Passionate Sage (34 page)

21.
Adams to James Warren, June 25, 1774 in Robert J. Taylor, ed.,
Papers of John Adams
(6 vols., Cambridge, 1977–), II, 99, hereafter cited as
Papers;
Adams to James Warren, July 25, 1774,
ibid
., 117; see also Adams to William Tudor, September 26, 1774,
ibid
., 176.

22.
Adams to Abigail Adams, September 25, 1774,
Family Correspondence
, I, 162–63; Adams to Abigail Adams, October 9, 1774,
ibid
., 167.

23.
Lyman Butterfield, ed.,
The Diary and Autobiography of John Adams
(4 vols., Cambridge, 1961), II, 121, 182, 173, hereafter cited as
Diary and Autobiography
.

24.
Diary and Autobiography
, II, 150; see also Adams to William Tudor, October 7, 1774,
Papers
, II, 188.

25.
Ibid
., III, 307, for the account of “Moody's Doctrine” in the autobiography; Adams to Abigail Adams, July 2, 1774,
Family Correspondence
, I, 121, for the contemporary version, which is slightly different; Adams to James Warren, April 9, 1774,
Papers
, II, 82–83; Adams to Moses Gill, June 10, 1774,
Papers
, III, 21.

26.
Adams to Abigail Adams, April 15, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, I, 383; Adams to Horatio Gates, March 23, 1776,
Papers
, IV, 59;
Diary and Autobiography
, II, 181; Adams to Abigail Adams, October 1, 1775,
Family Correspondence
, I, 290, for the anecdote about the Reformation, which Adams first heard from John Zubly, the delegate from Georgia.

27.
Diary and Autobiography
, II, 131, 152–53, and
Papers
, II, 144–52, for his role in drafting the Declaration of Rights and Grievances;
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 309–14, for his somewhat haphazard recollection of the events of the fall and winter of 1774–75;
Papers
, II, 216–387, for the text of
Novanglus; Diary and Autobiography
, II, 161, for his thoughts at the time and an editorial note by Butterfield.

28.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 327, 332–32, 358–59; Adams to William Tudor, April 12, 1776,
Papers
, IV, 118, 200–02, for the mistaken authorship of
Common Sense; ibid
., 65–73, for
Thoughts on Government
.

29.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 396–97, for his recollection of the speech, which several delegates confirmed was the dramatic and decisive event he described. The fullest account of the debate is in Julian Boyd, ed.,
The Papers of Thomas Jefferson
(26 vols., Princeton, 1950–), I, 311–13;
Papers
, IV, 341–51, for the Declaration of Independence, and
ibid
., 260–302, for the Plan of Treaties.

30.
Ibid
., 252–59, for his service on the Board of War and Ordnance; Adams to Nathaneal Greene, April 13, 1777,
Papers
, V, 56;
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 447; Adams to William Tudor, March 27, 1777,
Papers
, V, 132, for his prediction about the war's duration; Adams to Abigail Adams, September 8, 1777,
Family Correspondence
, II, 337–39, for one of several examples of his strategic vision of the military campaign; William Gordon to Adams, March 27, 1777,
Papers
, V, 133, for the kudo.

31.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 316, 383, 386–88.

32.
Diary and Autobiography
, II, 236; see also
ibid
., 181 and Adams to Abigail Adams, May 12, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, I, 406, for his suspicion of conspiracy against him.

33.
Adams to James Warren, July 24, 1775,
Papers
, III, 89–93, for the remarks about Dickinson in the letter that was intercepted by the British;
Diary and Autobiography
, II, 173–74, for his private reaction at the time of the incident;
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 318–19, for his version in his autobiography.

34.
Adams to Samuel Chase, June 14, 1776,
Papers
, IV, 312; Adams to James Warren, August 21, 1776,
ibid
., 482.

35.
Adams to Abigail Adams, May 22 [1777],
Family Correspondence
, II, 245–46.

36.
Adams to Abigail Adams, May 17, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, I, 410; Adams to Abigail Adams, June 2, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, II, 3.

37.
See Edmund S. Morgan, “John Adams and the Puritan Tradition,”
New England Quarterly
, XXXIV (1961), 518–29, for the earliest and still the best rumination on this theme; Mary McManus, “The Education of John Adams,” senior thesis (1975), Mount Holyoke College, remains the best secondary account of the early Adams.

38.
Diary and Autobiography
, I, 1. See Norman Pettit,
The Heart Prepared: Grace and Conversion in Puritan Spiritual Life
(New Haven, 1966), for the best analysis of the morphology of conversion in seventeenth-century Puritanism.

39.
Adams to Nathan Webb, October 12, 1755,
Papers
, 1, 4–7. It seems likely that Adams had recently read, or talked to someone who read, the essay by Benjamin Franklin,
Observations on the Increase of Mankind
(1755), which forecast the demographic explosion in America and its implications for the relationship with England. Less scientific predictions of America's inevitable destiny were “in the air” about this time, often associated with Bishop Berkeley's poem, “Verses on the Prospect of Planting Arts and Learning in America” (1753). For a modern look at this optimistic tradition and what lay behind it, see the first two chapters of Joseph J. Ellis,
After the Revolution: Profiles of Early American Culture
(New York, 1979).

40.
Adams to Richard Cranch, September 2, 1755,
Papers
, I, 3–4.

41.
Diary and Autobiography
, I, 25, 7–8, 37, 33–34, 13–14.

42.
Ibid
., 6–8.

43.
Adams to Charles Cushing, April 1, 1756,
Papers
, I, 13–14.

44.
Diary and Autobiography
, I, 42–43.

45.
Adams to Abigail Adams, December 2, 1778,
Family Correspondence
, III, 125.

46.
The classic statement of the relationship between the psychology of the reformed Christian pursuing God and grace and the modern capitalist is Max Weber,
The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism
, Talcott Parsons, ed. (New York, 1958). Strictly speaking, Franklin reversed the priorities of Puritan psychology, but even Franklin remained imbedded in Puritan values in ways that would have made him a stranger to nineteenth-century entrepreneurs.

47.
Adams to Samuel Dexter, March 23, 1801,
Works
, X, 580–81;
Diary and Autobiography
, I, L; Adams to Benjamin Stoddert, March 31, 1801,
Works
, X, 582; Adams to Thomas Jefferson, March 24, 1801, Reel 118.

48.
Adams to Elias Boudinot, January 26, 1801,
Works
, IX, 93–94; Adams to Joseph Ward, February 4, 1801,
ibid
., 97.

49.
Adams to Christopher Gadsen, April 16, 1801, Reel 118.

50.
Abigail Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, July 12, 1801, Reel 400.

2.
History and Heroes

1.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, August 17, 1812, in Alexander Biddle, ed.,
Old Family Letters Copied from the Originals for Alexander Biddle
(Philadelphia, 1892), 420, hereafter cited as
Old Family Letters
.

2.
Adams to Francis Vanderkemp, November 24, 1814, Reel 122; also Adams to Elbridge Gerry, April 26, 1813,
ibid
. The quotation from the French visitor is in Haraszti,
Prophets of Progress
, 22–23.

3.
Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, September 15, 1801, Reel 118; Adams to Francis Vanderkemp, October 18, 1814, Reel 122.

4.
Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, August 16, 1812, Worthington Chauncey Ford, ed.,
Statesman and Friend: Correspondence of John Adams and Benjamin Waterhouse, 1784–1822
(Boston, 1927), 81, hereafter cited as
Statesman and Friend
.

5.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, May 14, 1812, Reel 118; Adams to John Quincy Adams, December 22, 1804, Reel 95.

6.
Diary and Autobiography
, I. LXIX, for the Adams quotation.
Ibid
., I, XLIV–LXXIV, for the editorial history of the autobiography.

7.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, August 31, 1809,
Old Family Letters
, 238.

8.
The first use of what would become an Adams refrain that I can find is Adams to John Quincy Adams, January 8, 1808, Reel 118: “Shall I recommend to you the eternal Taciturnity of Franklin and Washington? I believe your nature is as incapable of it as mine.”

9.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 253. Adams began writing the autobiography on October 5, 1802.

10.
Peter Shaw,
The Character of John Adams
(New York, 1976), 278–82, has a thoughtful comparison of the two autobiographies. Leonard Labaree,
et al
., eds.,
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
(New Haven, 1964).

11.
The quotation is from Adams to John Quincy Adams, November 12, 1818, Reel 123.

12.
Adams to William Tudor, May 15, 1817, Reel 123. On Hutchinson's tragic role in the coming of the American Revolution, see Bernard Bailyn,
The Ordeal of Thomas Hutchinson
(Cambridge, 1974).

13.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 434–35; Adams to Francis Vanderkemp, January 25, 1806, Reel 118; Adams to Benjamin Rush, August 7, 1809,
Old Family Letters
, 237.

14.
Diary and Autobiography
, IV, 5;
ibid
., III, 330; Adams to Abigail Adams, March 19, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, I, 363; Adams to Benjamin Waterhouse, October 29, 1805,
Statesman and Friend
, 31.

15.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 335–36.

16.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, September 30, 1805,
Old Family Letters
, 86; Adams to Benjamin Rush, June 21, 1811, Reel 118; Adams to William Cunningham, September 27, 1809,
Correspondence Between Adams and Cunningham
, 167; Adams to Thomas Jefferson, November 12, 1813, Lester J. Cappon, ed.,
The Adams-Jefferson Letters
(2 vols., Chapel Hill, 1959), II, 392–93, hereafter cited as
Adams-Jefferson Letters
.

17.
Adams to Abigail Adams, May 17, 1776,
Family Correspondence
, I, 410–11;
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 335, 352.

18.
Diary and Autobiography
, III, 418–19. See also
ibid
., IV, 118–19, for Adams's discussion of Franklin in Paris; Adams to William Temple Franklin, May 5, 1817, Reel 123;
Diary and Autobiography
, IV, 69; Adams to Rush, August 14, 1811, John A. Schutz and Douglass Adair, eds.,
The Spur of Fame: Dialogues of John Adams and Benjamin Rush, 1805–1813
(San Marino, Calif., 1966), 185–86.

19.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, March 14, 1809,
Spur of Fame
, 135.

20.
Adams to Francis Vanderkemp, August 23, 1806, Reel 118.

21.
Adams to Elkanck Watson, August 10, 1812, Reel 118; Adams to Thomas Jefferson, July [3], 1813,
Adams-Jefferson Letters
, II, 349; Adams to Harriet Welsh, March 22, 1822, Reel 124; Adams to James Perspignam, March 4, 1823, Reel 124. See also Adams to Richard Rush, August 24, 1815, Reel 122; Adams to Harriet Welsh, May 9, 1821, Reel 124; Adams to John Holmes, August 10, 1815, Reel 122.

22.
Adams to Benjamin Rush, April 22, 1812,
Old Family Letters
, 375–81;
ibid
., 161–73.

23.
Adams to Nicholas Boylston, November 3, 1819, Reel 124.

24.
Katherine Anthony,
First Lady of the Revolution: The Life of Mercy Otis Warren
(New York, 1958). See also Lester Cohen, “Mercy Otis Warren: The Politics of Language and the Aesthetics of Self,”
American Quarterly
, XXXV (1983), 481–98.