Skip to content

The fundamental article of my political creed is that despotism, or unlimited sovereignty, or absolute power, is the same in a majority of a popular assembly, an aristocratical council, an oligarchical junto, and a single emperor. Equally arbitrary, cruel, bloody, and in every respect diabolical.

Another quote →

More quotes by John Adams

A pen is certainly an excellent instrument to fix a man's attention and to inflame his ambition.

There is, in the human Breast, a social Affection, which extends to our whole Species.

Every measure of prudence, therefore, ought to be assumed for the eventual total extirpation of slavery from the United States.

Letter to Robert J. Evans (1819)

The world grows more enlightened. Knowledge is more equally diffused.

Discourses on Davila (1790)

Tyranny can scarcely be practised upon a virtuous and wise people.

All John Adams quotes →

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: John Adams (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.