6 July.
I spent an hour last evening at Mr. Wyer's, with Judge
Cushing. Wyer's father, who has a little place in the customs, came in. He
began upon politics, and told us that Mr. Smith had a fast last week which he
attended. Mr. Gilman preached, he said, part of the day, and told them that the
judgments of God upon the land were in consequence of the mobs and riots which
had prevailed in the country; and then turning to me old Wyer said, “What do
you think of that, Mr. Adams?”
I answered, “I can't say but mobs and violence may have been
one cause of our calamities. I am inclined to think that they do come in for a
share; but there are many other causes. Did not Mr. Gilman mention bribery and
corruption as another cause? He ought to have been impartial, and pointed out
the venality which prevails in the land as a cause, as well as tumults.” “I
think he did,” says Wyer. I might have pursued my inquiry, whether he did not
mention universal pilfering, robbery, and picking of pockets which prevails in
the land, — as every man's pocket upon the continent is picked every day by
taking from him duties without his consent. I might have inquired whether he mentioned
the universal spirit of debauchery, dissipation, luxury, effeminacy, and
gaming, which the late ministerial measures are introducing, etc., etc., etc.,
but I forbore.
How much profaneness, lewdness, intemperance, etc., have
been introduced by the army and navy and revenue; how much servility, venality,
artifice, and hypocrisy have been introduced among the ambitious and avaricious
by the British politics of the last ten years. In short the original faulty
causes of all the vices which have been introduced are the political
innovations of the last ten years. This is no justification and a poor excuse
for the girls who have been debauched, and for the injustice which has been
committed in some riots; but surely the soldiers, sailors, and excisemen who have
occasioned these vices ought not to reproach those they have corrupted. These
Tories act the part of the devil. They tempt the women into sin and then
reproach them for it, and become soon their tormentors for it. A tempter and
tormentor is the character of the devil. Hutchinson, Oliver, and others of
their circle, who for their own ends of ambition and avarice have pursued,
promoted, encouraged, counseled, aided, and abetted the taxation of America,
have been the real tempters of their countrymen and women into all the vices,
sins, crimes, and follies which that taxation has occasioned. And now by
themselves and their friends, dependents, and votaries, they are reproaching
those very men and women with those vices and follies, sins and crimes.
There is not a sin which prevails more universally and has
prevailed longer than prodigality in furniture, equipage, apparel, and diet.
And I believe that this vice, this sin, has as large a share in drawing down
the judgments of Heaven as any. And perhaps the punishment that is inflicted
may work medicinally and cure the disease.
SOURCE: Charles Francis Adams, Familiar Letters of
John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams, During the Revolution, p. 12-14
