For I prophecy that men will live to a much greater age.

For I prophecy that they will grow taller and stronger.

For degeneracy has done a great deal more than is in general imagined.

For men in David's time were ten feet high in general.

For they had degenerated also from the strength of their fathers.

For I prophecy that players and mimes will not be named amongst us.

For I prophecy in the favour of dancing which in mutual benevolence is for the glory.

For the Venetian will know that the Englishman is his brother.

For the Liturgy will obtain in all languages.

For England is the head and not the tail.

For England is the head of Europe in the spirit.

For Spain, Portugal and France are the heart.

For Holland and Germany are the middle.

For Italy is one of the legs.

For I prophecy that there will not be a meetinghouse within two miles of a church.

For I prophecy that schismatics will be detected.

For I prophecy that men will learn the use of their knees.

For every thing that can be done in that posture upon the knees is better so done than otherwise.

For I prophecy that they will understand the blessing and virtue of the rain.

For rain is exceedingly good for the human body.

For it is good therefore to have flat roofs to the houses, as of old.

For it is good to let the rain come upon the naked body unto purity and refreshment.

For I prophecy that they will respect decency in all points.

For they will do it in conceit, word, and motion.

For they will go forth afield.

For the Devil can work upon stagnating filth to a very great degree.

For I prophecy that we shall have our horns again.

For in the day of David Men as yet had a glorious horn upon his forehead.

For this horn was a bright substance in colour and consistence as the nail of the hand.

For it was broad, thick and strong so as to serve for defence as well as ornament.

For it brightened to the Glory which came upon the human face at morning prayer.

For it was largest and brightest in the best men.

For it was taken away all at once from all of them.

For this was done in the divine contempt of a general pusillanimity.

For this happened in a season after their return from the Babylonish captivity.

For their spirits were broke and their manhood impaired by foreign vices for exaction.

For I prophecy that the English will recover their horns the first.

For I prophecy that all the nations in the world will do the like in turn.

For I prophecy that all Englishmen will wear their beards again.

For a beard is a good step to a horn.

For when men get their horns again, they will delight to go uncovered.

For it is not good to wear any thing upon the head.

For a man should put no obstacle between his head and the blessing of Almighty.

For a hat was an abomination of the heathen.

For the ceiling of the house is an obstacle and therefore we pray on the house-top.

For the head will be liable to less disorders on the recovery of its horn.

For the horn on the forehead is a tower upon an arch.

For it is a strong munition against the adversary, who is sickness and death.For it is instrumental in subjecting the woman.

For the insolence of the woman has increased ever since Man has been crest-fallen.

For they have turned the horn into scoff and derision without ceasing.

For we are amerced of God who has his horn.

For we are amerced of the blessed angels, who have their horns.

For when they get their horns again they will put them upon the altar.

For they give great occasion for mirth and music.

For our Saviour had not his horn upon the face of the earth.

For this was in meekness and condescension to the infirmities of human nature at that time.

For at his second coming his horn will be exalted in glory.

For his horn is the horn of Salvation.

For Jesus has exalted my voice.

For he has answered me in the air as with a horn from Heaven to the ears of many people.

For the horn is of plenty.

For this has been the sense of all ages.

For Man and Earth suffer together.

For when Man was amerced of his horn, earth lost part of her fertility.

For the art of Agriculture is improving.

For this is evident in flowers.

For it is more especially manifest in double flowers.

For earth will get it up again by  the industry of man.

For the horn is of plenty because of milk and honey.

For I pray be gracious to the Bees and the Beeves this day

           

                                jubilato agno 1763

To John Adams   10.28.1813

I agree with you that there is a natural aristocracy among men.  The grounds of this are virtue and talents. Formerly bodily powers gave place among the aristoi.  But since the invention of gunpowder has armed the weak as well as the strong with missile death, bodily strength, like beauty, good humor, politeness and other accomplishments, has become but an auxiliary ground of distinction.

There is also an artificial aristocracy founded on wealth and birth without either virtue or talents, for with these it would belong to the first class.

The natural aristocracy I consider as the most precious gift of nature for the instruction, the trusts, and government of society.  And indeed it would have been inconsistent in creation to have formed man for the social state and not to have provided virtue and wisdom enough to manage the concerns of the society.

May we not even say that the form of government is the best which provides the most effectually for a pure selection of these natural aristoi into the offices of government?  The artificial aristocracy is a mischievous ingredient in government and provision should be made to prevent its ascendency.

On the question  what is the best provision, you and I differ but we differ as rational friends using the free exercise of our own reason and mutually indulging its errors.  You think it best to put the pseudo-aristoi into a separate chamber of legislation where they may be hindered from doing mischief by their co-ordinate branches and where also they may be a protection to wealth against the agrarian and plundering enterprises of the majority of the people.

I think that to give them power in order to prevent them from doing mischief is arming them for it and increasing instead of remedying the evil.

Nor do I believe them necessary to protect the wealthy because enough of these will find their way into every branch of the legislation to protect themselves.

I think the best remedy is exactly that provided by all our constitutions,  to leave to the citizens the free election and separation of the aristoi from the pseudo-aristoi, of the wheat from the chaff.  In general they will elect the really good and wise.

A Randolph, a Carter or a Burwell must have great personal superiority over a common competitor to be elected by the people even at this day.

In some instances wealth may corrupt and birth blind them but not in sufficient degree to endanger the society.

2.19.1809

But we have a faction, to whose hostile passions the torture even of right into wrong is a delicious gratification.

Their malice I have long learned to disregard, their censure to deem praise.

But I observe that some republicans are not satisfied that this small return should be made.

They will think more justly at another day but in the meantime I wish to avoid offence.

Thomas J