AUG 7~ 1923 
LIBRARY 
NEW YORK 
A DISCOURSE IN COMMEMORATION 
OF 
JOHN ADAMS AND THOMAS JEFFERSON ; 
Delivered before the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 
October 30, 1826. 
By JOHN THORNTON KIRKLAND, 
VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE SOCIETY. 
GENTLEMEN oF THE American AcapEmy or Arts AND SCIENCES, 
Tue fiftieth anniversary of American Independence witnessed 
the decease of two out of the three surviving individuals, who 
affixed their signatures to the act declaring us a nation. As 
citizens and men, you partook in the deep emotion excited by 
this event, and joined in the solemn and affecting notice taken 
of their character and their removal. As members of this 
literary and scientific association, you reserved your particular 
expressions of honour to their memories for this, the birth-day of 
one of them, the original proposer of our Institution, and for a 
succession of years its presiding officer. 
“The recent death” (this is the language of your vote) “of 
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, distinguished members of this 
Institution, calls for a tribute of respectful remembrance from 
their surviving associates ; a tribute which we would not fail to 
render to men, who, in the lofty contemplation of American 
Independence, saw, with wise discernment, its essential connex- 
ion with intellectual improvement ; who brightened the darkest 
hours of a perilous conflict with the light of letters, and adorned 
nM 
“AL 
