Status Updates From Setting the World Ablaze: W...

‘In the last letter he wrote, Jefferson reiterated his belief that the American Revolution would prove to be "the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assure the blessings and security of self-government.” ’

‘For years men had served, and many had suffered and died in squalid camps and on lonely battlefields, in order to decide this terrible war. The soldiers had now done all they could. From this moment forward everything was in the hands of diplomats and politicians, who in the elegance and comfort of paneled drawing rooms would make the final decisions in a war spawned by the American Revolution.’

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‘Washington was present, sitting atop his white horse, while Rochambeau sat nearby on his mount. As a British band played a popular tune of the day, "The World Turned Upside Down," Washington, betraying no emotion, watched silently as his foes laid down their arms.’

‘The next morning at 10:00 AM Cornwallis sent a messenger under a white flag to Washington's headquarters. The commander heard the words he had waited years to hear. Cornwallis requested a meeting "to settle terms of the surrender." ’

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‘Next the French and American sappers…dug their first parallel, a trench three-quarters of a mile long. It was only 600 yards from Yorktown. One day Washington came to watch, To his surprise, an audacious soldier handed him a pick. But the commander good-naturedly chopped briefly at the sun-baked earth while the men laughed and cheered.’

LOLL that’s why we love him

“We have as good a Cause, as ever was fought for.”

‘If citizens "became inattentive to public affairs," he warned, the officeholders "shall all become wolves." ‘

‘He confessed to Abigail that when young he had longed to soldier more than he had wanted to study law. Now he wished again to soldier. "Oh that I was a Soldier! —I will be—I am reading military Books—Every Body must and will, and shall be a soldier," he wrote.’

‘Feeling betrayed by his own generation, Adams cried out that he was
"ashamed of the Age I live in.” ‘

‘When Great Britain resorted to force to suppress the colonial protest, he exhorted his countrymen to fight not to win freedom, but to save the freedom they already enjoyed "Liberty once lost is lost forever," he told them.’

‘He wished to eradicate idolatry to Monarchs, and servility to Aristocratical Pride," and in their place to cement the belief that the people were the source of all authority and power.’

‘He wished to destroy the system of privileges enjoyed by the elite in monarchical and aristocratic societies.’

…and then he became a Federalist 20 years later💀

‘They were defenders of freedom, like his Puritan forebearers. Throughout history, Adams wrote, "Liberty... has been compelled to skulk about in Corners of the Earth... everlastingly persecuted by the great, the rich, the noble ... the avaricious."

‘When barely out of college, Adams declared to a friend that to understand human behavior one had to comprehend "the passions, appetites, [and affections in nature" that drove humankind. "An intimate knowledge therefore of the intellectual and moral world is the sole foundation of which a stable structure of knowledge can be erected," he said.’

‘Venom dripped from Washington's pen as he alluded to the ministerial officials as “our lordly Masters.”’

‘America blazed with an almost revolutionary fervor.’