In the following November he again writes: "To make observations on the movements of the heavenly bodies has been, for a great portion of my life, a pleasure of gratified curiosity, of ever-returning wonder, and of reverence for the great Creator and Mover of these innumerable worlds. There is something of awful enjoyment in observing the rising and the setting of the sun. That flashing beam of his first appearing upon the horizon; that sinking of the last ray beneath it; that perpetual revolution of the Great and Little Bear around the pole; that rising of the whole constellation of Orion from the horizon to the perpendicular position, and his ride through the heavens with his belt, his nebulous sword, and his four corner stars of the first magnitude, are sources of delight which never tire. Even the optical delusion, by which the motion of the earth from west to east appears to the eye as the movement of the whole firmament from east to west, swells the conception of magnificence to the incomprehensible infinite." When one of his friends expressed a hope that we should hereafter know more of the brilliant stars around us, Mr. Adams replied: "I trust so. I cannot conceive of a world where the stars are not visible, and, if there is one, I trust I shall never be sent to it. Nothing conveys to my mind the idea of eternity so forcibly as the grand spectacle of the heavens in a clear night." To a letter addressed to him by the Secretary of State, by direction of the President, requesting him to communicate the result of his reflections on the Smithsonian Institution, Mr. Adams made the following reply: "QUINCY, _October 11, 1838_. "SIR: I have reserved for a separate letter what I proposed to say in recommending the erection and establishment of an Astronomical Observatory at Washington, as one and the first application of the annual income from the Smithsonian bequest, because that, of all that I have to say, I deem it by far the most important; and because, having for many years believed that the national character of our country demanded of us the establishment of such an institution as a debt of honor to the cause of science and to the world of civilized man, I have hailed with cheering hope this opportunity of removing the greatest obstacle which has hitherto disappointed the earnest wishes that I have entertained of witnessing, before my own departure for another world, now near at hand, the disappearance of a stain upon our good name, in the neglect to provide the means of increasing and diffusing knowledge among men, by a systematic and scientific continued series of observations on the phenomena of the numberless worlds suspended over our heads--the sublimest of physical sciences, and that in which the field of future discovery is as unbounded as the universe itself. I allude to the continued and necessary _expense_ of such an establishment.