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John Quincy Adams Quotes
1767–1848 United States
John Quincy Adams (July 11, 1767 – February 23, 1848) was an American statesman who served as the sixth president of the United States from 1825 to 1829. He also served as a diplomat, a senator and member of the House of Representatives.
United States Academics Lawyers Politicians Unitarians Also known as: Adams, John Quincy, JQA
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The great problem of legislation is, so to organize the civil government of a community … that in the operation of human institutions upon social action, self-love and social may be made the same.
Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish.
America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government.
Independence Day address (1821)
The highest, the transcendent glory of the American Revolution was this — it connected, in one indissoluble bond, the principles of civil government with the precepts of Christianity.
The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code...
We know the redemption must come. The time and the manner of its coming we know not: It may come in peace, or it may come in blood; but whether in peace or in blood, LET IT COME.
There is one principle which pervades all the institutions of this country, and which must always operate as an obstacle to the granting of favors to new comers. This is a land, not of privileges, but of equal rights.
Letter written as Secretary of State under President James Monroe (1819)
Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air. These qualities have ever been displayed in their mightiest perfection, as attendants in the retinue of strong passions.
Oration at Plymouth (1802)
I can never join with my voice in the toast which I see in the papers attributed to one of our gallant naval heroes. I cannot ask of heaven success, even for my country, in a cause where she should be in the wrong. Fiat justitia, pereat coelum. My toast would be, may our country always be successful, but whether successful or otherwise, always right.
The happiness of the individual is interwoven with that of his contemporaries: by the power of filial reverence and parental affection, individual existence is extended beyond the limits of individual love, and the happiness of every age is chained in mutual dependence upon that of every other.
I want the seals of power and place,
The barbarian chieftain, who defended his country against the Roman invasion, driven to the remotest extremity of Britain, and stimulating his followers to battle, by all that has power of persuasion upon the human heart, concludes his exhortation by an appeal to these irresistible feelings — "Think of your forefathers and of your posterity."
Oration at Plymouth (1802)
Slavery is the great and foul stain upon the North American Union... A dissolution, at least temporary, of the Union, as now constituted, would now be certainly necessary... The Union might then be reorganized on the fundamental principle of emancipation.
Diary entry (1820)
Posterity: you will never know how much it has cost my generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.
Misattributed
The precept of the Koran is, perpetual war against all who deny, that Mahomet is the prophet of God. The vanquished may purchase their lives, by the payment of tribute; the victorious may be appeased by a false and delusive promise of peace; and the faithful follower of the prophet, may submit to the imperious necessities of defeat: but the command to propagate the Moslem creed by the sword is always obligatory, when it can be made effective. The commands of the prophet may be performed alike, by fraud, or by force.
Disputed
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