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Abigail Adams
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“To be attentive to our guests is not only true kindness, but true politeness: for if there is a virtue which is its own reward, hospitality is that virtue. We remember slight attentions, after we have forgotten great benefits ...”
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“And now let me ask you, my friend, whether you do not think, that many of our disappointments and much of our unhappiness arise from our forming false notions of things and persons.”
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“...there is something which makes it more agreeable to condemn ourselves than to be condemned by others.”
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“The tea, that baneful weed, is arrived. Great and I hope, effectual opposition has been made to the landing of it. ... The flame is kindled, and like lightning it catches from soul to soul.”
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“We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them.”
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“I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and, like the grave, cries 'Give, give.'”
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“How is it possible, that the love of gain and the lust of domination should render the human mind so callous to every principle of honor, generosity and benevolence?”
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“These are times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. ... The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. All history will convince you of this, and that wisdom and penetration are the fruit of experience, not the lessons of retirement and leisure. Great necessities call out great virtues.”
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“Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.”
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“Necessity has no law ...”
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“O dear variety! how pleasing to the human mind is change.”
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“I begin to think, that a calm is not desirable in any situation in life. ... Man was made for action and for bustle too, I believe.”
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“The expense of living abroad, I always supposed to be high, but my ideas were nowise adequate to the thing.”
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“... fashion is the deity everyone worships in this country [France], and, from the highest to the lowest, you must submit. ... To be out of fashion is more criminal than to be seen in a state of nature, to which the Parisians are not averse.”
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“... America has much to do ere she arrives at her zenith; she possesses every requisite to render her the happiest country upon the globe.”
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“When an object is to be ridiculed, 'tis generally exaggerated ...”
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“All that is well intended is not well received.”
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“... ambition is a very wild passion ...”
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“Our countrymen create most of the misfortunes they feel, for want of a disinterested spirit, a confidence in each other, and a union of the whole. It is a great misfortune, when one State thwarts the measures of eleven or twelve, and thus injures the credit and reputation of the whole.”
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“I am sometimes led to think that human nature is a very perverse thing, and much more given to evil than to good.”
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“... no friend can supply the absence of a good husband ...”
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“... it is a maxim here, that he who dies with studying dies in a good cause, and may go to another world much better calculated to improve his talents, than if he had died a blockhead.”
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“Well, knowledge is a fine thing, and mother Eve thought so; but she smarted so severely for hers, that most of her daughters have been afraid of it since.”
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“... bluster will scarcely produce a mouse.”
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“Old Friends can never be forgotten by me.”
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“Faithful are the wounds of a friend.”
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“Party spirit is blind, malevolent, uncandid, ungenerous, unjust and unforgiving.... Party hatred, by its deadly poison, blinds the eyes and envenoms the heart.”
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“I must entreat you to remember me often. I never think your letters half long enough.”
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“Do not grieve, my friend — my dearest friend. I am ready to go, and — John, it will not be long.”
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“Whatever you undertake aim to make yourself perfect in it, for if it is worth doing at all, it is worth doing well.”
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“You will e'er long know that a Grandchild is almost as near to your Heart as your own children; my little Boys delight me and I should feel quite melancholy without them.”
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“... I hate to complain. No one is without their difficulties, whether in High, or low Life, & every person knows best where their own shoe pinches.”
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“Better is a little with contentment than great Treasure; and trouble therewith.”
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“I cannot bear to go to a place unprovided, when a little forethought and care would save me much trouble ...”
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“The longer we live in the world, the more do troubles thicken upon us, yet we hug the fleeting shadow.”
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“... when a spirit of private animosity is permitted to influence the mind, it always produces an illiberal conduct.”
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“Every soul knows its own bitterness.”
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“There is something always melancholy in the Idea of leaving a place for the last time. It is like burying a Friend.”
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“I long to hear that you have declared an independency — and by the way in the new Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no voice, or Representation. That your Sex are Naturally Tyrannical is a Truth so thoroughly established as to admit of no dispute, but such of you as wish to be happy willingly give up the harsh title of Master for the more tender and endearing one of Friend.”
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“Whilst you are proclaiming peace and good will to men, emancipating all nations, you insist upon retaining an absolute power over wives. But ... notwithstanding all your wise laws and maxims we have it in our power not only to free ourselves but to subdue our masters, and without violence throw both your natural and legal authority at our feet.”
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“Credulity and the Want of Foresight, are Imperfections in the human Character, that no Politician can sufficiently guard against.”
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“I am happy in a daughter who is both a companion and an assistant in my Family affairs and who I think has a prudence and steadiness beyond her years.”
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“Luxury that baneful poison has unstrung and enfeebled her [America's] sons. ... the Benevolent wish of general good is swallowed up by a Narrow selfish Spirit, by a spirit of oppression and extortion.”
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“However kind sons may be disposed to be, they cannot be daughters to a Mother.”
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“We have been a scattered family. If some of my Children could now be collected round the parent Hive it appears to me, that it would add much to the happiness of our declining Years.”
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“When ever I receive a Letter from you it seems to give new Springs to my nerves, and a brisker circulation to my Blood.”
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“Let me entreat you to write me more letters ... They are my food by day and my rest by night.”
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“... remember truth and justice have two ears.”
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“... I always thought the laughing philosopher a much wiser man than the sniveling one ...”
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“I could not but lament, that the uncovered bosom should display what ought to have been veild, or that the well turned, and finely proportiond form, should not have been less conspicuous in the dance, from the thin drapery which coverd it. I wishd that more had been left to the imagination, and less to the Eye.”
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“Would that my ability was equal to my inclination.”
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“Let us be just, and we shall not be miserable.”
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“Anticipated evils have often as much power over the mind as real ones. To guard against this imbecility of the mind an ancient Author observes 'that sufficient unto the day was the Evil thereof.'”
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“Business once lost, does not easily return to the old hands.”
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“The Stocks have fallen, I would not advise to selling out; nay if I had money to spair, I would vest it in them. I think they will rise again.”
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“I congratulate you and my dear Niece upon the late happy event in your Family. Can you really believe that you are a Grandmamma? Does not the little fellow feel as if he was really your own? If he does not now, by that time you have lived a year with him, or near you, I question if you will be able to feel a difference.”
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“Whenever you come to have Grandchildren, you will scarcly know any difference between them & your own children, particularly if you should be under the same roof with them.”
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“There is nothing that enlivens us so much as having these little creatures round us --”
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“I begin to think Grandparents not so well qualified to Educate Grandchildren as Parents. They are apt to relax in their Spirit of Government, and to be too indulgent.”
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“Ironing is very bad for you.”
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“There is no music sweeter in the Ears of parents, than the well earned praises of their children.”
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“I hope the rage for foreign conquest will not ever seize upon Americans.”
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“Every benevolent mind revolts at the Idea of Foreign powers forcing a Ruler upon a Nation, the majority of which reject him.”
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“We want more Men of deeds, and fewer of Words.”
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“The office of President has ever been stuck with thorns. It daily becomes a more difficult one to wield. A wise Man would find it a Herculean Task.”
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“No Man has more of my compassion and commiseration than he who Stands upon the giddy height of the pinnacle.”
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“Ambition often over shoots the mark.”
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“I should enjoy but little comfort in a state of idleness and uselessness.”
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“I detest still life — and had rather be jostled, than inanimate.”
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“What cannot be help'd must be endured.”
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“My Heart is much larger than my purse.”
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“When the people are fully inform'd and convinced of what is Right, they will execute, but the danger is, that from partial evidence, they will be led astray.”
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“The Cold has been more severe than I can ever before recollect. It has frozen the ink in my pen, and chill'd the Blood in my veins.”
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“May you never want either pleasure or amusement. We were made for active Life, and idleness and happiness are incompatible.”
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“You must not stay so long as to not make your Friends twice glad.”
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“Heaven avert the dangers which threaten us, and as we reside in a glass House, may our politicians beware of throwing stones.”
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“The Spirit of party has overpowered the Spirit of Patriotism.”
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“The great object of the honest men of both parties should be to unite for the common good, and to cultivate a spirit of candour, liberality and harmony. Until that can be effected our country will be torn alternately by contending factions.”
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“Any pilot may Navigate in smooth water. He who can conduct a Ship in a Storm, tho he has harder labour, will feel more Satisfaction when he reflects, that his Labours have largely contributed to her Safety.”
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“Publick service becomes urksome to all men of talents and to men in Years who are worn out by continual opposition and by constant exertions to support order, Harmony and peace against ambition, disorder and anarchy.”
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“I have seen and known that much of the conduct of a public ruler, is liable to be misunderstood and misrepresented.”
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“The expectation makes the blessing sweet.”
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“Let me hear from you by every opportunity, as the correspondence of my Friends is the only compensation I can receive for the loss of their Society.”
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“Letters from my Friends are a cordial to my Soul.”
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“No falsehoods ... have been thought too grose to palm upon the public.”
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“William must continue to write. Tell him it is a habit the pleasure of which increases with practice, but becomes more irksome with neglect.”
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“May we ... be as ready to do justice as to receive it.”
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“All revolutions are alike in many features.”
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“What we wish, we are very apt to believe.”
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“The Devil is always easier raisd than laid.”
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“Great deeds may be performed by a Small means.”
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“Truths are not always to be spoken.”
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“I wish most sincerely there was not a slave in the province. It always appeared a most iniquitous scheme to me — to fight ourselves for what we are daily robbing and plundering from those who have as good a right to freedom as we have. You know my mind upon this subject.”
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“[During the Revolutionary War:] How many have fallen, we know not. The constant roar of the cannon is so distressing that we cannot eat, drink, or sleep. ... The spirit of the people are very good; the loss of Charlestown affects them no more than a drop in the bucket.”
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“My pen is always freer than my tongue. I have written many things to you that I suppose I never could have talked.”
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“Great difficulties may be surmounted by patience and perseverance.”
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“I must entreat you to remember me often. I never think your letters half long enough.”
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“'Tis four months wanting three days since we parted. Every day of the time I have mourned the absence of my friend, and felt a vacancy in my heart which nothing, nothing can supply. In vain the spring blooms or the birds sing. Their music has not its former melody, nor the spring its usual pleasures. I look around with a melancholy delight and sigh for my absent partner.”
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“If our cause is just, it will be best supported by justice and righteousness. Though we have many other crimes to answer for, that of cruelty to our enemies is not chargeable upon Americans, and I hope never will be.”
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“I know the voice of fame to be a mere weathercock, unstable as water and fleeting as a shadow.”
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“Life takes its complexion from inferior things. It is little attentions and assiduities that sweeten the bitter draught and smooth the rugged road.”
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“... should I draw you the picture of my heart, it would be what I hope you still would love, though it contained nothing new. The early possession you obtained there, and the absolute power you have ever maintained over it, leave not the smallest space unoccupied. I look back to the early days of our acquaintance and friendship, as to the days of love and innocence, and with an indescribable pleasure I have seen near a score of years roll over our heads, with an affection heightened and improved by time; nor have the dreary years of absence in the smallest degree effaced from my mind the image of the dear, untitled man to whom I gave my heart.”
Abigail Adams, U.S. first lady, letterwriter
(1744 - 1818)
Full name: Abigail Smith Adams.