John Quincy Adams Digital Diary

2. IV:20. Monday.

Mr Bass came and paid a year’s interest on his note to me— I agreed to postpone the payment of the first instalment of the principal, till the next year— He spoke of paying the whole of the principal, by borrowing of some other person; and said Mr Curtis told him he could borrow money to any amount, at five per Cent interest, giving security— I promised to deliver up his note and to discharge the mortgage at any day when it might suit his convenience to make the payment— I planted a row of 24 crushed Whortleberries, along by the western Wall of my Nursery— Filled 3 book boxes with Earth, and stationed them in the garden, near the gate of my Nursery—for promiscuous experiments—to pass the winter sub dio. Planted two balsam pear seeds, in my two small green boxes. Bath with R. C. Buchanan. Swam— The Rev Jonathan Homer of Newton called to see me this afternoon— He has been some time engaged upon a history of the English Translations of the Bible, from that of John Wicliff in 1380 to that of 513James the first’s divines in 1611. He is brother in law to Dr James Freeman, still Pastor of the Chapel Church in Boston— Mr Homer left with me a printed notice of this work, extracted from the Boston daily Commercial Gazette. In the Evening I rode with Mary to the beach below Mount Wollaston. Finished reading the first Book of Cicero de Finibus, and afterwards read Parker’s English translation of it. The introduction is an apology by Cicero for writing upon these philosophical subjects; whence it appears that there were many of his cotemporaries, who blamed him for this employment of part of his time— They thought there was no use in meddling with the philosophy of the Greeks—and they maintained even that the Latin language was not suitable for philosophical disquisition. Cicero maintains on the contrary that the Latin language is richer than the Greek— There was indeed no moral philosophy at Rome before Cicero— Their young men were sent for Instruction to Athens; and there were taught the Grecian Philosophy— They adopted according to their individual characters, one or other of the systems of the Grecian Schools, and some were Epicureans, some Stoics, and some peripatetics, or Academics— There was no Original Roman philosophy; Lucretius was a cotemporary of Cicero, and his Poem was an exposition of the Epicurean System, in beautiful verse. Torquatus in this dialogue, delivers it in elegant prose—and he gives very plausible answers to the common objections against the System. The Style, as that of all Cicero’s writings is flowing and easy—adapted to the subject; between the undress of the familiar Epistles, and the formal array of the Orations.