are
of much account in our estimate of human happiness, and it is these
which ordinarily escape the attention of historians when they paint the
condition of society. Our admiration and our pity are alike wasted when
we turn our eyes to the outward condition of our rural ancestors, so
long as we have reason to believe that their souls were jubilant with
the benedictions of Heaven; and this joy of theirs is especially
noticeable when they are surrounded with perils and hardships.

Such was the state of society when John Adams appeared on the political
stage. There were but few rich men in New England,--like John Hancock
and John Langdon, both merchants,--and not many who were very poor. The
population consisted generally of well-to-do farmers, shopkeepers,
mechanics, and fishermen, with a sprinkling of lawyers and doctors and
ministers, most of whom were compelled to practise the severest economy,
and all of whom were tolerably educated and familiar with the principles
on which their rights and liberties rested. Usually they were
law-abiding, liberty-loving citizens, with a profound veneration for
religious institutions, and contentment with their lot. There was no
hankering for privileges or luxuries which were never enjoyed, and of
which they never heard. As we read the histories of cities or states, in
antiquity or in modern times, we are struck with their similarity, in
all ages and countries, in everything which pertains to domestic
pleasures, to religious life, to ordinary passions and interests, and
the joys and sorrows of the soul. Homer and Horace, Chaucer and
Shakespeare, dwell on the same things, and appeal to the same
sentiments.

So John Adams the orator worked on the same material, substantially,
that our orators and statesmen do at the present day, and that all
future orators will work upon to the end of time,--on the passions, the
interests, and the aspirations which are eternally the same, unless kept
down by grinding despotism or besotted ignorance, as in Egypt or
mediaeval Europe, and even then the voice of humanity finds entrance to
the heart and soul. "All men," said Rousseau, "are born equal;" and both
Adams and Jefferson built up their system of government upon this
equality of rights, if not of condition, and defended it by an appeal to
human consciousness,--the same in all ages and countries. In regard to
these elemental rights we are no more enlightened now than our fathers
were a hundred year