Memoir of the Life of John Quincy Adams. | Page 2

THE ORIGIN AND RESULTS OF THE FLORIDA WAR.--HIS DENUNCIATION OF DUELLING.--HIS ARGUMENT IN THE SUPREME COURT ON BEHALF OF AFRICANS CAPTURED IN THE AMISTAD, 302
CHAPTER XII.
WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.--HIS DEATH.--VICE-PRESIDENT JOHN TYLER SUCCEEDS.--REMARKS OF MR. ADAMS ON THE OCCASION.--HIS SPEECH ON THE CASE OF ALEXANDER M'LEOD.--HIS VIEWS CONCERNING COMMONPLACE BOOKS.--HIS LECTURE ON CHINA AND CHINESE COMMERCE.--REMARKS ON THE STATE OF THE COUNTRY, AND HIS DUTY IN RELATION TO IT.--HIS PRESENTATION OF A PETITION FOR THE DISSOLUTION OF THE UNION, AND THE VOTE TO CENSURE HIM FOR DOING IT.--HIS THIRD REPORT ON MR. SMITHSON'S BEQUEST.--HIS SPEECH ON THE MISSION TO MEXICO, 328
CHAPTER XIII.
REPORT ON PRESIDENT TYLER'S APPROVAL, WITH OBJECTIONS, OF THE BILL FOR THE APPORTIONMENT OF REPRESENTATIVES.--REPORT ON HIS VETO OF THE BILL TO PROVIDE A REVENUE FROM IMPORTS.--LECTURE ON THE SOCIAL COMPACT, AND THE THEORIES OF FILMER, HOBBES, SYDNEY, AND LOCKE.-- ADDRESS TO HIS CONSTITUENTS ON THE POLICY OF PRESIDENT TYLER'S ADMINISTRATION.--ADDRESS TO THE NORFOLK COUNTY TEMPERANCE SOCIETY. --DISCOURSE ON THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERACY OF 1643.--LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF BANGOR ON WEST INDIA EMANCIPATION.--ORATION ON LAYING THE CORNER-STONE OF THE CINCINNATI OBSERVATORY, 364
CHAPTER XIV.
REPORT ON THE RESOLVES OF THE LEGISLATURE OF MASSACHUSETTS PROPOSING AN AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES IN EFFECT TO ABOLISH A REPRESENTATION FOR SLAVES.--FOURTH REPORT ON JAMES SMITHSON'S BEQUEST.--INFLUENCE OF MR. ADAMS ON THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE NATIONAL OBSERVATORY AND THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION.--GENERAL JACKSON'S CHARGE THAT THE RIO GRANDE MIGHT HAVE BEEN OBTAINED, UNDER THE SPANISH TREATY, AS A BOUNDARY FOR THE UNITED STATES, REFUTED.-- ADDRESS TO HIS CONSTITUENTS AT WEYMOUTH.--REMARKS ON THE RETROCESSION OF ALEXANDRIA TO VIRGINIA.--HIS PARALYSIS.--RECEPTION BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.--HIS DEATH.--FUNERAL HONORS.--TRIBUTE TO HIS MEMORY, 409

MEMOIR
OF
JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.
CHAPTER I.
BIRTH.--EDUCATION.--RESIDENCE IN EUROPE.--AT COLLEGE.--AT THE BAR. --POLITICAL ESSAYS.--MINISTER AT THE HAGUE.--AT BERLIN.--RETURN TO THE UNITED STATES.
John Quincy Adams, son of John and Abigail Adams, was born on the 11th of July, 1767, in the North Parish of Braintree, Massachusetts--since incorporated as the town of Quincy. The lives and characters of his parents, intimately associated with the history of the American Revolution, have been already ably and faithfully illustrated.[1]
[1] See "Letters of Mrs. Adams, with an Introductory Memoir," and "The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States, with a Life of the Author," by their grandson, Charles Francis Adams.
The origin of his name was thus stated by himself: "My great-grandfather, John Quincy,[2] was dying when I was baptized, and his daughter, my grandmother, requested I might receive his name. This fact, recorded by my father at the time, is not without a moral to my heart, and has connected with that portion of my name a charm of mingled sensibility and devotion. It was filial tenderness that gave the name--it was the name of one passing from earth to immortality. These have been, through life, perpetual admonitions to do nothing unworthy of it."
[2] John Quincy represented the town of Braintree in the colonial legislature forty years, and long held the office of speaker.
At Braintree his mother watched over his childhood. At the village school he learned the rudiments of the English language. In after life he often playfully boasted that the dame who taught him to spell flattered him into learning his letters by telling him he would prove a scholar. The notes and habits of the birds and wild animals of the vicinity early excited his attention, and led him to look on nature with a lover's eye, creating an attachment to the home of his childhood, which time strengthened. Many years afterwards, when residing in Europe, he wrote: "Penn's Hill and Braintree North Common Rocks never looked and never felt to me like any other hill or any other rocks; because every rock and every pebble upon them associates itself with the first consciousness of my existence. If there is a Bostonian who ever sailed from his own harbor for distant lands, or returned to it from them, without feelings, at the sight of the Blue Hills, which he is unable to express, his heart is differently constituted from mine."
These local attachments were indissolubly associated with the events of the American Revolution, and with the patriotic principles instilled by his mother. Standing with her on the summit of Penn's Hill, he heard the cannon booming from the battle of Bunker's Hill, and saw the smoke and flames of burning Charlestown. During the siege of Boston he often climbed the same eminence alone, to watch the shells and rockets thrown by the American army.
With a mind prematurely developed and cultivated by the influence of the characters of his parents and the stirring events of that period, he embarked, at the age of eleven years, in February, 1778, from the shore of his native town, with his father, in a small boat, which conveyed them