[Transcriber's note: Obvious printer's errors have been corrected.The original spelling has been retained.
Missing page numbers correspond to blank pages.]
American Statesmen
STANDARD LIBRARY EDITION
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
American Statesmen
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS
BY
JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
Copyright, 1882 and 1898,
By JOHN T. MORSE, JR.
Copyright, 1898,
By HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO.
All rights reserved.
PREFACE
Nearly sixteen years have elapsed since this book was written. In thattime sundry inaccuracies have been called to my attention, and havebeen corrected, and it may be fairly hoped that after the lapse of solong a period all errors in matters of fact have been eliminated. I amnot aware that any fresh material has been made public, or that anynew views have been presented which would properly lead to alterationsin the substance of what is herein said. If I were now writing thebook for the first time, I should do what so many of the latercontributors to the series have very wisely and advantageously done: Ishould demand more space. But this was the first volume published, andat a time when the enterprise was still an experiment insistence uponsuch a point, especially on the part of the editor, would have beenunreasonable. Thus it happens that, though Mr. Adams was appointedminister resident at the Hague in 1794, and thereafter continued inpublic life, almost without interruption, until his(p. vi) death inFebruary, 1848, the narrative of his career is compressed withinlittle more than three hundred pages. The proper function of a workupon this scale is to draw a picture of the man.
With the picture which I have drawn of Mr. Adams, I still remainmoderately contented—by which remark I mean nothing more egotisticalthan that I believe it to be a correct picture, and done with whatevermeasure of skill I may happen to possess in portraiture. I should liketo change it only in one particular, viz.: by infusing throughout thevolume somewhat more of admiration. Adams has never received thepraise which was his due, and probably he never will receive it. Inorder that justice should be done him by the public, his biographerought to speak somewhat better of him than his real deserts wouldrequire. He presents one of those cases where exaggeration is theservant of truth; for this moderate excess of appreciation would onlyoffset that discount from an accurate estimate which his personalunpopularity always has caused, and probably always will cause, to bemade. He was a good instance of the rule that the world will for themost part treat the individual as the individual treats the world.Adams was censorious, not to say uncharitable in the extreme,...