“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.”
Imagination
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
GovernmentAll Quotes by John Adams
“The essence of a free government consists in an effectual control of rivalries.”
Government“My country has contrived for me the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.”
Imagination“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.”
Design“All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.”
Nature“Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society.”
Great“The Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation. If I were an atheist, and believed blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations.”
Men“Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people.”
Freedom“I must not write a word to you about politics, because you are a woman.”
Politics“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Government“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.”
Government“I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.”
Politics“Liberty, according to my metaphysics is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power.”
Power“Power always thinks it has a great soul and vast views beyond the comprehension of the weak.”
Great“While all other sciences have advanced, that of government is at a standstill - little better understood, little better practiced now than three or four thousand years ago.”
Government“Fear is the foundation of most governments.”
Fear“Let us tenderly and kindly cherish, therefore, the means of knowledge. Let us dare to read, think, speak, and write.”
Knowledge“Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war.”
Great“Old minds are like old horses you must exercise them if you wish to keep them in working order.”
Age“The happiness of society is the end of government.”
Government