John Adams July 25, 1796 Tom Paine had become a leading Deist, arguing against the infallibility of the Bible. Cloudy and begins to rain, the Wind at N.E. The Men gone up the Hill to rake the Barley. In conformity to the fashion I drank this Morning and Yesterday Morning, about a Jill of Cyder. It seems to do me good, by diluting and dissolving the Phlegm or the Bile in the Stomach. The Christian Religion is, above all the…
John Adams February 22, 1756 February 22 SUNDAY. Suppos a nation in some distant Region, should take the Bible for their only law Book, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited. Every member would be obliged in Concience to temperance and frugality and industry, to justice and kindness and Charity towards his fellow men, and to Piety and Love, and reverence towards almighty God. In this Commonwealth, no man would impair his health by Gluttony,…
John Adams February 21, 1765 Found in his diary, this was a draft of a longer essay on cannon and feudal law. It was a Resolution formed by a sensible People almost in despair. [The Puritans’ decision to leave England and settle in America.] They Puritans had become intelligent in general, and some of them learned but they had been galled, and fretted, and whipped and cropped, and hanged and burned. In short they had been so worried by Plagues…
John Adams February 13, 1756 Adams doesn’t think much of the idea that Christ wiped away the sins of others. pleasant morning. Saw my classmates Gardner, and Wheeler. Wheeler dined, spent the afternoon, and drank Tea with me. Supped at Major Gardiners, and ingag’d to keep School at Bristol, provided Worcester People, at their insuing March meeting, should change this into a moving School, not otherwise. Major Greene this Evening fell into some conversation with me about the Divinity and…
John Adams February 2, 1756 Suppos a nation in some distant Region, should take the Bible for their only law Book, and every member should regulate his conduct by the precepts there exhibited. Every member would be obliged in Concience to temperance and frugality and industry, to justice and kindness and Charity towards his fellow men, and to Piety and Love, and reverence towards almighty God. In this Commonwealth, no man would impair his health by Gluttony, drunkenness, or Lust-no…
John Adams August 14, 1796 Adams lays out the mechanics of why religion is particularly effective at promoting morality. The Weather hot and dry. One great Advantage of the Christian Religion is that it brings the great Principle of the Law of Nature and Nations, Love your Neighbour as yourself, and do to others as you would that others should do to you, to the Knowledge, Belief and Veneration of the whole People. Children, Servants, Women and Men are all…
John Adams 1765 Patriots equated the practices of the Church of England with that of the Catholic Church. On August 12, 1765, the Boston Gazette published an essay again linking both churches to each other, and to tyranny. The essay argued that religious canon law – “extensive and astonishing” — was created by the “the Romish clergy for the aggrandizement of their own order.” Church law enslaved people by “reducing their minds to a state of sordid ignorance and staring timidity” and…
James Monroe April 12, 1785 In the third paragraph, Madison updates his friend James Monroe about the “general assessment,” Patrick Henry’s proposal to tax Virginians to help support religion. He notes with contempt that the Presbyterians had opposed state support of religion when Orange April 12 1785. Dear Sir,— I wrote you not long since by a young gentleman who proposed to go as far as N. Y. acknowledging the rect. of your favor of Feby 1st. I have since…
James Madison December 22, 1792 In what was otherwise a political polemic, Madison writes a few sentences (the 7th paragraph) that express a personal belief about faith: that humans have little capacity to understand God’s plan. National Gazette, December 22, 1792 Republican. — The people themselves. The sacred trust can be no where so safe as in the hands most interested in preserving it. Anti-republican. — The people are stupid, suspicious, licentious. They cannot safely trust themselves. When they have established government they…
James Madison June 12, 1788 In the Virginia convention called to consider ratification of the Constitution, opponents such as Patrick Henry argued that the Constitution would allow creation of a national religion or other forms of state involvement in religion. James Madison returned to Virginia to rebut the arguments himself, claiming that a Bill of Rights was not needed because the Constitution did not give Congress powers to regular religion. The honorable member has introduced the subject of religion. Religion…