Quotes from John Adams
I have accepted a seat in the House of Representatives, and thereby have consented to my own ruin, to your ruin, and to the ruin of our children. I give you this warning that you may prepare your mind for your fate.
- John Adams
The fundamental law of the militia is, that it be created, directed and commanded by the laws, and ever for the support of the laws.
- John Adams
I will insist that the Hebrews have done more to civilize man than any other nation.
- John Adams
Did you ever see a portrait of a great man without perceiving strong traits of pain and anxiety?
- John Adams
The happiness of man, as well as his dignity, consists in virtue.
- John Adams
I Pray Heaven to bestow the best of blessing on this house, and on ALL that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof!
- John Adams
To believe all men honest is folly. To believe none is something worse.
- John Adams
No good government but what is republican... the very definition of a republic is 'an empire of laws, and not of men.'
- John Adams
It already appears, that there must be in every society of men superiors and inferiors, because God has laid in the constitution and course of nature the foundations of the distinction.
- John Adams
[I] never understood [what a republican government was and] I believe no other man ever did or ever will.
- John Adams
If there is a form of government, then, whose principle and foundation is virtue, will not every sober man acknowledge it better calculated to promote the general happiness than any other form?
- John Adams
Education makes a greater difference between man and man than nature has made between man and brute.
- John Adams