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The question recurs 'how shall we fortify against it?' The answer is simple. Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well-wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor; --let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap --let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; --let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs; --let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars.
Abraham Lincoln

Quote Author: Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 - April 15, 1865) was the sixteenth President of the United States, serving from March 4, 1861 until his assassination. As an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery in the United States, Lincoln won the Republican Party nomination in 1860 and was elected president later that year. During his term, he helped preserve the United States by leading the defeat of the secessionist Confederate States of America in the War Between the States. He introduced measures that resulted in the abolition of slavery, issuing his Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and promoting the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 1865.

Lincoln closely supervised the victorious war effort, especially the selection of top generals, including Ulysses S. Grant. Historians have concluded that he handled the factions of the Republican Party well, bringing leaders of each faction into his cabinet and forcing them to cooperate. Lincoln successfully defused a war scare with the United Kingdom in 1861. Under his leadership, the Union took control of the border slave states at the start of the war. Additionally, he managed his own reelection in the 1864 presidential election.

Opponents of the war (also known as "Copperheads") criticized him for refusing to compromise on the slavery issue. Conversely, the Radical Republicans, an abolitionist faction of the Republican Party, criticized him for moving too slowly in abolishing slavery. Even with these problems, Lincoln successfully rallied public opinion through his rhetoric and speeches; his Gettysburg Address is but one example of this. At the close of the war, Lincoln held a moderate view of Reconstruction, seeking to speedily reunite the nation through a policy of generous reconciliation. His assassination in 1865 was the first presidential assassination in U.S. history and made him a martyr for the ideal of national unity.

Scholars now rank Lincoln among the top three U.S. Presidents, with the majority of those surveyed placing him first. He is noted for his lasting influence on U.S. politics, including a redefinition of republicanism.

Other Abraham Lincoln Quotes

If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?

He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.

Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?

If there is anything that a man can do well, I say let him do it. Give him a chance.

If you intend to work, there is no better place than right where you are; if you do not intend to go to work, you cannot get along anywhere. Squirming and crawling from place to place can do no good.

Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.

Surely God would not have created such a being as man, with an ability to grasp the infinite, to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for immortality.

Stand with anybody that stands right while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.

Property is desirable, is a positive good in the world.

People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.

No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.

Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed.

The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.

If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem. You may fool all of the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.

Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

I destroy my enemy when I make him my friend.

Freedom is the last, best hope of earth.

Force is all-conquering, but its victories are short-lived.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.

Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them.

It has ever been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all the time.

The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die.

To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards out of men.

The true rule in determining to embrace or reject anything is not whether it have any evil in it, but whether it have more of evil than of good. There are few things wholly evil or wholly good.

The fiery trials through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation.

I think that God means that we shall do more than we have yet done in furtherance of his plans and he will open the way for our doing it.

The question recurs 'how shall we fortify against it?' The answer is simple. Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well-wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor; --let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap --let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; --let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs; --let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars.

If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business. I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what's said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.

In regard to this Great Book, I have but to say, it is the best gift God has given to man. All the good the Savior gave to the world was communicated through this book.

The best gift God has given man is the Bible. It is by all odds the most influential book (or rather collection of books) in existence. The Old and New Testaments have held men together spiritually through the centuries. Three hundred and fifty years ago, in 1611, fifty four devoted English scholars and churchmen, assigned to the task by King James I, gave to the English speaking world a monument of noble prose, on which so many of us have been brought up. The Bible has been translated into more than 1,150 languages. In short, the Bible has had the most dramatic career of any book in the world.

The most notable feature of a disturbance in your city last summer was the hanging of some working people by other working people. It should never be so. The strongest bond of human sympathy, outside of the family relation, should be one uniting all working people, of all nations, and tongues, and kindreds.

The things I want to know are in books; my best friend is the man who'll get me a book I ain't read.

Neither party expected for the war, the magnitude, or the duration, which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered; that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes.

Character is like a tree and reputation its shadow. The shadow is what we think it is; the tree is the real thing.

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.

To correct the evils, great and small, which spring from want of sympathy and from positive enmity among strangers, as nations or as individuals, is one of the highest functions of civilization.

I cannot make it better known than it already is that I strongly favor colonization.

As the chief speaker at the dedication of the national cemetery at the Gettysburg Battlefield, statesman Edward Everett wrote to Lincoln: I should be glad if I could flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion in two hours as you did in two minutes.

Remarks at Closing of Sanitary Fair, Washington D.C., March 18, 1864. I have never studied the art of paying compliments to women; but I must say that if all that has been said by orators and poets since the creation of the world in praise of women were applied to the women of America, it would not do them justice for their conduct during this war. I will close by saying, God bless the women of America!

What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?

As President, I have no eyes but constitutional eyes; I cannot see you.

He has the right to criticize who has the heart to help.

Dear Madam,—I have been shown in the files of the War Department a Statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts, that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom. Yours, very sincerely and respectfully, President Abraham Lincoln

He said that he felt 'like the boy that stumped his toe,—'it hurt too bad to laugh, and he was too big to cry.'

All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.

No man is good enough to govern another man without that other’s consent.

I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference. NOTE: President Richard M. Nixon used similar words about his plan for peace in an address to the nation on the war in Vietnam, November 3, 1969: 'If it does succeed, what the critics say now won't matter. If it does not succeed, anything I say then won't matter.' — Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Richard Nixon, 1969, p. 909.

I have very large ideas of the mineral wealth of our Nation. I believe it practically inexhaustible. It abounds all over the western country, from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific, and its development has scarcely commenced. . . . Immigration, which even the war has not stopped, will land upon our shores hundred of thousands more per year from overcrowded Europe. I intend to point them to the gold and silver that waits for them in the West. Toll the miners from me, that I shall promote their interests to the utmost of my ability; because their prosperity is the prosperity of the Nation, and we shall prove in a very few years that we are indeed the treasury of the world. Message for the miners of the West, delivered verbally to Speaker of the House Schuyler Colfax, who was about to depart on a trip to the West, in the afternoon of April 14, 1865, before Lincoln left for Ford's Theatre. Colfax delivered the message to a large crowd of citizens in Denver, Colorado, May 27, 1865. - Edward Winslow Martin, The Life and Public Services of Schuyler Colfax, pp. 187-88 (1868).

Am I not destroying my enemies when I make them my friends?

President Lincoln was once criticized for his attitude toward his enemies. 'Why do you try to make friends of them?' asked an associate. 'You should try to destroy them.' 'Am I not destroying my enemies,' Lincoln gently replied, 'when I make them my friends?'

At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide. At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.

Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterward. And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.

After a man reaches forty, he is responsible for his face.

The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just; it shall not deter me.

I can see how it might be possible for a man to look down upon the earth and be an atheist, but I cannot conceive how a man could look up into the heavens and say there is no God.

Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.

My friends: No one, not in my situation, can appreciate my feeling of sadness at this parting. To this place, and the kindness of these people, I owe everything. Here I have lived a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young to an old man. Here my children have been born, and one is buried. I now leave, not knowing when or whether ever I may return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington. Without the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With that assistance I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me, and remain with you, and be everywhere for good— let us confidently hope that all will yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell.

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you can not fool all the people all of the time. Attributed to Abraham Lincoln. — Alexander K. McClure, 'Abe' Lincoln's Yarns and Stories, p. 184 (1904). Many quotation books have also attributed this to Lincoln, with a variety of sources given. According to Roy R Basler ed., The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 3, p. 81 (1953), 'Tradition has come to attribute to the Clinton [Illinois] speeches [September 2, 1858] one of Lincoln's most famous utterances — ’You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.' But he goes on to say that the epigram and any references to it have not been located in Surviving Lincoln documents. This remark has also been attributed to P. T. Barnum.

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own, intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty.

This is a world of compensation; and he who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.

Freedom is not the right to do what we want, but what we ought. Let us have faith that right makes might and in that faith let us; to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country. Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We, even we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free — honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last best hope of earth.

In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free — honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just — a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end ... I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me.

Without the assistance of that Divine Being ... I cannot succeed. With that assistance I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me, and remain with you, and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be well.

If all do not join now to save the good old ship of the Union this voyage, nobody will have a chance to pilot her on another voyage.

... that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nati

Gentlemen, suppose all the property you were worth was in gold, and you had put it in the hands of Blondin to carry across the Niagara River on a rope, would you shake the cable, or keep shouting out to him - 'Blondin, stand up a little straighter - Blondin, stoop a little more - go a little faster - lean a little more to the north - lean a little more to the south?' No, you would hold your breath as well as your tongue, and keep your hands off until he was safe over. The Government are carrying an immense weight. Untold treasures are in their hands. They are doing the very best they can. Don't badger them. Keep silence, and we'll get you safe across. -Francis B. Carpenter, 'Anecdotes and Reminiscences of President Lincoln' in Henry Jarvis Raymond, The Life and Public Services of Abraham Lincoln..., p. 752 (1865). Carpenter, a portrait artist, lived in the White House for six months beginning February 1864, to paint the president and the entire Cabinet. His relations with the president became of an 'intimate character,' and he was permitted 'the freedom of his private office at almost all hours,...privileged to see and know more of his daily life' than most people. He states that he 'endeavored to embrace only those [anecdotes] which bear the marks of authenticity. Many....I myself heard the President relate; others were communicated to me by persons who either heard or took part in them' (p. 725). Blondin (real name Jean Francois Gravelet) was a French tightrope walker who crossed Niagara Falls on a tightrope in 1855, 1859, and 1860

... I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.

I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free.

You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.

What has once happened, will invariably happen again, when the same circumstances which combined to produce it, shall again combine in the same way.

I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives and to so live that the place he lives is proud of him.

A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half-slave and half-free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved — I do not expect the house to fall — but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other.

Human action can be modified to some extent, but human nature cannot be changed.

Hypocrite: The man who murdered his parents, and then pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan.

I think very much of the people, as an old friend said he thought of woman. He said when he lost his first wife, who had been a great help to him in his business, he thought he was ruined — that he could never find another to fill her place. At length, however, he married another, who he found did quite as well as the first, and that his opinion now was that any woman would do well who was well done by. So I think of the whole people of this nation — they will ever do well if well done by. We will try to do well by them in all parts of the country, North and South, with entire confidence that all will be well with all of us.

Surely God would not have created such a being as man ... to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for immortality.

In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government, while I shall have the most solemn one to 'preserve, protect, and defend it'.

I know there is a God, and that He hates injustice and slavery. I see the storm coming, and I know that His hand is in it. If he has a place and work for me — and I think He has — I believe I am ready. This comment was made in a private conversation with Newton Bateman, superintendent of public instruction for the state of Illinois, a few days before the election of 1860. During the election of 1960, Senator John F. Kennedy used the same words in a speech to the United Steelworkers of America convention, Atlantic City, New Jersey, September 19, 1960. — Freedom of Communications, final report of the Committee on Commerce, United States Senate, part 1, p. 286 (1961). Senate Report. 87-994. As president, he used a variation of these words at the 10th annual presidential prayer breakfast, March 1, 1962. — Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F Kennedy, 1962, p. 176.

A jury too often has at least one member who is more ready to hang the panel than the traitor.

With malice toward none, with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan – to do all which may achieve and cherish a just, and a lasting, peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.

There is no grievance that is a fit object of redress by mob law.

Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?

The story of a jackass Lincoln owned as a young man: The case of that jackass was most singular. When everything was pleasant all around he would kick the worst. When his rack was fullest and his stall fixed with new straw and everything real comfortable, that jackass would start in on the almightiest spell of kicking that was ever seen. All the veterinary surgeons in the neighborhood came and tried to find out just what made the critter kick so. They never could agree about it. One thing we all noticed was that he always brayed and kicked at the same time. Sometimes he would bray first and then kick, but other times he would kick first and then bray, so that confused us, and nobody in that whole country was ever able to find out whether that jackass was braying at his own kick or kicking at his own brays.

I agree with you, Mr. Chairman, that the working men are the basis of all governments, for the plain reason that they are the more numerous, and as you added that those were the sentiments of the gentlemen present, representing not only the working class, but citizens of other callings than those of the mechanic, I am happy to concur with you in these sentiments, not only of the native born citizens, but also of the Germans and foreigners from other countries.

In the early days of the world, the Almighty said to the first of our race 'In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread'; and since then, if we except the light and the air of heaven, no good thing has been, or can be enjoyed by us, without having first cost labour. And inasmuch [as] most good things are produced by labour, it follows that [all] such things of right belong to those whose labour has produced them. But it has so happened in all ages of the world, that some have labored, and others have, without labour, enjoyed a large proportion of the fruits. This is wrong, and should not continue. To [secure] to each laborer the whole product of his labour, or as nearly as possible, is a most worthy object of any good government.

It is better then, to save the work while it is begun. You have done the labor; maintain it — keep it. If men choose to serve you, go with them; but as you have made up your organization upon principle, stand by it; for as surely as God reigns over you, and has inspired your mind, and given you a sense of propriety, and continues to give you hope, so surely will you still cling to these ideas, and you will at last come back after your wanderings, merely to do your work over again.

To secure to each laborer the whole product of his labor, or as nearly as possible, is a worthy object of any good government.

It is assumed that labor is available only in connection with capital; that nobody labors unless somebody else, owning capital, somehow by the use of it, induces him to labor. This assumed, it is next considered whether it is best that capital shall hire laborers, and thus induce them to work by their consent. Having proceeded so far, it is naturally concluded that all laborers are either hired laborers or what we call slaves. Now, there is no such relation between capital and labor as here assumed .... Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

I leave you, hoping that the lamp of liberty will burn in your bosoms until there shall no longer be a doubt that all men are created free and equal. .

I have always believed that a good laugh was good for both the mental and physical digestion.

I laugh because I must not cry.

I do not think much of a man who does not know more today than he did yesterday.

The legitimate object of government is to do for a community of people whatever they need to have done, but cannot do at all in their separate and individual capacities. In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought n

The Democracy of today holds the liberty of one man to be absolutely nothing, when in conflict with another man's right of property. Republicans, on the contrary, are for both the man and the dollar; but in cases of conflict, the man before the dollar.

What constitutes the bulwark of our own liberty and independence? It is not our frowning battlements, our bristling sea coasts, the guns of our war steamers, or the strength of our gallant and disciplined army. These are not our reliance against a resumpt

Address at Sanitary Fair, Baltimore, Maryland, April 18, 1864 We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word many mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name — liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names — liberty and tyranny.

Here's Abraham Lincoln's incredible journey to become the sixteenth president of the United States of America! 1809 – Born February 12 in a log cabin in the backwoods of Hardin County (now Larue County), Kentucky 1816 – He worked to support his family aft

Liquor may have its defenders, but it has no defense.

Discourage litigation. Persuade your neighbors to compromise whenever you can. Point out to them how the nominal winner is often a real loser — in fees, expenses, and waste of time. As a peacemaker the lawyer has a superior opportunity of being a good man. There will still be business enough.

I have stepped out upon this platform that I may see you and that you may see me, and in the arrangement I have the best of the bargain.

Reply to a clergyman who said to Lincoln that he hoped 'the Lord was on our side.' I know that the LORD is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that this nation should be on the LORD'S side.

Whatever woman may cast her lot with mine, should any ever do so, it is my intention to do all in my power to make her happy and contented; and there is nothing I can imagine that would make me more unhappy than to fail in the effort.

It is difficult to make a man miserable while he feels worthy of himself and claims kindred to the great God who made him.

Upon the North gaining control of the Mississippi River: The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea.

It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: ‘And this, too, shall pass away.’ How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! — how consoling in the depth of affliction! Many versions of this story exist. Another one is: 'The Sultan asked for a Signet motto, that should hold good for Adversity or Prosperity. Solomon gave him, 'This also shall pass away.’' — Edward Fitzgerald, Polonius: A Collection of Wise Saws and Modern Instances, item 112, p. 80 (1901). The words In neez bogzarad, which can be translated, 'This also shall pass,' appear in the Diven of the twelfth century Persian poet and philosopher, Sana'I of Ghaznl, ed. Mazahir Musaffa, p. 92 (1957).

All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother. Josiah G. Holland, The Life of Abraham Lincoln, p. 23 (1866), and George Alfred Townsend, The Real Life of Abraham Lincoln, p. 6 (1867). According to the latter, Lincoln made this remark to his law p

That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

We should be too big to take offense and too noble to give it.

Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side, My great concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.

I have got you together to hear what I have written down. I do not wish your advice about the main matter — for that I have determined for myself. Attributed to President Abraham Lincoln. — Salmon P. Chase, diary entry for September 22, 1862, Diary and Correspondence of Salmon P Chase, p. 88 (1903, reprinted 1971). According to the Chase account, Lincoln spoke these words at a cabinet meeting he had called to inform the members of his decision to issue the Emancipation Proclamation. This quotation is also used in Carl Sandburg, Abraham Lincoln: The War Years, p. 584 (1939). Although these words are not used, the same thought is conveyed in the diary of another member of Lincoln's cabinet, Gideon Welles. See his diary entry for the same date in Diary of Gideon Welles, vol. 1, pp. 142-43 (1911).

Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed.

Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new after all.

A man watches his pear tree day after day, impatient for the ripening of the fruit. Let him attempt to force the process, and he may spoil both fruit and tree. But let him patiently wait, and the ripe fruit at length falls into his lap.

This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?

God must love the common man, he made so many of them.

People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like.

The President tonight has a dream: — He was in a party of plain people, and, as it became known who he was, they began to comment on his appearance. One of them said: — 'He is a very common-looking man.' The President replied: — 'The Lord prefers common-looking people. That is the reason he makes so many of them.'

Hold on with a bulldog grip, and chew and choke as much as possible.

Having chosen our course, without guile and with pure purpose, let us renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear and with manly hearts.

It is not best to swap horses while crossing the river.

A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.

I have never had a policy. I have simply tried to do what seemed best each day, as each day came.

Broken campaign promises are as old as the Presidency itself. Here the 'Great Emancipator' makes an inaugural pledge that history would sooner forget. 'I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.'

I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day.

I think the necessity of being ready increases. — Look to it.

Important principles may and must be inflexible.

Leave nothing for tomorrow which can be done today.

Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes crimes out of things that are not crimes. A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.

Nor should this lead us to a war upon property, or the owners of property. Property is the fruit of labor; property is desirable; is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich and, hence, is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another, but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus, by example, assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.

Property is the fruit of labor ... property is desirable ... is a positive good in the world. That some should be rich shows that others may become rich, and hence is just encouragement to industry and enterprise. Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.

As the problems are new, we must disenthrall ourselves from the past.

Our safety, our liberty, depends upon preserving the Constitution of the United States as our fathers made it inviolate. The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts — not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool then to speak out and remove all doubt.

In the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates, Lincoln did not hesitate to dispel the notion that he was a champion of racial equality: 'I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races — that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality.'

He who does something at the head of one regiment, will eclipse him who does nothing at the head of a hundred.

Must a government, of necessity, be too strong for the liberties of its own people, or too weak to maintain its own existence?

I will study and prepare and perhaps my chance will come.

I have not permitted myself, gentlemen, to conclude that I am the best man in the country; but I am reminded, in this connection, of a story of an old Dutch farmer who remarked to a companion once that 'it was not best to swap horses while crossing streams.'

The demon of intemperance ever seems to have delighted in sucking the blood of genius and of generosity.

From the collection of Lincoln's papers in the Library of America series, Vol II, pp. 520-521. The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantl

I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

It has pleased Almighty God to prolong our national life another year, ... to favor as well our citizens in their homes as our soldiers in their camps, and our sailors on the rivers and seas, with unusual health. He has largely augmented our free populati

Has it [popular sovereignty] not got down as thin as the homeopathic soup that was made by boiling the shadow of a pigeon that had starved to death?

It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.

Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.

Both parties deprecated war; but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive; and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. And the war came.

So you're the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war.

A woman is the only thing that I am afraid of that I know will not hurt me.

Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.

No matter how much the cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens.

I believe it is an established maxim in morals that he who makes an assertion without knowing whether it is true or false is guilty of falsehood, and the accidental truth of the assertion does not justify or excuse him.

I happen temporarily to occupy this big White House. I am living witness that any one of your children may look to come here as my father's child has.

Quarrel not at all. No man resolved to make the most of himself can spare time for personal contention. Still less can he afford to take all the consequences, including the vitiation of his temper and loss of self-control. Yield larger things to which you can show no more than equal right; and yield lesser ones, though clearly your own. Better give your path to a dog than be bitten by him in contesting for the right. Even killing the dog would not cure the bite.

I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me.

As an individual who undertakes to live by borrowing, soon finds his original means devoured by interest, and next no one left to borrow from — so must it be with a government.

How many legs does a dog have if you call the tail a leg? Four. Calling a tail a leg doesn't make it a leg.

To ease another's heartache is to forget one's own.

When you have got an elephant by the hind leg, and he is trying to run away, it is best to let him run.

I don't like that man. I must get to know him better.

We know nothing of what will happen in future, but by the analogy of experience.

My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.

Our cause, then, must be intrusted to, and conducted by, its own undoubted friends — those whose hands are free, whose hearts are in the work — who do care for the result. Two years ago the Republicans of the nation mustered over thirteen hundred thousand strong. We did this under the single impulse of resistance to a common danger, with every external circumstance against us. Of strange, discordant, and even, hostile elements, we gathered from the four winds, and formed and fought the battle through, under the constant hot fire of a disciplined, proud, and pampered enemy. Did we brave all then to falter now? — now when that same enemy is wavering, dissevered, and belligerent? The result is not doubtful. We shall not fail — if we stand firm, we shall not fail. Wise councils may accelerate or mistakes delay it, but, sooner or later, the victory is sure to come.

The best thing about the future is that it comes only one day at a time.

I had been told I was on the road to hell, but I had no idea it was just a mile down the road with a dome on it.

I am struggling to maintain the government, not to overthrow it. I am struggling especially to prevent others from overthrowing it.

If we do not make common cause to save the good ship of the Union on this voyage, nobody will have a chance to pilot her on another voyage.

If all men were just, there still would be some, though not so much, need of government.

There is an important sense in which government is distinctive from administration. One is perpetual, the other is temporary and changeable. A man may be loyal to his government and yet oppose the particular principles and methods of administration. Attributed to Representative Abraham Lincoln. by W. T. Roche, address at Washington, Kansas, April 9, 1942: 'These words were spoken by Lincoln, then a Congressman, in defense of his condemnation of President Polk for provoking the Mexican War.'

I don't know who my grandfather was; I'm much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.

I am for those means which will give the greatest good to the greatest number.

We meet this evening, not in sorrow, but in gladness of heart.

People are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action.

Nothing valuable can be lost by taking time.

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.

If the policy of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, ... the people will have ceased, to be their own rulers, having, to that extent, practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal. Nor is there, in this view, any assault upon the court, or the judges. It is a duty, from which they may not shrink, to decide cases properly brought before them; and it is no fault of theirs, if others seek to turn their decisions to political purposes.

I could not have slept tonight if I had left that helpless little creature to perish on the ground. (reply to friends who chided him for delaying them by stopping to return a fledgling to its nest.)

Don’t interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.

The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name — liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names — liberty and tyranny.

And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.

When someone asked Abraham Lincoln, after he was elected president, what he was going to do about his enemies, he replied, 'I am going to destroy them. I am going to make them my friends.'

I could as easily bail out the Potomac River with a teaspoon as attend to all the details of the army. Attributed to President Abraham Lincoln by General James B. Fry.—Allen Thorndike Rice, Reminiscences of Abraham Lincoln, chapter 22, p. 393 (1886). This supposedly had been part of Lincoln's response to a young volunteer soldier who had come to Lincoln's office asking his help with a grievance. The story has been repeated in numerous books on Lincoln: Alexander K. McClure, 'Abe' Lincoln's Yarns and Stories, p. 162 (1904); Ida M. Tarbell, The Life of Abraham Lincoln, vol. 2, p. 153 (1917); and Caroline T. Harnsberger, The Lincoln Treasury, p. 14 (1950).

Moral principle is a looser bond than pecuniary interest.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed but I am bound to live the best life that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right and part from him when he goes wrong.

Senator [Stephen] Douglas is of world-wide renown. All the anxious politicians of his party, or who have been of his party for years past, have been looking upon him as certainly, at no distant day, to be the President of the United States. They have seen in his round, jolly, fruitful face, post offices, land offices, marshalships, and cabinet appointments, chargeships and foreign missions, bursting and sprouting out in wonderful exuberance ready to be laid hold of by their greedy hands.

While the people retain their virtue, and vigilance, no administration, by any extreme of wickedness or folly, can very seriously injure the government, in the short space of four years.

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.

I care not much for a man's religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it.

When I hear a man preach, I like to see him act as if he were fighting bees.

Seriously, I do not think I am fit for the Presidency.

We must not promise what we ought not, lest we be called on to perform what we cannot.

You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

The way for a young man to rise is to improve himself in every way he can, never suspecting that anybody wishes to hinder him.

Remarks at the Monogahela House February 14, 1861 I am rather inclined to silence, and whether that be wise or not, it is at least more unusual nowadays to find a man who can hold his tongue than to find one who cannot.

To stand in silence when they should be protesting makes cowards of men.

Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried upon him personally.

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to success is more important than any other one thing.

When I'm getting ready to reason with a man, I spend one-third of my time thinking about myself and what I am going to say — and two-thirds thinking about him and what he is going to say.

Letter to Horace Greeley. August 22, 1862 My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause.

... peace is a thing which a person must be willing to fight for ...

The will of God prevails. In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be, wrong. God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time. In the present civil war it is quite possible that God's purpose is something different from the purpose of either party — and yet the human instrumentalities, working just as they do, are of the best adaptation to effect His purpose.

My father taught me to work; he did not teach me to love it.

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