Title: From John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 April 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, Thomas Boylston

N. 38.
St: Petersburg 3. April 1813.

After an interval of a few days less than Nine Months, I had the day before yesterday the happiness of receiving your number 28/19 dated 6. December last—I have regularly acknowledged the receipt of every scrap of Paper from you that has come to my hands—of your New Series I have the first seven numbers—but since then, only 10. 13. 14. and 19—So that numbers 8. 9. 11. 12. 15. 16. 17. and 18 are missing—I have no Account, since that to the close of the year 1810—I regret much that you should have had the trouble of writing so much to be sunk in the Ocean or to be buried in the fouler Sink of British Admiralty Courts; but it is a satisfaction to me in the misfortune of losing so many of your valuable communications, to know that at least you have been punctual on your part in making them.
The first notice I have had of the issue of the Lazell law-suit was by your letter now just received—I shall certainly not disapprove the amount of the fees you paid Mr Whitman for his Services in the Cause, and I wish you to thank him in my name for his zealous and assiduous attention to it—You will charge in your next Account if you have not already done it, the same Sum for your own Services as Counsel, as that you paid Mr Whitman, and accept my thanks to yourself at the same time as you present them to him—The Event has relieved me from the burden of an expence which in itself was considerable, but it has relieved me from the much greater mortification of finding myself the dupe of a shameful imposition—My concern had always been that the Evidence of my strongest defence could not be brought before the Court and Jury; owing to my own simplicity, and negligence in neither writing, nor taking witnesses, of my express direction to Lazell to take off my name from the subscription paper, before a dollar of expence upon the Turnpike had accrued; and in taking his word originally for the two Condition upon which I first subscribed, both which Conditions were violated when they made the Turnpike—The cost and trouble to which I have been put by this affair I consider as a just penalty upon my inconsiderateness in subscribing my name, at all, on the faith of verbal promises made by a man who was an utter stranger, and in giving him only verbal notice of my determination to have no concern in the Company. I am sorry for some members of the Corporation, that he has added to the badness of their bargain the charges and Costs which his suit against me must have occasioned, and I most particularly rejoyce that I have not been sentenced Volens Nolens to be a member of a Corporation of which he is the Agent and Treasurer—
As to the decays and defalcations in the rest of my property in your trust, I must reconcile myself to them with as much philosophy as I can command—The political changes in Europe, and the desperate plunges into paper Currency, which every Nation in this part of the world, are is making, with England now foremost in the example, have wrought precisely the same effect on upon my income at my present Post; and with all the pinching and pairing of my economy, the last year my expences exceeded my revenue; and must still more exceed it the present—Had I not at the time when I fixed my establishment here assumed its scale on the principles which I mentioned to you in a former letter, and to which I have inflexibly adhered, I should at this day have been irretrievably ruined—My misfortune is that being obliged to draw upon Amsterdam  for my funds, I am involved in all the fluctuations of Exchange—And that for more than a year I have been drawing at a loss from 20 to 50 per Cent—At this moment the Exchange is just double what it was two years ago—That is, in drawing for the same sum on Amsterdam, I receive just half the sum here which the draft would have produced then—And such are the irregular and convulsive effects of paper money, that every article of indispensable expenditure has been rising in prices, while my means of supply have been sinking—If it should be my destiny to remain here another Winter, I shall find it difficult to get through without contracting debts—As yet however I have been able to avoid this embarassment, and hope eventually to escape it.
I cheerfully acquiesced in the arrangement by which my two sons were placed at Atkinson, where I knew they would receive every kind attention that our excellent Aunt could shew them, but I am more gratified to know them so much nearer to my father and Mother, and you, as they are at Hingham—It is more than a year since the date of the last Letters we received from them—They have now reached an age, George particularly, when he ought to write me by every opportunity, and I beg you to remind him of this duty—I trust he will be seriously preparing himself for College, and I hope he will devote his most strenuous application to the Latin and Greek Languages—I wish he may have no occasion to change his school again (unless it be for tuition from myself) untill he enters College—For a frequent change of schools very much obstructs and delays the progress of a boy in the acquisition of classical learning. It was one of the inconveniences in my own education, that from the commencement untill the close of my classical studies I was continually changing schools and teachers—In my case it was unavoidable, and the injury resulting from it on one side was compensated by advantages which it afforded me on the other—But the consequence has been that I have always had “small Latin and less Greek”—And the little I have, has contributed so much to the uses, the comforts and the pleasures of my life, that I have always lamented the shallowness of the streams with which I have been indulged from the those inexhaustible fountains of virtue, elegance and taste.—I hope my sons will be much more accomplished classical scholars than their father is or can ever be, but if they often change their schools, I shall not expect it.
As the walk from Hingham to Quincy is now only five Miles they will I doubt not traverse it as often as the usual relaxations from their attendance at the Academy will admit—When I was of their age I remember with what delight I used to walk over to our Grandfathers at Weymouth, which was then at the same distance—It is as you remark about the old walnut-desk, and the spot where we were born—There is a charm in the remembrances of our infancy, which to my feelings becomes more vivid the further I advance in years—Those were times of public distress, and terrors, and sufferance still more than the present—I remember the melting of the pewter Spoons in our house, into bullets, immediately after the 19th. of April 1775—I remember the smoke and the flames of Charles town which I saw from the Orchard on Penn’s hill—I remember the packing up and sending away of the Books and furniture from the reach of Gage’s troops, while we ourselves were hourly exposed for many Months to have been butchered by them—All this has passed away like a troublous dream; and all this adds pleasure to every recollection of that time—The same Spirit, from the same Nation has now kindled against us another War—I pray God that it may not expose the infancy of our children to such perils as those which surrounded your childhood and mine—But if it is the Will of Providence that it should, my  next prayer is that to them as to me after the lapse of forty years, the alarms, and dangers which befall them in consequence of their Country’s struggle for her rights, may serve but to rivet their affections to their Country and her Cause, and to mingle the remembrance of evils over come and of deliverance from distress with all the first traces of conscious existence and of opening intellect—Complete Redemption from imminent Calamity is among the sweetest enjoyments of human life.
You and I sympathise so generally in our sentiments upon political affairs, that even while separated at this distance from each other, I seldom have occasion to ask what you think upon any public concern, in any other manner than by consulting my own heart—Your remarks upon the issue of the Presidential Election have given me a fresh example of this identity in the process of our thoughts concerning the same Event—I rejoyce at Mr: Madison’s re’election, and at Mr: Gerry’s election, because it has proved the Spirit of the Nation to be still determined in support of their rights—They have trials to go through in its progress, which give me already many a bitter pang of anticipation, and among the keenest of them is that of witnessing our own Section of the Union at heart in the Enemy’s Quarters—If our People were United, I should neither have a doubt of our ultimate success, nor consider the War itself as seriously formidable—On the question of Impressment, they only hinge upon which the War now turns, all the parties in England have combined against us—They have therefore besides all their other advantages that of united Councils against us, while ours are fearfully divided in opposing them—They have in short every thing against us but a righteous Cause—It is for the practice of man-stealing from our ships upon the Ocean that the Nations are to be drenched in blood—Is it possible that a righteous Providence should smile upon such a Cause?—Is it possible that our Country should submit to a Peace, stipulating formally or tacitly to endure the continuance of such an indignity?—It is now for the God of Battles to decide, and to him only must it be left.
The Continent of Europe is just commencing the progress of a Counter-Revolution the end of which it is yet impossible to foresee—The posts of Russia and of Poland have struck at the roots of Napoleon’s laurels and of his power—In September he entered Moscow as a Conqueror, and in March his Enemy took possession of his “good City” of Hamburg—All Germany is in combustion—Prussia has deserted his banners, and rallies all the remnants of her force under the standard of Alexander. Denmark has implored Peace of England, her despoiler, and has been rejected—Austria negotiates and dissembles, and arms, probably to join at last the new Coalition against her antient foe, and France has the most imminent prospect of being reduced at least to her ante-revolutionary dimensions, and perhaps to the restoration of the Bourbons—Nothing less than this is now intended; and between this design and its accomplishment there is now nothing but the life and the Genius of Napoleon to interpose—For his Fortune has deserted him; and of his Genius Independent of his Fortune, I have never entertained a very exalted opinion—Caesar was once in perhaps as great a strait as he now is and extricated himself from it—But to extricate himself he must possess greater resources of genius than were ever employed by Caesar, and I do not yet believe that he has them to display.
Your’s affectionately
A


Title: From John Quincy Adams to George Washington Adams, 4 April 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, George Washington

Letter 9.
My Dear Son.
St: Petersburg 4. April 1813.

The imperfections of the Mosaic Institutions which it was the object of Christ’s Mission upon Earth to remove appear to me to have been these.
1. The Want of a sufficient sanction. The Rewards and the Penalties of the Levitical Law had all reference to the present life—There are many passages in the Old Testament which imply a state of existence after death, and some which directly assert a future state of retribution—But none of these were contained in the delivery of the Law—At the time of Christ’s advent it was so far from being a settled article of the Jewish faith, that it was a subject of sharp and bitter controversy between the two principal sects of the Pharisees who believed in it, and of the Sadducees who denied it—It was the special purpose of Christ’s appearance upon Earth to bring immortality to light.—He substituted the rewards and the penalties of a future state in the room of all others—The Jewish Sanctions were exclusively temporal—those of Christ exclusively Spiritual.
2. The Want of Universality. The Jewish Dispensation was exclusively confined to one small and obscure Nation—The purposes of the Supreme Creator in restricting the knowledge of himself to one petty hord of Egyptian slaves are as inaccessible to our intelligence, as those of his having concealed from them as well as from all the rest of mankind the certain knowledge of their own immortality—The fact is unquestionably so—The mission of Christ was intended to communicate to the whole human race, all the permanent advantages of the Mosaic Law, superadding to them upon the condition of repentance, the kingdom of Heaven; the blessings of eternal life.
3. The Complexity of the Objects of Legislation. I have remarked in a former Letter that the Law from Sinai comprized not only all the ordinary subjects of regulation for human Societies, but those which human Legislators cannot reach—It was a Civil Law, a Municipal Law, an Ecclesiastical Law, a Law of Police, and a Law of Morality and Religion—It prohibited Murder, Adultery, theft and perjury, and it prescribed the number of taches for the curtains of the tabernacles, and directed how the snuffers for the holy Candlesticks were to be made—It prescribed rules for the thoughts as well as for the Actions of Men—This complexity however practicable and even suitable, for one small national Society, could not have been extended to all the families of the Earth.—The parts of the Jewish Law adapted to promote the happiness of mankind, under every variety of situation and of Government in which they can be placed, were all recognized and adopted by Christ, and he expressly separated them from all the rest—He disclaimed all interference with the ordinary objects of human Legislation—He declared that his kingdom was not of this World. He acknowledged the Authority of the Jewish Magistrates—He paid for his own person the tribute to the Romans—He refused in more than one instance to assume the office of a judge in matters of legal controversy—He strictly limited the objects of his own precepts and authority to religion and morals. He denounced no temporal punishments; he promised no temporal rewards. He took up man as a governable being, where the human Magistrate is compelled to leave him, and supplied both precepts of virtue and motives for practicing it, such as no other moralist or Legislator ever attempted to introduce.
4. The burdensome duties of positive rites, minute formalities and expensive sacrifices. All these had a tendency not only to establish and maintain the separation of the Jews from all other Nations, but in process of time had been mistaken by the scribes and Pharisees and Lawyers, and probably by the great body of the People, for the Substance of Religion. All these were abolished by Christ, or as St: Paul expresses it were “nailed to his Cross.”
You will recollect that I am now speaking of Christianity not as the scheme of redemption to mankind from the consequences of original Sin, but as a system of morality for regulating the conduct of men while on Earth. And the most striking and extraordinary feature of its character in this respect is its tendency and its exhortations to absolute perfection—The Language of Christ to his disciples is explicit “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.” And this he enjoins at the conclusion of that precept so expressly laid down and so unanswerably argued, “to Love their enemies, to bless those that cursed them, and to pray for those that despitefully used, and persecuted them.” He seems to consider this temper of benevolence in return for injury as constituting of itself a perfection similar to that of the divine Nature—It is undoubtedly the greatest conquest which the spirit of man can atchieve over its own infirmities, and to him who can attain that elevation of Virtue, which it requires, all other Victories over the evil Passions must be easy—Nor was this absolute perfection merely preached by Christ as a doctrine; it was practiced by himself throughout his life—practised to the last instant of his agony upon the Cross—practised, under Circumstances of trail such as no other human being was ever exposed to—He proved by his own example the possibility of that Virtue which he taught; and although possessed of miraculous powers sufficient to controul all the Laws of Nature, he expressly and repeatedly declined the use of them to save himself from any part of the sufferings which he was to endure. The Sum of Christian Morality then consists in Piety to God, and Benevolence to Man—Piety manifested not by formal solemnities and sacrifices of burnt offerings; but by Repentance—by obedience, by Submission by Humility; by the worship of the heart—and Benevolence, not founded upon selfish motives, but superior even to the sense of wrong or the resentment of injuries—Worldly Prudence, is scarcely noticed among all the instructions of Christ—The pursuit of Honours and of Riches the objects of Ambition and Avarice, are strongly discountenanced in many places; an undue solicitude about the ordinary cares of life, is occasionally and forcibly reproved—Of worldly Prudence there are rules enough in the Proverbs of Solomon, and in the compilation of the Son of Sirach—Christ passes no censure upon them—But he left what I have called the Selfish Virtues, where he found them—It was not to proclaim common place morality that he came down from Heaven—His commands were new—That his disciples should love one another—that they should love even Strangers—Nay that they should love their Enemies. He prescribed barriers against all the maleficent Passions; he gave us a Law the utmost point of perfection of which human power are susceptible; and at the same time he allowed degrees of indulgence and relaxation to human frailty proportioned to the powers of every individual.
An Eminent and ingenious Writer in favour support of Christianity, Dr: Paley, expresses the opinion that the direct object of the Christian Revelation was “to supply motives and not rules, sanctions and not precepts”—and he strongly intimates that independent of the purposes of Christ’s atonement and propitiation for the sins of the World, the only object of his mission upon Earth was to reveal a future State—to bring life and immortality to light. He does not appear to think that Christ promulgated any new principal of morality, and he positively asserts that “morality neither in the gospel, nor in any other book, can be a subject of discovery—Because the qualities of actions depend entirely upon their effects, which effects must all along have been the subject of human experience.” (Paley. Evidences of Christianity, 2—p. 25-26.)
To this I reply that Christ in the expressly terms of Christ. (John XIII.34.) “A new Command I give unto you—that ye love one Another”—And I add that this command, explained, illustrated and dilated as it was by the whole tenor of his discourses, and especially by the Parable of the good Samaritan appears to me to have been not only entirely new, but in the most rigorous sense of the word a discovery in morals—and a discovery the importance of which to the happiness of the human species, as far exceeds any discovery in the physical Laws of Nature, as the Soul is superior to the body.
If it be objected that the principle of benevolence towards Enemies, and the forgiveness of injuries, may be found not only in the Books of the old Testament but even in some of the heathen writers, and particularly in the discourses of Socrates, I answer that the same may be said of the immortality of the Soul, and of the rewards and punishments of a future State—The doctrine was not more a discovery than the precept—But their connection with each other, the authority with which they were taught, and the miracles by which they were enforced, belong exclusively to the mission of Christ.—Attend particularly to the miracle recorded in the second Chapter of St: Luke as having taken place at the birth of Jesus—When the Angel of the Lord said to the Shepherds “Fear not: for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all People—For unto you is born this day in the City of David, a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.”—In these words the character of Jesus as the Redeemer was announced—But the Historian adds “And suddenly there was with the Angel a Multitude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth Peace, good will toward men.”—Which words as I understand them announce the moral precept of benevolence, as explicitly for the object of Christ’s appearance, as the preceding words had declared the purpose of Redemption.
It is related in the life of the Roman Dramatic Poet Terence, that when one of the personages of his Comedy, the Self-Tormentor, the first time uttered on the Theatre the line “Homo sum, Humani nil a me alienum puto,” an universal shout of applause, burst forth from the whole Audience; and that in so great a multitude of Romans, and of deputies from the Nations their subjects and allies, there was not one individual but felt in his heart the power of this noble sentiment—Yet how feeble and defective it is, in comparison with the Christian command of Charity, as unfolded in the Discourses of Christ, and enlarged upon in the writings of his Apostles!—The heart of man, will always respond with rapture to this sentiment, when there is no selfish or unsocial Passion at work to oppose it—But the command to lay it down as the great and fundamental rule of Conduct, for human life, and to subdue and sacrifice all the tyrannical and selfish Passions to preserve it, this is the peculiar and unfading glory of Christianity—This is the conquest over ourselves, which without the aid of a gracious and merciful God, none of us can atchieve, and which it was worthy of his special interposition, to enable us to accomplish.
From your affectionate father
A.


Title: From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 4 April 1813
From: Adams, Louisa Catherine Johnson
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

St Petersburgh April 4th 1813

Your kind letter my dear Mother as well as that of my kind Sister call for an answer and although the effort is almost too much for me I will endeavor to controul the pangs of my bursting heart and entreat you to compassionate and not condemn a grief which is beyond my reason to subdue had you witnessed the horrid circumstances of my Angels death you would pity and forgive me my heart is almost broken my health is gone and my peace of mind is I fear for ever destroy’d dreadful as the loss of my dear Sisters Child was to her she has at least the happiness of knowing that it was not occasion’d by any accidental circumstance while I have the horrid idea that I lost my darling owing to a fall which I had with her in my arms in which I did not percieve that she had met with the slightest injury but which is said to have been the cause of her death Six long months have elapsed since her pure Soul took its flight to Heaven I trust to pray for the release of her mother from a state of suffering which renders her existence a calamity to all who surround her in religion alone have I found a gleam of comfort and to in God who gives us strenght to bear up against the afflictions which assail us in our passage through this vale of tears do I put my trust—
The health of your Son my dear Madam is a scource of perpetual anxiety to us all and I myself believe it absolutely essential to remove him to a milder Climate I think it my duty to inform that his breast is attacked and that although he is himself aware of it he will take no precautions whatever to check its progress in addition to which we are all in the hands of a very careless Physician who though a man of great abilities will pay but little attention to his patients unless their deseases are attended by some dangerous symptoms by which means things in themselves light are suffer’d to grow into desperate cases do not however be alarm’d as I do not think this so deeply rooted in its present state but am in terrors at the idea of what another winter may produce could he pass a few months in any mild climate I am confident he might be rappidly restored—
You will have heard of the marriage of your Grandson with my Sister may you my dear Madame crown it with your approbation—
I sincerely thank you for all the good news letter contain’d I cannot write to my boys I had set my heart on seeing them this summer should I never more have this greatest blessing you will my dear mother assure them of the tender affection of their mother whose every hope & prayer is for their future happiness prosperity and welfare & that whatever Station they fill they may prove an honour to the name they bear
Present me affectionately to all the family more especially to my Father and accept the best wishes of your sincerely affectionate daughter
L C Adams


Title: From John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 5 April 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, John

My Dear Son.
St: Petersburg 5. April 1813.

A few days ago I received letters from your Grandmama, and your Uncle, which rejoyced me very much, for I had not before heard from them nor you for many Months; and now these letters which were dated in December last, informed us that they and you were well, which is the most delightful news we can receive—But I looked among the letters for one from your brother George or you, and was disappointed; so that it is now nearly a year since we received a letter from either of you, and more than a year since they were dated—I have since that time written several letters to him, and several to you, besides one addressed to you both: but I do not know whether you have received any of them
Your Grandmama and uncle write that you have been removed from Atkinson to the Hingham Academy, and though I am persuaded you were very happy under the care of your Uncle and Aunt Peabody, you will now have the advantage of being so much nearer to your Grandpapa and Grandmama, that you can go to see them almost every week—I am glad to hear that you were well pleased with your situation at Mr: and Mrs: Kimball’s, to whom I wish you to present your Mama’s thanks and mine for their kindness to you—
I have long and anxiously wished to have an opportunity this present year of returning home to my own Country, and to enjoy once more the  Society of my dear Parents and Children—But I do not yet know that I shall be favoured with this blessing—If I do not, I renew my charge to you and George to write either to your Mama or to me as often as you can—If the letters are ever so short, only telling us that you are well and happy, they will be welcome to us—let them be in your own hand-writing, and that alone will shew us what improvement you make in one part of your Studies—I suppose that before this you have begun to learn Latin, and that you will soon being upon Greek—You must give me from time to time an account of your progress, and of what Books you read both in and out of school.
Your brother Charles sends his love to George and to you—The Winters here are so very long, and so severely cold, that his health suffers for want of sufficient exercise in the open air—He reads and speaks French and English, as well as can be expected at his age, and he also speaks German; but not much Russian—He has lately begun to learn to write and to cypher; and with God’s blessing I hope that in a few months he will able to write you a letter of his own—He has been much pleased with some pretty English children’s story-books by Miss Edgworth, and by a pleasant poem called “the peacock at home,” which a Lady had been obliging enough to lend him—He reads these to his Mama, and Berquin’s Children’s friend, in French to me—At the Carnaval and Easter Holidays which are sporting times in this Country I take him with me to see the Gachellies, which are puppet shows, and other exhibitions in use here for the amusement of the People—When he first went to see them two years ago, they frightened him, and he insisted upon coming immediately home—But now he sees them without fear, and with some pleasure—
God bless you my dear children, and may he in his own due time restore you both to the bosom of your affectionate father
John Quincy Adams


Title: From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 April 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

N. 45
St: Petersburg 7. April 1813

I know not whether it was generosity, or any other virtue, or merely a disposition to receive the postage, that induced the transmission of your favour of 30. December to Mr: Williams at London; for by him it was kindly forwarded to me, and on the first day of this Month, to my inexpressible joy came to hand—It was but so short a time before that I had received your letter of 29. July!—and excepting that, not a line from Quincy later than April of the last year—This last letter had apparently been opened, although the impression of your Seal upon the wax was restored—A circumstance which indicates that it was done in England, where they still affect the appearance of not breaking seals at the Post-Office—On this Continent they are less scrupulous about forms—When they open letters they break the seals, and do not take the trouble of restoring them—They send them open to their address—It remind me of an anecdote I have lately met with of Prince Kaunitz when he was prime Minister of the Empress Maria Theresa—One of his Clerks whose business it was to copy the opened letters, coming to foreign Ministers at Vienna, in the hurry of reclosing a dispatch to one of the Envoys, sent him his copy instead of the original—The Envoy went to Prince Kaunitz, shewed him the copy that he had received, and complained that the original was withheld from him—The Prince immediately sent for the Clerk, severely reprimanded him in the Envoy’s presence for his blunder, and directed him to bring instantaneously the original dispatch—The Clerk brought it accordingly, and the Prince gave it to the Envoy, with many apologies for the trouble occasioned him by the Clerk’s mistake, and assurances of his hope that it would never occur again.
In the present state of the Relations between us and Britain, I have nothing to say, if they open letters to or from me which they get fairly into their hands—But I should think it more creditable to them, if they did not attempt the imposition of restoring the impression of the Seals.
Next to the delight which it gave me to know that my father and you, and my boys were all in good health, (which, may God Almighty preserve) was that of being informed that my children were so much nearer to you, than at Atkinson—I knew how kindly my dear Aunt would attend to them, but my father, and you, and my brother, nobody could supply your places for the progress of their Education; and the thought that they could have the opportunity of seeing you at  most only two or three times in a year was an affliction to me, which their residence at Kingham will relieve. Should it be my destiny to stay much longer in Europe, I wish them to be sent to me—I hope in a few weeks to know upon what I am to depend—My constant wish has been to return to the United States the present year, and I have been long since so written, both to the President and the Secretary of State—There are however Circumstances, known I trust to them ere this, and probably to you, which place it altogether at the Presidents determination whether I shall have either occupation or motive for remaining here sometime longer—The communications transmitted to our Government from hence last October, I presume will be no secret in America, whatever the result of them may be—If they are received as it is my wish they may be, the measures adopted in consequence of them may make it my duty as it will be my inclination to postpone my return home for a Season—If they are viewed in a different light, I shall have stronger reasons than ever for wishing myself as speedily as possible in my native Country, in the bosom of my family, and devoted entirely and exclusively to the support of my family and the Education of my Children—Should I receive the President’s permission to return this year, I suppose it will be possible for me to return by the way of England in a Cartel—I should indeed be obliged to ask it as a favour of the British Government, which would not be very pleasant to my feelings—There has been one instance of the same kind since our residence here—Count Stedingk who had been the Swedish Ambassador here, returned home by Water in July 1811. while Sweden and England were at War—The British Admiral in the Baltic gave without hesitation a special permission to pass without annoyance to the vessel which came for him and in which he returned. There is more bitterness and inveteracy in their War with America than in that against Sweden, for they have wronged America too much to forgive her, and Sweden had declared War against them, without provocation. Yet I do not expect they would deny me what they so readily granted to Count Stedingk.
Of Peace, unless eventually produced by a course and through a channel at which I have already hinted I now utterly despair—Our new 74’s and frigates, will only protract and obstruct every prospect of Peace—The prodigies performed by our Apology for a Navy (To call it a Navy is too ridiculous) have had the same effect—and so have our disgraces in Canada—There is a National Spirit among the British, which such successes and such defeats grasp at with equal eagerness to unite all parties against us—We are a more virtuous and less vicious People than the British; but of that National Spirit which is a political virtue of the highest order, we have much less than they—Under our present Administration I have no fear that we shall subscribe to a disgraceful and degrading Peace, and from the temper of the British Government at this time, there is little expectation of any disposition in them for any other.
The conflagration of Moscow, and the sufferings of the Russian Empire under the formidable invasion of the last Summer were awful visitations of Heaven, but they have been succeeded by prosperities and successes without example in modern History—The iron-Crown of Napoleon, and his Imperial Crown too, will henceforth be but crowns of thorns to him—His Violence and Injustice are recoiling upon his own head. Russia, Poland, Prussia, and all the North of Germany are delivered from his power, and the Cities of Lubeck and Hamburg which had been formally annexed to the French Empire are already in Possession of the Russians—His internal Government is convulsed even at Paris, and the pretensions of the House of Bourbon are again advanced, under the patronage of the British Government and perhaps of Russia—The situation of France has never been so precarious and in such imminent danger since the Duke of Brunswick’s invasion of Champagne in 1792—And instead of universal monarchy, or even the preponderancy of power in Europe, she has now the prospect before her of being called again to contend for her antient boundaries—Whether the happiness of mankind or the Peace of the world, will gain any thing by this new Revolution in the affairs of Europe is yet among the secrets of Providence. That Russia should maintain and that Germany should recover their Independence; and that Spain Portugal and Italy should have the same good fortune in the South is undoubtedly desirable, but when Ambition is controuled only by Ambition, and one boundless lust of domination is only exchanged for another, Humanity gains very little by the substitution—At present Russia is the arbitress of Europe—Of her Wisdom and Moderation I am not inclined to doubt—She has gloriously stood the trial of Adversity, which was severe but short—She has now the stronger test of Prosperity to go through endure—The character of her Sovereign promises much for the relief of our species—I trust he will not catch the infection of Passions which would only prolong the scenes of horror and devastation that have so long been desolating Europe.
I learn with much pleasure that Coll: Smith is to be a member of the present Congress; though I should prefer seeing him in the field—I sicken at the very name of Canada—Will bitter experience teach us Wisdom?—God Grant that it may! and bless the Country and the Parents of your affectionate Son.
A.


Title: From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 April 1813
From: Peabody, Elizabeth Smith Shaw
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

My Dear Sister,
Atkinson April 7th. 1813

Your kind Letters of Feb. 15th & March 31st lie before me, in which I find are several things unanswered, though I assure you, not unnoticed—Those Covers I have lately sent, you perceive were written in great haste—Though yours to me, however short, are gratifying—
Your very flattering, & fanciful Allusion, my Dear Sister, to the two sweet Choristers, was an evidence (I will not say, of want of correct Taste,) but of Sisterly Partiality, & of an Exuberance of that Christian Humility, which is ever ready “to esteem Others better than Himself—”
Undeserved Encomium, I have ever considered as the keenest Satire—but this I do not apply to my loved Sister—Could I have had the advantages which our young Ladies; now enjoy, of an early academic Education, & have had leisure to have gratified my ardent desire of a knowledge of the Languages, Philosophick, & Literary Acquirements, I often think, I should been more worthy, & more deserving of yours, & of my respected Brothers approbation—But limited, & circumscribed in every view, as I have ever been, I hope; even now I am not unuseful in Life—& with Gratitude have reason to say, by divine Grace, “I am, what I am.”—And though I have had disappointments—the Death of dear Friends, “buffeted,” wounded, disconcerted in my Prospects, & best Plans, yet in all my Path of Life, I have found a never failing Source of comfort, in a consciousness of a desire, & endeavour to act agreeably to my best informed Judgment, & what appeared the strongest Reason—firmly believing that He, who sees not as Man sees, directs the course of human Events, & brings the greatest Good, out of what we deem Evil—And this is a powerful motive for Resignation, & Reliance—Whatever is our allotment, whether prosperous, or adverse, it is my Sister; a most consoling Idea, to believe that we are under the Gaurdianship of Superior Intelligence, & if we truly love God, when we “ask Bread, he will not give us a Stone”—or if he does, & our Lot is hard, He will so ameliorate by circumstances, as to render us cheerful, make our “yoke easy, & our Burthen Light”—
Your dear absent Son, seems to feel the want of parental soothing—kind interested Friends to participate, & to awaken in his own mind those sublime Motives for Consolation, which upon a similar Bereavement, he so beautifully suggested to his wive’s Sister—But there are sometimes wounds so deep, as no Balm can reach, & for which we cannot account—Our heavenly Parent, who knows what is best for us, “scourgeth every Son, & Daughter, whom he receiveth—.” & the voice of every Affliction is, “Repent”—“Increase in every Christian Virtue.” Luke 13 4th 5th verse—Second Epistle of Peter, 1st Chap from 5th to the 9th
Those Lines quoted of Scott, no Parent could read without being penetrated by there exquisite touch—Though my dear Nephew, & Niece are far from there native Land, embittered by the painful Idea, that he must there leave bone of his bone, & deprived of pleasant anticipations, yet, in all his Griefs, & extreme distress, We are happy to believe, his mind turns to that inexhaustable Fountain of Light, & Love, which can check each rebellious Sigh, assuage our Tears, & repair all earthly Losses with unfading Laurells—
Like you, my Sister, I have been led to enquire, perhaps, not with so humble, & acquiescent a Spirit, as I ought, why things are thus? & thus? in our domestic Circle!—But when we confide our own unworthyness, that we are all in some degree, “verily guilty,” have we not reason to be thankful that our Lots; are no worse? rather than to repine, or fancy We could adjusted better.—I have experienced the futility of my own Wishes—I am quiet—& pray that my Path may be directed—
In a Family so heterogeneous as yours, there wilt be opposing Interests; & Offences must be expected—But I should be grieved if anything took place, to interrupt your Tranquility, or the Peace of your excellent Daughter—I rejoice at the prospect of her, & her Caroline’s spending the Summer with her Parents—My dear Sister, we can travel but a little longer in this Wilderness, & it seems a Duty, to keep your Daughter with you all in your power—to cheer you on your way—
It is happy age have a relish, & may innocently indulge in social, & every virtuous affection, while to brighten our declining Sun, Heaven favours us with the sweetest temporal Blessing, the conversation, & tender assiduities of a well-informed, amiable, dutious Child—“Long may the pleasing Talk engage”—& soften the pillow of Infirmity, with the gentlest Hand—Can such pleasant Society be given up? For to Husbands & Sons, however kind, & good, one cannot communicate so unreservedly, as to a Daughter—I know you must sensibly feel the want of that dear relative, with which Indulgent Heaven so long blessed you—But O how happy, that we can trace her to “Sweet Fields, beyond the swelling Flood; Where Saints immortal reign. Infinite Day, excludes the Night, And pleasures banish Pain”—
Mr Norton, I presume, will soon enlarge your Circle of Friends—I am pleased that Mrs Greenleaf approves of his choice—I believe he is delighted with his fair Hebe, modest as Dian, elegant as Venus, & mild as the Summers Evening—May the dear children find a Mother, interested in their welfare—The wife can easily be obtained—I hope, his Zeal in his proffession, has not “eaten up his House.” But I fear she will have an arduous Task—
There is something I believe, in the cold air of March very unfavorable to health—About three weeks since Mr Peabody was threatened with an heavy stroke of the Paralytick Kind, which affected his left side, so that he was unable to attend upon the Sabbath, or to dress, or undress himself for several Days, But he seems now much better—The long confinement from free air in winter, generally makes me sick by Spring—I have had an ague in my head, neck, & pain voilent in my Ear—& my Eyes have been very weak, & face swelled like the Erysipelas—
Abby thinks I was very sick, for my head felt in such a fog, that I could not write—It is pleasant for me, to think Dr Tufts, is yet spared in life, to do more good, I trust—The widow, & the fatherless have long been his Charge—Do, whatever you, & he think, is right, & best, & I will sanction it, with an Heart full of love, & respect, to all my dear retalives, by the Hand, of / Your affectionate
Elizabeth Peabody—


Title: From John Adams to George Washington Adams, 9 April 1813
From: Adams, John
To: Adams, George Washington

Dear George
Quincy April 9 1813

I Send you, a few Lines from the Old Astronomical and Astrological Poet, Manilius, whom you may Some time or other, think it worth your while to read, from curiosity at least.
Sunt autem cunctis permixti partibus ignes;
Qui gravidas habitant fabricantes fulmina nubes;
Et penetrant torras, Ætnamque minantur Olympo;
Et callidas reddunt ipsis in fontibus undas;
Ac Silice in dura, viridique in cortice Sedem;
Inveniunt, cum Sylva Sibi collisa crematur:
Ignibus usque adeo, natura est omnis abundans.
Lib. 1. vs. 850–6.
Now, Mr George, I will give you the most Simple and litteral Translation, that I can make of these Verses, and you Shall Study it and try whether you can correct it, or improve it, or embellish it.
But Fires are intermingled in all Parts; which inhabit the heavy clouds fabricating thunderbolts, and penetrate the earth, and menace Etna against Olympus; and render the Waters hot, even in Springs; and find a Seat, in the hard flint, and even in the green bark, when Wood rubbed against itself is Set on fire. To Such a degree is all Natura abounding in Fires.
And what, my dear Boy, could a modern Chymist Say more, excepting the Use of the Word Calorie, instead of Fires.
You must write your Translation, to your Grandfather
John Adams


Title: From James Monroe to Abigail Smith Adams, 10 April 1813
From: Monroe, James
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

Dear Madam
Washington April 10. 1813

I fear that the pressure of much business, and an anxiety to avail myself of a moment of leisuir, to write to Mr Adams in reply to his kind letter, made me delay it longer than I ought to have done. I now return you the letter—which he had the goodness to submit to my perusal, and with many thanks to him for it. The sentiments which it conveys do honor to the head & the heart of the author—.
It is impossible to state the precise time when your son will return to the UStates. He is associated in the negotiation with G Britain, which is to be commenc’d in St. Petersburg, under the mediation of the Emperor of Russia. His service in that negotiation is consider’d of high importance to his country, and it is hoped that it will not interfere in any respect with his views, or with those of yourself or his father in regard to him. Whenever he resolves to return home, every facility which the government can allow, will be extended to him.
The Letter—which I had the pleasure to receive from you, for your son, shall be forwarded to him, at a very early day, as shall any others which you will have the goodness to send me, on the reciet of this.
with sentiments of great respect & / esteem I am dear Madam yr very obt / servant

Jas Monroe


Title: From Mercy Otis Warren to Abigail Smith Adams, 15 April 1813
From: Warren, Mercy Otis
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

Plymouth Ms. April 15th 1813—

I had for several weeks been anticipating the pleasure I have recently received on the arrival of your Son.—I very well knew he could not come without a Letter for me from his good mother, which is always a cordial to my bosom.—
A sublunary being indeed, I yet stand:—with animation sufficient to flatter myself with the enjoyment of again embracing the remnant of a few worthy friends who yet  on this ball of earth & with sight enough to add my signature whenever I think they wish to see the tremulous scratch.—But I have not courage enough to attempt to answer the very important question contained in yours of the 9th Instt.—
It is true as you observe, I “have lived many Years.”—I have experienced much—.I have not been deficient in observation—I have seen changes, and have felt events with too much poignancy, not to excite much and deep reflection.—But, to give an opinion on the exciting state of the civilized world, especially, when you might disclose it to the long experienced Statesman by your side, might be a bold intrusion from so poor a calculator of events, that may tend to promote the happiness of the great family of man.—
It is true I have been looking much into the prophetic writings and the best Commentators thereon—but the incomprehensible decrees of the Creator have been so long hidden in the vale of prophecy, that the more weak mortals endeavour to develope the counsels of Deity, the more is the mind bewildered:—and the more we contemplate the inscrutable designs of providential Government, the more are we convinced how limited are our faculties.—We can only adore, and wait a fuller disclosure of prophetic intimations which I have no doubt are designed, however distressing in the present day, to terminate in the ultimate peace & happiness of mankind.—
It is not probable that either you or myself shall see the Millennium on Earth, nor do I think the present Generation merit such a blessing.—We have been an ungrateful people—we have a abused our priviledges, and by avarice, dissention, pride; and the vile passions that hang about the human heart, been worrying on the distress of Nations, which I think we are told must universally take place before the happy period when the twelve hundred and sixty days shall be completed, when the Kingdom of this world shall become the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour.—
I consider the burning of Cities, the slaughter of millions, and the overturning of Empires, as the precursors of the destruction of Antichrist and the restoration of the Jews.—
I could indulge my pen in communicating the many, many reflections of my lonely hours, but the brevity of your Letter, give me a check and forbid my fatiguing my friends by a certain loquacity, of disposition which might neither tend to pleasure nor improvement. I am griev’d to hear that my beloved Mrs Smith does not enjoy health. Do you expect her again at Quincy this Year?—If she comes there I shall expect her at Plymouth if I should be then a sublunary Being. Be that as it may, I shall according to your promise expect the repetition of a visit from you.—You will present my respectful Compliments to Mr. Adams.—Does he now want to see Mrs. Warren once more in her corner at Plymouth? Let him answer this question himself.—It would be pleasant to me to see you together, but if we meett not on Earth I hope we shall meet in some of the mansions prepared for the disciples of a compassionate Redeemer.
It is my request that you write soon and often to / Yr. truly Affecte. Friend.

Mercy Warren


Title: To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 19 April 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, John

N: 23
Dear Sir.
St: Petersburg 19. April 1813.

I intended in my last Letter to have mentioned to you the Circumstances which procured me somewhat unexpectedly the pleasure of an acquaintance with Sir Francis d’Ivernois, when the more singular incident which introduced me to that of Madame de Stael crossed my purpose, and engrossed the latter to itself—I now return to Sir Francis.
Lord Cathcart, on his arrival here, sent me the usual Card of Notice from Ambassadors to Ministers of the Second order, informing me that he had presented to the Emperor his credentials as Ambassador Extraordinary from His Britannic Majesty—This was a Politesse, which I had not expected, and which I made no hesitation to return, by paying him a formal visit of etiquette, in person—I had already met him as I told you before at Madam de Stael’s. He received me with all proper courtesy, and expressed his hopes, that our War would be stop’d at the threshold—Hopes in which I warmly and sincerely concurred, but which by the Will of Heaven have been disappointed—He professed a great regard for America, and alluded to his particular and personal motives for attachment to that Country, of which I understand his Lady is a Native—He returned my visit, but it happened to be at a moment when my child was at the last extremity, and I could not receive him—Since then, and untill he left the City to join the Emperor Alexander at his Head Quarters, I did not repeat my visit, and only occasionally saw him in other places when we talked on such topics, as Swift says he and Harley were used to discuss on the road to Windsor.
Sir Francis d’Ivernois was not formally connected with the Embassy—He was engaged upon a Mission of his own, and I presume was collecting materials for a new pamphlet against Napoleon.—On his first arrival he sent me his Card, and I sent him mine—Sometime afterwards I heard he had expressed a desire to make my acquaintance having as he said had the pleasure of your’s when you were in England.—A common friend invited me to dine with him, for the particular purpose of bringing us to meet; but Sir Francis was seized with a fever which confined him to his apartments, on the day of the dinner, and I thus missed the opportunity.
Some Months afterwards on occasion of a Te Deum at Court, I met him there, and he was introduced to me—He immediately mentioned to me his antient acquaintance with you, and added that he had at a later period been in Correspondence with you.—One thing which appeared to have left an impression upon his mind more lasting than from so slight an incident might have been expected was that in your Defence of the American Constitutions, you had styled him Doctor d’Ivernois:—He told me that he believed Doctor Price had been the occasion of the mistake—That he remembered having once dined with you at his house, and that Doctor Price had several times at table spoken to him as Doctor d’Ivernois; a title to which he had no pretension. Sir Francis having since that time received the honour of knighthood from his Britannic Majesty, appears not to consider the Doctorate as a title of honour—Shenstone’s Schoolmistress challenged and held-right-dear the additions of “Goody, good woman, gossip, ne aunt and dame”—But that was because
“no flattery did corrupt her truth,
Ne Pompous title did debauch her ear”—
Sir Francis told me that he was on the point of departure—That he was going to make a tour through Silesia, and if the Russian armies should open the passage for him, into Switzerland—He said he had heard of some Letters of mine concerning Silesia, and asked me, if I knew where he could procure them—I had picked up here one copy of the French Translation of them, which I sent to Sir Francis, requesting his acceptance of it, observing in the Note, that though a Republican, I was happy to have a sort of hereditary title to his Friendship—He paid me a visit a day or two afterwards, and in return for my present gave me two publications of his own—One called Les trois offrandes a Bonaparte, and the other Napoleon Administrateur et Financier—But he seemed to have taken my calling myself a Republican, something as he had felt your styling him a Doctor—He said with a good-humoured smile, that by the expression though a Republican, as applied to myself, there was a lurking Epigram upon him as being no longer a Republican—I assured him that there was nothing epigrammatic at-all in my intention—there was nothing but an Antithesis between my own Republicanism and my hereditary claim to his good Graces—He replied that as a Genevan, he had been a Republican also, and if Geneva still existed as a Republic he should be so still—But as an Englishman, which he must now consider himself he was not a Republican nor could with propriety be so; to which I very readily assented—We had then a long and not unanimated Conversation upon Politics—Upon the State of Affairs between U.S. and G.B. in which I immediately perceived, what indeed I had  no reason to doubt of before—that we agreed only in one point—in most profoundly lamenting the War—With regard to its Causes we totally differed upon the facts, and with regard to its Consequences, upon the speculations—He thought the War would be short, and that we should come to the British terms—He thought we should have done more wisely to join in the War against France, and taken care to be in at the Death of Napoleon—Longe alia mihi est mens—I had no Passion for Napoleon hunting, and told him as I had told Madame de Stael, that I thought he had hunters enough at his heels already—I had no Ambition to see him receive the coup de pied de l’Ane, from America.
Sir Francis was very strenuous in the persuasion that the present British Ministry were reluctant at this War with America—He had heard of the assertion made by Sir Robert Wilson at a Gentleman’s table in this City, which I have mentioned to you in former letters—Sir Francis told me that he did not believe that Mr Perceval had ever said any thing like it to Sir Robert Wilson—That Sir Robert was by no means one of Mr Perceval’s intimate friends as he himself had been—That he knew Mr Perceval’s sentiments as he knew his own—That Mr Perceval had not been three minutes from him when he fell into the hands of Bellingham—That Mr Perceval would have adhered to the Orders in Council, though at the cost of a War with America—But he neither desired, intended nor expected that War, and would very sincerely have lamented it—I mention this Circumstance in Candour, because it goes at least some way to invalidate the testimony of Sir Robert Wilson which was as reported to me, expressed in very strong terms—Mr Whitbread however very directly charged Mr Perceval in open Parliament with the intention, of going to War with America, and there, Mr Perceval did not disclaim it—I mentioned this to Sir Francis, but he thought an imputation from the Opposition was no proof of a Minister’s intention, though he might see fit to leave it uncontradicted.—Sir Francis left the City, before I had an opportunity of returning his visit—There is every prospect that he will have the means of pursuing his journey into Switzerland without molestation.
Madame de Stael is at Stockholm, and has become an important political personal there—in high favour with the Crown Prince, whose Chivaleresque Virtues she has been celebrating in a pamphlet against the Continental system, and the Doctrine that free ships make free goods—She expatiates on the advantage which the acquisition of Norway would be to Sweden, because she says “ce n’est pas le tout, de s’aggrandir; il vaut mieux savoir s’arrondir”—an axiom well suited to the conception of a Lady-politician.
I am, Dear Sir, ever faithfully your’s
A.


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to James Monroe, 20 April 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: Monroe, James

Dear Sir
Quincy April 20th 1813

I have this day the pleasure of your Letter of April 10th with the inclosure.
The intelligence you have been pleased to communicate to mr Adams, and to me, occasion many reflections in my mind.
But with respect, to the path of Duty before me, I have not any hesitation.
Early taught to relinquish all personal considerations and enjoyments, at the call of my Country, Surrounded with a young Family, and resideing at the Seat of war, I submitted to many years Seperation during the Revolution, from my Protector, The Friend of my youth: my companion, and the Husband of my choice. after the Peace, I joined him abroad; and past four Years with him in Europe.
Soon after my return, I was calld to the painfull Separation from my Oldest Son, who was then honourd by an embassy to Holland by President Washington.
That he discharged the various Duties assignd him to the honour and advantage of his Country, and the approbation of his employer—was my Compensation, and my Reward.
Having Since advanced many years towards the close of Life, and knowing that my Son had a young Family to Educate and provide for—(I need not Say to you Sir, that this is not to be done by a foreign Embassy) I confess that it was with Still greater, and increased reluctance that I again consented to his leaving his Country upon the Embassy to St petersburgh. that he has been able to render Service to his Country, merrited and received the confidence and approbation of the President, as you assure me he has—is a high and gratefull testimony to me—
alltho I have daily hoped that he would return the ensuing Season. yet do I freely, and willingly relinquish him to his Country; upon an occasion so highly important, and so pregnant with concequences to this Nation, knowing that he would consider no personal Sacrifices which he can make of any value when placed in competition, of being an instrument in the hand of Providence to restore Peace upon a just and honorable Basis between the two contending Nations.
I Shall avail myself of this opportunity of writing to him, by forwarding Letters to the Gentlemen at philadelphia as you advise—
I am Sir with Sentiments of Respect / and Regard / Your Humble Servant

Abigail Adams


Title: From Walter Hellen to John Quincy Adams, 20 April 1813
From: Hellen, Walter
To: Adams, John Quincy

My dear Sir,
Washington 20th: April 1813.

I had the honor to write you, on the 18th: Nov. 1811, since which I have been deprived of the pleasure of any of your always highly esteemed favors. I heard with the most sincere sorrow,  it had been the Divine Dispensation, to afflict you & your dear Lady with the loss of your little Daughter, I wish it was in my power to offer any Consolation on an occasion so trying & distressing; but alass from woful experience, I too will Know, how difficult it is, to alleviate our feelings from such Heart breaking Scenes. Yet my dear Sir, you ought  both, & I have no doubt have derived great satisfaction, in reflecting how much your distress might have been heightened had it been the Divine Will, to have call’d one of you, instead of the dear little Cherub—Most sincerely do I pray you may both be spared, to be a blessing to those you have left.
The appearance of Mr Gallatin, the Bearer hereof wil at St. Petersburgh, will I presume be a surprize to you, unless indeed you have been apprized of his visit—great expectations are entertain’d by all parties here of the success of his Mission—tho’ some say, they had rather Mr Bayard had gone alone & from which more might have been calculated—As I understand they are both Joined with your goodself in the Mission, I have every hope & Confidence that your exertions may terminate in an Honorable & solid Peace—an event which at this time must be very desirable to England as well as to ourselves—indeed it wou’d seem, if there is really a sincere desire on both sides, that nothing can prevent it.
It has been whisper’d, that its likely you may return this ensuing Autumn, should it be your wish, in which case, Mr Bayard if he likes, is to take your place, this arrangement, tho’ not talk’d of is—as I observed before the whisper, & as such I mention it to you—I need not say how happy your return will make your friends here—I frequently hear from your Sons thro’ your friends in Boston, & it gives me great pleasure to find they are such fine Boys—My own Children thank Heaven are all very well except my little Daughter, who is just recovering of the Meazles. As to my own Health it still continues in the most precarious state—The Winter before the past, I had hoped I was about to recover, but as the Spring advanced, I had another Attack of which however I thought I got the better of, during the Summer but early in the last Fall, I was Attacked again, & have been confined to my Room, of & some times to my Bed almost ever since—it has deprived me of the little Strength I had, I have now scearcely a hope of ever regaining y Afflictions my dear sir, in every  have been of the most severe kind, & I  often wonder how I have been able to withstand them thus long—God Almighty grant, that you nor yours may never suffer the like.
Present me in the most affectionate manner to your Lady & Kitty & believe me my dear Sir, / Your ever faithfully
Walter Hellen


Title: From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 22 April 1813
From: Adams, John
To: Adams, John Quincy

My dear Son
Quincy April 22 1813

I have Official Information that Mr Bayard and Mr Gallatin are joined with you in a Negotiation of great importance and no little difficulty, nor less hazard to your Reputation. What the Result will be I know not: but I need not Say to you that you cannot decline a Share in the Business. Your return to me is the first Wish of my private heart: but I am not yet So Selfish as to hope for the gratification of my Inclination at the Expence of your honour, or the Interest of your Country. I hope the Opprobrium of American Commissioners, Divisions, Jealousies and Altercations will be avoided.
The Vacation at Hingham commences this day. John is already here and George will be in a few hours: both are very well and do well. Our Friends, for a rarity are all well.
Your Colleagues will carry all the News. Our Frigates have won Laurels, which they can never looze: but how soon they may be compelled to Submit to Superiour force or reverse of fortune, cannot be foreseen.
If you remain in Europe longer than this new Negotiation lasts, I hope it will be nearer home, and in a State of Peace when We can Send your Sons to you.
My Love to Wife Son, Nephew Sister. I long to embrace them all; but dare not indulge the hope. In our inevitable doom my Faith is perfect that all is intended and will end in our good. So believes and So prays your affectionate Father
John Adams


Title: From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 23 April 1813
From: Adams, John
To: Adams, John Quincy

My dear Son
Quincy April 23 1813

This Line is intended to go by Mr Bayard or Mr Gallatin, who are associated with you, or you with them in a Negotiation for Peace with G.B. under the Mediation of The Emperor. As I am and desire to be possessed of no Secrets, I cannot judge of the Probability of Success.
The Gentlemen your Colleagues are well known to you to be able Men; and all of you must be Sensible of the delicacy of the Trust and the risque of your Popularity. If you make peace upon Terms Short of the highest Claims of one Party, you will be charged by one half the Nation with betraying the Rights and honour of your Country. If on the other hand you cannot obtain Terms that you can accept, you will be reproached by the other half, with the guilt of Sacrificing the Lives of your Fellow Citizens by a wanton continuance of an unjust and unnecessary War.
For my Personal Part, I Should not much care, if like Mr Jay you Should retire and Study Prophecies or translate Demosthenes, provided you are So near me that I could See you once a day or even once a Week.
George and John are with Us, for the Vacation, and as gay as the Larks and Robins.
We are all well. Each of the Gentlemen carries with him in his own head a Magazine of American and other Information. Besides no doubt all the Necessary Public and private Papers printed And Manuscript.
With cordial Salutations to Wife Child Sister and Nephew I remain forever your Affectionate
John Adams


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody, 24 April 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: Peabody, Elizabeth Smith Shaw

my dear Sister
Quincy April 24th 1813.

Yesterdays post brought us heavey tydings tidings from Philadelphia. our Friend, our Physician, the constant and weekly correspondent of my Husband is no more; the Learned the accomplished, the Benevolent Rush is gone; I cannot describe how heavily this loss falls upon us in our old Age. it is like severing a Limb from the Body. upon the 10th of this Month the president received a Letter full of spirits & vigor, for which he was always remarkable. Yesterday expecting a Letter from him in return for one written upon the 18th, a Letter came, from Dr Waterhouse, inclosing his sons account of his death after a few days illness with the typhus fever—he who from principles of benevolence, exposed his Life through the two dreadfull yellow fevers which almost depopulated the city of Philadelphia by remaining in the city when thousands fled, to Comfort and administer relief to those poor objects, who could not remove was then preserved, as the Bishop of Marceilles  was during the plague which raged there, which occasiond pope to Ask?
“Why drew Marceilles Bishop purer Breath
“When nature sickened and each gale was death”
The stroke to me was sudden. altogether unprepared, it comes with redoubled force—I had looked to him as the Friend most capable of doing justice to the Character of my Friend, should he survive him. they served together in the commencement of the Revolution in Congress, more than thirty years ago. there they contracted a Friendship and intimacy which no changes or time or circumstance have ever interupted—a steady faithfull Friend, through all the vissisitudes which have shaken off many others “a Friend unrotten at the core” and whose constant correspondence was our weekly delight and entertainment—
What is the worst of woes that wait on Age?”
What stamps the wrinkle deeper on the brow?
To view each lov’d one blotted from Life’s page
And be alone on Earth”
“Before the Chastener humbly let me bow,
o’er heart divided and o’er hopes destroy’d”
I find releif in pouring out my sorrows. I beleive we feel more sensibly in Age the loss of those who have journeyed with us near the last stage, and if we live to old Age, we may be said, “to be alone on Earth” as it respects those who were our cotemporaries.
I thank you my dear Sister for your her excellent Letter of April 7th I should have replied sooner, but I have much engaged in writing abroad. so few safe conveyances present, that I wished to avail myself of this as soon as I was officially informed that two gentleman were joind in commission with mr Adams under the Mediation of the Emperor Alexander to negotiate a peace with Great Britain
“The Secretary of State writes me, “The conduct of mr Adams has obtaind the entire approbation of the president; and it is hoped that he will take part in negotiation for peace should G Britain accept the Mediation of Russia, as is presumed, and in forming a commercial treaty with both those powers as is contemplated, his knowledge of the subject in relation to both makes it of great importance that his country should have the advantage of his Services in the important transactions”
Heaven grant that he may be an instrument in the hand of providence of restoring peace to his Bleading Country I regret that one of the Gentlemen associated, should be so unpopular an appointment, yet he has filld great and responsible stations, and without any delinquincy or proof of mal conduct—altho not without back biting calumny his not being a Native is a great objection, in the minds of many people and is in mine. altho a genevian he is from a land of freedom and Liberty he is undoubtedly is a man of sense experience and knowledge of public affairs. he is well known to mr Adams, altho as the common people say—“I say it that should not say it, I beleive there are many persons who had rather intrust the whole negotiation in the hands of mr Adams, than have had him thus associated. but to him it would have been considerd too great & weighty a trust  to have borne it alone. it has been customary here to have send three ministers, when a negotiation for peace has been treated for.
I am sensible it is a great and mighty trust—if a peace is made—there will be a dissatisfaction with many, and if they are unsuccessfull the continuence of the war will be asscribed to them.
I hope they will do their duty and submit concequences—
I have letters from mrs Smith she had been again afflicted with distressing pain and lameness and thinks she shall not be able to come this spring—
I have been the last week quite sick with the severest cold, I have had through the winter.— it is going of—let me hear from you and from mr Peabody who I am sorry to learn has been so much indisposd I would rather suppose his complaint Rheumatic than other ways—
We are all in pretty good health in all the families which amidst other afflictions is a comfort scarcely over estimated, but by its reverse. If I had patience to revise and coppy my Letters they might be more worthy the perusal of my sister—but they are the spontaneous effusions of a heart full of Love and affection, to my dear Sister, now the only remaining Branch from the ancient stock, yet  unpluct from the Heart of her / affectionate

Abigail Adams


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to Julia Stockton Rush, 24 April 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: Rush, Julia Stockton

O my dear Madam.
Quincy April 24 1813

how shall I address you. how offer the consolation I need for myself upon an occasion which has torn my heart with anguish, filld my Bosom with Greif, and so overwhelmd me by the magnitude of the Bereavement, that I cannot utter my feelings
The Stroke was so unexpected to me who had calculated upon going myself to the world of Spirits before him, and that he would be the Friend, to administer consolation to His Friend
When the post arrived this morning, his Friend as usual looked for a Letter from him—a Letter came! hit with tydings that rent his heart, he burst forth into this exclamation
O my Friend, my Friend, my ancient, my constant, my unshaken Friend, My Brother, art thou gone, gone forever?
Who can estimate thy worth, who can appreciate thy loss? to thy Country, to thy Family to thy Friends to Science to Literature to the World at large? to a Character which in every relation of Life shone resplendent?
To you my dear Madam words cannot administer releif. my sympathizing heart weeps with you, joins in your Sorrows and Echo’s your Sighs
To the Great Author of our Being, and fountain of Life I commend you, and your amiable afflicted Family for consolation—
how prophetic were the words of his last Letter—which Struck me at the Time Knowing that my time is short, and that the night of Imbecility of mind or Death is fast approaching, I have sat down to prepare two small tracts for the press.—The time indeed was short, too short I fear to have fullfilld his design—
You have Children my dear Madam worthy of their parents, raised up to support and console you, and the memory of your dear departed husband is so clustered about with virtues that when the Lenient hand of Time shall meliorate your greif, you will dwell upon the sweet remembrance of them with unceasing delight. they will brighten your passage when calld to Join him in the  realms of Light & Bliss.
Beleive me dear Madam your / sympathizing and afflicted / Friend

Abigail Adams


Title: From Mercy Otis Warren to Abigail Smith Adams, 24 April 1813
From: Warren, Mercy Otis
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

My dear Madam,
Plymouth April 24th 1813

The inclosed was written with design to forward by your Son, who I then presumed would have returned to Quincy the last Saturday the 17th—Judge Adams call’d on me the day he came to Plymouth & delivered your agreeable favor—I have not seen him since—I did not know he was going to Barnstable—is he there still—or has he return’d by the route of N. Bedford or Bridgwater?—Surely, he would not have return’d through Plymouth without calling on the ancient friend of his parents.—If he has he must doubtless have some good apology to make—if he is reprehensible no one can execute that business better than his mother.—But I am ever glad we are not obliged to any private hand to aid our epistolary intercourse—we have a mail which comes forward three times a week, of course. I may expect soon to hear from you with the usual pleasure which ever accompanies your letter,—when directed to
Mercy Warren


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to Abigail Amelia Adams Smith, 27 April 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: Smith, Abigail Amelia Adams

my dear daughter:
Quincy, April 27, 1813.

You will, I know, share with your father and me, in lamenting the death of our ancient friend, our physician, the constant correspondent and endearing companion; the benevolent, learned, and ever to be regretted Rush. It is indeed a heavy stroke; an unexpected one to your father: one for which we were unprepared, having a weekly correspondence with him for a long time. On Saturday last we sent, as usual, to the post-office for letters, expecting to receive a very interesting one from him. Instead of a letter from him, the post brought one from a friend announcing his death. On the Wednesday previous to his death, from his usual health he was seized with a pain in his side: bleeding and blistering were applied; he soon had symptoms of a typhus fever, which upon the fifth day, put a period to his life, to the unspeakable grief of his family; and the whole city (it is said in our letters,) were in tears as for a common father. He has left lasting memorials of his skill and industry: to the poor he was in his profession unbounded in his charity, kindness, and benevolence; when the eye saw him it blessed him. The loss to his family, his friends, his country, and to the world at large, is not easily estimated. Although arrived at seventy, he was still vigorous and active, constantly employing his pen for the benefit of society.
A friend of so many years ripening, whom no changes had warped, but constant and steady, “unrotten at the core,” who had passed together with him through many political conflicts, in the most perilous times, is a loss not to be repaired; a breach not to be healed; and as such does it weigh down your father. Death, in taking Rush, has taken from him one of his greatest pleasures, in the constant correspondence with him.
“What is the worse of woes that wait on age?
What stamps the wrinkles deeper on the brow?
To view each loved one blotted from life’s page,
And be alone on earth.”
Those who have lived in the world three score years and ten, may literally be said to “be alone on earth” as it respects their cotemporaries. How few, how very few of my much loved early acquaintances remain? and every year diminishes the number.
April 28th.
I have just received your letter of March 18th. I see by your handwriting that you are better. ******* Knowing by the prejudice existing in New-England against foreigners, I could have wished he had been a native. Mr. Gallatin came to this country from the free republic of Geneva; although since that time her liberties have been sacrificed to France. Geneva was once regarded as the centre and asylum of the reformed religion; the inhabitants became Christians so early as the third century. And here the celebrated John Calvin, although not a native, founded an academy in which the children of all the citizens might receive an education. Here he liberally promoted the cultivation of science and the study of elegant literature; and such was the reputation of this seminary, that students resorted here from all quarters of the protestant world to attend the lectures of Calvin and his learned colleagues, all men of eminence. In no city of Europe, or perhaps of the whole world, adds this writer, are the people so well informed. I mention these circumstances to show that Mr. Gallatin derived his origin in a country where both the religion and the government were congenial to our own. He is a naturalized citizen; he has risen by his talents and industry to places of high trust in the state of Pennsylvania. I know now of any want of honour, honesty, or integrity which has been ascribed to him even by his enemies, in the high and responsible station of Secretary of the Treasury. He is a man of learning, and well acquainted with all our foreign negotiations, as well as the affairs of the country; he leaves a wife and family and large possessions in the country. I wish to view with a liberal and candid temper of spirit, every measure of the government and administration: they have difficulties enough to encounter when every allowance is made. I hope the native American may prove as able, as wise, and as candid, as true to the interests of the country, as the Genevean; and I believe your brother will not take any exception to his associates. Upon this occasion they are all commissioned as envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipo, and as such must be presented to the emperor.
I wish I could have conveyed you intelligence soon enough for you to have written by them; we have done so; you may still try; but I hope they will be away before your letters will get here; the sooner the better. I pray they may be successful. *****
My love to dear Caroline. I shall write to the Colonel when he gets to Washington and has reconnoitred the ground. The post will leave me if I do not hasten to subscribe, / Your affectionate mother,
 A. Adams.


Title: From John Adams to George Washington Adams, April 1813
From: Adams, John
To: Adams, George Washington

Dear George
Quincy April 1813

I sent you by Mr Colman a few latin lines, with a bald translation. Cannot you render that translation into French? Try.
I send you now a few sentences on the same subject of Caloric by which you may judge how far the Ancients were behind the Moderns, in this point of natural Knowledge.
Cicero, in his Essay De Natura Deorum; an admirable Work for its Age, which I hope you will, one day Study for the Religion, the Morality and Philosophy as well as the Eloquence of it, says Lib. 2.Ss. 9.10 “Omnia, quæ alantur, et crescant, contineant in Se, vim caloris: Sine qua neque ali possent, neque crecere. Nam omne, quod est calidum, et igneum, cietur, et agitur motu suo. Quod autem alitur, et crescit, motu quodam utitur certo, et equabili: qui quamdiu remanet in nobis, tamdiu sensus et vita remanet: refrigerato autem, et extincto calore, occidimus ipsi, et extinguimur.”
But I will not fatigue you, with a long quotation, at once. You may try your Skill in translating this. I may hereafter send you more: by which you may See, with what subtle penetration and profound Ingenuity this great Theologian, applies the Properties in Nature and physical Phenomina to prove the Existence of a God, a Principatus in the Universe.
Follow, my dear Boy, the good impulse of your Mind, and the amiable dictates of your heart, and continue to be studious and inquisitive as you generally have been; and distrust not the Blessing of Heaven. So hopes and So prays your grandfather
John Adams


Title: From John Adams to William Cranch, 1 May 1813
From: Adams, John
To: Cranch, William

Dear Sir
Quincy May 1st 1813

Shall I ask a favor of you? to pay Mr Gales 5 Dollars for my third years subscription for his National Intelligencer and let me pay it for you to Brother Peabody, or your Brother John Greenleaf? We have no paper Bills here that will pass at Washington and silver cannot go by the Post So much for the grave: proceed we now to the gay.
Yesterday 30th of April the President and Congress weighed their Anchors unfurled their sails and went to sea, in the face and eyes of British Frigates and 74s some say: and although some imprudent People in Quincy had the curiosity to look at them from chimney tops, and the peaks of the mountains: yet we are told that, in Boston not a soul condescended to bestow a glance upon them even from the wharves. Not that a sight has wholly lost its attraction on a mob, but because a sublimer spectacle was exhibited by the Washington benevolent society.
In the evening your Aunt and I, deserted by all the Family were enjoying themselves ourselves like Darby and Joan, when in came your nephew John Greenleaf and his young neighbour Ward Murston all alive to tell us, the glorious news that the essex had arrived at Newport  and that Decatur had gone out with the United States and the Macedonian, and taken a British 74 after a bloody battle. They said the news was in every bodys mouths and they heard everybody say that it was generally believed to be true.
When the lads were gone, thinks I to myself and says I to Madam, would not good Mr Johnson of Woburn record this days events as instances of the wonder working providence of Zions savior in “New England”? But do you believe the story? Not a record of it. The Friends of the Navy are anxious and gloomy, from an apprehension that  general Smith are gone out to be sacrificed. The “Washington society with A. Quincy for their mirth piece are exulting and triumphing in the success of their Coups de Theatre; and the maichaivillians among the Democrats have invented these lies to keep up the spirit of their party and mortify ’tho only for a night, their enemies. Umbone repellitor Umbro Jesuitry is answered by Jesuitry And the poor simple ignorant people are the dupes. I know not whether idolatry among the hebrews was ever punished with more signal manifestations of divine vengeance than the idolatry to the name of Washington is in this country.
What a privilege it is to be insignificant? To be nobody? To be nothing? You who are a great man dare not write in this style, you ought not. I would not if I was any thing I mean any thing public; I have some private relations in which I may boast, and among them there is one which gives me great satisfaction, I mean that of, / your Uncle
John Adams


Title: From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 1 May 1813
From: Adams, John Quincy
To: Adams, Abigail Smith

N. 46.
St: Petersburg 1. May 1813.

Every day that passes gives me occasion more and more to lament this unfortunate War, with which it has pleased heaven to visit us—If it could have been avoided we should now have had a free commercial intercourse with all the North of Europe, at least to Bremen inclusively, and in a few Months more with Holland—Besides the advantages which our Country would have derived from this, I should have had continual opportunities of hearing from my dear friends in America, and of writing to them, and what would have been yet more agreeable to me had our Peace been preserved, there would have been no other than the natural obstacles to prevent my return to them and to my Country. As it is—the only means I have of communicating with America, is by the way of England—How precarious that is, you can easily judge; for it depends upon the forbearance of the British Government to stop individual travellers who go to England, there to embark for America, in the Cartels—Of these there has however been a succession at short intervals through the Winter, by every one of whom I have written to you.—I now write by an American who is going to Hamburg, and thence to England—I enclose the letter as I have done once or twice before, to R. G. Beasley Esqr. Agent for American prisoners of War, London.—If it should be our destiny to remain here another Winter, I would recommend it to you to enclose letters for us under cover to him, and to send them by the Cartels—He informs me that by the regulations, all the letters sent by the Cartels, must be open except his. So that by transmitting them under cover to him, they will be less exposed to perusal on their way.
I say, if it should be our destiny to remain here another Winter, because I have yet no orders from our Government that indicate what we are to expect. This uncertainty cannot however much longer continue—I have already learnt from English Newspapers the arrival at New-York of the Freeling Cartel in which Mr Harris was a passenger—Whatever the President may determine, concerning the dispatches of which he was the bearer, it will at least be decisive with regard to our prospects for the present year—That we should stay here is the least probable, as well as the least desirable of the alternatives that I can anticipate—After an experience of four successive Russian Winters, I believe there is no person accustomed to milder climates, who would not be desirous of an opportunity to assure himself once more that in the changes of the Seasons there is such a thing as Summer—We have formed no social attachments that can make us much regret the Country; and I have no employment here which can even afford me the consolation of being useful to my own
On the Continent of Europe, the year upon which we have entered, promises to be as eventful, and threatens to be as sanguinary, as its last predecessor. But the scene of action, and the cause are totally changed—The dream of universal Monarchy in France, which may have tickled the imagination of the Corsican, and which has so hideously haunted the fancies of his Enemies, is forever past—France will not soon again appear in the character of an invader—She is herself invaded—The Hanseatic Cities are already lost—Holland in a few Months, perhaps in a few weeks will share the same fate—Prussia from the most subservient of her allies, has become the most exasperated of her Enemies—Denmark has deserted her and is before this, numbered with her foesAustria will in all probability very soon join the Same Side—A Swedish, Russian and British force, commanded by a French General is destined to recover Hanover, and to restore Holland to the house of Orange; while at the same time Louis 18 has issued a Declaration claiming anew the throne of France as his inheritance—To oppose all this Napoleon has little but the resources of a Genius, great only by success, and the remnant of a shattered military reputation—It is rumoured that he is collecting a large army upon the Rhine, but his troops will be mostly raw and inexperienced, and all of them disheartened—His present Disasters are so entirely imputable to himself that it can scarcely be said Fortune has abandoned him—There is so little in his personal character that can take hold of the affections of mankind that his destruction which is as certain as any human Event that can be foretold, will leave no sympathizing feelings behind—But what will be the Fortunes of France, it is not so easy to foresee—If she takes back the Bourbons, She must take them from the hands of her Enemies—And with the Bourbons She must take conditions the most humiliating to her Pride; and at the price of sacrifices the most fatal to her Power—This is a point of View, by  no means grateful to contemplation, but which cannot be overlooked—Louis 18. in his Declaration has promised to abolish the Laws of Conscription—A promise certainly well suited to the purposes of England; but which if accomplished, will make the Bourbons themselves when restored the mere puppets of foreign Powers, and France alternately a prey to all her neighbours—
The reflection of the present state of things upon our own concerns is not auspicious—In the Spring–tide of success which has flowed with such an impetuous torrent in favour of the English, almost from the moment of our Declaration of War, they have been gathering spirit and inveteracy, and unanimity, so that now the language of all their parties is, that we must be chastised into submission.—The loss of three frigates and of more than five hundred Merchant vessels in six Months, has only stimulated them to revenge, and our shameful failures in Canada, have made them perfectly secure in the only quarter where they could have any reason to fear us.—They have blockaded, all or Ports from the Mississippi to New-York inclusively, and the rest I suppose will soon follow—I hope our Country will prove herself equal to the trial that awaits her—Peace is not to be expected.
After a Winter more severe than I ever witnessed even in this Country we have had the compensation of an earlier Spring than is usual—The month of March was moderate and mild, and the river Neva broke up on the 11th: of April New Style—We still have occasional frost and snow, but the Summer is always reckoned from the dissolution of the River—This Event has always before been peculiarly interesting, to us, because it opened our direct Communications with America—Every week brought numbers of our Countrymen, and intelligence from our friends was always fresh—Our prospects have changed, and we shall see nothing of the American flag this Season—The opening of the River is accordingly a matter of indifference to us.
Mrs Smith, my wife’s Sister, is just recovering from the scarlet fever—the rest of us are as well as we can expect to be here— The week of the Easter–Holidays is just closing, and it is a time of universal merriment, festivity and intoxication.
I am ever faithfully your’s
A


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to Caroline Amelia Smith De Windt, 3 May 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: De Windt, Caroline Amelia Smith

My dear Caroline
Quincy May 3d: 1813.

I inclose you a volm from Harriot, and I have written to your Mother so late, that I have not a brain prolific enough to entertain you. I could inform you that our old gardner went to France this winter and did not expect to return soon enough to garden, and we have got another in his stead, who like most successors, finds fault with his predecessor, that this should have been so, and that otherwise, accordingly he must make alterations, time must prove whether for the better, upon April 28, our Appricot tree bloomed, our plumb trees are just opening, the season although very cold, is more forward than the last year, the grain failed in all parts, of the state the last year and there would have been a want, and a scarcity with us, if we had no other cause, but the blocade of our Harbors, has cut off the coasting trade; and we cannot get grain, but, by land from the Southard which renders it very high, flour is at seventeen dollars pr barrel, corn nine shillings, and Rye 15 pr bushel, this a calamity which I hope will not last long, if we should be blessed with a fruitful season, bread the staff of life, and the chief reliance of the poor, should be kept  low. Our 74s are building, our little Navy show what we should have done, if we had not been impeded in its growth, but to compare great things with small, the successor to the father of the Navy like the gardner thought, that this was not necessary, and that might be laid asside. Taxes repealed least our revenue should be so abundant, that we should commit mischief with it. Oh blindness to the future, I will not say in this instance kindly given, Will you, tell Harriot, that she must not write politicks.—now tis as natural for me to fall upon them as to breath. it distresses me to see so many of my kindred and acquaintance whom I love and esteem going blindfold as I think, led astray by deceivers, ascribing views and designs to the government of which I know them to be innocent.
Come my good girl let me quit this subject, how many Cows do you have upon the farm? how many ducks have you raised? how many chickens? now we have found them so mischivous, that we have banished them all, not a solitary Hen clucks upon our territories, or a stately cock rears his head with a cock a doe upon the place.
Our girls went a maying yesterday as they called it, walked to Bents point bridge, cold and damp weather, expected to meet by appointment the Hingham Belles and Beau’x, but they were too prudent to risk the weather and wisely stayed at home. Our young ladies in Quincy, are too dissipated, Caroline, never at rest, never satisfied with home. I complain, their Mother complains, their Grandfather complains, yet do I know I am reasonably indulgent. Oh time how few thy value know.
I was called away last evening before I could close, we have a roomful every Sunday evening, sometimes overflowing, we have an agreeable addition, Mr & Mrs Apthorp have since his return from abroad been frequent in their visits to us. He is the most sensible and intelligent gentleman of all the Quincy society, he is candid, rational and liberal upon political subjects. He has been to Lisbon, to Portugal, mixed with both English and French officers, of Army and Navy, and returns to his own Country astonished at the partiality which prevails in favor of foreign Countries, and at the opposition to the government of our own. Well here I am again, upon the old topic, all I can say in excuse is, out of the ‘abundence of the heart’ and uncle Tobias wars in flanders.
Nurse up your dear Mother that she may be well enough to take her journey. I want to see you all. With love, regard, and esteem and without complement I am as ever. I think I will not put my name.
Do you burn this for the Credit of your grandmother, you must not send it to any of the family but Mother.


Title: From Abigail Smith Adams to John Quincy Adams, 3 May 1813
From: Adams, Abigail Smith
To: Adams, John Quincy

My Dear Son
May 3d 1813

The vessel which carries you this Letter will convey to you the account of the Death of a dear and valued Friend, the Friend of his Country, the Friend of Mankind, and the confidential Friend & constant correspondent of your Father, the Sincerely lamented Rush
upon the 10 of April your Father received a Letter from him, as he had done for more than a year almost every week. upon the 18th to st. instead of a Letter from him, came the sad tydings of his death—he lay only 5 days—and then terminated a Life, if not full of years, full of usefullness—the Stroke was So Sudden, So unexpected to us that it has fallen with redoubled force upon us—your Father feels it like a string Seperated from his Heart. no Man now living has so intimate so long and So correct a knowledge of your Father and his public transactions as Dr Rush—and no Man had he Survived him would have done more justice to his Character. but it has pleased heaven to take him hence—at a time of Life—when his death is universally regreeted, and when to all appearance his usefullness in his profession was unimpared—
You who know him as a Physician as a Scholor as a man of Science and Literature—and as a Man of universal Benevolence need not any Eulogiums to heighten your regreet for his loss—or respect for his memory. there is a great Similarity of character between his own & that drawn by him of Sydenham, and I may apply the Lines to him which he calls upon Physicians to apply deposit upon the Tomb of Sydenham
“with every healing plant, his grave adorn,
Saviour of many millions, yet unborn.”
This morning the post brought Letters from Philadelphia from Mr Smith to his Family—as not a Solatary has reachd us from you as yet, I could not refrain from the temptation of opening the Letter to Caroline—to learn the date and the health of all my dear absent flock. I found it to be decbr 24 and that the Family were well with the exception of my dear daughter whose many Sorrows and afflictions have borne heavily upon her. we have determined to write on to Philadelphia to know if it will be practacable to get George ready to go if, they will take him with mr Galletin & Bayard. if we had been officially informd of the reality  of the mission in Season we would certainly have embraced the opportunity of Sending him out. he is himself very desirous of it, whilst John is utterly averse and I would not press him upon a Subject So tender to my own feelings
I have written twice already by this vessel and regreet that we did not sooner apply for George. but our first direct accounts were that the vessel would Sail in ten days, and we feard that we should Scarcly have time to forward our Letters Soon enough. indeed we have not yet received a replie from either of the Gentlemen nor have we yet learnt whether they have saild.
We have not any Letters of a later date than 25 october from you. Both your Father and I have—made it an invariable Rule not to pry into the Secreets of Government. with respect to the arrangement of the present mission mr Munroe has been kind enough to give us a detail, but whether as Some suppose the mediation has been Susgested by you to the Emperor, or whether it has been his own free will offering is alltogether unknown to us—however it may be, the Success of the mission is most earnestly desired by every Friend of his Country. we are told in Scripture Blessed are the Peace Makers—it must be Blessed are they with the approbation of their own conscience. For they may be sure they will not receive their Reward here—
it is needless for me to write any thing respecting our own National affairs. of them you will be more fully and accurately informd by the Gentlemen associated with you—of our own State affairs! what shall I say? of N England the Present dominant Party, the Party who now Governs—I would it were only a comedy Errors—it may terminate in Tradegy which God forbid—
I have Letters this day from Washington from Adelaid—She writes that She has embraced the opportunity of writing by mr Gallatin.