor me with a Blank
Book, I will transcribe the most remarkable occurances I meet
with in my reading, which will serve to fix them upon my mind.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
(At the Age of Eighteen)
A "
PRIL 26TH, 1785. — A letter from Mr. Gerry of Feb. 25th Says
that Mr. Adams is appointed Minister to the Court of
London.
I believe he will promote the interests of the United States,
as much as any man, but I fear his duty will induce him to make
exertions which may be detrimental to his health. I wish how-
ever it may be otherwise. Were I now to go with him, probably
my immediate satisfaction might be greater than it will be in
returning to America. After having been traveling for these
seven years almost all over Europe, and having been in the
World, and among company, for three; to return to spend one
or two years in the pale of a College, subjected to all the rules
which I have so long been freed from; then to plunge into the
dry and tedious study of the Law for three years; and afterwards
not expect (however good an opinion I may have of myself) to
bring myself into notice under three or four years more; if ever!
It is really a prospect somewhat discouraging for a youth of my
ambition (for I have ambition, though I hope its object is laud-
able). But still
“Oh! how wretched
Is that poor Man, that hangs on Princes' favors »
## p. 138 (#160) ############################################
138
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
or on those of anybody else. I am determined that so long as I
shall be able to get my own living in an honorable manner, I
will depend upon no one. My Father has been so much taken up
all his lifetime with the interests of the public, that his own for-
tune has suffered by it; so that his children will have to provide
for themselves, which I shall never be able to do, if I loiter away
my precious time in Europe and shun going home until I am
forced to it. With an ordinary share of Common sense which I
hope I enjoy, at least in America I can live independent and free;
and rather than live otherwise I would wish to die before the
time when I shall be left at my own discretion. I have before
me a striking example of the distressing and humiliating situation
a person is reduced to by adopting a different line of conduct,
and I am determined not to fall into the same error.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
JA
ANUARY 14TH, 1831. -I received a letter from John C. Calhoun,
now Vice-President of the United States, relating to his pres-
ent controversy with President Jackson and William H. Craw-
ford. He questions me concerning the letter of General Jackson
to Mr. Monroe which Crawford alleges to have been produced at
the Cabinet meetings on the Seminole War, and asks for copies,
if I think proper to give them, of Crawford's letter to me which
I received last summer, and of my answer. I answered Mr. Cal.
houn's letter immediately, rigorously confining myself to the direct
object of his inquiries. This is a new bursting out of the old and
rancorous feud between Crawford and Calhoun, both parties to
which, after suspending their animosities and combining together
to effect my ruin, are appealing to me for testimony to sustain
themselves each against the other. This is one of the occasions
upon which I shall eminently need the direction of a higher power
to guide me in every step of my conduct. I see my duty to dis-
card all consideration of their treatment of me; to adhere, in
everything that I shall say or write, to the truth; to assert noth-
ing positively of which I am not absolutely certain; to deny
nothing upon which there remains a scruple of doubt upon my
memory; to conceal nothing which it may be lawful to divulge,
and which may promote truth and justice between the parties.
With these principles, I see further the necessity for caution and
prudence in the course I shall take. The bitter enmity of all
## p. 139 (#161) ############################################
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
139
three of the parties - Jackson, Calhoun, and Crawford — against
me, an enmity the more virulent because kindled by their own
ingratitude and injustice to me; the interest which every one of
them, and all their partisans, have in keeping up that load
of obloquy and public odium which their foul calumnies have
brought down upon me; and the disfavor in which I stand before
a majority of the people, excited against me by their artifices;-
their demerits to me are proportioned to the obligations to me -
Jackson's the greatest, Crawford's the next, Calhoun's the least of
positive obligation, but darkened by his double-faced setting him-
self up as a candidate for the Presidency against me in 1821, his
prevarications between Jackson and me in 1824, and his icy.
hearted dereliction of all the decencies of social intercourse with
me, solely from the terror of Jackson, since the 4th of March,
1829. I walk between burning ploughshares; let me be mindful
where I place my foot.
J"
FROM THE MEMOIRS
UNE 7TH, 1833. -The first seedling apple-tree that I had observed
on my return here just out of the ground was on the 22d
of April. It had grown slowly but constantly since, and had
put out five or six leaves. Last evening, after my return from
Boston, I saw it perfectly sound. This morning I found it broken
off, leaving one lobe of the seed-leaves, and one leaf over it. This
may have been the work of a bug, or perhaps of a caterpillar. It
would not be imaginable to any person free from hobby-horse or
fanciful attachments, how much mortification such an incident oc-
casions. St. Evremond, after removing into the country, returned
to a city life because he found himself in despair for the loss of
a pigeon. His conclusion was, that rural life induced exorbitant
attachment to insignificant objects. My experience is conformable
to this. My natural propensity was to raise trees, fruit and forest,
from the seed. I had it in early ġouth, but the course of my life
deprived me of the means of pursuing the bent of my inclina-
tion. One shellbark-walnut-tree in my garden, the root of which
I planted 8th October, 1804, and one Mazzard cherry-tree in the
grounds north of the house, the stone of which I planted about
the same time, are the only remains of my experiments of so
ancient a date. Had my life been spent in the country, and my
experiments commenced while I was at College, I should now
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
have a large fruit garden, flourishing orchards of native fruit, and
very valuable forests; instead of which I have a nursery of about
half an acre of ground, half full of seedlings, from five years to
five days old, bearing for the first time perhaps twenty peaches,
and a few blossoms of apricots and cherries; and hundreds of
seedlings of the present year perishing from day to day before my
eyes.
FROM THE MEMOIRS
Spevening in the multitudinous whimses olevar disabled mind
EPTEMBER 9TH, 1833. — Cold and cloudy day, clearing off toward
In the multitudinous whimseys of a disabled mind
and body, the thick-coming fancies often come to me that
the events which affect my life and adventures are specially
shaped to disappoint my purposes. My whole life has been a
succession of disappointments. I can scarcely recollect a single
instance of success to anything that I ever undertook. Yet, with
fervent gratitude to God, I confess that my life has been equally
marked by great and signal successes which I neither aimed at
nor anticipated. Fortune, by which I understand Providence, has
showered blessings upon me profusely. But they have been
blessings unforeseen and unsought. «Non nobis Domine, non
nobis, sed nomini tuo da gloriam ! ” I ought to have been taught
by it three lessons:-1. Of implicit reliance upon Providence.
Of humility and humiliation; the thorough conviction of my
own impotence to accomplish anything. 3. Of resignation; and
not to set my heart upon anything which can be taken from me
or denied.
2.
THE MISSION OF AMERICA
A
From his Fourth of July Oration at Washington, 1821
ND now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned
philosophers of the older world, the first observers of nuta.
tion and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and
invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and shrapnel
shells, should find their hearts disposed to inquire, What has
America done for mankind ? let our answer be this:— America,
with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as
nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of
human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government.
America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among
a
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
141
them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them
the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous
reciprocity. She has uniformly spoken among them, though often
to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal
liberty, equal justice, and equal rights. She has, in the lapse of
nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the
independence of other nations, while asserting and maintaining
her own. She has abstained from interference in the concerns of
others, even when the conflict has been for principles to which
she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She
has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of
that Aceldama, the European World, will be contests between
inveterate power and emerging right. Wherever the standard of
freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there
will her heart, her benedictions, and her prayers be. But she
goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the
well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the
champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend
the general cause, by the countenance of her voice, and the
benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by
once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even
the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself,
beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and
intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume
the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental
maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to
force. The frontlet upon her brows would no longer beam with
the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its
stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in
false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and
power. She might become the dictatress of the world; she would
no longer be the ruler of her own spirit.
THE RIGHT OF PETITION
Quoted in Memoir by Josiah Quincy
IR, it is . . . well known that, from the time I entered this
house, down to the present day, I have felt it a sacred duty
to present any petition, couched in respectful language, from
any citizen of the United States, be its object what it may, - be
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
the prayer of it that in which I could concur, or that to which I
was utterly opposed. I adhere to the right of petition; and let
me say here that, let the petition be, as the gentleman from
Virginia has stated, from free negroes, prostitutes, as he supposes,
for he says there is one put on this paper, and he infers that
the rest are of the same description, — that has not altered my
opinion at all. Where is your law that says that the mean, the
low, and the degraded, shall be deprived of the right of petition,
if their moral character is not good? Where, in the land of free-
men, was the right of petition ever placed on the exclusive basis
of morality and virtue ? Petition is supplication - it is entreaty -
it is prayer! And where is the degree of vice or immorality
which shall deprive the citizen of the right to supplicate for a
boon, or to pray for mercy ? Where is such a law to be found ?
It does not belong to the most abject despotism. There is no
absolute monarch on earth who is not compelled, by the constitu-
tion of his country, to receive the petitions of his people, whoso-
ever they may be. The Sultan of Constantinople cannot walk
the streets and refuse to receive petitions from the meanest and
vilest in the land. This is the law even of despotism; and what
does your law say ? Does it say, that, before presenting a peti-
tion, you shall look into it and see whether it comes from the
virtuous, and the great, and the mighty? No, sir; it says no such
thing. The right of petition belongs to all; and so far from
refusing to present a petition because it might come from those
low in the estimation of the world, it would be an additional
incentive, if such an incentive were wanting.
NULLIFICATION
From his Fourth of July Oration at Quincy, 1831
N"
ULLIFICATION is the provocation to that brutal and foul contest
of force, which has hitherto baffled all the efforts of the
European and Southern American nations, to introduce
among them constitutional governments of liberty and order. It
strips us of that peculiar and unimitated characteristic of all our
legislation - free debate; it makes the bayonet the arbiter of law;
it has no argument but the thunderbolt. It were senseless to
imagine that twenty-three States of the Union would suffer their
laws to be trampled upon by the despotic mandate of one. The
act of nullification would itself be null and void. Force st be
-
-
-
-
--
---
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JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
143
called in to execute the law of the Union. Force must be applied
by the nullifying State to resist its execution -
“Ate, hot from Hell,
Cries Havoc! and lets slip the dogs of war. ”
The blood of brethren is shed by each other. The citizen of
the nullifying State is a traitor to his country, by obedience to
the law of his State; a traitor to his State, by obedience to the law
of his country.
The scaffold and the battle-field stream alter-
nately with the blood of their victims. Let this agent but once
intrude upon your deliberations, and Freedom will take her flight
for heaven. The Declaration of Independence will become a phi-
losophical dream, and uncontrolled, despotic sovereignties will
trample with impunity, through a long career of after ages, at
interminable or exterminating war with one another, upon the
indefeasible and unalienable rights of man.
The event of a conflict of arms, between the Union and one
of its members, whether terminating in victory or defeat, would
be but an alternative of calamity to all. In the holy records of
antiquity, we have two examples of a confederation ruptured by
the severance of its members; one of which resulted, after three
desperate battles, in the extermination of the seceding tribe. And
the victorious people, instead of exulting in shouts of triumph,
<< came to the House of God, and abode there till even before
God; and lifted up their voices, and wept sore, and said, -0
Lord God of Israel, why is this come to pass in Israel, that there
should be to-day one tribe lacking in Israel ? ” The other was a
successful example of resistance against tyrannical taxation, and
severed forever the confederacy, the fragments forming separate
kingdoms; and from that day, their history presents an unbroken
series of disastrous alliances and exterminating wars- of assas-
sinations, conspiracies, revolts, and rebellions, until both parts of
the confederacy sunk in tributary servitude to the nations around
them; till the countrymen of David and Solomon hung their
harps upon the willows of Babylon, and were totally lost among
the multitudes of the Chaldean and Assyrian monarchies, the
most despised portion of their slaves. "
In these mournful memorials of their fate, we may behold
the sure, too sure prognostication of our own, from the hour
when force shall be substituted for deliberation in the settlement
of our Constitutional questions. This is the deplorable alternative
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144
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
1
race.
- the extirpation of the seceding member, or the never-ceasing
struggle of two rival confederacies, ultimately bending the neck of
both under the yoke of foreign domination, or the despotic sov-
ereignty of a conqueror at home. May Heaven avert the omen!
The destinies of not only our posterity, but of the human race,
are at stake.
Let no such melancholy forebodings intrude upon the festivi.
ities of this anniversary. Serene skies and balmy breezes are not
congenial to the climate of freedom. Progressive improvement
in the condition of man is apparently the purpose of a superin-
tending Providence. That purpose will not be disappointed. In
no delusion of national vanity, but with a feeling of profound
gratitude to the God of our Fathers, let us indulge the cheering
hope and belief, that our country and her people have been
selected as instruments for preparing and maturing much of the
good yet in reserve for the welfare and happiness of the human
Much good has already been effected by the solemn pro-
clamation of our principles, much more by the illustration of our
example. The tempest which threatens desolation, may be des-
tined only to purify the atmosphere. It is not in tranquil ease
and enjoyment that the active energies of mankind are displayed.
Toils and dangers are the trials of the soul. Doomed to the
first by his sentence at the fall, man, by his submission, converts
them into pleasures. The last are since the fall the condition of
his existence. To see them in advance, to guard against them
by all the suggestions of prudence, to meet them with the com-
posure of unyielding resistance, and to abide with firm resigna-
tion the final dispensation of Him who rules the ball, — these are
the dictates of philosophy — these are the precepts of religion –
these are the principles and consolations of patriotism; these re-
main when all is lost — and of these is composed the spirit of
independence - the spirit embodied in that beautiful personifica-
tion of the poet, which may each of you, my countrymen, to the
last hour of his life, apply to himself:
“Thy spirit, Independence, let me share,
Lord of the lion heart and eagle eye!
Thy steps I follow, with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky. ”
In the course of nature, the voice which now addresses you
must soon cease to be heard upon earth. Life and all which it
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SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
145
inherits, lose of their value as it draws toward its close. But for
most of you, my friends and neighbors, long and many years of
futurity are yet in store. May they be years of freedom — years
of prosperity — years of happiness, ripening for immortality! But,
were the breath which now gives utterance to my feelings, the
last vital air I should draw, my expiring words to you and your
children should be, INDEPENDENCE AND UNION FOREVER!
SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
(1805-1848)
T
His English poet, whose hymn, Nearer, my God, to Thee,' is
known wherever the English language is spoken, was born
at Great Harlow, Essex, England, in 1805. She was the
daughter of Benjamin Flower, who in 1799 was prosecuted for plain
speaking in his paper, the Cambridge Intelligencer. From the out-
come of his trial is to be dated the liberty of political discussion
in England. Her mother was Eliza Gould, who first met her future
husband in jail, whither she had gone on a visit to assure him of her
sympathy. She also had suffered for liberal opinions. From their
parents two daughters inherited a distinguished nobility and purity of
character. Eliza excelled in the composition of music for congrega-
tional worship, and arranged a musical service for the Unitarian
South Place Chapel, London. Sarah contributed first to the Monthly
Repository, conducted by W. J. Fox, her Unitarian pastor, in whose
family she lived after her father's death. In 1834 she married William
Bridges Adams. Her delicate health gave way under the shock of
her sister's death in 1846, and she died of decline in 1848.
Her poetic genius found expression both in the drama and in
hymns. Her play, Vivia Perpetua' (1841 ), tells of the author's rapt
aspiration after an ideal, symbolized in a pagan's conversion to Christ-
ianity. She published also “The Royal Progress,' a ballad (1845), on
the giving up of the feudal privileges of the Isle of Wight to Edward
I. ; and poems upon the humanitarian interests which the Anti-Corn-
Law League endeavored to further. Her hymns are the happiest
expressions of the religious trust, resignation, and sweetness of her
nature.
Nearer, my God, to Thee,' was written for the South Place
Chapel service. There are stories of its echoes having been heard
from a dilapidated log cabin in Arkansas, from a remote corner of
the north of England, and from the Heights of Benjamin in the Holy
1-10
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146
SARAH FLOWER ADAMS
Land. But even its devotion and humility have not escaped censure —
arising, perhaps, from denominational bias. The fault found with it
is the fault of Addison's (How are thy servants blessed, O Lord,'
and the fault of the Psalmody begun by Sternhold and Hopkins,
which, published in Geneva in 1556, electrified the congregation of
six thousand souls in Elizabeth's reign,- it has no direct reference
to Jesus. Compilers of hymn-books have sought to rectify what they
deem a lapse in Christian spirit by the substitution of a verse begin-
ing “Christ alone beareth me. ” But the quality of the interpolated
verse is so inferior to the lyric itself that it has not found general
acceptance. Others, again, with an excess of zeal, have endeavored
to substitute «the Cross” for “a cross” in the first stanza.
An even share of its extraordinary vogue must in bare justice be
credited to the tune which Dr. Lowell Mason has made an insepa-
rable part of it; though this does not detract in the least from its
own high merit, or its capacity to satisfy the feelings of a devout
soul.
