Adams Family Correspondence, volume 10
May] 11 1794
This day has been our May meeting and without clubs or even Drunkeness, tho we have little purity to boast of in that respect, our Election has been calmly carried, & your Brother chosen.1 it seems the Name is in high estimation, as the Prophet Samll. find himself not only first but second, being Elected by the people both Govenour & Liut Govenour which I believe is the first instance of the kind in this State. the Land I wrote you about was this day sold for more than a hundred pounds as your Brother informs me, and concequently I was out bidden. Dr Phips purchased it, as your Brother Supposes with an intention of Building upon it. the Town have agreed to sell the front seats in the Meeting House for pews—and your Brother has told them that they shall have that in which we sit, for the use of the Aged, at what it will fetch and he means to purchase for you one of the others. I tell him I chuse that upon the right hand. I suppose they will be high, as that of old captain Beals was sold a few weeks ago at 40 pounds— Captain Beal will purchase one of them I presume—2
Dr Bracket of this Town lies dead. he was getting into practise & was much esteemed.3 mr Howard who mareid your Aunt Dyed last 173 Saturday.4 Your Mother I think is better than she was a week ago. we are extreemly dry here, quite as much so as the last spring. we have but little News. if as tis reported Robertspear is absconded from Paris—some important change will take place in their affairs. he may however have a hydra Head5 I see by the N york papers that the Gullotine has been advertized to be seen there.6 I think it should be as “advertized in England, Here is to be seen the Goulotine of the French—and the Wild Beasts”
I begin to expect your return, and one week of expectation will appear longer than a Month when I know you fixt. I am Sorry that the dry weather will give to my labours so unfavourable an appearence
present me kindly to all inquiring Friends and, as ever I am wholy / Yours
RC (Adams Papers); addressed by JQA: “The Vice-President of the United States / Philadelphia.”; endorsed: “Mrs A. April. 11 / 1794.” Filmed at 11 April 1794.
Peter Boylston Adams was elected to represent Quincy for the 1794–1795 term in the Mass. General Court (Mass., Acts and Laws,
1794–1795, p. 145).
For JA’s purchase of a new church pew, see AA to JA, 4 Jan. 1795, below.
Dr. Ebenezer Brackett (1773–1794), Dartmouth 1791, was the son of the tavern keeper James Brackett (Sprague, Braintree Families
).
Lt. Joshua Hayward (or Howard, 1699–1794) of Randolph had married JA’s aunt Bethia Adams Hunt Bicknell in 1777. He died on 10 May (same).
Both the Massachusetts Mercury, 9 May, and the Boston Columbian Centinel, 10 May, reported on Maximilien Robespierre’s alleged flight from Paris. There was no truth to the rumor. He remained in Paris and in control of the Convention and the Committee of Public Safety until his overthrow and execution on 27–28 July (Bosher, French Rev.,
p. lv, 200–202).
The museum and waxwork of New York, located at the Exchange on Broadway and largely supported by the Tammany Society, advertised in March “that from the late & many applications to see the Guillotine, there is a separate appartment provided in the building, and a compleat Guillotine is erected, and a wax figure which perfectly represents a man beheaded.” The guillotine was available for viewing three days a week, and for the squeamish, the museum keeper noted that “it may be seen with the beheaded figure or by itself—when the machine is seen alone, nothing appears horrible” (
New-York Directory,
1795, Evans, No. 28598; New York American Minerva, 22 March).
r.Charles
Your Favour of April 19. I believe has not yet been acknowledged. The Extracts from the King of Prussia were very acceptable.1
Yesterday I received your favour of May 9th.— You ask whether there might not exist Such an Equality in Society as the Democrats of this Day Seem to advocate? Yes my Son, there are many Such
174
Societies, in the Forrests of America, called Indian Tribes. Yet among these there are Princely Chiefs, noble Families and Aristocratical Sachems and Warriours. Plato’s Laws, are a fictitious Example— But he thought himself obliged to prohibit Commerce and all Communication with Foreigners.2 Lycurgus prohibited Commerce & Intercourse with foreigners and made an equal Division of Lands it is Said.3 The Lawgivers of the East, both in China and in India prohibited Commerce or at least Navigation. Yet in China, they have an oppressive Aristocracy, tho under an Emperor and in India their Casts established as horrid Inequalities as any in Europe.
If you admit Arts and Sciences, Manufactures, Commerce and Industry into your Society, you must provide against all Inequalities of Property which will be the natural and unavoidable fruit of them.
If you exclude all Art and Industry, you must be Savages, and Submit to all the Evils of that State of society. Yet even there there are Inequalities, of Birth as well as Merit. The Tartars & Arabs who lead the Lives of shepherds are Said to be more absolutely under the Influence of particular hereditary families, than the Indians of America the Negroes of Africa or the polished Nations of Europe.
Plato not only equalized Property, or rather established a Community of Property: but in order to make this practicable or even conceivable he was obliged to introduce a Community of Wives and Children: knowing that unequal families would rise up, if Individuals had Wives and Children— But all systems so unnatural will forever be found chimerical: and impossible.
New England is happy from her Education and Institutions: but her happiness is preserved by continual Emigrations into the Wilderness. fill up that Country with People, and their manners & Institutions will change.
The other Evils you mention are Corruptions in Elections which arise from Ambition more than Avarice. Ambition or Emulation would exist where there is no Property, or an Equality of Property or a Community of Property. Emulation would produce Jealousy and Envy and consequently Crimes, in every state of society you can conceive, even that the most destitute of Property.— Love allso would produce disputes and Crimes in all possible states of society— even in Platos Commonwealth— For neither Love of Women nor of Children could be extinguished—nor all Knowledge of Parents and Children prevented.
I am pleased to see your Mind taking a turn to such Speculations, 175 and am glad you have got an office to your Wish. The Baron I fear will find too much Ennui in his retreat. Yet I long for mine— If I had his Land and even his small Income I should be tempted to follow his Example. I am indeed weary. May you, my son find an easier Path in Life, than that into which Providence has cast / your affectionate Father
RC (MHi:Seymour Coll.).
On 19 April CA responded to JA’s interest in sequestration of debts by summarizing Prussia’s use of such a policy against Britain in the 1750s (Adams Papers).
Plato set down rules for the proper treatment of foreigners, suggesting that they should be accorded respect but that “intercourse with them [shall be] within the strict bounds of necessity.” They might be shown the temples and entertained by military leaders but should not be allowed to wander freely (The Laws of Plato, transl. A. E. Taylor, London, 1934, Book XII, p. 346–347).
In Plutarch’s life of Lycurgus, he describes both Lycurgus’ division of the lands of Sparta, “that they might be perfectly equal in their possessions and way of living,” and his forbidding strangers to come “who could not assign a good reason for their coming; … lest they should teach his own people some evil” (Plutarch, Lives, transl. John Langhorne and William Langhorne, rev. edn., N.Y., 1859, p. 33, 41).