Famous John Adams Quotations

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"All men profess honesty as long as they can. To believe all men honest would be folly. To believe none so is something worse."
by John Quincy Adams
"A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows is one of the earliest as well as the keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man."
by John Adams
"I always consider the settlement of America with reverence and wonder, as the opening of a grand scene and design in providence, for the illumination of the ignorant and the emancipation of the slavish part of mankind all over the earth."
by John Adams
"Old minds are like old horses; you must exercise them if you wish to keep them in working order."
by John Adams
"Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak."
by John Adams
"Liberty, according to my metaphysics is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power."
by John Adams
"Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air."
by John Quincy Adams
"Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
by John Quincy Adams
"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."
by John Quincy Adams
"Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost."
by John Adams
"...a revolution of government is the strongest proof that can be given by a people of their virtue and good sense."
by John Adams
"America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own."
by John Quincy Adams
"As we look over the list of the early leaders of the republic, Washington, John Adams, Hamilton, and others, we discern that they were all men who insisted upon being themselves and who refused to truckle to the people. With each succeeding generation, the growing demand of the people that its elective officials shall not lead but merely register the popular will has steadily undermined the independence of those who derive their power from popular election. The persistent refusal of the Adamses to sacrifice the integrity of their own intellectual and moral standards and values for the sake of winning public office or popular favor is another of the measuring rods by which we may measure the divergence of American life from its starting point."
by James Truslow Adams
"As to the history of the revolution, my ideas may be peculiar, perhaps singular. What do we mean by the revolution? The war? That was no part of the revolution; it was only an effect and consequence of it. The revolution was in the minds of the people, and this was effected from 1760 to 1775, in the course of fifteen years, before a drop of blood was shed at Lexington."
by John Adams
"Because power corrupts, society's demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases."
by John Adams
"Books that cannot bear examination, certainly ought not to be established as divine inspiration by penal laws"
by John Adams
"But America is a great, unwieldy Body. Its Progress must be slow. It is like a large Fleet sailing under Convoy. The fleetest Sailors must wait for the dullest and slowest. Like a Coach and sixthe swiftest Horses must be slackened and the slowest quickened, that all may keep an even Pace."
by John Adams
"But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever."
by John Adams
"Children should be educated and instructed in the principles of freedom."
by John Adams
"Facts are stubborn things and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
by John Quincy Adams
"Facts are stubborn things and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence."
by John Adams
"Facts are stubborn things and what ever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passions, they can not alter the state of facts, and evidence."
by John Adams
"Forcing Mr. Duncan to go forward without adequate time to prepare will deprive him of his federal and Idaho Constitutional rights to the effective assistance of counsel, to prepare a defense and to basic fairness and due process."
by John Adams
"Had I been chosen President again, I am certain I could not have lived another year."
by John Adams
"His face is livid, gaunt his whole body, his breath is green with gall; his tongue drips poison."
by John Quincy Adams
"I am well aware of the Toil and Blood and Treasure, that it will cost Us to maintain this Declaration, and support and defend these States. Yet through all the Gloom I can see the Rays of ravishing Light and Glory. I can see that the End is more than worth all the Means. And that Posterity will tryumph in that Days Transaction, even altho We should rue it, which I trust in God We shall not."
by John Adams
"I made the four minutes of the prelude entirely with the sound of hand-tools. At one point it sounds to me like you're inside an electron accelerator. And I've used recordings made by US Marines in 1945 in the Pacific Ocean, which give an idea of the sound and texture of that time."
by John Adams
"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain."
by John Adams
"I read my eyes out and cant read half enough. The more one reads the more one sees we have to read."
by John Adams
"I request that they may be considered in confidence, until the members of Congress are fully possessed of their contents, and shall have had opportunity to deliberate on the consequences of their publication; after which time, I submit them to your wisdom."
by John Adams
"If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader."
by John Adams
"In my many years I have come to a conclusion that one useless man is a shame, two is a law firm, and three or more is a congress."
by John Adams
"In that telling, there were things that were exposed about Dr. King. It cut through me in a way I (had) to do something with their story."
by John Adams
"It must be felt that there is no national security but in the nation's humble acknowledged dependence upon God and His overruling providence"
by John Adams
"It is weakness rather than wickedness which renders men unfit to be trusted with unlimited power"
by John Adams
"It was a matter of please don't kill me. I kept hollering out at them 'save us! save us! save yourself! don't kill us! trying to make them feel some sort of guilt."
by John Adams
"Jefferson still survivies."
by John Adams
"Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people."
by John Adams
"Liberty can not be preserved without a general knowledge among the people."
by John Adams
"My critics feel there was a lack of fairness in the opera, because the Palestinians are treated with romantic harmonies and choruses of longing, and the Jews are treated unfairly because all we hear about them are their bodily ailments. And, yes, you do hear about Marilyn and Leon Klinghoffer's bodily problems, like their hip replacements, because that's exactly the sort of thing that a retired person on a cruise would talk about."
by John Adams
"My critics feel there was a lack of fairness in the opera, because the Palestinians are treated with romantic harmonies and choruses of longing, and the Jews are treated unfairly because all we hear about them are their bodily ailments, ... And, yes, you do hear about Marilyn and Leon Klinghoffer's bodily problems, like their hip replacements, because that's exactly the sort of thing that a retired person on a cruise would talk about."
by John Adams
"Never trouble trouble till trouble troubles you"
by John Adams
"No man who ever held the office of president would congratulate a friend on obtaining it."
by John Adams
"Now, my friend, can prophecies or miracles convince you or me that infinite benevolence, wisdom, and power, created, and preserves for a time innumerable millions, to make them miserable forever, for his own glory? Wretch! What is his glory? Is he"
by John Adams
"Patience and perserverence have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish."
by John Quincy Adams
"Power always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws."
by John Adams
"Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak and that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws."
by John Quincy Adams
"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself"
by John Adams
"Statesmen may plan and speculate for liberty but it is religion and morality alone that can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand."
by John Adams
"The declaration that our People are hostile to a government made by themselves, for themselves, and conducted by themselves, is an insult"
by John Adams
"The deliberate union of so great and various a people in such a place, is without all partiality or prejudice, if not the greatest exertion of human understanding, the greatest single effort of national deliberation that the world has ever seen."
by John Adams
"The divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity"
by John Adams
"The end of the institution, maintenance, and administration of government is to secure the existence of the body politic; to protect it, and to furnish the individuals who compose it with the power of enjoying, in safety and tranquillity, their natur"
by John Adams
"The jaws of power are always open to devour, and her arm is always stretched out, if possible, to destroy the freedom of thinking, speaking, and writing"
by John Adams
"The proposition that the people are the best keepers of their own liberties is not true. They are the worst conceivable, they are no keepers at all; they can neither judge, act, think, or will, as a political body."
by John Adams
"The proposition that the people are the best keepers of their own liberties is not true. They are the worst conceivable, they are no keepers at all they can neither judge, act, think, or will, as a political body."
by John Adams
"The rich, the well-born, and the able, acquire an influence among the people that will soon be too much for simple honesty and plain sense, in a house of representatives. The most illustrious of them must, therefore, be separated from the mass, and placed by themselves in a senate; this is, to all honest and useful intents, an ostracism."
by John Adams
"The Science of Government it is my Duty to study, more than all other Sciences: the Art of Legislation and Administration and Negotiation, ought to take Place, indeed to exclude in a manner all other Arts. I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine."
by John Adams
"There are two types of education. One should teach us how to make a living, And the other how to live"
by John Adams
"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty."
by John Adams
"This is the last of earth! I am content."
by John Quincy Adams
"Thomas Jefferson still lives."
by John Adams
"Tiffany really picked up her game in the second half of the season. She struggled with her shot early, but I kept telling her to shoot the ball because I know what a great player she is and I knew eventually she?d get hot."
by John Adams
"We are going to check whether signing up people automatically will help stem the denial and apathy about flood risk which can discourage people from registering for flood warnings."
by John Adams
"We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them."
by Abigail Adams
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution is designed only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for any other."
by John Adams
"We're in a war, dammit! We're going to have to offend somebody! by"
by John Adams
"You will never be alone with a poet in your pocket."
by John Adams
"You say that at the time of the Congress, in 1765, The great mass of the people were zealous in the cause of America. The great mass of the people is an expression that deserves analysis. New York and Pennsylvania were so nearly divided, if their propensity was not against us, that if New England on one side and Virginia on the other had not kept them in awe, they would have joined the British. Marshall, in his life of Washington, tells us, that the southern States were nearly equally divided. Look into the Journals of Congress, and you will see how seditious, how near rebellion were several counties of New York, and how much trouble we had to compose them. The last contest, in the town of Boston, in 1775, between whig and tory, was decided by five against two. Upon the whole, if we allow two thirds of the people to have been with us in the revolution, is not the allowance ample? Are not two thirds of the nation now with the administration? Divided we ever have been, and ever must be. Two thirds always had and will have more difficulty to struggle with the one third than with all our foreign enemies."
by John Adams
"'This is a revolution, damn it! We're going to have to offend somebody!'"
by John Adams
"As much as I converse with sages and heroes, they have very little of my love and admiration. I long for rural and domestic scene, for the warbling of birds and the prattling of my children"
by John Adams
"There are only two creatures of value on the face of the earth: those with the commitment, and those who require the commitment of others."
by John Adams
"Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. The jaws of power are always open to devour, and her arm is always stretched out, if possible, to destroy the freedom of thinking, speaking, and writing. Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the People, who have... a right, an indisputable, unalienable, indefeasible, divine right to that most dreaded and envied kind of knowledge, I mean the characters and conduct of their rulers. There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free 'government' ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among people."
by John Adams
"Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish."
by John Quincy Adams
"There are two educations. One should teach us how to make a living and the other how to live."
by John Adams
"The arts and sciences, in general, during the three or four last centuries, have had a regular course of progressive improvement. The inventions in mechanic arts, the discoveries in natural philosophy, navigation and commerce, and the advancement of civilization and humanity, have occasioned changes in the condition of the world and the human character which would have astonished the most refined nations of antiquity. A continuation of similar exertions is everyday rendering Europe more and more like one community, or single family."
by John Adams
"Yesterday the greatest question was decided which ever was debated in America; and a greater perhaps never was, nor will be, decided among men. A resolution was passed without one dissenting colony, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States."
by John Adams
"When people talk of the freedom of writing, speaking or thinking I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists; but I hope it will exist. But it must be hundreds of years after you and I shall write and speak no more."
by John Adams
"Genius is sorrow's child."
by John Adams
"Fear is the foundation of most government."
by John Adams
"Thomas Jefferson -- still surv"
by John Adams
"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geograhy, natural history, naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music architecture, statuary, tapestry, and porcelain."
by John Adams
"Think of your forefathers! Think of your posterity."
by John Adams
"In politics the middle way is none at all."
by John Adams
"Here is everything which can lay hold of the eye, ear and imagination -- everything which can charm and bewitch the simple and ignorant. I wonder how Luther ever broke the spell."
by John Adams
"The question before the human race is, whether the God of nature shall govern the world by his own laws, or whether priests and kings shall rule it by fictitious miracles."
by John Adams
"Suppose a nation in some distant region should take the Bible for their only law book, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited. What a Utopia! What a paradise this region would be."
by John Adams
"Twenty times in the course of my late reading have I been on the point of breaking out, 'This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it!' But in this exclamation I would have been as fanatical as Bryant or Cleverly. Without religion this world would be something not fit to be mentioned in polite company, I mean hell."
by John Adams, 2nd president of the U.S.
"The Revolution was effected before the War commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments of their duties and obligations. This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution."
by John Adams
"If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?"
by John Adams
"The happiness of society is the end of government."
by John Adams
"Where annual elections end where slavery begins."
by John Quincy Adams
"Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society."
by John Adams


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