Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams During the Revolution Part 22

I am afraid to hear again, almost, lest some other should be sick in the house. Yet I hope better, and that you will rea.s.sume your wonted cheerfulness and write again upon news and politics. Send your letters to Warren for conveyance. I won't trust any other.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 110: Dr. Church's treachery, which incidentally exposed some vices of his private life.]

73. JOHN ADAMS.

29 October.

I cannot exclude from my mind your melancholy situation. The griefs of your father and sisters, your uncles and aunts, as well as the remoter connections, often crowd in upon me, when my whole attention ought to be directed to other subjects. Your uncle Quincy,[111] my friend as well as uncle, must regret the loss of a beloved sister. Dr. Tufts, my other friend, I know bewails the loss of a friend, as well as an aunt and a sister. Mr. Cranch, the friend of my youth as well as of my riper years, whose tender heart sympathizes with his fellow-creatures in every affliction and distress, in this case feels the loss of a friend, a fellow-Christian, and a mother. But, alas! what avail these mournful reflections? The best thing we can do, the greatest respect we can show to the memory of our departed friend, is to copy into our own lives those virtues which, in her lifetime, rendered her the object of our esteem, love, and admiration. I must confess I ever felt a veneration for her, which seems increased by the news of her translation.

Above all things, my dear, let us inculcate these great virtues and bright excellences upon our children.

Your mother had a clear and penetrating understanding, and a profound judgment, as well as an honest, and a friendly, and a charitable heart.

There is one thing, however, which you will forgive me if I hint to you.

Let me ask you, rather, if you are not of my opinion? Were not her talents and virtues too much confined to private, social, and domestic life? My opinion of the duties of religion and morality comprehends a very extensive connection with society at large and the great interests of the public. Does not natural morality and much more Christian benevolence make it our indispensable duty to lay ourselves out to serve our fellow-creatures, to the utmost of our power, in promoting and supporting those great political systems and general regulations upon which the happiness of mult.i.tudes depends? The benevolence, charity, capacity, and industry which, exerted in private life, would make a family, a parish, or a town happy, employed upon a larger scale, in support of the great principles of virtue and freedom of political regulations, might secure whole nations and generations from misery, want, and contempt. Public virtues and political qualities, therefore, should be incessantly cherished in our children.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 111: Norton Quincy, the only brother of Mrs. Adams's mother.

Mr. Cranch had married the elder sister of Mrs. Adams.]

74. JOHN ADAMS.

Philadelphia, 29 October, 1775.

Human nature, with all its infirmities and deprivation, is still capable of great things. It is capable of attaining to degrees of wisdom and of goodness which, we have reason to believe, appear respectable in the estimation of superior intelligences. Education makes a greater difference between man and man, than nature has made between man and brute. The virtues and powers to which men may be trained, by early education and constant discipline, are truly sublime and astonis.h.i.+ng.

Newton and Locke are examples of the deep sagacity which may be acquired by long habits of thinking and study. Nay, your common mechanics and artisans are proofs of the wonderful dexterity acquired by use; a watchmaker, in finis.h.i.+ng his wheels and springs; a pin or needle-maker, etc. I think there is a particular occupation in Europe, which is called a paper-stainer or linen-stainer. A man who has been long habituated to it shall sit for a whole day, and draw upon paper fresh figures to be imprinted upon the papers for rooms, as fast as his eye can roll and his fingers move, and no two of his draughts shall be alike. The Saracens, the Knights of Malta, the army and navy in the service of the English republic, among many others, are instances to show to what an exalted height valor, or bravery, or courage may be raised by artificial means.

It should be your care, therefore, and mine, to elevate the minds of our children and exalt their courage; to accelerate and animate their industry and activity; to excite in them an habitual contempt of meanness, abhorrence of injustice and inhumanity, and an ambition to excel in every capacity, faculty, and virtue. If we suffer their minds to grovel and creep in infancy, they will grovel all their lives.

But their bodies must be hardened, as well as their souls exalted.

Without strength and activity and vigor of body, the brightest mental excellences will be eclipsed and obscured.

75. JOHN ADAMS.

Same date.

There is in the human breast a social affection which extends to our whole species, faintly indeed, but in some degree. The nation, kingdom, or community to which we belong is embraced by it more vigorously. It is stronger still towards the province to which we belong, and in which we had our birth. It is stronger and stronger as we descend to the county, town, parish, neighborhood, and family, which we call our own. And here we find it often so powerful as to become partial, to blind our eyes, to darken our understandings, and pervert our wills.

It is to this infirmity in my own heart that I must perhaps attribute that local attachment, that partial fondness, that overweening prejudice in favor of New England, which I feel very often, and which, I fear, sometimes leads me to expose myself to just ridicule.

New England has, in many respects, the advantage of every other colony in America, and, indeed, of every other part of the world that I know anything of.

1. The people are purer English blood; less mixed with Scotch, Irish, Dutch, French, Danish, Swedish, etc., than any other; and descended from Englishmen, too, who left Europe in purer times than the present, and less tainted with corruption than those they left behind them.

2. The inst.i.tutions in New England for the support of religion, morals, and decency exceed any other; obliging every parish to have a minister, and every person to go to meeting, etc.

3. The public inst.i.tutions in New England for the education of youth, supporting colleges at the public expense, and obliging towns to maintain grammar schools, are not equaled, and never were, in any part of the world.

4. The division of our territory, that is, our counties, into towns.h.i.+ps; empowering towns to a.s.semble, choose officers, make laws, mend roads, and twenty other things, gives every man an opportunity of showing and improving that education which he received at college or at school, and makes knowledge and dexterity at public business common.

5. Our law for the distribution of intestate estates occasions a frequent division of landed property, and prevents monopolies of land.

But in opposition to these we have labored under many disadvantages. The exorbitant prerogative of our Governors, etc., which would have overborne our liberties if it had not been opposed by the five preceding particulars.

76. JOHN ADAMS.

4 November, 1775.

I have but yesterday received yours of October 21. Your letters of the following dates I have received: 8 and 10, 16, 29 September; 1, 9, 21, and 22 October.[112] These letters, and indeed every line from you, give me inexpressible pleasure, notwithstanding the melancholy scenes described in most of them of late. I am happy to learn that the family is in health once more, and hope it will continue. My duty to my mother.

I wish she would not be concerned about me. She ought to consider that a dysentery can kill as surely as a cannon. This town is as secure from the cannon and men-of-war as the moon is. I wish she had a little of your fort.i.tude. I had rather be killed by a ball than live in such continual fears as she does.

I can't write as often as I wish. I am engaged from seven in the morning till eleven at night.

Two pair of colors, belonging to the Seventh Regiment, were brought here last night from Chambly, and hung up in Mrs. Hanc.o.c.k's chamber with great splendor and elegance. That lady sends her compliments and good wishes. Among a hundred men, almost, at this house, she lives and behaves with modesty, decency, dignity, and discretion, I a.s.sure you.

Her behavior is easy and genteel. She avoids talking upon politics. In large and mixed companies she is totally silent, as a lady ought to be.

But whether her eyes are so penetrating, and her attention so quick to the words, looks, gestures, sentiments, etc., of the company, as yours would be, saucy as you are this way, I won't say.

But to resume a more serious subject. You ask me to write to your father and sister, and my heart wishes and longs to do it, but you can have no conception what there is to prevent me. I really fear I shall ruin myself for want of exercise.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 112: Letters No. 64, 66, 70, 71, pp. 103, 105, 111, 114.]

77. ABIGAIL ADAMS.

5 November, 1775.