[John Adams's] vividly descriptive prose is supremely quotable. Adams wears his heart on his sleeve and reveals all of his ambitions, doubts, and insecurities, especially in his diary, which is one of the greatest and most readable in all of American literature.

[John] Adams was arguing that a separate social order existed that needed to be embodied in senates and his fellow Americans could not accept this and accused him rightly of being obsessed with the English constitution.

The relationship between [John] Adams and [Tomas] Jefferson was extraordinary. They differed on every conceivable issue, except on the Revolution and the love of their country.

After [Tomas] Jefferson's defeat of [John] Adams in the presidential election of 1800, they didn't communicate with one another for more than a decade.

[John] Adams's letters reveal his persistence and determination to win over the Dutch against all odds and to convince them and the other peoples of Europe of the potential greatness of the United States and of the importance of the Revolution to the world.

[John] Adams's letters to [his wife] Abigail are wonderful. In his letters, he is loving, humorous, preachy, learned, and saucy. He speaks to her with almost complete abandon, revealing all of his sensuous and vulnerable nature.

If history teaches anything, it teaches humility.