Edith B. Gelles

“Gridley, however, would demand discipline of his new protégé. Pursue the law and not the gain of it, he admonished. Don’t socialize, and don’t marry too early. “An early marriage will obstruct your improvement…and twill involve you in expense.” He then sent John off to read Coke’s Institutes of the Laws of England. John bound himself to this agreement, but reluctantly because he was twenty-three years old. The pledge to avoid social life entirely, and particularly female companionship, pained him. He was far too extroverted to isolate himself entirely with the law books that Mr. Gridley gave him. Still, he mastered his assigned readings so successfully that Gridley invited him to participate in an elite club of lawyers that met to discuss legal theory. But the command to avoid socializing proved too hard. He managed to fulfill his commitment to Gridley while also keeping company with friends. In fact, John was under the spell of a different romance when he and Abigail met for the first time in the summer of 1759. His visit to the Weymouth parsonage occurred because he accompanied his good friend Richard Cranch, who was courting Abigail’s older sister, Mary. “Polly and Nabby are Wits,” he noted dismissively, using the Smith sisters’ nicknames. John meant that Abigail and Mary were smart and clever, that they sparkled in conversation. Perhaps he was even intimidated by the young women’s erudition. They certainly were interesting and lively. John, however, was currently enamored of Hannah Quincy, a cousin of Abigail’s, whom he had met the previous winter. During that winter, while he was still bound to read law with Jeremiah”
― Edith B. Gelles, Abigail & John: Portrait of a Marriage