John Adams

Fear is the foundation of most governments.

— John Adams

I shall have the liberty to think for myself.

— John Adams

To be good, and to do good, is all we have to do.

— John Adams

Where annual elections end, there slavery begins

— John Adams

“In general, our generals were out generalled.”

— John Adams

Virtue is not always amiable.

— John Adams

Politics are a labyrinth without a clue.

— John Adams

Pray how does your asparagus perform?

— John Adams

The balance of power in a society accompanies the balance of property in land.

— John Adams

We hold that each man is the best judge of his own interest.

— John Adams

“...I say, that Power must never be trusted without a check.”

— John Adams

During the whole time I sat with him in Congress, I never heard him utter three sentences together.

— John Adams

You will never be alone with a poet in your pocket.

— John Adams

“I never saw the face of Cobbett...I should not know him if I met him in my porridge dish.”

— John Adams

The United States is not a Christian nation any more than it is a Jewish or a Mohammedan nation.

— John Adams

Modesty is a virtue that can never thrive in public.

— John Adams

A taste for literature and a turn for business, united in the same person, never fails to make a great man.

— John Adams

Grief drives men into habits of serious reflection, sharpens the understanding, and softens the heart

— John Adams

We electors have an important constitutional power placed in our hands; we have a check upon two branches of the legislature.

— John Adams

The frightful engines of ecclesiastical councils, of diabolical malice, and Calvinistical good-nature never failed to terrify me exceedingly whenever I thought of…

— John Adams

Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the…

— John Adams

I pray Heaven to bestow the best of Blessings on this House and on all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none…

— John Adams

If national pride is ever justifiable or excusable it is when it springs, not from power or riches, grandeur or glory, but…

— John Adams

It's of more importance to community that innocence should be protected than it is that guilt should be punished

— John Adams

I didn't grow up imagining myself as an opera composer. Only once in my entire adolescence did I attend an opera. I…

— John Adams

As good government is an empire of laws, how shall your laws be made? In a large society, inhabiting an extensive country,…

— John Adams

The law no passion can disturb. 'Tis void of desire and fear, lust and anger. 'Tis mens sine affectu, written reason, retaining…

— John Adams

The dignity and stability of government in all its branches, the morals of the people, and every blessing of society depend so…

— John Adams

I am well pleased with what I hear of you: The principal Satisfaction I can expect in Life, in future will be…

— John Adams

Let the pulpit resound with the doctrines and sentiments of religious liberty... Let us hear the dignity of his [man's] nature, and…

— John Adams

A representative assembly, although extremely well qualified, and absolutely necessary, as a branch of the legislative, is unfit to exercise the executive…

— John Adams

Your Letters concerning Miss N. have given me as much Concern as they ought-not knowing the Character nor what to advise, but…

— John Adams

The date will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be…

— John Adams

Thus, experience has ever shown, that education, as well as religion, aristocracy, as well as democracy and monarchy, are, singly, totally inadequate…

— John Adams

Suppose a nation, rich and poor, high and low, ten millions in number, all assembled together; not more than one or two…

— John Adams

The good of the governed is the end, and rewards and punishments are the means, of all government. The government of the…

— John Adams

We should be unfaithful to ourselves if we should ever lose sight of the danger to our Liberties if anything partial or…

— John Adams

“...The Presidential election has given me less anxiety than I myself could have imagined. The next administration will be a troublesome one,…

— John Adams

Liberty, according to my metaphysics, is an intellectual quality, an attribute that belongs not to fate nor chance. Neither possesses it, neither…

— John Adams

The Europeans are all deeply tainted with prejudices, both ecclesiastical and temporal, which they can never get rid of. They are all…

— John Adams