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Article: Antiques.(John Adams on emulation)(Brief Article)
- Article from:
- The Magazine Antiques
- Article date:
- May 1, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 Brant Publications, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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EMULATION, which is imitation and something more--a desire not only to equal or resemble, but to excel, is so natural a movement of the human heart, that, wherever men are to be found, and in whatever manner associated or connected, we see its effects.... Emulation really seems to produce genius.
John Adams, "Discourses on Davila," 1790-1791
The American revolutionaries may never have heard the term industrial revolution, but they had a growing sense of the changes described by that later phrase. Already in 1773 Provost William Smith of the College of Philadelphia recognized the category of activity that included "such Mechanic Arts, Inventions arid ...