Lectures on Rhetoric
and Oratory

John Quincy Adams
Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory,
Delivered to the Classes of Senior
and Junior Sophisters in
Harvard University. 2 vols.
Cambridge: Hilliard and Metcalf, 1810
Rare Book & Special Collections Division
Gift of Joseph M. Toner, 1882 (9.12)

John Quincy Adams's Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory were sent to Jefferson by John Adams and described as "Two Pieces of Homespun." John Quincy Adams wrote the two volumes while a professor at Harvard University. Jefferson included the books in his library, which subsequently came to the Library of Congress when Jefferson sold his library to the government in 1815. The two original volumes sent to Jefferson by Adams are on view in the reconstruction of Jefferson's library in the Northwest Gallery.