Adams was conscious of his great pride, writing in his diary in May 1756, at the age of thirty, that “Vanity I am sensible, is my cardinal Vice and cardinal Folly, and I am in continual Danger, when in Company, of being led an ignis fatuus [will-o’-the-wisp] Chase by it, without the strictest Caution and watchfulness over my self.”38 But he would continue to let it run barely checked all his life, eventually doing great damage to his presidency.
