Tuesday, June 17, 2008

President John Adams on the Bible

Our second president, John Adams, opined about possible influence of the Bible on society:

"Suppose 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 conscience to temperance, frugality, and industry; to justice, kindness, and charity towards his fellow men; and to piety, love and reverence toward Almighty God ... What a utopia, what a paradise would this be region be..."

From:
Butterfield, L.H. ed, Diary and Autobiography of John Adams, Vol. III, p.9 (Cambridge, MA, The Belknap Press of Harvard University), 1961

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