Old Minds Are Like Old Horses

This saying is attributed to Adams in an 1865 anthology, Looking Toward Sunset by Lydia Maria Child, which cited it via Josiah Quincy III. It reflects a preoccupation Adams expressed repeatedly in his letters to Benjamin Rush: his fear of intellectual decline in old age and his deliberate effort to keep reading, writing, and arguing well into his eighties. Adams was still corresponding actively with Thomas Jefferson until both men died on July 4, 1826 — the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.