Lincoln, A 
 R92 Hanaford 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, his 
 life and public services 
 ROOM STORAGE 
 
 Central Ubraiy 
 
 UADENA PUBLIC LIBRARY 
 
 DEFERENCE
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 HIS LIFE AND PUBLIC SERVICES 
 
 BY 
 
 PHEBE A. HANAFORD 
 
 Author of " Life of Charles Dickens," " Life of George Peabody 
 " Women of the Century " 
 
 " That life is long which answers life's great end." YOUNG 
 
 ' God buries his workmen, but carries on his work." CHARLES WESLEY 
 
 "The righteous hath hope in his death." PROV. xir.yt 
 
 CHICAGO: 
 
 E. A. WEEKS & COMPANY, 
 521-531 Wabash Ave.
 
 COPYRIGHT 1883 
 
 BY D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1895 
 
 BY THE WERNER COMPANY
 
 SRLf 
 URL 
 
 TO 
 
 ALL LOYAL MEN AND WOMEN, 
 
 NORTH AND SOUTH, EAST AND WEST, 
 
 TO 
 THE U JV I O A SL KMT Ji JV D JV A Y J\ 
 
 AW I) ESPECIALLT 
 
 TO THE LONG -OPPK ESS KD KACE FOB WHOM 
 
 President Lincoln 
 
 WKOTB 
 
 THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION. 
 
 THIS RECORD OF HIS STAINLESS LIFE AXD 
 MARTYR'S DEATH IS NOW 
 
 INSCRIBED. 
 
 SEP 5 1967
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 It has been thought that a biography of our martyred 
 President, brief, yet comprehensive, ought to be published. 
 
 Of this remarkable man it can be said, as it was of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, " The common people heard him gladly ; " 
 and therefore a memoir expressly designed for the mass of 
 readers in our country cannot fail to be warmly welcomed. 
 
 Every new book finds new readers and meets some un- 
 supplied demand. If a volume like this now offered be in- 
 deed as it is supposed to be a desideratum, its own 
 readers for whom it is designed, will cluster about it, and 
 the hopes of its author and publisher be realized. 
 
 The special aim of this volume is twofold : First, To present 
 a truthful picture of the character of the great and good man 
 who has fallen among us, delineating, as far as possible in 
 narrating the events of his life, the growth and development 
 of those grand and heroic virtues which stamp him with the 
 unmistakable seal of Heaven's approval, and make his name 
 
 " One of the few, the immortal names 
 That were not born to die." 
 
 And secondly, To sho\v that " the course of human events " 
 was such, during his earthly existence, and his relation to 
 them so peculiar in the providence of God, as to indicate 
 that he was specially commissioned for his day and work, a 
 man of the times, and a man for the times ; that he lived 
 long enough to be able to say, like his Lord, " It is finished," 
 
 5
 
 6 PREFACE, 
 
 and then passed on to hear from divine lips the unrivalled 
 words of welcome, "Well done, good and faithful servant! 
 enter thou into the joy of thy Lord ! " 
 
 Should this volume deepen the convictions of its readers in 
 the grand truths of God's sovereignty on earth as well as in 
 heaven, and of his love to all the family of man, shown 
 especially in his care for the outcast and oppressed ; and 
 should it make them love freedom and righteousness more 
 and more as they contemplate the character and life of the 
 Martyr-President, the labor spent in its preparation will 
 not have been in vain, and to God will be ascribed the glory. 
 
 P. A. H.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 &ARLY DAYS IN OBSrt'KITY 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 CULTURE tt 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK . . , at 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR 57 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 FuouBLOUS TIMES . . . 81 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 THE COURSE PURSUED 92 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 PECULIAR TRIALS 104 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS 116 
 
 CHAPTER IX.
 
 b CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS ** Kit 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 CHOSEN AGALN 184 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 LAST DAYS AND A NATION'S (}I:IEK 195 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS 317
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EARLY DAYS IN OBSCURITY. 
 
 " Donor and shame from no condition rise: 
 Act well your part, there all the honor lies." 
 
 POFR. 
 
 " But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; 
 aud God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things thai 
 rc mighty; 
 
 'And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God 
 chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are : 
 
 "That no flesh should glory in his presence." ST. PAUL (1 Cor. 1. 27). 
 
 THE sixteenth President of the United States was 
 born in obscurity. No Gabriel heralded his birth; no 
 shepherds saw the star of his nativity, and heard the 
 chanting of celestial visitants to earth ; nor did sages 
 and philosophers come to his cradle-side with costly 
 offerings and significant homage. Yet he had a grand 
 mission on earth to perform, and was to be, in some sense, 
 the savior of many, and in the obscurity of his birth, at 
 least, resembled the Master whose footsteps he afterward 
 loved to follow. It is the design of Infinite Wisdom that 
 the tiny acorn should precede the towering oak, the 
 little rivulet commence the mighty river; and that Wis- 
 dom was no less manifest in the humble birth and 
 parentage of one .whom the good of all nations, in all 
 time, should afterward delight to honor. 
 
 In that part of Hardin County, Ky., now known 
 as L,a Ru<\ on the 12th of February, 1809, ABRAHAM
 
 10 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 LINCOLN entered upon existence. His father, Thomas 
 Lincoln, and the grandfather whose patriarchal name he 
 bore, were natives of Rockingham County, Va., a 
 part of the "Old Dominion" to which their ancestors 
 had removed from Berks County, Penn. 
 
 Abraham, the grandfather, migrated to Kentucky with 
 his family in the year. 1780, where he obtained possession 
 of a small tract of land in the then wilderness, and there 
 erected a rude cabin, and commenced a life of toil and 
 danger. Like the Pilgrim colonists of our own New 
 England, he was accustomed to carry his gun with his 
 axe, or other implement of labor, when he went forth to 
 his toil ; and, when he laid his head upon his nightly pil- 
 low, it was with his trusty firelock conveniently at hand, 
 that there might be safety for him and his should the 
 wild war-whoop of the savage Indian break upon his 
 slumbers. These merciless " lords of the forest" manifest- 
 ed intense hostility to the " pale-faces," and with ruthless 
 barbarity murdered men, women, and children, when the 
 opportunity was afforded them. For four years, our 
 President's grandfather was unharmed ; but at the end 
 of that period, while he was using his axe at a place 
 some four miles from his home, he was suddenly attacked 
 by the Indians, and, unable to reach his gun in season, 
 was overpowered, killed, and scalped after the hideous 
 Indian fashion. Search was made for him when his pro- 
 longed absence awakened alarm, and the next morning 
 his remains were discovered. This loss of their beloved 
 father resulted finally in the scattering of the children. 
 
 The father of our martyred President left his early 
 home when only about twelve years old, but afterwards 
 returned to Kentucky, and in 1806 married Miss Nancy 
 Sparrow, who was a native of Virginia. Both of our late 
 P-eaiclent's parents were members of the Baptist Church,
 
 KARLT DAYS IN OBSCURITY. 11 
 
 *nd well known as a pious, unassuming, but uneducated 
 conple. The father could neither read nor write, save to 
 scribble his name in rude hieroglyphic letters which 
 could hardly be understood. The mother could not 
 write, but she could read; and this accomplishment made 
 her seem a remarkable woman for that time and place. 
 Moreover, it gave her the power to .peruse the blessed 
 volume, and to read its holy words to her husband for 
 his guidance and consolation, and its interesting stories 
 to her beloved son Abraham. 
 
 Thomas Lincoln appreciated this privilege which his 
 wife possessed, and it deepened his respect for her; for, 
 though himself so unlearned, he appreciated all the more, 
 perhaps, the advantages of education : and all who pos^ 
 sessed a more than ordinary share of learning challenged 
 and received from him the most unbounded respect. And, 
 could he have foreseen the career of his noble and excel- 
 lent son, he would have been still more desirous than he 
 was that Abraham should have the opportunity to study, 
 and still more proud of the facility with which he mas- 
 tered his lessons. 
 
 It was at the age of seven that "Abe," as he was 
 familiarly termed in the home-circle, first began to attend 
 school in a small academy with a teacher who loved not 
 his great work, and was only anxious that his pupils 
 should learn to read and write. Having put into their 
 hands the power to do these two great things, he left 
 them to use that power or not, as they pleased. But, 
 under this apathetic and incompetent teacher, Abraham 
 was not destined long to stay. 
 
 His father was a lover of liberty. He could not breathe 
 freely in a slave State. He saw the peculiar disadvan- 
 tages of life for poor whites in a land where labor was 
 degraded by slavery; and he resolved that his e
 
 12 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 should be relieved from his own unsatisfactory lot of 
 hopeless endeavor, where the very genius loci was 
 against him. 
 
 Therefore, early in October, 1816, when Abraham was 
 nearly eight years old, and had been in school but a brief 
 period, the family removed to Indiana, and settled in 
 Spencer County, in the southern part of the State, near 
 the Ohio River, about midway between Louisville and 
 Evansville. 
 
 The farm and homestead which Thomas Lincoln sold 
 could not have been very valuable; for the equivalent 
 received was ten barrels of whiskey, valued at two hun- 
 dred and eighty dollars, and twenty dollars in money. 
 Mr. Lincoln was a temperate man, and consented to this 
 arrangement, not from any love of the " fire-water," but 
 because it was a customary transaction, and, in those 
 days, regarded as perfectly proper. 
 
 The following description of the exodus from Kentucky 
 presents such a graphic idea of the early days of Presi- 
 dent Lincoln, that it is quoted verbatim. The author is 
 anonymous; but it is believed to be correct in every 
 particular : 
 
 " The homestead was within a mile or two of the Roll- 
 ing Fork River ; and, as soon as the sale was effected, Mr. 
 Lincoln, with such slight assistance as little Abe coul j 
 give him, hewed out a flat-boat, and, launching it, filled 
 it with his household articles and tools and the barrels 
 of whiskey, and bidding adieu to his son, who stood upon 
 the bank, pushed off, and was soon floating down the 
 stream, on his way to Indiana to select a new home. His 
 journey down the Rolling Fork and into the Ohio River 
 was successfully accomplished; but, soon afterwards, 
 his boat was unfortunately upset, and its cargo thrown 
 into the water. Some men standing on the bank wit-
 
 KAtlLY DAtS It* OH$CtJRlTr. 12 
 
 nessed the accident, and saved the boat ana its uwner ; 
 but all the contents of the craft were lost, except a few 
 carpenter's tools, axes, three barrels of whiskey, and some 
 other articles. He again started, and proceeded to a 
 well-known ferry on the river, from whence he was 
 guided into the interior by a resident of the section of 
 country in which he had landed, and to whom he had 
 given his boat in payment for his services. After several 
 days of difficult travelling, much of the time employed 
 in cutting a road through the forest wide enough for a 
 team, eighteen miles were accomplished, and Spencer 
 County, Ind., was reached. The site for his new home 
 having been determined upon, Mr. Lincoln left his goods 
 under the care of a person who lived a few miles distant, 
 and, returning to Kentucky on foot, made preparations to 
 remove his family. In a few days, the party bade fare- 
 well to their old home and slavery ; Mrs. Lincoln and 
 her daughter riding one horse, Abe another, and the 
 father a third. After a seven-days' journey through an 
 uninhabited country, their resting-place at night being a 
 blanket spread upon the ground, they arrived at the spot 
 selected for their future residence ; and no unnecessary 
 delays were permitted to interfere with the immediate 
 and successful clearing of a site for a cabin. An axe 
 was placed in Abe's hands; and, with the additional 
 assistance of a neighbor, in two or three days Mr. Lincoln 
 had a neat house of about eighteen feet square, the logs 
 composing which being fastened together in the usual 
 manner by notches, and the cracks between them filled 
 with mud. It had only one room ; but some tlabs laid 
 across logs overhead gave additional accommodations, 
 which were obtained by climbing a rough ladder in one 
 corner. A bed, table, and four stools, were then made by 
 the two settlers, father and son ; and the building waa 
 
 3
 
 14 AMAIIAM LINCOLN. 
 
 ready for occupancy. The loft was Abe's bed-room, uiui 
 there, night after night, for many years, he who after- 
 ward occupied the most exalted position in the gift of 
 the American people, and who dwelt in the White House 
 at Washington, surrounded by all the comforts that 
 wealth and power could give, slumbered, with one coarse 
 blanket for his mattress, and another for his covering. 
 
 LINCOLN'S EARLY HOME IN KENTUCKY. 
 
 " Although busy during the ensuing winter with his 
 axe, he did not neglect his reading and spelling, and also 
 practised frequently with a rifle ; the first evidence of 
 his skill as a marksman being manifested, much- to the 
 delight of his parents, in the killing of a wild turkey, 
 which had approached too near the cabin. The knowledge 
 of the use of the rifle was indispensable in the border 
 settlements at that time, as the greater portion of the 
 food required for the settlers was procured by it; and 
 the family which had not among its male members one 
 or more who could discharge it with accuracy was very 
 apt to suffer from a scarcity of comestibles."
 
 RAkLY DAfS Itf OhSCVK/Tt Ift 
 
 When Abe went to Mr. Hazel's school in Kentucky 
 he took with him a copy of Dillworth's Spelling-book, 
 one of the three books which composed the whole of the 
 family library. The Bible and Catechism were the other 
 two. Diligently conned, and even well-studied, his 
 scanty early library did much to form the character of 
 the child and the man. The spelling-book was the key 
 to unlock for him all the treasures of knowledgs he 
 afterward made his own. From JEsop's lesson-fraught 
 fables, soon after presented to him, he gained the aptness 
 of illustration which has made " the President's last 
 anecdote'* a byword; and from the best of books and 
 Catechism he gathered those ripe sheaves of wisdom 
 which fitted him for his place in life and in history. 
 
 His mother noble and blessed woman was his in- 
 spiration. She was determined that her son should at 
 least learn to read his Bible ; and, before God called her 
 to dwell with the angels, she had the satisfaction of see- 
 ing him read the volume which he never afterward 
 neglected. Abraham's mother might have said, as did 
 Mary the mother of Jesus, " From henceforth all gen- 
 erations shall call me blessed ; " and while this nation 
 shall revere the name and memory of the mother of 
 George Washington, side by side with hers will it 
 write the name of the mother of Abraham Lincoln. The 
 parallel between Washington and Lincoln did not linger 
 here. It paused not till the bells tolled a requiem, and 
 a nation once more wept over its beloved dead. True, 
 there were apparent points of difference, but only such 
 as, under Providence, were needed to fit each for their 
 separate duties and destinies as leaders of the American 
 people in their two great wars, one for national inde- 
 pendence, the other for national unity. 
 
 Washington was of a family renowned in English
 
 16 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 heraldry. Lincoln could trace an honorable descant 
 from Quaker stock in Pennslyvania. 
 
 " Washington was the natural representative of na- 
 tional independence. He might also have represented 
 national unity, had this principle been challenged to 
 bloody battle during his life ; for nothing was nearer his 
 heart than the consolidation of our Union, which, in his 
 letter to Congress transmitting the Constitution, he de- 
 clared to be the greatest interest of every true Ameri- 
 can. . . . But another person was needed, of different 
 birth and simpler life, to represent the ideas which were 
 now assailed." * 
 
 There were not a few contrasts in origin, in early 
 life, in condition and opportunities between Washing- 
 ton and Lincoln, but the parallels are more numerous ; 
 and Washington himself had a mighty influence on the 
 boy Lincoln through the record of his life, which Abra- 
 ham read while yet a dweller in the rude log-cabin on 
 the outskirts of civilization. One biographer f of Lincoln 
 Bays, " The hatchet story of Washington, which has 
 done more to make boys truthful than a hundred solemn 
 exhortations, made a strong impression upon Abraham, 
 and was one of those unseen, gentle influences which 
 helped to form his character for integrity and honesty. 
 Its effect may be traced in the following story, which 
 bids fair to become as never-failing an accompaniment 
 to a Life of Lincoln as the hatchet case to that of Wash- 
 ington : 
 
 " Mr. Crawford had lent him a copy of Ramsay's ' Life 
 of Washington.' During a severe storm, Abraham im- 
 proved his leisure by reading this book. One night he 
 laid it down carefully, as he thought, and the next morn- 
 
 " Eulogy on Abraham Lincoln," by Hon. Charles Sumner. 
 * H?nry J. Raymond.
 
 KARLY DATS IX OBSCURITY. 17 
 
 ing he found it soaked through. The wind had jhaugod, 
 the storm had beaten in through a crack in the logs, and 
 the appearance of the book was ruined. How could he 
 face the owner under such circumstances ? He had no 
 money to offer as a return ; but he took the book, went 
 directly to Mr. Crawford, showed him the irreparable 
 injury, and frankly and honestly offered to work for him 
 until he should be satisfied. Mr. Crawford accepted the 
 offer, and gave Abraham the book for his own in return 
 for three days' steady labor in ' pulling fodder.' His 
 manliness and straight-forwardness won the esteem of 
 the Crawfords, and indeed of all the neighborhood." 
 
 Rev. William M. Thayer states, probably on the au- 
 thority of those who knew Abraham Lincoln in early 
 life, that, "during the long winter evenings of that first 
 winter in Indiana, he read by the light, of the fire only ; 
 for they could not afford the luxury of any other light 
 in their cabin. This was true, very generally, of the 
 pioneer families : they had no more than was absolutely 
 necessary to supply their wants. They could exist 
 without lamp-oil or candles, and so most of them did 
 without either. They could afford the largest fire possi- 
 ble, since wood was so plenty that they studied to get 
 rid of it. Hence the light of the fire was almost equal 
 to a good chandelier. Large logs and branches of wood 
 were piled together in the fireplace, and its mammoth 
 blaze lighted up every nook and corner of the dwelling. 
 Hence lamps were scarcely needed." 
 
 Not long after the removal of the family to Indiana, 
 the mother of Lincoln died. This was a sad loss to the 
 whole of the little circle, especially to the children. 
 Abraham had one sister who lived to womanhood, waa
 
 l8 ABRAHAM 
 
 married, and died shortly after, leaving no children. His 
 only brother died in infancy. Mrs. Lincoln, as has been 
 intimated, was one of the most devoted of mothers, spar- 
 ing no pains to insure the welfare of her beloved chil- 
 dren. Abraham was always a dutiful son, and her coun- 
 sel and example were not lost on him, but, as good seed 
 sown on good ground, her instructions sprang forth into 
 a life of good order and usefulness. The bereaved boy 
 was almost inconsolable at her loss. No minister was 
 near to pray with the survivors as they laid down the 
 dear head of the wife and mother for the last, long sleep 
 amid the shadows of the forest. Sympathizing neigh- 
 bors gathered around; but the want of a minister to 
 conduct the usual solemn rites of Christian burial was 
 deeply felt. Some months afterward, Abraham had an 
 opportunity of learning to write, which with character- 
 istic energy and industry he faithfully improved. " Af- 
 ter a few weeks of practice under the eye of his in- 
 structor, and also out of doors with a piece of chalk or 
 charred stick, he was able to write his name, and in less 
 than twelve months could and did write a letter." 
 
 One of the first letters he wrote was to an old friend 
 of his mother, a travelling preacher, whom he desired to 
 come and preach her funeral sermon. Parson Elkins did 
 not receive the letter for some three months ; but then 
 he hastened to Indiana, and the neighbors again assem- 
 bled a year after her death to pay a last tribute of 
 respect to one universally beloved. Abraham's services 
 as a letter-writer were thus known, and he soon found 
 himself busied in writing letters for his neighbors. 
 
 President Lincoln never forgot his mother. It was 
 very long before the loneliness and desolation of that 
 sad bereavement passed away. Her lessons of diviuest 
 wisdcm he kept stored in his heart, and all her hallowed
 
 EARLY DATS Itf OBSCURITY. 19 
 
 influence was eternally sealed upon his soul by her de- 
 parture from earth. Who shall say that it was not deep- 
 ened and intensified by that very change which gave 
 aer henceforth more intimate communion with spirits, 
 and possibly with the spirit of her son ? Her grave, to 
 which hallowed spot the bereaved son was wont fre- 
 quently to repair, and muse upon his great loss and her 
 eternal gain, is still embowered amid the majestic forest- 
 trees of that region. No tombstone yet denotes the 
 sacred spot ; and the place where the remains lie buried 
 is an unfrequented locality, or nearly so. President Lin- 
 coln wrote a letter, shortly before his death, expressing 
 his intention to visit the grave during the approach- 
 ing summer, and cause a suitable monument to be erect- 
 ed; and in that letter, which was to an old friend, he 
 expressed regret that care and business had so long hin- 
 dered him from performing this duty. 
 
 He will never perform it. Instead of going to her 
 grave, he has gone to her ; and blissful beyond human 
 computation must have been, ere this, the meeting of 
 such a mother with such a son. Yet that humble 
 grave should not be neglected. A nation owes it to the 
 memory of a President martyred in its holy cause that 
 his mother's tomb should be honorably distinguished. 
 
 During the next year after Mrs. Lincoln's death, Abra- 
 ham's father married again, and secured in Mrs. Sally 
 Johnston of Elizabethtown, Kentucky, a worthy step- 
 mother for his children. She had three children, and 
 seemed to have been one who could say with Mrs. 
 Howe, 
 
 " Then spoke the angel of mothers 
 
 To me in gentle tone, 
 4 Be kind to the children of others, 
 And thus deserve thine own.' " 
 
 Between her and the son to whom she became a true
 
 20 AHR AII AM LINCOLN. 
 
 friend as well as a step-mother sprang up a devoted at- 
 tachment; and she ever acted as if she said to him in 
 tender tones of ardent sympathy, using the words of 
 Mrs. Welby,- 
 
 " Child of the lost, the buried, and the sainted, 
 
 I call thee mine, 
 
 Till fairer still, with tears and sin untainted, 
 Her home be thine." 
 
 Step-mothers are not all heartless, and those who, like 
 the writer of these pages, have known the devoted care 
 and tender love of a good step-mother, do not like to hear 
 them as a class condemned. This second mother of our 
 late President still survives to remember his nobleness 
 of soul, and to mourn his martyrdom. She resides at 
 Goose Nest, Coles County, eight miles south of Charles- 
 town, Illinois. 
 
 A few years after the death of his mother, a Mr. Craw- 
 ford, one of the settlers, opened a school in his own 
 cabin; and thither Abraham regularly repaired to add a 
 knowledge of arithmetic to his reading and writing. 
 His appearance was in keeping with his humble home. 
 He was arrayed in buckskin clothes, with a raccoon-skin 
 cap, and carried an old arithmetic, which had been in- 
 dustriously sought for his benefit. " His progress was 
 rapid, and his perseverance and faithfulness won the in- 
 terest and esteem of his teacher." His love of 'books 
 continued, and he read all that he could obtain far and 
 near. With the immortal dreamer of Bedford jail, he 
 traced the pathway of the Christian pilgrim from the 
 City of Destruction to his Celestial Home beyond the 
 river ; and no doubt he felt that he, too, would gladly 
 follow such a path, sure as he was that his own dear 
 mother would be one of the shining ones to greet him 
 on the heavenly shore. He pored over such books as
 
 KAKLY DATS Iff OBSCURITY. 21 
 
 the " Lives of Clay and Washington," till the fires of a 
 noble emulation and true patriotism glowed in his heart; 
 and he thus daily grew more and more to be of the very 
 spirit of which heroic leaders and wise counsellors are 
 made. God was- fitting him, even in his childhood and 
 his youth, for the very work which was before him. 
 Bishop Simpson expressed this idea in his funeral sermon 
 at Springfield, Illinois, on the 4th of May, 1865. lie 
 said, " Mr. Lincoln was no ordinary man. I believe the 
 conviction has been growing on the nation's mind, as it 
 certainly has been on my own, especially in the last years 
 of his administration, that by the hand of God he was 
 especially singled out to guide our Government in these 
 troublesome times ; and it seems to me that the hand of 
 God may be traced in many of the events connected 
 with his history. First, then, I recognize this in the 
 physical education which he received, and which pre- 
 pared him for enduring herculean labors. In the toils 
 of his boyhood, and the labors of his manhood, God was 
 giving him an iron frame. Next to this was his identifi- 
 cation with the heart of this great people, understanding 
 their feelings because he was one of them, and con- 
 nected with them in their movements and life. His 
 education was simple. A few months spent in the 
 schoolhouse gave him the elements of education. He 
 read few books, but mastered all he read. 'Pilgrim's 
 Progress,' 'JSsop's Fables/ and the ' Life of Washington,' 
 were his favorites. In these we recognize the works 
 which gave the bias to his character, and which partly 
 moulded his style. His early life, with its varied strug- 
 gles, joined him indissolubly to the working masses ; and 
 no elevation in society diminished his respect for the sons 
 of toil. He knew what it was to fell the tall trees of the 
 forest, and to stem the current of the broad Mississippi.
 
 72 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 His home was i/jthe growing West, the heart of the Re 
 public ; and, invigorated by the wind which swept over 
 its prairies, he learned lessons of self-reliance which sus- 
 tained him in seasons of adversity." 
 
 Bishop Simpson's allusion to Abraham's efforts on the 
 broad bosom of the " Father of Waters " was founded, 
 doubtless, on the fact, that, when about nineteen years 
 of age, Abraham accompanied the son of the owner of a 
 flatboat, who intrusted a valuable cargo to their care, to 
 the city of New Orleans. He was hired at the rate of 
 
 FLATBOAT. 
 
 ten dollars a month, and the twain composed the -only 
 crew. With only one companion, it was rather a danger, 
 ous journey. " At night they tied up alongside of the 
 bank, and rested upon the hard deck, with a blanket for 
 a covering ; and during the hours of light, whether their 
 lonely trip was cheered by a bright sun, or made dis- 
 agreeable in the extreme by violent storms, their craft 
 floated down the stream, its helmsmen never for a mo- 
 ment losing their spirits, or regretting their acceptance
 
 EARLY DATS IN OBSCURITT. 
 
 23 
 
 of the positions they occupied. Nothing occurred to 
 u\ar the success of the trip, nor the excitement naturally 
 incident to a flatboat expedition of some eighteen hun- 
 dred miles, save a midnight attack by a party of negroes, 
 who, after a severe conflict, were compelled to flee." 
 
 In the spring of 1830, the Lincoln family again sought 
 a new home. Their journey, in a region where roads 
 were rough and railroads unknown, was made in fifteen 
 days. They carried their goods in large wagons drawn 
 by oxen, and Abraham himself drove one of the teams. 
 They halted on the north side of the Sangamon River, at 
 a place about ten miles west of Decatur, Illinois. While 
 crossing the bottom lands of the Kaskaskia River on their 
 way, the men of the party were obliged to wade through 
 water several feet deep. So the journey was not ac- 
 
 LINCOLN'S FIRST HOUSE IN ILLINOIS. 
 
 complished without some hindrances. On their arrivM 
 a log-cabin was to be built, ground broker, for covn. ant 1 
 a rail-fence to be made around the farm, in all of which 
 Abraham labored faithfully.* Those rails have been im- 
 
 * In this work the Lincolns were assisted by a relative of Abraham's 
 mother, named John Hanks. While this volume was in preparation, Mr. 
 Han kg was m Bostou exhibiting this identical log-cabin, together with other relic*
 
 24 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 mortalized by orators and poets, and will henceforth be 
 mentioned by historians. Sumner says, " These rails 
 have become classical in our history, and the name of 
 ' rail-splitter' has been more than the degree of a college. 
 Not that the splitter of rails is especially meritorious, 
 but because the people are proud to trace aspiring talent 
 to humble beginnings, and because they found in this 
 tribute a new opportunity of vindicating the dignity of 
 free labor, and of repelling the insolent pretensions of 
 slavery." The newspaper report of the first public men- 
 tion of Abraham Lincoln as a rail-splitter is as follows: 
 " During the sitting of the Republican State Convention 
 at Decatur, a banner attached to two of these rails, and 
 bearing an appropriate inscription, was brought into the 
 assemblage, and formally presented to that body, amid a 
 scene of unparalleled enthusiasm. After that, they were 
 in demand in every State in the Union in which free 
 labor is honored, where they were borne in processions 
 of the people, and hailed by hundreds of thousands of 
 freemen as a symbol of triumph, and as a glorious vindi- 
 cation of freedom and of the rights and dignity of free 
 labor. These, however, were far from being the first or 
 only rails made by Lincoln. He was a practised hand at 
 the business. Mr. Lincoln has now a cane made from 
 one of the rails split by his own hands in bcj'-hood." 
 
 of Lincoln's early clays of poverty and obscurity. He is an honest-looking 
 gentleman, with a silvery beard, about seven years older than Mr. Lincoln, but 
 much more venerable in appearance. He can neither read nor write. He says 
 that his cousin Dennis F. Hanks taught "little Abe" his letters. The log- 
 cabin above mentioned has no windows; but a half sheet of paper oiled, placed 
 in a sort of wooden shutter, admitted a little light when the shutter was closed. 
 It is said to be truly a Union cabin, having in it sticks of oak, hickory, hack- 
 berry, red elm, walnut, basswood, honey, locust, and sassafras, but, it is be- 
 lieved, not a stick of pine. The dimensions are eighteen feet by sixteen; and 
 it is nine logs, or about eight feet, high. It has a peaked roof, the highest part 
 of which is about five foot from the level of its eaves. It was begun March 
 80, 1830; aud fiur days were spent in building it.
 
 KARLT DAYS AV OBSCURITY. 25 
 
 Thus in the foregoing pages have been depicted the 
 events and influences of Abraham Lincoln's life during 
 his early days. In the eloquent language of his eulogist 
 in the " Athens of America," on the day set apart for 
 commemorative services all over the land, this chapter 
 may be fittingly closed : 
 
 "His youth was now spent, and at the age of twenty- 
 one he left his father's house to begin the world for him- 
 self. A small bundle, a laughing face, and an honest 
 Heart, these were his visible possessions, together with 
 that unconscious character and intelligence which his 
 country afterward learned to prize. In the long history 
 of ' worth depressed/ there is no instance of such a con- 
 trast between the depression and the triumph, unless, 
 perhaps, his successor as President may share with him 
 this distinction. No academy, no university, no alma 
 mater of science or learning, had nourished him. No 
 government had taken him by the hand, and given to him 
 the gift of opportunity. No inheritance of land or money 
 had fallen to him. No friend stood by his side. lie was 
 alone in poverty ; and yet not all alone. There was God 
 above, who watches all, and does not desert the lowly. 
 Simple in life and manners, and knowing nothing of form 
 or ceremony, with a village schoolmaster for six months 
 as his only teacher, he had grown up in companionship 
 \vith the people, with nature, with trees, with the fruitful 
 corn, and with the stars. While yet a child, his father 
 had borne him away from a soil wasted by slavery; and 
 he was now the citizen of a free State, where free 
 labor had been placed under the safeguard of irreversi- 
 ble compact and fundamental law. And thus closed the 
 youth of the future President, happy at least that he 
 could go forth under the day-star of Liberty."
 
 CHAPTER IL 
 
 CULTURE. 
 
 " The more our spirits are enlarged on earth, 
 The deeper draught will they receive of heaven." 
 
 " The righteous shall flourish like the palm-tree ; he shall grow like a cedar in 
 Lebanon." 1'SALM xcii. 12. 
 
 THE celebrated German poet Goethe once made this 
 instructive declaration, in a conversation with his friend 
 Eckerman : " Each bon-mot has cost me a purse of gold : 
 half a million of my own mono} 7 , the fortune I inherited, 
 my salary, and the large income I have derived from my 
 writings for fifty years back, have been expended to in- 
 struct me in what I know." Men are apt to overlook 
 the stupendous price at which they have every thing; 
 and the culture which has only been secured through a 
 civilization which has cost suffering and toil and thought, 
 and even heroism and martyrdom, is still deemed to have 
 been obtained without much expenditure, when, in fact, 
 it was priceless ; so much so, that to ask its amount is 
 almost like asking, with the Lord Jesus, "What shall it 
 profit a maa if he gain the whole world and lose his 
 own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his 
 soul?" 
 
 We think of that log-cabin in the woods, of the inele- 
 gant surroundings of the future President, and say, " Such 
 a man was not cultured, and it cost nothing to train him 
 for duty and destiny." But it did cost much : not, it may 
 be, of money, though more of that than a superficial 
 observer might suppose ; but labor and influence and 
 
 M
 
 CULTURE. 27 
 
 prayers, and the silent but powerful ministrations of Na- 
 ture and Nature's God with his angelic messengers, who 
 are declared to be "ministering spirits, sent forth to min- 
 ister for them who shall be heirs of salvation." 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was not a man of science, or a literary 
 man, as men often use those terms. He would not be 
 classed with Humboldt or Newton, nor with Scott or 
 Irving; but he was nevertheless a man of culture. La- 
 bor made him such ; his own earnest efforts to gain 
 learning, his parents' efforts that he should obtain at least 
 the rudiments of an education, and enter, at all events, 
 the porch of the temple of wisdom, and the labor of in- 
 structors who must have been encouraged by the earnest 
 attention and patient industry of the boy for whom God 
 had in store a high place and a noble work. Influence 
 the influence of mighty rulers in the realm of mind, 
 mighty though few was brought to bear upon his 
 nascent spirit for its growth and culture. Plutarch and 
 ^Esop, Washington, and Franklin, and Clay, lived for 
 Abraham Lincoln, as well as for others whom they have 
 influenced in the paths of honor and virtue. And the 
 tinker of Bedford, whose immortal allegory wreathes its 
 author's head with the unfading laurels, he, too, had no 
 mean part in the culture of a man who has proved him- 
 self often a Great-Heart, but never a Worldly-wise-Man. 
 And, above all, the historians and prophets of ancient 
 times, the Hebrew bards whose harps will never cease 
 to echo through the ages, the apostolic teachers of the 
 dawning Christian era, and especially He who "spake 
 as never man spake," all had their mighty and far-reach- 
 ing influence on the mind of the boy, who, like young 
 Timothy, studied the Holy Scriptures, and early accepted 
 them as a " lamp to his feet and a light to his path." 
 
 Prayers, too, had something to do with his culture.
 
 28 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 There may be those who scoff at prayer, who scout the 
 idea once expressed in rhythmical harmony, that 
 
 " Prayer moves the hand which moves the world; " 
 
 but as there are forces in Nature whose origin and in- 
 fluence we cannot fully explain, while yet we are com- 
 pelled to acknowledge their existence ; so, though we 
 may not comprehend how prayer accomplishes its di- 
 vinely appointed ends, yet it is none the less true that 
 prayer is a power in the universe. Other things being 
 equal, he that has most power in prayer is surest of suc- 
 cess ; for in prayer he takes hold of the arm of God, joins 
 to his weakness the infinite strength, and finds himself 
 possessed of the true Archimedean lever. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln's mother was a praying woman. 
 " She who would rather her son would ' learn to read 
 his Bible than own a farm' was a true, model mother; 
 and when in his early childhood a green mound in the 
 wilderness showed that she had finished her course, and 
 gained her reward, well might that boy Lincoln visit 
 that holy place, and weep lor very bitterness of soul." * 
 The prayers of such a woman must have been answered 
 in the dew of grace that early fell upon the soul of her 
 motherless boy. There were other prayers, too, which 
 undoubtedly had their unseen influence in the culture 
 of Abraham Lincoln. Far away in the rice-swamps and 
 cotton-plantations of the South, a long-oppressed race 
 were crying for deliverance. Worse task-masters than 
 those of Egypt were crushing out the very manhood and 
 womanhood of the slavery-cursed people ; and the de- 
 spairing cry of agony went up to heaven, in the tears 
 and groans and prayers of long, long years, for a de- 
 
 itev. A. Caldwell'i Address.
 
 CULTURK. 29 
 
 liverer. God lieard those prayers ; and tslowly to our 
 eyes and to their waiting hearts, but more surely for the 
 fulfilment of his own grand purposes of love and mercy, 
 he prepared the man who should grasp the keys of des- 
 tiny with a firm hand but a tender heart, and unlock the 
 doors of the prison-house. And so prayer cultured Abra- 
 ham Lincoln. 
 
 But how describe the culture which that great soul 
 received from Nature with her myriad forms of beauty, 
 and from God and the angels? The receptive mind, 
 consciously or unconsciously (and more often the latter) 
 is powerfully impressed with' the wonders of the out- 
 ward world ; and Abraham Lincoln was one of those who 
 could not witness that awakening of the spring-time, 
 which Longfellow calls " the great annual miracle of Na- 
 ture," without receiving lasting and salutary impres- 
 sions. So, too, the " soft summer-time," autumn with 
 its golden glory, and the winter with its crystals of 
 geometric beauty covering the earth with a snowy car- 
 pet, all taught him divinest lessons. There was no 
 Vatican, nor British Museum, nor Astor Library, with 
 their myriad volumes, to aid in his intellectual culture ; 
 but he early learned to find 
 
 " Tongues in the trees, books in the running brooks, 
 Sermons in stones, and good in every thing; " 
 
 and his young soul grew more and more. 
 
 Angels from the world of light hovered around his 
 pathway, as long ago around his Lord, and as they en- 
 camp around all God's dear children. The dream of 
 Doddridge, which showed him an angel-guardian in many 
 a scene of danger through which he had passed, was but 
 a truthful expression of the fact that the " cloud of wit- 
 nesses" ever around the immortal but earth-veiled spirit
 
 30 ABRAHAM 
 
 of the child of God are fulfilling grand purposes of 
 blessing to the soul they guard. 
 
 Above all, Abraham Lincoln was taught of God. The 
 " still small voice " was not unheard by him from early 
 infancy. His own prayers mingled with those already 
 mentioned, and the Great Spirit heard and answered. 
 The divine utterance in his own soul was not unheeded ; 
 and day by day listening to it, and heeding its require- 
 ments, he not only " grew in wisdom and in stature," 
 but, like the Holy Child, he also " grew in favor with 
 God and man." 
 
 "The man who is complete in that for which the world 
 wants him," as Abraham Lincoln was, " seems not only to 
 bo suited for his work, but to have had all circumstances 
 suited to him. He is born in the right age of history. 
 The proper spot of earth waits for him and receives 
 him. The household into which he enters appears best 
 for him amidst all the households of humanity. So per- 
 haps it might not be judged in many a case if we saw 
 the man in the first stages of his nurture ; but so we 
 find it when we can see his life in its issues. A similar 
 adaptation may be noticed in any remarkable man's 
 tastes, trials, and pursuits ; in all, indeed, that subserves 
 his training and his experience."* Abraham Lincoln 
 became just such a remarkable man, after a youth spent 
 in receiving just the culture of heart and mind 'needed 
 for his place in the world. 
 
 The early days of Lincoln, spent in the obscurity of 
 his forest home, have already been traced. His removal 
 to Illinois brought him to new scenes, and under new 
 influences. He was now to be cultured by society in a 
 greater degree than ever before. 
 
 " Illustrations of Genius," by Rev. Henry Giles.
 
 CULTURE. 31 
 
 Having passed his twenty-first birthday, he began in 
 1831 to labor for himself. He aided to build a flatboat, 
 and then went in it to New Orleans, and so satisfactorily 
 cared for boat and cargo, that his employer took him 
 into his store at New Salem, twenty miles below Spring- 
 field. Here for a twelvemonth he became more familiar 
 with arithmetic ; and here he so dealt with his customers, 
 and so conducted himself in all. the relations of life, that 
 he began to be known as " Honest Abe," an honorable 
 title which will never be taken away; for he never for- 
 feited it. 
 
 Athletic and active, young Lincoln could not fail to 
 engage in the usual out-door sports of young men in that 
 place, and was usually the acknowledged judge of the 
 games, whose integrity or good judgment was unques- 
 tionable. 
 
 It cannot be said that the culture of Abraham Lincoln 
 was that which would make him shine in polite society. 
 His uncouth, awkward form and homely visage, his un- 
 polished dress and address, wore to be expected from his 
 pioneer life ; but his soul was robed in beauty which the 
 angels could discern, and which all high souls, to whom he 
 was known on earth, sooner or later perceived. His cul- 
 ture was such as many a man of humble birth and lowly 
 home may share, and it brought him into sympathy with 
 the people over whom he was to be placed, and clothed 
 him with true humility when he stood on the pinnacle of 
 power and fame. It was a culture which produced sim- 
 plicity, that child-like charm which won all appreciative 
 hearts to the Martyr-President. " Simplicity adapts it- 
 self artlessly to others, because it is full of charity, and 
 therefore desires to make others happy. Its words are 
 the overflow of genial thought and kindly affection ; and 
 all hearts that hold aught in common with it open and
 
 32 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 expand before its influences, as plants start at the touch 
 of spring. . . . There is no affectation, no straining for 
 effect, in simplicity. All is natural and genuine with it. 
 Its wit is never forced, its wisdom is never stilted; nor 
 is either ever dragged in for mere display."* 
 
 This rare simplicity was a special result of the culture 
 which President Lincoln received; and, while the hand of 
 God is plainly to be observed in all his history, nowhere 
 is it more prominently seen than in the circumstances 
 and influences which helped to make Lincoln what he 
 was, a man whose culture was not scientific or literary 
 mainly, but just such as would make a man of the people 
 fit to govern the people in righteousness and love. 
 
 " Element* of Character," by Mrs. Mary G War*
 
 CHAPTER m. 
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 
 
 "Walk 
 
 Boldly and wisely in that light tbou haat : 
 There la hand above will help thee on." 
 
 BAILKT'S 
 
 " M and therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on tin 
 breastplate of righteousness, and your feet shod with the preparation of the 
 fospel of peace ; above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able 
 o quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and 
 he sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." ST. I'AUL (Kph. vl. 14-17). 
 
 VEIL the truth as we may, if indisposed to see it, yet, 
 nevertheless, there will come shining through the mighty 
 fact that God had a work for Abraham Lincoln to per- 
 form, and that he prepared him for it, not by giving 
 him wealthy friends, inherited honors, splendid position, 
 but by permitting him to be inured to toil and hardship 
 and bereavement, and thus to 
 
 " Know how sublime a thing it it 
 To suffer and be strong." 
 
 Pay by day, amid the peculiar circumstances of his 
 early days and opening manhood, was he putting on the 
 armor which should be needed in the hours of stern con- 
 flict that were approaching. Well has one * said, " Lap 
 of luxury and home of ease send not forth the arms that 
 move the world. He who is driven aloft by the force of 
 2ircum?tances becomes the noblest soul and the might!
 
 34 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 est power. Call we a humble home, a scanty board, and 
 threadbare coat, but a blight or curse ? Ah 1 
 
 ' God, in cursing, 
 Gives us better gifts than men in blessing; ' 
 
 and those humble ones who have struggled upward with 
 nothing but a stern will and a consciousness of right to 
 uphold them have proved the world's richest friends." 
 
 The Lord Jesus teaches, in his pertinent question con- 
 cerning the falling sparrow and the numbered hairs, that 
 God exercises a constant watchfulness over all men, and 
 continually guides them in the affairs of life. The his- 
 tory of our late President's career, and of the times in 
 which he lived, everywhere shows the guiding hand of 
 a divine providence. 
 
 " Many are willing to acknowledge a general provi- 
 dence, who do not believe in a universal or particular 
 one. But there cannot be a general providence without a 
 particular one. That would be utterly impossible; for all 
 generals are made up of particulars. Could a man culti- 
 vate a farm in general, without ploughing any particular 
 field, or casting into the earth any particular seeds? Could 
 a watchmaker make watches in general, without making 
 any particular wheels and springs, and giving to every 
 wheel its special form and size and place, finishing the 
 minutest parts in the nicest manner? Could a merchant 
 sell things in general, and nothing in particular, having 
 no particular store, or particular goods, or special price ? 
 Or if we look at the material creation, where we can see 
 the divine method of working, does the Lord make a tree 
 in general, without any particular branches, twigs, leaves, 
 bark, fibre, and cells ? No : on the contrary, the whole 
 tree is built up by the action of the pores and cells in their 
 least parts. This is the universal method of the divine
 
 MtEPARATlON FOR HIS WORK. 35 
 
 operations. ... It is impossible that there can bo a 
 general providence without a special one. If there is a 
 general providence, it is the result of a universal or par- 
 ticular one."* 
 
 The great work of Abraham Lincoln was to guide the 
 American Ship of State during the storm of rebellion, 
 and, as an indissoluble duty, to emancipate the oppressed 
 millions in our land, whose unrighteous bondage made 
 our glorious banner too long a "flaunting lie," and our 
 " Independent days " ostentatious cheats. We have 
 seen how his childhood and early manhood were the 
 precursors of a useful maturity ; and still may we trace 
 the guiding hand of God in his further steps, preparing 
 him for the Presidency of the United States, and to be 
 Commander-in-Chief of the Union Army. 
 
 Before the death of his mother, the future director of 
 the greatest army the world ever saw was taught the 
 use of fire-arms ; and it is worthy of note that the mother 
 of Lincoln brave pioneer woman that she was! her- 
 self loaded the rifle with which he then shot his first 
 game, a large wild turkey. He became very expert 
 in the use of the rifle ; and, as has been already inti- 
 mated, was able thus to add to the family larder, and 
 also to procure furs, which were then in great demand. 
 
 One of his biographers says, " There is no doubt that 
 the culture he received by the use of the rifle hud its 
 influence in developing his physical energies, as he was 
 ever distinguished for his strength and powers of en- 
 durance ; and that it indirectly served to inspire his 
 heart with courage, promptness, and decision, for which 
 his whole life has been eminent." 
 
 The same biographer relates a circumstance which 
 happened during the time when Abraham attended Mr. 
 
 Her. Uhauucy Gilee.
 
 S6 AJiRAIIAM LINCOLN. 
 
 Crawford's school, that illustrates the growing capacity 
 of the lad, and foreshadows his future labors as a public 
 speaker. The scholars were talking, one Monday morn- 
 ing before the hour for school to commence, about the 
 sermon to which they had listened the day before. Abra- 
 ham declared himself able to repeat a large part of the 
 sermon ; and, when the boys doubted it, he proved his 
 retentive memory, close attention, and speech-making 
 powers, by mounting a stump and rehearsing the ser- 
 mon. The young orator was overheard by his teacher, 
 and won his admiration and applause as well as that of 
 his fellow-pupils. Little did any of them think how he 
 would address large audiences in the future just unfold- 
 ing before him, swaying their minds and influencing 
 their hearts by a forcible and earnest presentation of 
 high truths intimately connected with the safety and 
 happiness of the nation. 
 
 He, of whom one of his early associates says, " We 
 seldom went hunting together ; Abe was not a noted 
 hunter, as the time spent by other boys in such amuse- 
 ments was improved by him in the perusal of some 
 good book," did not fail to grow in knowledge ever 
 after he left his father's roof, and sought to carve his 
 own way to fame and fortune, wholly ignorant of the 
 lofty niche assigned him in the temple of renown.. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln, for %o he should be called since he was 
 twenty-one and had an indisputable right to wear the 
 toga virilis, sought employment among those who need- 
 ed a strong arm, and exemplified in his own efforts the 
 sensible words which he uttered thirty years later in 
 reference to hired labor : 
 
 " My understanding of the hired laborer is this : A 
 young man finds himself of an age to be dismissed from 
 parental control ; he has for his capital nothing save
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 37 
 
 two strong hands that God has given him, a heart will- 
 ing to labor, and a freedom to choose the mode of his 
 work, and the manner of his employer ; he has no soil 
 nor shop, and he avails himself of the opportunity of 
 hiring himself to some man who has capital to pay him 
 a fair day's wages for a fair day's work. He is bene- 
 fited by availing himself of that privilege ; he works in- 
 dustriously, he behaves soberly, and the result of a 
 year or two's labor is a surplus of capital. Now he 
 buys land on his own hook ; he settles, marries, begets 
 sons and daughters ; and, in course of time, he, too, has 
 enough capital to hire some new beginner." 
 
 This homely and characteristic speech was truthful, 
 like the man who uttered it when on the eve of nomina- 
 tion to the highest office in the gift of the nation ; and 
 at that same time he expressed his opinion in regard to 
 free labor, in the same straightforward, though rather in- 
 elegant manner. His words may as well be quoted here. 
 They were these ^ "Our Government was not estab- 
 lished that one man might do with himself as he pleases, 
 and with another man too. ... I say, that, whereas 
 God Almighty has given every man one mouth to be fed, 
 and one pair of hands adapted to furnish food for that 
 mouth, if any thing can be proved to be the will of 
 Heaven, it is proved by this fact, that that mouth is to 
 be fed by those hands, without being interfered with by 
 any other man, who has also his mouth to feed and his 
 hands to labor with. I hold, if the Almighty had ever 
 made a set of men that should do all the eating and none 
 of the work, he would have made them with mouths 
 only, and no hands ; and if he had ever made another 
 class that he had intended should do all the work, and 
 none of the eating, he would have made them without 
 and with all hands," 
 
 4
 
 38 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 As a hired laborer, young Lincoln spent the 
 and fall with a Mr. Armstrong, who observed his studious 
 habits, and proposed to his wile to keep the youthful 
 student through the winter. He insisted on laboring for 
 Mr. Armstrong enough to pay his board, and spent the 
 rest of his time in study. 
 
 Early the next spring, as before stated, he assisted in 
 building a boat at Sangamon, and then made a trip to 
 New Orleans, which was so successful, that his employer, 
 gratified with the industry and tact young Lincoln ex- 
 hibited, engaged him to take charge of his mill and store 
 in the village of New Salem. Thus Mr. Lincoln, having 
 already been prepared to sympathize with the mechanic, 
 came to have a near relation also to the merchant, that, 
 he could understand in after-life the trials and preplexi- 
 ti'es of that class among the men he was called to govern. 
 
 The young man who spent his leisure moments, amid 
 the distractions of mercantile life, in studying grammar 
 and arithmetic, may well be supposed to feel an interest 
 in public events transpiring in his native land. 
 
 Early in the year 1832 the Black-Hawk War commenced, 
 and the Governor of Illinois called for volunteer troops. 
 Young Lincoln, with patriotic ardor, was the first to 
 place his name on the roll at the recruiting-office in New 
 Salem. A company was soon raised there ; and such 
 was the confidence of his fellow-townsmen and comrades- 
 in-arms, that they unanimously chose him to be their 
 captain, an office which he reluctantly accepted, having 
 a modest doubt of his own ability to serve in that capacit} T . 
 
 " The New-Salem company went into camp at Beards- 
 town, from whence, in a few days, they marched to the 
 expected scene of conflict. When the thirty days of their 
 enlistment had expired, however, they had not seen the 
 enemy. They were disbanded at Ottawa, and most of
 
 f REPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 89 
 
 the volunteers returned ; but, a new levy being called 
 for, Abraham re-enlisted as a private. Another thirty 
 days expired, and the war was not over. His regiment 
 was disbanded, and again, the third time, he volunteered. 
 He was determined to serve his country as long as the 
 war lasted. Before the third term of his enlistment had 
 expired, the battle of Bad Axe was fought, which put an 
 end to the war. 
 
 "He returned home. 'Having lost his horse, neav 
 where the town of Janesville, Wisconsin, now stands, he 
 went down Rock River to Dixon in a canoe ; thence he 
 crossed the country on foot to Peoria, where he again 
 took canoe to a point on the Illinois River, within forty 
 miles of home. The latter distance he accomplished on 
 foot.' 
 
 " One who served under him in the New-Salem company 
 writes, that he was a universal favorite in the army; that 
 he was an efficient, faithful officer, watchful of his men, 
 and prompt in the discharge of duty ; and that his 
 courage and patriotism shrank from no dangers or hard- 
 ships." 
 
 Thus by personal participation in military duties the 
 future Commander-in-Chief was preparing for his coming 
 responsibilities ; and this preparation was such as to make 
 him truly sympathize with privates as well as officers, 
 and to be just to both. 
 
 He returned to New Salem and to business when no 
 longer needed as a soldier. The author of the " Lincoln 
 Memorial " says, in speaking of Mr. Lincoln as a clerk 
 and manager, " He soon made his mark : an attempt of a 
 gang of the bullies of the place to give him a beating 
 resulted in the defeat of their champion by the tall 
 einewy stranger, who at once became a favorite with
 
 40 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 those who gauged men by their physical endurance and 
 courage; while his affable manners, his unfailing cheerful- 
 ness, his ready wit, and his stones, made him a favorite 
 with all. A store was soon his own ; but he was too honest 
 and too kind-hearted to drive sharp bargains, and soon 
 found himself in difficulties which it required years of 
 subsequent struggle to clear away, but which he allowed 
 to stand no longer than till he had ability to discharge 
 them. Honest Abraham Lincoln knew no bankrupt's 
 discharge, but a receipt in full on payment in full." 
 
 Another noticeable fact in Mr. Lincoln's history is thus 
 mentioned by the same writer : " The office of post- 
 master of New Salem, a petty office indeed, was his first 
 public position, and one which gave him intense pleasure 
 from the opportunity of reading it afforded him ; and it is 
 not a little remarkable that he began life, we may say, by 
 serving the General Government in a civil, and soon 
 after in a military capacity." 
 
 The writer of the " Lincoln Memorial " thinks that the 
 fact of Lincoln's captaincy was significant, and almost 
 symbolical. " This early choice," he says, " of one who 
 was at most a clerk and hand in a country store, shows 
 how clearly his fellow-citizens had recognized him as one 
 born to be a ruler of men. At the next election for 
 members of the legislature, he was taken up as the 
 candidate of his district, and so completely united the 
 votes of all parties in his precinct, that he received every 
 vote but seven out of two hundred and eighty-four ; and 
 though he was defeated in the district at large, it was the 
 only occasion in which he failed in such an election." 
 
 While acting as postmaster, Mr. Lincoln continued his 
 studies, and improved his increased opportunities for 
 extensive reading. He is said to have written out a 
 synopsis of every book he read, and thus to have fixed 
 the contents in his memory.
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. II 
 
 About this time, John Calhoun, afterwards President 
 of the Lecomptou Constitutional Convention, and promi- 
 nent in the troubles in Kansas, came to New Salem. lie 
 soon formed the acquaintance of the best conversation- 
 ist in the place, and advised him to learn surveying, 
 the work in which he himself was engaged. Mr. Lin- 
 coln did so, and soon obtained employment as a sur- 
 veyor, thus unconsciously imitating him whose place as 
 the head of a great nation he was afterwards to occupy. 
 Little thought Washington or Lincoln, as they drove 
 their stakes or stretched their chains over their neigh- 
 bors' lands " for a consideration," that they should one 
 day, so to speak, drive the stakes of their tent in the 
 Capitol of the nation, and stretch the chain of their in- 
 fluence over the whole broad country. But God " put- 
 teth down one, and setteth up another;" and he upon 
 whose brow God has ordained a crown should rest will 
 surely wear it in the fulness of time, though he may 
 have been born in a hovel or a manger. 
 
 Difficulties beset the path of the future President. 
 He had not the never-empty purse of Fortuuatus, nor 
 the power of the Phrygian king to turn every thing he 
 touched to gold ; and therefore he often found himself 
 embarrassed in financial matters ; and at one time, it is 
 said, even his instruments used in surveying were actu- 
 ally seized for debt. 
 
 "He still took an active part in politics; and in Au- 
 gust, 1834, he was elected to the legislature by a large 
 majority. In this new field he learned much. He was 
 a persistent student, and had already, by close applica- 
 tion, made up for much of the deficiency of his early 
 education. He analyzed all he read, and gave up noth- 
 ing till he had thoroughly mastered it. This gave him 
 a correctness and precision of thought which never
 
 42 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 failed him. Naturally modest, he discharged his legifela 
 live duties without any of the parade or elation which 
 makes some inexperienced members mere tools of the 
 wily politician, or personally ridiculous. His clearness 
 and eloquence struck the Hon. John T. Stuart, one of 
 his fellow-members, and he urged the young member to 
 study law. Acting on this advice, he set himself to 
 Blackstone with ardor, his favorite retreat being a 
 wooded knoll in New Salem, where, stretched under an 
 oak, he would pore over the doctrines of common law, 
 utterly unconscious of all passing around him, and im- 
 pressing some, at least, of his neighbors with doubts of 
 his entire sanity." 
 
 The author of the " Pioneer Boy " thus refers to this 
 period of study : " He canvassed the whole subject in 
 the beginning, and he resolved to spend no evenings in 
 social entertainments. He saw that he must do it from 
 sheer necessity, as he would be obliged to use up the 
 night-hours much more economically than the laws of 
 health would permit. And now he was inflexible. His 
 purpose was fixed, and no allurements or promises of 
 pleasure could make him swerve a hair's-breadth there- 
 from. 
 
 " Springfield was twenty-two miles from New Salem ; 
 and yet Lincoln walked there and back on the day pro- 
 posed. He made a long day of it, and a wearisome one 
 too. On the following evening, Greene called upon him 
 to learn how he made it. 
 
 " ' What ! ' he exclaimed, ' did you bring all those 
 books home in your arms ? ' They were ' Blackstone's 
 Commentaries,' in four volumes. 
 
 ' Yes, and read one of the volumes more than half 
 of the way,' Lincoln replied. ' Come, now, just examine 
 me on that first volume.' He had a faculty of perusing
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 43 
 
 a volume when he was walking, and he often did it. He 
 gained time thereby. 
 
 "'I don't see what yom are made of, to endure so,' 
 continued Greene. ' It would use me all up to carry 
 euch a load a quarter part of that distance.' 
 
 " ' I am used to it, you know ; and that makes the dif 
 ferencc. But, come, just see what I know about the first 
 part of that volume.' Arid he passed the first volume to 
 him. 
 
 " ' If you pass muster, you'll want I should admit you 
 to the bar, I suppose,' responded Greene humorously. 
 ' That I shall be glad to do.' 
 
 " So he proceeded to examine Lincoln on the first 
 volume ; and he found, to his surprise, that he was well 
 posted on every part of it that he had read. By his 
 close attention, and the ability to concentrate his 
 thoughts, he readily made what he read his own. 
 
 " Thus Lincoln began and continued the study of law, 
 alternating his time between surveying and study ; go- 
 ing to Springfield for books as often as it was necessary, 
 and often pursuing his reading of law far into the night. 
 People were universally interested in his welfare, and 
 all predicted that he would make his mark by and by. 
 
 " With such devotion did he employ his time in study 
 and manual labor, denying himself of much that young 
 men generally consider essential, that he might have 
 said with Cicero, ' What others give to public shows 
 and entertainments, to .festivity, to amusements, nay, 
 even to mental and bodily rest, I give to study and philos- 
 ophy.' Even when he was engaged in the fields survey- 
 ing, his thoughts were upon his books, so that much 
 which he learned at night was fastened in his mind by 
 day. He might have said again with Cicero, ' Even my 
 leisure hours have their occupation,' "
 
 44 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 In 1836 he obtained a law-license, and in April, 1837, 
 be removed to Springfield, and became the law-partner 
 . of Mr. Stuart ; and, when the latter went to Congress, 
 he became a partner of Judge Logan. One touching 
 incident of his law-practice, which paints in vivid colors 
 the character of Lincoln as a man and his ability as a 
 lawyer, is thus narrated in a Cleveland paper : " Some 
 few years since, the eldest son of Mr. Lincoln's old 
 friend, Armstrong, the chief supporter of his widowed 
 mother, the good old man having some time previous- 
 ly passed from earth, was arrested on the charge of 
 murder. A young man had been killed during a riot- 
 ous melee in the night-tirne, at a camp-meeting, and ono 
 of his associates stated that the death-wound was inflicted 
 by young Armstrong. A preliminary examination was 
 gone into, at which the accuser testified so positively, 
 that there seemed no doubt of the guilt of the prisoner, 
 and therefore he was held for trial. As is too often the 
 case, the bloody act caused an undue degree of excite- 
 ment in the public mind. Every improper incident hj 
 the life of the prisoner, each act which bore the leaot 
 semblance of rowdyism, each school-boy quarrel, was 
 suddenly remembered and magnified, until they pictured 
 him as a fiend of the most horrible hue. As these ru- 
 mors spread abroad, they were received as gospel truth, 
 and a feverish desire for vengeance seized upon the in- 
 fatuated populace, whilst only prison-bars prevented a 
 horrible death at the hands of a mob. The events were 
 heralded in the county papers, painted in the highest 
 colors, accompanied by rejoicing over the certainty of 
 punishment being meted out to the guilty party. The 
 prisoner, overwhelmed by the circumstances under which 
 he found himself placed, fell into a melancholy condition 
 bordering on despair; and the widowed mother,
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 4f 
 
 through her tears, saw no cause for hope from earthly 
 aid. 
 
 At this juncture the widow received a letter from 
 Mr. Lincoln, volunteering his services in an effort tc 
 save the youth from the impending stroke. Gladly was 
 his aid accepted, although it seemed impossible for even 
 his sagacity to prevail in such a desperate case; but 
 the heart of the attorney was in his work, and he set 
 about it with a will that knew no such word as fail. 
 Feeling that the poisoned condition of the public mind 
 was such as to preclude the possibility of impanelling an 
 impartial jury in the court having jurisdiction, he pro- 
 cured a change of venue and a postponement of the 
 trial. He then went studiously to work, unravelling the 
 history of the case, and satisfied himself that his client 
 was the victim of malice, and that the statements of the 
 accuser were a tissue of falsehoods. 
 
 When the trial was called on, the prisoner, pale and 
 emaciated, with hopelessness written on every feature, 
 and accompanied by his half-hoping, half-despairing 
 mother, whose only hope was in a mother's belief of 
 her son's innocence, in the justice of the God she wor- 
 shipped, and in the noble counsel, who, without hope of 
 fee or reward upon earth, had undertaken the cause, 
 took his seat in the prisoner's box, and with a stony 
 firmness listened to the reading of the indictment. Lin- 
 coln sat quietly by, whilst the large auditory looked on 
 him as though wondering what he could say in defence 
 of one whose guilt they regarded as certain. 
 
 The examination of the witnesses for the State was 
 begun, and a well-arranged mass of evidence, circum- 
 stantial and positive, was introduced, which seemed to 
 impale the prisoner beyond the possibility of extrication. 
 The counsel for the defence propounded but few ques
 
 46 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 tiona, and those of a character which excitod IK uneasi 
 ness on the part of the prosecutor; merely, in most 
 cases, requiring the main witnesses to be definite as to 
 the time and place. When the evidence of the prose- 
 cution was ended, Lincoln introduced a few witnesses to 
 remove some erroneous impressions in regard to the 
 previous character of his client, who, though somewhat 
 rowdyish, had never been known to commit a vicious 
 act, and to show that a greater degree of ill-feeling ex- 
 isted between the accuser and the accused than the 
 accused and the deceased. 
 
 The prosecutor felt that the case was a clear one, and 
 his opening speech was brief and formal. Lincoln arose, 
 while a deathly silence pervaded the vast audience, and 
 in a clear and moderate tone began his argument. Slowly 
 and carefully he reviewed the testimony ; pointing out 
 the hitherto unobserved discrepancies in the statements 
 of the principal witness. That which had seemed plain 
 and plausible he made to appear crooked as a serpent's 
 path. The witness had stated that the affair took place 
 at a certain hour in the evening, and that, by the aid of 
 a brightly shining moon, he saw the prisoner inflict the 
 death-blow with a slung-shot. Mr. Lincoln showed that 
 at the hour referred to the moon had not yet appeared 
 above the horizon, and consequently the whole tale was 
 a fabrication. 
 
 An almost instantaneous change seemed to have been 
 wrought in the minds of his auditors, and the verdict of 
 " Not Guilty" was at the end of every tongue. But the 
 advocate was not content with this intellectual achieve- 
 ment. His whole being had for months been bound up 
 in this work of gratitude and mercy ; and as the lava of 
 the over-charged crater bursts from its imprisonment, so 
 great thoughts and burning words leaped forth from
 
 PREPARATION FOR BIS WORK 4? 
 
 the soul of the eloquent Lincoln. He drew a picture of 
 the perjurer, so horrid and ghastly that the accuser could 
 sit under it no longer, but reeled and staggered from the 
 court-room, whilst the audience fancied they could see the 
 brand upon his brow. Then, in words of thrilling pathos, 
 Lincoln appealed to the jurors, as fathers of some who 
 might become fatherless, and husbands of wives who 
 might be widowed, to yield to no previous impressions, no 
 ill-founded prejudice, but to do his client justice; and as 
 he alluded to the debt of gratitude which he owed the 
 boy's sire, tears were seen to fall from many eyes unused 
 to weep. 
 
 It was near night when he concluded by saying, that, 
 if justice was done, as he believed it would be, be- 
 fore the sun should set, it would shine upon his client a 
 free man. The jury retired, and the court adjourned for 
 the day. Half an hour had not elapsed, when, as the 
 officers of the court and the volunteer attorney sat at 
 the tea-table of their hotel, a messenger announced that 
 the jury had returned to their seats. All repaired im- 
 mediately to the court-house; and whilst the prisoner 
 was coming from the jail, the court-room was filled to 
 overflowing with citizens from the town. When the 
 prisoner and his mother entered, silence reigned as com- 
 pletely as though the house were empty. The foreman 
 of the jury, in answer to the usual inquiry from the 
 court, delivered the verdict of "Not Guilty!" The 
 widow dropped into the arms of her son, who lifted her 
 up, and told her to look upon him as before, free and in- 
 nocent. Then with the words, "Where is Mr. Lincoln?" 
 he rushed across the room and grasped the hand of his 
 deliverer, whilst his heart was too full for utterance. 
 Uncoln turned his eyes towards the west, where the sun 
 utill lingered in view, and then, turning to the youth,
 
 ABE All AM LINCOLN. 
 
 said, " It is not yet sundown, and you are fivje 1 " I con- 
 fess that my cheeks were not wholly unwet by tears, and 
 1 turned from the affecting scene. As I cast a glance be- 
 hind, I saw Abraham Lincoln obeying the divine injunc- 
 tion by comforting the widowed and fatherless. 
 
 Three times was Mr. Lincoln, after this, elected to the 
 Legislature, and there commenced his political acquaint- 
 ance with Stephen A. Douglas. He then remained several 
 years in private life, practising law with good success. 
 In 1842, he married Miss Mary Todd, daughter of lion. 
 Robert Todd of Lexington, Kentucky. Their children 
 have been four in number: "Robert, recently a captain 
 on Gen. Grant's staff, born in 1843 ; a second son, born in 
 1846, and William, born in 1850, both of whom are dead; 
 and Thaddeus, born in 1853, who stands beside his father 
 in the last photograph taken of the President. 
 
 " It gives some idea of the prominence of Mr. Lin- 
 coln in Illinois, that, though elected to the Legislature 
 only in 1834, he was a Whig candidate for presidential 
 elector at every election from 1836 to 1852. An ear!/ 
 and warm admirer of Henry Clay, he came forward, in 
 1844, and stumped the entire State of Illinois in his 
 favor, and then crossed into Indiana, attracting attention 
 by the homely force, humor, energy, and eloquence of his 
 addresses. Thus thrown again into active politics, he 
 was elected to Congress in 1846, from the Central Dis- 
 trict of Illinois, by a majority of fifteen hundred, being 
 the only Whig member from the State. Called now into 
 the great council of the nation, Mr. Lincoln took his seat 
 among great men. In the Senate, Clay, Calhoun r Web- 
 ster, Benton, still shaped the destinies and restrained the 
 passions of men; and men of great ability stood forth in 
 the lower House. Mr, Lincoln was opposed to the annex- 
 ation of Texas and to the Mexican War. He voted many
 
 MR. LINCOLN AND "TAD."
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 49 
 
 times 'about forty/ he once said for the Wilmot 
 Proviso ; thus as early as 1847 showing himself the same 
 friend of freedom in the Territories which he was after 
 wards when ' bleeding Kansas' received his sympathy. 
 'On other great questions which came before Congress, 
 Mr. Lincoln, being a Whig, took the ground which was 
 held by the great body of his party. He believed in the 
 right of Congress to make appropriations for the im- 
 provement of rivers and harbors. He was in favor of 
 giving the public lands, not to speculators, but to actual 
 occupants and cultivators, at as low rates as possible ; 
 and he was in favor of a protective tariff, and of abolish- 
 ing the franking privilege.' " * 
 
 In 1858, Mr. Lincoln was nominated by the Repub- 
 licans as candidate for the United-States Senate. Mr. 
 Douglas was his rival on the Democratic ticket. Both 
 stumped the State, and finally held personal debates 
 with each other without personal animosity on the dif- 
 ferent political views they held. Judge Douglas had the 
 grace, at Springfield, to say, " I take great pleasure in 
 bearing testimony to the fact that Mr. Lincoln is a kind- 
 hearted, amiable, good-natured gentleman, with whom 
 no man has a right to pick a quarrel, even if he 
 wanted one. He is a worthy gentleman. I have known 
 him for twenty-five years ; and there is no better citizen, 
 and no kinder-hearted man. He is a fine lawyer, pos- 
 sesses high ability ; and there is no objection to him, ex- 
 cept the monstrous revolutionary doctrines with which 
 he is identified." 
 
 In July, 1858, Lincoln threw down the gauntlet, which 
 Douglas lifted, and seven debates followed, at Ottawa, 
 Preeport, Jonesborough, Charleston, Galesbarg, Quincy, 
 and Alton. They are said to be unsurpassed in campaign 
 
 * Raymond'* " Life of Lincoln."
 
 50 AB&A&AM LINCOLN. 
 
 annals for eloquence, ability, adroitness, or comprehen- 
 siveness. Often these rival candidates travelled in the 
 same car or carriage, manifesting personal good feeling, 
 yet each contending fearlessly for the mastery when 
 they entered the gladiatorial area for debate, 
 
 During this campaign, Mr. Lincoln paid a tribute to 
 the Declaration of Independence, which should be read 
 by all who revere his memory : " These communities, 
 (the thirteen colonies) by their representatives in old In- 
 dendence Hall, said to the world of men, 'We hold these 
 truths to be self-evident, that all men are born equal ; 
 that they are endowed by their Creator with inalienable 
 rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit 
 of happiness.' This was their majestic interpretation of 
 the economy of the universe. This was their lofty and 
 wise and noble understanding of the justice of the 
 Creator to his creatures. Yes, gentlemen, to all his 
 creatures, to the whole great family of man. In their 
 enlightened belief, nothing stamped with the divine 
 image and likeness was sent into the world to be trodden 
 on and degraded and imbruted by its fellows. They 
 grasped not only the race of men then living, but they 
 reached forward and seized upon the farthest posterity. 
 They created a beacon to guide their children and their 
 children's children, and the countless myriads who should 
 inhabit the earth in other ages. Wise statesmen as they 
 were, they kneAv the tendency of prosperity to breed 
 tyrants ; and so they established these self-evident truths, 
 that when, in the distant future, some man, some faction, 
 some interest, should set up the doctrine, that none but 
 rich men, or none but white men, or none but Anglo- 
 Saxon white men, were entitled to life, liberty, and the 
 pursuit of happiness, their posterity might look up 
 again to the Declaration of Independence, and take cour-
 
 PREPARATION FOR sis WORK. 51 
 
 age to renew the battle which their fathers began ; so 
 that truth and justice and mercy, and all the humane and 
 Christian virtues, might not be extinguished from the 
 land ; so that no man would hereafter dare to limit and 
 circumscribe the great principles on which the temple 
 of Liberty was being built. 
 
 " Now, my countrymen, if you have been taught doc- 
 trines conflicting with the great land-marks of the Decla- 
 ration of Independence ; if you have listened to sugges- 
 tions which would take away from its grandeur and 
 mutilate the fair symmetry of its proportions ; if you have 
 been inclined to believe that all men are not created 
 equal in those inalienable rights enumerated by our 
 charter of liberty, let me entreat you to come back; 
 return to the fountain whose waters spring close by the 
 blood of the Revolution. Think nothing of me, tako no 
 thought for the political fate of any man whomsoever, 
 but come back to the truths that are in the Declaration 
 of Independence. 
 
 "You may do any thing with me that you choose, if you 
 will but heed these sacred principles; you may not only 
 defeat me for the Senate, but you may take me and put 
 me to death. While pretending no indifference to earthly 
 honors, I do claim to be actuated in this contest by some- 
 thing higher than an anxiety for office. I charge you to 
 drop every paltry and insignificant thought for any man's 
 success. It is nothing; lam nothing; Judge Douglas 
 is nothing. Bid do not destroy that immortal emltlem of 
 humanity, the Declaration of American Independence.' 11 
 
 Though it is not designed to enlarge this volume by the 
 publication of many of our late President's speeches or 
 letters, the following eloquent outburst of patriotism and 
 devotion to principle must not be omitted. It is the 
 closing part of a speech made in December, 1839.
 
 52 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 "Many free countries have lost their liberties, and 
 ours maylose hers fbut if she shall, may it be my proud- 
 esT plume, not that I was the last to desert her, but 
 that I never deserted her ! I know that the great volcano / 
 at Washington, aroused and directed by the evil spirit 
 that reigns there, is belching forth the lava of political 
 corruption in a current broad and deep, which is sweep- 
 ing with frightful velocity over the whole length and 
 breadth of the land, bidding fair to leave unscathed no 
 green spot or living thing ; while on its bosom are riding, 
 like demons on the waves of hell, the imps of the evil 
 spirit, and fiendishly torturing and taunting all those whr 
 dare resist its destroying course with the hopelessness Gi 
 their efforts ; and knowing this, I cannot deny that all 
 may be swept away. Broken by it I too may bej bow 
 to it I never will. The probability that we may fall in 
 the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a 
 cause which we deem to be just. It shall not deter me. 
 If ever I feel the soul within me elevate and expand to 
 those dimensions not wholly unworthy the Almighty 
 Architect, it is when I contemplate the cause of my 
 country deserted by all the world besides, and I, stand- 
 ing alone, hurling defiance at her victorious oppressors. 
 And here, without contemplating consequences, before 
 high heaven, and in the face of the whole world, I swear 
 eternal fidelity to the just cause, as I deem it, of the land 
 of my life, my liberty, and my love. And who that thinks 
 with me will not adopt the oath that I take ? Lot none 
 falter who thinks he is right, and we may succeed. But 
 if, after all, we shall fall, be it so. We shall have the proud 
 consolation of saying to our conscience, and to the de- 
 parted shade of our country's freedom, that the course 
 approved by our judgments and adored by our hearts, in
 
 68 
 
 ^ disaster, in chains, in torture, and in death, we never 
 | faltered in defending." 
 
 One of the greatest speeches of his life was made by 
 Mr. Lincoln in New York, at the Cooper Institute, on the 
 27th of February, 1860, before a crowded house ; the 
 venerable poet, William Cullen Bryant, presiding, and 
 introducing the speaker in highly complimentary terms. 
 It is too long for place on these pages, and its unity so 
 perfect, that it is not easy to quote from it. It was emi- 
 nently patriotic, and did much toward securing for him 
 the favor of the New-York Republicans in the hour of 
 nomination for the Presidency. 
 
 Some writer has given the following pen-portrait of 
 President Lincoln, which is believed to be correct: 
 
 " Mr. Lincoln stands six feet and four inches high in his 
 stockings. His frame is not muscular, but gaunt and 
 wiry ; his arms are long, but not unreasonably so for a 
 person of his height ; his lower limbs are not dispropor- 
 tioned to his body. In walking, his gait, though firm, is 
 never brisk. He steps slowly and deliberately, almost 
 always with his head inclined forward, and his hands 
 clasped behind his back. In matters of dress he is by no 
 means precise. Always clean, he is never fashionable ; 
 he is careless, but not slovenly. In manner he is re- 
 markably cordial, and, at the same time, simple. His 
 politeness is always sincere, but never elaborate and 
 oppressive. A warm shake of the hand, and a warmer 
 smile of recognition, are his methods of greeting his 
 friends. At rest, his features, though those of a man of 
 mark, are not such as belong to a handsome man ; but 
 when his fine dark gray eyes are lighted up by any emo- 
 tion, and his features begin their play, he would be chosen 
 from among a crowd as one who had in him not only the 
 kindly sentiments which women love, but the heavier
 
 54 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 metal of which full-grown men and presidents are made. 
 His hair is black, and, though thin, is wiry. His head 
 sits well on his. shoulders, but beyond that it defies de- 
 scription. It nearer resembles that of Clay than that of 
 Webster ; but it is unlike either. It is very large, and, 
 phrenologically, well-proportioned, betokening power in 
 all its developments. A slightly Roman nose, a wide- 
 cut mouth, and a dark complexion, with the appearance 
 of having been weather-beaten, complete the description. 
 
 " In his personal habits, Mr. Lincoln is simple as a child. 
 He loves a good dinner, and eats with the appetite which 
 goes with a great brain ; but his food is plain and nutri- 
 tious. He never drinks intoxicating liquors of any sort, 
 not even a glass of wine. He is not addicted to the use 
 of tobacco in any shape. He never was accused of a 
 licentious act in all his life. He never uses profane 
 language." 
 
 How would the heart of Lincoln's pious mother have 
 rejoiced, could she have foreseen such a record of her 
 son's spotless character and blameless life ! 
 
 Still another writer pictures his manner in speaking: 
 " As a speaker, he is ready, precise, and fluent. His 
 manner before a popular assembly is as he pleases to 
 make it, being either superlatively ludicrous or very im- 
 pressive, lie employs but little gesticulation, but, when 
 lie desires to make a point, produces a shrug of his 
 shoulders, an elevation of his eyebrows, a depression of 
 his mouth, and a general malformation of countenance so 
 comically awkward, that it never fails to bring down 
 the house. His enunciation is slow and emphatic ; and 
 his voice, though sharp and powerful, at times has a 
 frequent tendency to dwindle into a shrill and unpleasant 
 sound. But, as before stated, the peculiar characteristic 
 of his delivery is the remarkable mobility of his features,
 
 PREPARATION FOR HIS WORK. 55 
 
 the frequent contortions of which excite a merriment hia 
 words could not produce." 
 
 A distinguished scholar, who heard him debate with 
 Mr. Douglas, says, " He then proceeded to defend the 
 Republican party. Here he charged Mr. Douglas with 
 doing nothing for freedom ; with disregarding the rights 
 and interests of the colored man ; and for about forty 
 minutes he spoke with a power that we have seldom heard 
 equalled. There was a grandeur in his thoughts, a com- 
 prehensiveness in his arguments, and a binding force 
 in his conclusions, which were perfectly irresistible. 
 The vast throng were silent as death : every eye was 
 fixed upon the speaker, and all gave him serious atten- 
 tion. He was the tall man eloquent : his countenance 
 glowed with animation, and his eye glistened with an in- 
 telligence that made it lustrous. He was no longer 
 awkward and ungainly, but graceful, bold, command- 
 ing." 
 
 Here the chapter narrating the struggles and suc- 
 cesses of his manhood, previous to his entering on his 
 great work, may fittingly close. It has been conclu- 
 sively shown that the growing man was preparing for 
 the advancing era. Bishop Simpson stated in his funeral 
 address, that, "as early as 1839, Mr. Lincoln presented 
 resolutions in the Legislature asking for emancipation in 
 the District of Columbia, when, with but rare excep- 
 tions, the whole popular mind of his State was opposed 
 to the measure. From that hour he was a steady and 
 uniform friend of humanity, and was preparing for the 
 conflict of later years." 
 
 Who cannot see God's hand in all these events, though 
 rapidly traced, as the hour and the man approached each 
 other ? The scroll of Time is fast unrolling ; and aa
 
 66 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 every daj prophecy becomes history, we should learn 
 lessons of patient hope, and humble, earnest, rejoicing 
 faith ; for 
 
 " Blind unbelief is sure to err, 
 
 And scan His work in vain : 
 God is his own interpreter, 
 And be will make it plain."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIS. 
 
 " The man whom Heaven appoiatt 
 To govern others should himself first learn 
 To bend his passions to the sway of reason." 
 
 THOMSON'S TANCRED AND SIOISMDMDA. 
 
 " Then Samuel took the horn of oil, and anointed him in the midst of his breth- 
 ren; and the Spirit of the Lord came upon David from that day forward." 
 
 1 SAM. xvi. 13. 
 
 THE prepared man now moved toward the appointed 
 place of labor. The hour of destiny struck in Chicago 
 on the 18th of May, 1860, when the Republican National 
 Convention met " in an immense building, which the peo- 
 ple of Chicago had put up for the purpose, called the 
 Wigwam. There were four hundred and sixty-five dele- 
 gates. The city was filled with earnest men who had 
 gathered to press the claims of their favorite candidates, 
 and the halls and corridors of all the hotels swarmed and 
 buzzed with an eager crowd, in and out of which darted 
 or pushed or wormed their way the various leaders of 
 party politics." * 
 
 Mr. Lincoln was then at his home in Springfield. With 
 a not improper anxiety to hear the result of the Conven- 
 tion he called at the telegraph-office, and there learned 
 how the first and second ballots resulted. He then left, 
 and, going to the office of the " State Journal," sat there 
 quietly conversing with some friends, when a boy placed 
 a note m his hand. It was the announcement of his 
 
 Baymond'i Life of Lincoln." 
 
 U
 
 58 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 nomination on the third ballot. He looked at it silently, 
 while the friends around him shouted in triumph ; and 
 then, putting it into his pocket, with characteristic calm- 
 ness he said, in his own peculiar way, " There is a little 
 woman down at our house would like to hear this; I'll 
 go down and tell her;" and immediately returned to hia 
 home. 
 
 The next day brought to Springfield the Committee 
 appointed by the Convention to inform Mr. Lincoln of- 
 ficially of his nomination. They were escorted to his 
 house by a large concourse of citizens. One * who was 
 present on that occasion, and will never forget that 
 memorable visit to the plain, white, two-story wooden 
 
 LINCOLN'S IIOJUE IN SPRINGFIELD. 
 
 house, on the corner of two streets, where the unpre- 
 tending nominee received his official visitors, stated to 
 the writer of those pages that no refreshments were 
 proi ided save iced-water ; and that when citizens of 
 
 C. G. Coffin, Eiq.
 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 59 
 
 Springfield, apprising Mr. Lincoln of the coming Com- 
 mittee, asked him to furnish them with wine, &c., 
 as was customary, he refused, saying he never used 
 liquors himself, and could not give them toothers: they 
 insisted on furnishing some themselves ; but the noble 
 man answered characteristically, " I will not permit my 
 friends to do in my house what I will not do myself." 
 So temperance principles triumphed, and those citizens 
 could only "put the cup to their neighbors' lip" by 
 taking them afterward to a hotel, where all who wished 
 strong drink could be gratified. 
 
 The President of the Convention was spokesman for 
 )he Committee, and in a brief speech informed the host 
 Df his nomination. With an expression half sad, half dig- 
 lified, Mr. Lincoln heard the words ; and, after a short 
 pause of reflection, he answered : 
 
 'MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE, 
 
 " I tender to you, and through you to the Republican 
 National Convention, and all the people represented in 
 ft, my profoundest thanks for the high honor done me, 
 which you now formally announce. Deeply and even 
 painfully sensible of the great responsibility which is 
 inseparable from this high honor, a responsibility 
 which I could almost Avish had fallen upon some one of 
 tl.o far more eminent men and experienced statesmen 
 whose distinguished names were before the Convention, 
 I shall, by your leave, consider more fully the resolu- 
 tions of the Convention denominated the platform, and 
 without any unnecessary or unreasonable delay respond 
 to you, Mr. Chairman, in writing, not doubting that the 
 platform will be found satisfactory, and the nomination 
 gratefully accepted. And now I will not longer defer 
 the pleasure of taking you and each of you by the 
 Laud."
 
 80 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 As one incident of this interesting occasion, it ia said 
 that " tall Judge Kelly of Pennsylvania, who was one 
 of the Committee, and who is himself a great many feet 
 high, had meanwhile been eying Mr. Lincoln's lofty 
 form with a mixture of admiration, and very likely 
 jealousy : this had not escaped Mr. Lincoln, and, as he 
 shook hands with the judge, he inquired, ' What is your 
 height? ' 'Six feet three : what is yours, Mr. Lincoln? ' 
 ' Six feet four.' 
 
 "'Then,' said the judge, 'Pennsylvania bows to Illinois. 
 My dear man, for years my heart has been aching for a 
 President that Icould look up to, and I've found him at 
 last in a land where we thought there were none but 
 little giants.' " * 
 
 On the 23d of the month, Mr. Lincoln replied formally, 
 by letter, to the official announcement of his nomination, 
 in these words : 
 
 " Hon. GEORGE ASHMUN. 
 
 " Sir, 1 accept the nomination tendered me by the 
 Convention over which you presided, of which I am 
 formally apprised in a letter of yourself and others acting 
 as a Committee of the Convention for that purpose. The 
 declaration of principles and sentiments which accom- 
 panies your letter meets my approval, and it shall be my 
 care not to violate it or disregard it in any part. Im- 
 ploring the assistance of Divine Providence, and with 
 due regard to the views and feelings of all who were 
 represented in the Convention, to the rights of all the 
 States and Territories and people of the nation, to the 
 inviolability of the Constitution, and the perpetual union, 
 harmony, and prosperity of all, I am 'most happy to co- 
 
 Raymond's " Life of Lincoln."
 
 CALLED tO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHA1H, 61 
 
 operate for the practical success of the principles de- 
 clared by the Convention. 
 
 " Your obliged friend and fellow-citizen, 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN." 
 
 The enthusiasm of the Republicans during the ensuing 
 presidential campaign was very great, scarcely equalled 
 even in the log-cabin days of " Tippecanoe and Tyler too ; " 
 and, as one after another of the Northern and Western 
 States declared the Chicago nominee to be their choice, 
 the wildest demonstrations of joy were exhibited in 
 torch-light processions, illuminations, &c., all over the 
 loyal portion of the country. The Quakers of Pennsyl- 
 vania were moved from their position of "eminent grav- 
 ity " on this occasion, and polled an overwhelming vote 
 for the champion of liberty; and the Quaker poet who 
 stands second to none in America told the triumph in 
 tuneful numbers.* 
 
 The solid phalanx of earnest men who had resolved 
 that freedom should reign in America formed a body of 
 
 * It was the privilege of the writer to prepare, as a portion of the street 
 decorations on the premises of Mr. S. D. Herrick, on the occasion of a jubilee 
 illumination in Beverly, Mass., one line of Whittier's poem, in gigantic letter- 
 ing; T:Z., " For Lincoln goes in when the Quakers come out." The whole 
 poem was read at a Republican meeting in Georgetown, Mass., and was as 
 follows : 
 
 " Not vainly we waited, and counted the hours; 
 The buds of our hope have 1 burst out into flowers. 
 No room for misgiving; no loop-hole of doubt: 
 We've heard from the Keystone I The Quakers are out! 
 
 The plot has exploded; we've found out the trick; 
 The bribe goes a-begging; the fusion won't stick : 
 When the Wide-Awake lanterns are shining about, 
 The rogues stay at home, and the true men come out I 
 
 The good State has broken the cords for her spun ; 
 tier oil-ipriug* and water won't fuse into one;
 
 62 A&ltASAM LINCOLN. 
 
 nearly two millions of voters, who carried for Mr. Lincoln 
 the electoral votes of the States of Maine, New Hamp- 
 shire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecti- 
 cut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 
 Michigan, Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and California. 
 
 Already the mutterings of the coming storm were to 
 be heard along the horizon. A pusillanimous President 
 sat helpless in the White House, while seceding States 
 unrighteously possessed themselves of forts and other 
 Government property, and began to prepare for civil 
 war. Never nation needed a leader more. God saw 
 our necessity. It was his glorious opportunity. He 
 saw our need of a pillar of fire in the night of war fast 
 settling down upon us; and, lo! Abraham Lincoln "stood 
 before us, a man of the people. He was thoroughly 
 American; had never crossed the sea, had never been 
 spoiled by English insularity or French dissipation ; a 
 quiet native, aboriginal man, as an acorn from the oak ; 
 no aping of foreigners, no frivolous accomplishments ; 
 Kentuckian-born, working on a farm ; a fiatboat-man, a 
 captain in the Black-Hawk W T ar, a country lawyer, a 
 representative in the rural Legislature of Illinois, on 
 such modest foundations the broad structure of his fame 
 was laid. How slowly, and yet by happily prepared 
 steps, he came to his place ! " * 
 
 One eloquent eulogist f thus pictured the people's 
 choice : " In person he was tall and rugged, with little 
 
 The Dutchman has seasoned with freedom his krout; 
 And slow, Into, but certain, the Quakers are out ! 
 
 Give the (lag to the winds ! set the hills all aflame I 
 Make way for the man with the patriarch's name ! 
 Aw;iy with misgiving:, away with all doubt! 
 For LINCOLN goes in when the Quakers come out ! " 
 
 B. W. Emerson. t Hon. Charles Sumn.
 
 CALLED TO TffS PRESIDENTIAL CSAltt. 63 
 
 resemblance to any historic portrait, unless he might 
 seem in one respect to justify the epithet which was 
 giveu to an early English monarch. His countenance 
 had even more of rugged strength than his person. 
 Perhaps the quality which struck the most at first sight 
 was his simplicity of manners and conversation, without 
 form or ceremony of any kind, beyond that among neigh- 
 bors. His hand-writing had the same simplicity. It 
 was as clear as that of Washington, but less florid. Each 
 dad been a surveyor, and was perhaps indebted to this ex- 
 perience. But the son of the Western pioneer was more 
 simple in nature, and the man appeared in the autograph. 
 That integrity which has become a proverb belonged to 
 the same quality. The most perfect honesty must be 
 the most perfect simplicity. The words by which an 
 ancient Roman was described belong to him : Vitd in- 
 nocent issimus, proposito sanctissimus. He was naturally 
 humane, inclined to pardon, and never remembering the 
 hard things said against him. He was always good to 
 the poor, and in his dealings with them was full of those 
 ' kind little words which are of the same blood as great 
 and holy deeds.' Such a character awakened instinc- 
 tively the sympathy of the people. They saw his fellow- 
 feeling with them, and felt the kinship. With him as 
 President, the idea of republican institutions, where no 
 place is too high for the humblest, was perpetually man- 
 ifest, so that his simple presence was like a proclamation 
 of the equality of all men." 
 
 Such pen-pictures of this great and good man are often 
 to be met, and will continually be drawn by poets, eulogists, 
 and historians. One of those invaluable newspaper cor- 
 respondents, who like his co-laborers aided to give the 
 waiting North a true panorama of events from time to time, 
 thus speaks of President Lincoln: "Our interview left
 
 64 A6RABAM LINCOLN. 
 
 no grotesque recollections of the President lounging, hia 
 huge hands and feet, great mouth, or angular features. 
 We remembered rather the ineffable tenderness which 
 shone through his gentle eyes, his childlike ingenuous- 
 ness, his utter integrity, and his love of country. Igno- 
 rant of etiquette and conventionalities, without the graces 
 of form or manner, his great reluctance to give pain, hia 
 beautiful regard for the feelings of others, made him 
 
 1 Worthy to bear without reproach 
 The grand old name of gentleman.' 
 
 iStrong without symmetry, humorous without levity, 
 religious without cant; tender, merciful, forgiving; a 
 profound believer in divine love, an earnest worker for 
 human brotherhood, Abe Lincoln was perhaps the best 
 contribution which America has made to history."* 
 
 As another most eloquent eulogist f said before the 
 General Assembly of Connecticut, " Plis greatness is the 
 most original and bizarre in the world's history, shaped 
 after no model, suggesting as a compact whole no pattern, 
 no parallel, . . . and can only be loosely described as 
 composed of great simplicity, great naturalness, great 
 bonhomie, great shrewdness, great strength, great de- 
 votion, great equanimity, and great success, on the 
 greatest theatre ever offered to such qualities for 
 exhibition. . . . Ennobled by no patent but that of 
 nature, with no diploma but his record, crowned as it 
 were with the wild flowers of the forest, and with all its 
 flavor and freshness upon him, he walks into the surprised 
 Pantheon of the world's great men, a large grotesque 
 backwoodsman, but with credentials to admission which 
 
 A. D. Richardson's " The Secret Service, the Field, Dungeon, and 
 Escape." 
 
 t Hon. H. C. Deming.
 
 CALLED TO THE RESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 65 
 
 cannot be challenged or disallowed ; like the hirsute and 
 half-naked Brennus striding into the grave and reverend 
 decorum of a Roman senate; like Hans Luther's plebeian 
 and beetle-browed son confronting the stoled, mitred, 
 and ermined Diet of Charles the Fifth ; like a red-nosed, 
 cropped, and mail-clad Cromwell, shuffling through the 
 silken splendors, the Vandyke dresses, the perfumed love- 
 locks, and the fastidious etiquette, of outraged White- 
 hall ; like St. Artegans' iron soldier, marching with his 
 invincible flail into the startled and shrinking ranks of 
 vulnerable and pain-suffering warriors." 
 
 One aim of this volume is to give a true picture of 
 Abraham Lincoln as a man, and the concurrent testimony 
 of various contemporaries is exceedingly valuable. The 
 " New- York World," which, while he lived, was ever op- 
 posed to his cause and policy, thus spoke of the people's 
 choice when death had set its seal upon his virtues: 
 
 "If we look for the elements of character which have 
 contributed to the extraordinary and constantly growing 
 popularity of Mr. Lincoln, we have not far to seek. The 
 kindly, companionable, jovial turn of his disposition, free 
 from every taint of affectation, puerile vanity, or parvenu 
 insolence, conveyed a strong impression of worth, sense, 
 and solidity, as well as goodness of heart. He never 
 disclosed the slightest symptom that he was dazzled or 
 elated by his great position, or that it was incumbent 
 upon him to be anybody but plain Abraham Lincoln. 
 This was in infinitely better taste than would have been 
 any attempt to put on manners that did not sit easily 
 upon his training and habits, under the false notion that 
 he would be supporting the dignity of his office. No 
 offence in manners is so intolerable as affectation, nor any 
 thing so vulgar as a soul haunted by an uneasy conscious- 
 ness of vulgarity. Mr. Lincoln's freedom from any such
 
 66 ABRABAM LINCOLN. 
 
 upstart affectations was one of the good points oi his 
 character: it betokened his genuineness and sincerity." 
 
 On the llth of February, 1861, the President elect 
 left his home in Springfield for Washington. A vast 
 crowd attended him at the depot ; and before the cars 
 started he thus addressed a few farewell words to his 
 neighbors and friends : 
 
 "Mr FRIENDS, No one not in my position can appreci- 
 ate the sadness I feel at this parting. To this people 1 
 owe all that I am. Here I have lived more than a quarter 
 of a century. Here my children were born, and here one 
 of them lies buried. I know not how soon I shall see 
 you again. A duty devolves upon me which is perhaps 
 greater than that which has devolved upon any other man 
 since the days of Washington. He never would have 
 succeeded except for the aid of Divine Providence, upon 
 which he at all times relied. I feel that I cannot succeed 
 without the same divine aid which sustained him, and 
 in the same Almighty Being I place my reliance for sup- 
 port ; and I hope you, my friends, will all pray that I may 
 receive that divine assistance, without which 1 cannot 
 succeed, but with which success is certain. Again I bid 
 you all an affectionate farewell." 
 
 All along the route to the Capitol, multitudes assem- 
 bled at the railway stations to greet him, and on several 
 occasions he addressed them in few but happily chosen 
 words. 
 
 At Toledo, in response to continual calls, he appeared 
 on the platform, and said, " I am leaving you on an 
 errand of national importance, attended, as you are aware, 
 with considerable difficulties. Let us believe, as some 
 poet has expressed it, 
 
 ' Behind the cloud the sun is shining still.' 
 
 I bid you an affectionate farewell."
 
 CALLED TO TSB PRKSIDElf'i'tAL CHAIR. 67 
 
 At Indianapolis, Mr. Lincoln was welcomed by the 
 Governor of the State, and escorted by a procession 
 composed of the Legislature, municipal authorities, mili- 
 tary, and firemen. On reaching the hotel, he addressed 
 the people in his own homely and humorous but sensible 
 manner, giving some intimation of the policy he would 
 pursue : 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE STATE OF INDIANA, I am 
 here to thank you for this magnificent welcome, and still 
 more for the very generous support given by your State 
 to that political cause, which, I think, is the true and 
 just cause of the whole country and the whole world. 
 Solomon says, ' There is a time to keep silence ; ' and 
 when men wrangle by the mouth, with no certainty that 
 they mean the same thing while using the same words, 
 it perhaps were as well if they would keep silence. 
 
 " The words ' coercion ' and ' invasion ' are much used 
 in these days, and often with some temper arid hot blood. 
 Let us make sure, if we can, that we do not misunder- 
 stand the meaning of those who use them. Let us get 
 the exact definition of these words, not from dictionaries, 
 but from the men themselves, who certainly deprecate 
 the things they would represent by the use of the words. 
 What, then, is ' coercion'? what is ' invasion'? Would 
 the marching of an army into South Carolina, without 
 the consent of her people, and with hostile intent toward 
 them, be invasion? I certainly think it would, and it 
 would be coercion also if the South Carolinians were 
 forced to submit. But if the United States should merely 
 hold and retake its own forts and other property, and 
 collect the duties on foreign importations, or even with- 
 hold the mails from places where they were habitually 
 violated, would any or all of these things be invasion or 
 coercion ? Do our professed lovers of the Union, who
 
 68 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 spitefully resolve that they will resist coercion and in 
 vasion, understand that such things as t T <ese, on the part 
 of the United States, would be coercion or invasion of a 
 State? If so, their idea of means to preserve the object 
 of their great affection would seem to be exceedingly 
 thin and airy. If sick, the little pills of the homoeopathist 
 would be much too large for it to swallow. In their 
 view, the Union, as a family relation, would seem to be 
 no regular marriage, but rather a sort of free-love ai- 
 rangement, to be maintained on passional attraction. 
 
 " By the way, in what consists the special sacredness 
 of a State ? I speak not of the position assigned to a 
 State in the Union by the Constitution, for that is a bond 
 we all recognize. That position, however, a State can- 
 not carry out of the Union with it. I speak of that as- 
 sumed primary right of a State to rule all which is les-; 
 than itself, and to ruin all which is larger than itself. If 
 a State and a county, in a given case, should be equal 
 in number of inhabitants, in what, as a matter of princi- 
 ple, is the State better than the county ? Would an ex- 
 change of name be an exchange of rights? Upon what 
 principle, upon what rightful principle, may a State, being 
 no more than one-fiftieth part of the nation in soil and 
 population, break up the nation, and then coerce a propor- 
 tionably large sub-division of itself in the most arbitrary 
 way ? What mysterious right to play tyrant is con- 
 ferred on a district or county, with its people, by simply 
 calling it a State ? Fellow-citizens, I am not asserting 
 any thing : I am merely asking questions for you to con- 
 sider. And now allow me to bid you farewell." 
 
 At Cincinnati, the President elect received a most en- 
 thusiastic welcome. lie was escorted to the Burnet 
 House by the Mayor of the city, who addressed him in 
 words of welcome, to which he made a fitting re- 
 spouse.
 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 69 
 
 At Columbus also be received a cordial welcome } and 
 spoke briefly. At Steubenville he also made a brief ad- 
 dress. He spoke also at Pittsburg and Cleveland ; but 
 the limits of this volume forbid the insertion of all these 
 speeches. Ex-President Fillmore headed the citizen- 
 host who greeted him at Buffalo, and the Mayor wel- 
 comed him in words. At Albany he was conducted to 
 the Capitol, and welcomed by Gov. Morgan. At Pough- 
 keepsie he was welcomed by the Mayor, and also in 
 New York. It is said that the reception in that com- 
 mercial metropolis was " a most imposing demonstra- 
 tion : places of business were generally closed, and 
 hundreds of thousands were in the streets." At Tren- 
 ton he tarried a few hours, and visited both houses 
 of the Legislature. He addressed the Senate as fol 
 lows : 
 
 MR. PRESIDENT, AND GF.XTJ.EMEX OF TIIK 
 
 SEXATE OF TIIE STATE OF NEW JERSEY, 
 
 " I am very grateful to you for the honorable recep- 
 tion of which I have been the o.bject. I cannot but 
 remember the place that New Jersey holds in our early 
 history. In the early Revolutionary struggle, few of the 
 States among the old Thirteen had more of the battle- 
 fields of the country within its limits than old New Jer- 
 sey. May I be pardoned, if, upon this occasion, I men- 
 tion that away back in my childhood, the earliest days 
 of my being able to read, I got hold of a small book, 
 such a one as few of the younger members have ever 
 seen, Weems's ' Life of Washington' ? I remember all 
 the accounts there given of the battle-fields and struggles 
 for the liberty of the country; and none fixed themselves 
 upon my imagination so deeply as the struggle here at 
 Trenton, New Jersey. The crossing of the river, tUe
 
 70 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 contest with the Hessians, the great hardships endured 
 at that time, all fixed themselves on my memory more 
 than any single Revolutionary event; and you all know, 
 for you have all been boys, how these early impressions 
 last longer than any others. I recollect thinking then, 
 boy even though I was, that there must have been some- 
 thing more than common that those men struggled for. 
 I am exceedingly anxious that that thing which they 
 struggled for ; that something, even more than national 
 independence ; that something, that held out a great 
 promise to all the people of the world in all time to 
 come, I am exceedingly anxious that this Union, the 
 Constitution, and the liberties of the people, shall be 
 perpetuated in accordance with the original idea for 
 which that struggle was made; and I shall be happy 
 indeed if I shall be a humble instrument, in the hands 
 of the Almighty and of this his almost chosen people, 
 tor perpetuating the object of that great struggle. You 
 give me this reception, as I understand, without dis- 
 tinction of party. I learn that this body is composed of 
 a majority of gentlemen, who, in the exercise of their 
 best judgment in the choice of a chief magistrate, did 
 not think I was "the man. I understand, nevertheless, 
 that they came forward here to greet me as the consti- 
 tutional President of the United States ; as citizens of 
 the United States, to meet the man, who, for the time 
 being, is the representative man of the nation, united 
 by a purpose to perpetuate the Union and liberties of 
 the people. As such, I accept this reception more grate- 
 fully than I could do did I believe it was tendered to me 
 as an individual." 
 
 Mr. Lincoln then addressed the Assembly; and after 
 repeating, in substance, some things in his previous 
 speech, continued : " You, Mr. Speaker, have well said
 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 71 
 
 that this is the time when the bravest and wisest look 
 with doubt and awe upon the aspect presented by our 
 national affairs. Under these circumstances, you will 
 readily see why I should not speak in detail of the 
 course I shall deem it best to pursue. It is proper that 
 I should avail myself of all the information and all 
 the time at my command, in order that, when the time 
 arrives in which I must speak officially, I shall be able 
 to take the ground which I deem the best and safest, 
 and from which I may have no occasion to swerve. 1 
 shall endeavor to take the ground I deem most just to 
 the North, the East, the West, the South, and the whole 
 country. I take it, I hope, in good temper, certainly 
 with no malice towards any section. I shall do all that 
 may be in my power to promote a peaceful settlement 
 of all our difficulties. The man does not live who is 
 more devoted to peace than I am ; none who would do 
 more to preserve it. But it may be necessary to put 
 the foot firmly down ; and if I do my duty, and do it 
 right, you will sustain me, will you not ? Received as 
 I am by the members of a Legislature, the majority of 
 whom do not agree with me in political sentiment, I 
 trust that I may have their assistance in piloting the 
 Ship of State through this vo} T age, surrounded by perils 
 as it is ; for, if it should suffer shipwreck now, there will 
 be no pilot needed for another voyage." 
 
 On arriving at Philadelphia, the words of welcome 
 and response were again uttered ; and the next morning 
 Mr. Lincoln visited the old " Independence Hall " for 
 the purpose of raising the national flag over it. Here 
 he was warmly welcomed, and spoke as follows : 
 
 " 1 am filled with deep emotion at finding myself stand 
 ing here in this place, where were collected the wisdom, 
 the patriotism, the devotion to principle, from whicj)
 
 72 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 sprang the institutions under which we live. You have 
 kindly suggested to me that in my hands is the task of 
 restoring peace to the present distracted condition of 
 the country. I can say in return, sir, that all the politi- 
 cal sentiments I entertain have been drawn, so far as I 
 have been able to draw them, from the sentiments which 
 originated, and were given to the world, from this hall. 
 I have never had a feeling politically that did not 
 spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration 
 of Independence. I have often pondered over the dan- 
 gers which were incurred by the men who assembled 
 here, and framed and adopted that Declaration of In- 
 dependence. I have pondered over the toils that were 
 endured by the officers and soldiers of the army who 
 achieved that independence. I have often inquired of 
 myself what great principle or idea it was that kept this 
 confederacy so long together. It was not the mere mat- 
 ter of the separation of the colonies from the mother- 
 land, but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this 
 country, but, I hope, to the world for all future time. It 
 was that which gave promise, that, in due time, the weight 
 would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is 
 a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independ- 
 ence. Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon 
 this basis ? If it can, 1 will consider myself one of the 
 happiest men in the world if I can help to save it. If it 
 cannot be saved upon that principle, it will be truly 
 awful. But if this country cannot be saved without 
 giving up that principle, I waa about to say I would 
 rather be assassinated on this spot than surrender it. 
 Now, in my view of the present aspect of affairs, there 
 need be no bloodshed or war. There is no necessity 
 for it. I am not in favor of such a course ; and I may
 
 CALLED TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 73 
 
 say, in advance, that there will be no blood shed unless 
 it be forced upon the Government, and then it will be 
 forced to act in self-defence. 
 
 " My friends, this is wholly an unexpected speech, and 
 I did not expect to be called upon to say a word when I 
 came here. I supposed it was merely to do something 
 towards raising the flag. I may, therefore, have said 
 something indiscreet. I have said nothing but what J 
 am willing to live by, and, if it be the pleasure of Al- 
 mighty God, to die by." 
 
 The party then proceeded to a platform in front of 
 the State House ; and there Mr. Lincoln made a brief 
 speech, stating his willingness to comply with the re- 
 quest to raise the flag, and alluded to the original flag 
 of thirteen stars, saying that " the number had increased 
 as time rolled on, and each star added to the prosperity 
 of the nation. 
 
 " The future," he added, " is in the hands of the peo- 
 ple. It is on such an occasion as this that we can reason 
 together, and re-affirm our devotion to the country and 
 the principles of the Declaration of Independence. Let 
 us make up our minds, that, when we do put a new star 
 upon our banner, it shall be a fixed one, never to be 
 dimmed by the horrors of war, but brightened by the 
 contentment and prosperity of peace. Let us go on to 
 extend the area of our usefulness, add star upon star, 
 until their light shall shine upon five hundred millions 
 of a free and happy people." Mr. Lincoln then raised 
 the flag to the top of the staff. 
 
 Shortly after, he and his party left for Harrisburg. 
 Here he addressed the Legislature ; and, referring to 
 the morning's experience, said, " Our friends there had 
 provided a magnificent flag of the country. They had 
 arranged it so that I was given the honor of raising it 
 7
 
 J4 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 to the head of its staff; and, when it went up, I was 
 pleased that it went to its place by the strength of my 
 own feeble arm. When, according to the arrangement, 
 the cord was pulled, and it flaunted gloriously to the wind 
 without an accident in the bright glowing sunshine of 
 the morning, I could not help hoping that there was, in 
 the entire success of that beautiful ceremony, at least 
 something of an omen of what is to come ; nor could 1 
 help feeling then, as I often have felt, in the whole of 
 that proceeding, 1 was a very humble instrument. I had 
 not provided the flag ; I had not made arrangements 
 for elevating it to its place; I had applied but a very 
 small portion of my feeble strength in raising it. In the 
 whole transaction, I was in the hands of the people who 
 had arranged it ; and, if I can have the same generous 
 co-operation of the people of the nation, I think the flag 
 of our country may be kept flaunting gloriously 1 " 
 
 Those who lived to see the events of the four years 
 in which President Lincoln guided the nation to victory 
 and freedom can recognize the omen of which he spoke, 
 as gloriously fulfilled. 
 
 He did not speak again in public till he reached Wash- 
 ington. At Philadelphia, information was communicated 
 to him of a plot which was on foot to assassinate him in 
 Baltimore. The existence of such a plot had been sus- 
 pected before. Threats had been freely made by the 
 more fanatical Southern men that he would never reach 
 Washington alive. An attempt was made to throw from 
 the track the car in wJiich he was riding on his journey 
 through Ohio ; and, just as he was leaving Cincinnati, a 
 hand-grenade was found to have been secreted on board 
 the cars. Investigations were set on foot which revealed 
 the fact that a small gang of assassins, under the leader- 
 ship of an Italian, who assumed the name of Orsini, had
 
 CALLKD TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CHAIR. 75 
 
 nndertaken to do the work of the slaveholders by mur- 
 dering Mr. Lincoln as he passed through Baltimore. 
 
 " The only precaution which he took against this at- 
 tack was to leave Harrisburg one train earlier than had 
 been expected. He thus passed through Baltimore in 
 the night, and arrived in Washington on the morning of 
 Saturday, the 23d of February, where his safe arrival 
 was greeted with joy by his friends, and ill-concealed 
 disappointment by his enemies. The threats against his 
 life were continued ; and but for the watchfulness and 
 determination of his friends, and the care and military 
 preparations of Gen. Scott, it is quite probable that his 
 inauguration would never have taken place." * 
 
 A correspondent of the " New-York Herald " thus 
 narrates the occurrences of the memorable day : 
 
 " On the day of his arrival in Washington he dined 
 with Mr. Seward, called on the President ; and at ten 
 minutes before nine, P.M., he returned to his hotel, and 
 was received by an enthusiastic crowd, who greeted him 
 as though he was their father and their life. Some were 
 old men, and some were old and young ladies. They 
 reflected the general feeling, that in Mr. Lincoln rests 
 the future hope of the Government and the Union. 
 
 " Mr. Lincoln passed through the long parlor-hall, 
 thronged with the elite and fashion of the national me- 
 tropolis, shaking hands as fast as he could on his right 
 and left with the ladies and gentlemen, so intensely in- 
 terested, that he forgot even to take his hat off, which 
 was excused by a looker-on, who remarked that it was 
 new, and outshined the crowd. 
 
 " At nine o'clock, according to previous arrangement, 
 Mr. Lincoln received the Peace Congress. The members 
 
 * Henry J. Raymond'* " Life of Lincoln,."
 
 76 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 formed in procession in the hall where they met, and 
 proceeded to the reception parlor. Ex-Preside.at Tyler, 
 and Governor Chase of Ohio, led the van. The latter 
 introduced Mr. Tyler: Mr. Lincoln received him with all 
 the respect due to his position. The several delegates 
 were then presented to Mr. Lincoln by Gov. Chase in 
 the usual manner. 
 
 "The greatest curiosity was manifested to uituesa 
 Mr. Lincoln's first reception in Washington. The most 
 marvellous thing that occurred was the manifestation by 
 Mr. Lincoln of a most wonderful memory. It will be 
 remembered that the convention is composed of many 
 men, who, although distinguished in their time, have until 
 very lately not been very much known. Each member 
 was introduced by his last name ; but, in nine cases out 
 of ten, Mr. Lincoln would promptly recall their entire 
 name, no matter how many initials it contained. In sev- 
 eral instances he recited the historical reminiscences of 
 families. In short, he understands the material of the 
 Peace Congress. 
 
 " When the tall Gen. Doniphan of Missouri was intro- 
 duced, Mr. Lincoln had to look up to catch Doniphan's 
 eye. He immediately inquired, ' Is this Doniphan, who 
 made that splendid march across the plains, and swept 
 the swift Camanches before him?' ' I commanded the 
 expedition across the plains/ modestly responded the 
 general. 
 
 '"Then you have come up to the standard of my ex. 
 pectations,' rejoined Mr. Lincoln. 
 
 " After the reception of the Peace Congress was con- 
 cluded, a large number of citizens were presented. Mr. 
 Lincoln was then notified that the ante-rooms and main 
 parlors of the hotel were filled with ladies who desired 
 to pay their respects ; to which the President-elect very
 
 CALLED TO THE PKESIDEXTIAL CBA1K. 77 
 
 promptly consented. The ladies then passed in review, 
 each being introduced by the gentleman who accom- 
 panied her. Mr. Lincoln underwent the new ordeal with 
 much good humor. 
 
 " At ten o'clock, Mr. Buchanan's Cabinet called, and 
 paid their respects, in response to Mr. Lincoln's coup d'e- 
 tat at the White House in the morning. Their recep- 
 tion was very pleasant. 
 
 " It may be truly said that Mr. Lincoln's first day in 
 Washington as President-elect has been a decided suc- 
 cess. Democrats as well as Republicans are pleased with 
 him ; and the ladies, who thought he was awkward at 
 first sight, changed their opinion, and now declare him 
 'a very pleasant, sociable gentleman, and not bad-looking 
 by any means.' " 
 
 The 4th of March, 1SG1, arrived, INAUGURATION DAY. 
 It was somewhat cloudy and cool in the morning, but 
 afterwards seemed like May, bright and genial. 
 
 " The ceremonies at the inauguration of Mr. Lincoln 
 were in some respects the most brilliant and imposing 
 ever witnessed at Washington. Nearly twenty well- 
 drilled military companies of the District, comprising a 
 force of more than two thousand men, were on parade. 
 Georgetown sent companies of cavalry, infantry, and ar- 
 tillery, of fine*"appearance. The troops stationed at the 
 City Hall and Willard's Hotel became objects of attrac- 
 tion to vast numbers of botli sexes. At noon the Senate 
 Committee called upon President Buchanan, who pro- 
 ceeded with them to Willard's Hotel to receive the 
 President-elect. The party thus composed, joined by 
 other distinguished citizens, then proceeded in open 
 carriages along the avenue at a moderate pace, with 
 military in front arid rear, and thousands of private citi- 
 zens in carriages, on horseback and on foot, crowding the
 
 7fc ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 broad street. The Capitol was readied by passing up on 
 the north side of the grounds, and the party entered the 
 building by the northern door over a temporary planked 
 walk. During the hour and a half previous to the arrival 
 of President Buchanan and the President-elect in the 
 Senate Chamber, that hall presented a gayer spectacle 
 than ever before. The usual desks of the senators had 
 been removed, and concentric lines of ornamented chairs 
 set for the dignitaries of this and other lands with which 
 this country was in bonds of amity and friendship. The 
 inner half-circle on the extreme left was occupied by the 
 members of the cabinety of Mr. Buchanan and Mr. Lin- 
 coln, mingled together, and farther on by senators. The 
 concentric circle farther back was filled with senators. 
 The next half-circle immediately in the rear of that occu- 
 pied by the ministers were the secretaries and attaches. 
 The half-circles on the left, corresponding to those occu- 
 pied by the corps diplomatique, furnished places for 
 senators and governors of States and Territories. Out- 
 side of all, on both sides, stood for there was no further 
 room for seats the members of the House of Repre- 
 sentatives and chief officers of the executive bureaus. 
 The galleries all round the Senate were occupied by 
 ladies. 
 
 " At a quarter-past one o'clock, the President of the 
 t/nitbd States and the President-elect entered the Sen- 
 ate Chamber, preceded by Senator Foote and the marshal 
 of the District of Columbia, and followed by Senators 
 Baker and Pearce. They took seats immediately in front 
 of the clerk's desk, facing outward ; President Buchanan 
 having the Presidentelect oa his right, and the senators 
 equally distributed right and k>ft. 
 
 " In a few minutes, Vice-Preb ; dent Ilamlin, who had 
 oeen previously ^stalled, ordered the reading of the
 
 CALLD TO THE PRESIDENTIAL CtlAIR. 79 
 
 order of procession to the platform on the east of the 
 Capitol ; and the line was formed, the Marshal of the Dis- 
 trict of Columbia leading. Then followed Chief Justice 
 Taney and the Judges of the Supreme Court, the Ser- 
 geant-at-arms of the Senate, the Committee of Arrange- 
 ments of the Senate, the President of the United States 
 and the President-elect, Vice-President of the United 
 States, and Senate, the nlembers of the diplomatic 
 corps, governors of State and Territories, and members 
 of the House of Representatives. In this order the 
 procession marched to the platform erected in the usual 
 position over the main steps on the east front of the 
 Capitol, where a temporary covering had been placed to 
 protect the President-elect from possible rain during the 
 reading of his inaugural address. The greater part of 
 an hour was occupied in seating the procession on the 
 platform, and in the delivery of the address of Mr. Lin- 
 coln, which he read with a clear, loud, and distinct voice, 
 quite intelligible to at least ten thousand persons below 
 him. At the close of the address, Mr. Lincoln took the 
 oath of office from the venerable Chief Justice of the 
 Supreme Court.* 
 
 " After the ceremony of inauguration had been com- 
 pleted, the President and Ex-President retired by the 
 same avenue, and the procession, or the military part of 
 it, marched to the executive mansion. On arriving at 
 tho President's house, Mr. Lincoln met Gen. Scott, by 
 whom he was warmly greeted ; and then the doors of Jio 
 house were opened, and thousands of persons rapidly 
 passed through, shaking hands with the President, who 
 stood in the reception-room for that purpose. In this 
 simple and quiet manner was a change of rulers made." -f 
 
 Chief Justice Taney administered this oath to ten successive president*. 
 f " Annual Cyclopedia," 1861.
 
 80 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 And thus the lowly-born son of the Western pioneer sat 
 down in the presidential chair of a great Republic, a 
 seat more honorable than any throne on earth. The con- 
 trast between his humble home in early life and this 
 
 WHITE HOUSE, D. C. 
 
 high position is seen in the sketch thuvS purposely given 
 of the imposing ceremonies of inauguration. Well might 
 the eloquent statesman* add, after mentioning Csesar, 
 William of Orange, and Henry IV. of France, all of 
 whom were assassinated, " his star will not pale by the 
 side of theirs. . . . Those are illustrious names; but 
 there is nothing in them which can eclipse the simple 
 life of our President, whose example will be an epoch iiT 
 the history of humanity, and a rebuke to every usurper, 
 to be commemorated forever by history and by song. ' I 
 called thee from the sheep-cot to be ruler over Israel,' 
 said the Lord to David ; and whoever is thus called is 
 more than Csesar. Such an appointment was his-; and 
 his simple devotion to human rights was more than 
 genius or power." 
 
 Hon. Charles Sumner.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 TROUBLOUS TIMES. 
 
 " We wait beneath the furnace hlait 
 
 Tlie pangs of transformation : 
 Not painlessly doth God recast 
 And mould anew the nation. 
 Hot burns the fire 
 U'here wrongs expire ; 
 Nor ppares the hand 
 That from the land 
 L'proots the ancient evil." 
 
 WIMTTIER. 
 
 " I am for peace ; but, when I speak, they are for war." Ps. cxx. 7. 
 
 THE "Quaker drop" showed itself in the inaugural 
 address of the new President. The blood of a pious and 
 peaceful ancestry coursed along the veins of him whom 
 God had called to be the head of a great nation in its 
 most troublous times : with a prescience belonging to that 
 inheritance, he saw the gathering cloud, and heard the 
 thunders of war. Yet he would fain stay the glittering 
 bolt of destiny, and, if possible, forbid the clashing of 
 c ontecding steel. Hence the deprecatory tone of his 
 first icaugural; the evident desire for peace, that shone, 
 like the golden symbol of the descending SpiVit, in the 
 illuminated missals of other days. But it was unavailing. 
 The soft utterances of peace were drowned in the noisy 
 clamors of war ; and the closing paragraph of that inaug- 
 ural address was, even more than its author knew, the 
 very voice of prophecy. Only a few short months, and 
 " the mystic cords of memory " did stretch from many a 
 M battle-field and patriot grave " to living hearts and 
 
 si
 
 82 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 hearth-stones all over our broad land ; and at the close 
 of the mighty conflict, from his own grave the grave 
 of a martyr was to cornea voice pleading with human- 
 ity for liberty and righteousness. But wo will not antici- 
 pate. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's first act was to choose a Cabinet. This 
 he did with his usual discrimination; and though the lapse 
 of time and changing course of events led to changes in 
 the Cabinet, yet none are willing to impeach the wisdom 
 which selected the first set of Cabinet-officers. For the 
 important position of Secretary of State, William H. 
 Seward of New York was selected; Salmon P. Chase of 
 Ohio was placed in charge of the Treasury Department ; 
 Simon Cameron of Pennsylvania became Secretary of 
 War ; Gideon Welles of Connecticut, Secretary of the Na- 
 vy ; Caleb B. Smith of Indiana, Secretary of the In- 
 terior ; Montgomery Blair of Maryland was appointed 
 Postmaster-General ; and Edward Bates of Missouri, At- 
 torney-General. 
 
 As every reader of to-day knows, the Southern States 
 manifested a rebellious spirit long before Lincoln filled 
 the chair of Washington. Had the imbecile Buchanan 
 but possessed the old Roman spirit of one of his prede- 
 cessors, he would have shown that he had a "backbone," 
 and taken a Jacksonian share of the " responsibility " 
 in using measures that would have crushed the viper in 
 the egg. But the pusillanimous policy adopted just suited 
 the " letme-alone " theory of the Southern secessionists ; 
 and so the infamous Floyd could steal our arms, and the 
 double-dyed traitor, Robert E. Lee, could linger in our 
 ranks till he had possessed himself of Gen. Scott's 
 plans, and then desert to the enemy, thenceforth to use 
 his knowledge in an effort to overthrow the best Gov- 
 ernment the world ever saw, and place a man, who dis-
 
 TIMES. 83 
 
 graced the name of a former President of our Republic, 
 on a throne, the corner-stone of whose tottering pedes- 
 tal was human slavery. And thus Buchanan made the 
 way rough and hard for Lincoln. But the hour and the 
 man were ready for each other. The President went 
 calmly forward. " Coming to the presidency pre-occupied 
 by the traditional theories and opinions of the political 
 school in which he was educated, he devoted himself 
 with a purpose single and exclusive to the practical in- 
 terpretation of events, to the study of those lessons 
 taught by the experience through which the country 
 was called to pass; and learning, in common with a 
 majority of his countrymen, in the strifes and agonies 
 of the Rebellion, by the lurid glare of the fires of treason 
 and of civil war, how to accommodate opinion to the al- 
 tered relations of States, interests, and sections of the 
 people, he marched, side by side with the advancing 
 hosts of the best and most discerning, in the direction 
 where Divine Providence pointed the way."* 
 
 Yet he could not conscientiously counsel war at first. 
 His inaugural was an olive-branch vainly held out to 
 hands that would not receive it. Then came a pause 
 after its utterance. It was the lull before the storm ; 
 the portentous calm that precedes the burst of the tor- 
 nado. " Since the close of the Revolutionary struggle, 
 no man had seen in the free States any other banner 
 floating over a regiment of our people than the stars and 
 stripes: though the waves of party-spirit had often run 
 mountain-high, and we had seemed just on the brink of 
 disruption and civil war, yet the dreaded collision had 
 always been somehow averted, and the moment of fiercest 
 excitement, of wildest alienation, had often been the \m 
 
 GOT. Andrew's AJdresi.
 
 84 AnnAIIA^f LINCOLN. 
 
 mediate precursor of a halcyon era of reconciliation, peace, 
 and fraternal harmony. It was not easy for Northern 
 men, especially those who never visited and sojourned 
 at the South, to comprehend and realize the wide preva- 
 lence and intensity of anti-national sentiment and feel- 
 ing in those localities whose social order, industry and 
 business, were entirely based on slavery. Neither envy- 
 ing nor hating the Southerners while lamenting their 
 delusions and restricting their exactions, it was hard in- 
 deed for many, if not most, of the citixens of the free 
 States to realize that we stood on the brink of a volcano 
 whose rumbling precluded an eruption of blood as well 
 as ashes." * 
 
 But the country seemed unprepared for war in every 
 sense. Jefferson Davis and John B. Floyd had directed 
 the War Department for eight years with an eye to South- 
 ern supremacy. Most of our little army had been or- 
 dered to Texas, where it was placed under command of 
 the rebel general Twiggs, who soon betrayed it into the 
 hands of his fellow-traitors. Floyd had acted the part of 
 a thief in transferring arms and ammunition from North- 
 ern to Southern arsenals ; and the larger and better 
 portion of our little navy had been scattered over dis- 
 tant seas. Now, the South desired to gain entire pos- 
 session of the forts along her shores, and thus obtain 
 means to defy the North when it would collect the reve- 
 nue that it should receive from vessels entering South 
 ern ports. This, President Lincoln could not allow. 
 
 Yet he was slow to declare war. He could not, until 
 it seemed unavoidable, imbrue his hands in a brother's 
 blood. Hear his own words in reference to the Mexican 
 War, spoken while a member of Congress : " Now, air, 
 
 Greeley'* " History of the American Conflict," p. 429.
 
 TROUBLOUS TIMES. 85 
 
 for the purpose of obtaining the very best evidence as 
 to whether Texas had actually carried her revolution to 
 the place where the hostilities of the present war com- 
 menced, let the President answer the interrogations I pro- 
 posed. Let him answer fully, fairly, and candidly. Let 
 him answer with/acfe, not with arguments. Let him re- 
 member he sits where Washington sat; and, so remember- 
 ing, let him answer as Washington would answer. As a 
 nation should not, and the Almighty will not, be evaded, 
 so let him attempt no evasion, no equivocation. . . . But 
 if he cannot or will not do this ; if, on any pretence or 
 no pretence, he shall refuse or omit it, then I shall be 
 fully convinced of what I more than suspect already, 
 that he is deeply conscious of being in the wrong ; that 
 he feels the blood of this war, like the bluod of Abel, is 
 crying to heaven against him ; that he ordered Gen. 
 Taylor into the midst of a peaceful Mexican settle- 
 ment purposely to bring on a war ; . . . and, trusting tc 
 escape scrutiny by fixing the public gaze upon the ex- 
 ceeding brightness of military glory, that attractive 
 rainbow that rises in showers of blood, that serpent's 
 eye that charms to destroy, he plunged into it, and 
 has swept on and on, till, disappointed in his calculation 
 of the ease with which Mexico might be subdued, he 
 now finds himself he knows not where." * 
 
 Now Lincoln himself sat where the great man he ven- 
 erated once sat; and he felt that it became him to think 
 calmly and soberly, and to act only after the severest 
 scrutiny and profoundest deliberation, and, above all, not 
 till the leadings of Divine Providence had shown him the 
 path of duty. He had no wish to emulate Napoleon or 
 Alexander; ro desire to be a second Cain. Not a gleam 
 
 * " President'* Words," p. 20.
 
 86 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 of military glory dazzled his peace-loving eyes, nor did 
 any murderous purpose lurk in his soul ; and, when he 
 finally came to the conclusion that war was inevita- 
 ble, it was with a sadness like that which must have 
 wrapped the brow of Abraham in gloom ere he offered 
 up his beloved Isaac ; or like that which deepened the 
 lines of sorrow and bade the tears glisten on His face 
 who bowed himself over Jerusalem, mourning the 
 desolation that must come upon her for her disobedi- 
 ence. 
 
 Lincoln was no party-man ; or, if he ever had been, 
 the exigencies of the times, or rather the providence 
 of God, which was preparing him for those times, bade 
 him rise above mere party-limits. 
 
 When he had borne the heavy burdens of two war- 
 cursed years, his language was that of a wisdom which 
 showed a discrimination based on integrity of purpose. 
 Said he in Ma} T , 1863, with characteristic plainness and 
 accuracy of speech, " The dissensions between Union 
 men in Missouri are due solely to a factious spirit which 
 is exceedingly reprehensible. The two parties ought to 
 have their heads knocked together. Either would rather 
 see the defeat of their adversary than that of Jefferson 
 Davis. We are in civil war. In such cases, there is 
 always a main question ; but, in this case, that question 
 is a perplexing compound, union and slavery. It be- 
 comes a question not of two sides merely, but of at least 
 four sides, even among those who are for the Union, say- 
 ing nothing of those who are against it : thus those 
 who are for the Union with, but not without, slavery ; 
 those for it without, but not with those for it with or 
 without, but prefer it with ; and those for it with or with- 
 out, but prefer it without" 
 
 And, with a wisdom which could only have come from
 
 TROUBLOUS flMES. 87 
 
 above, Lincoln guided the Ship of State month after 
 month, year after after year, carefully avoiding Scylla 
 on the one hand, andCharybdis on the other. Men could 
 not always see this ; and more than one sought for a life- 
 preserver, deeming shipwreck inevitable. But though 
 the wild waters heaved tumultuously, and the huge 
 breakers lifted their crested heads, and filled the ear of 
 every listener with their tremendous voice, " deep call- 
 ing unto deep " in the hour of our nation's dismay, yet 
 calmly and steadily the hand of God's appointed pilot 
 grasped the helm ; and the eye of Abraham Lincoln 
 glanced only from the needle that indicated the path of 
 justice, to the star that rose in the East, and heralded the 
 day of freedom. 
 
 The parricidal hands of Southern traitors were at last 
 raised against their father-land ; and at "3.20, A.M., of the 
 12th of April, 1861, Major Anderson was duly notified 
 that fire would be opened on Fort Sumter in one hour. 
 Punctual to the appointed moment, the roar of a mortar 
 from Sullivan's Island, quickly followed by the rustling 
 shriek of a shell, gave notice to the world that the era 
 of compromise and diplomacy was ended ; that the slave- 
 holders' confederacy had appealed from sterile negotia- 
 tions to the ' last argument ' of aristocracies as well as 
 kings. Another gun from that island quickly repeated 
 the warning, waking a response from battery after bat- 
 tery, until Sumter appeared the focus of a circle of vol- 
 canic fire. Soon the thunder of fifty heavy breach- 
 ing-cannon, in one grand volley, followed by the crashing 
 and crumbling of brick, stone, and mortar around and 
 above them, apprised the little garrison that their stay 
 in those quarters must necessarily be short."* 
 
 And reluctantly the brave defenders of the star- 
 
 * Greeley's " History."
 
 88 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 spangled banner were compelled to surrender. We all 
 know the story of Fort Sumter. Every loyal heart ac- 
 knowledged Major Anderson a hero and a patriot ; and 
 when, on Monday morning, April 15, 1861, President 
 Lincoln issued his first proclamation,* calling for the 
 country's defenders, there camo a universal "Amen " to 
 the call. 
 
 " ' COME TO THE KESCUE!' The cry went .forth 
 Through the length and breadth of the loyal North; 
 For the gun that startled Sumter heard 
 Wakened the land witli its fiery word. 
 The farmer paused with his work half done, 
 And snatched from the nail his rusty gun; 
 And the swart mechanic wiped his brow, 
 Shouting, ' There's work for my strong arm now I ' 
 And the parson doffed his gown, and said, 
 4 Bring me my right good sword instead ; ' 
 And the scholar paused in his eager quest, 
 And buckled his belt on with the rest; 
 And each and all to the rescue went 
 As unto a royal tournament: 
 For the loyal blood of a nation stirred 
 To the gun that startled Sumter heard." t 
 
 Governors and legislatures vied with each other in 
 proffers of men and money to the Government. The 
 Governor of Rhode Island, who was not a Republican, 
 not only promptly raised the quota of men required, but 
 actually led it to Washington and to the battle-field. 
 The same feeling of self-sacrificing patriotism nerved the 
 heart and arm of privates as well as officers. " Among 
 tho privates in Rhode Island's first regiment was one 
 worth a million dollars, who destroyed the passage-ticket 
 he had bought for a voyage to Europe on a tour of ol> 
 
 Seo Chapter VTIL f Mrs. Caroline A. Mason.
 
 TROUBLOUS TIAfJfS. 89 
 
 servation and pleasure, to shoulder his musket in de- 
 fence of his country and her laws." * 
 
 On marched the loyal soldiers of New England to de- 
 fend the Capitol of their country. As Guv. Andrew 
 said to the Mayor of Baltimore, " Their march through 
 New York was triumphal." But "bloody Baltimore" 
 chose to re-enact the scenes of the 19th of April, 1778 ; 
 and on the 19th of April, 1861, 
 
 " The streets our soldier-fathers trod 
 
 Blushed with their children's gore: 
 \Ve saw the craven rulers nod, 
 And dip in blood the civic rod. 
 Shall such things be, righteous Godl 
 
 In Baltimore? " f 
 
 The blood of Massachusetts patriots crimsoned the 
 stones of Baltimore ;| and as the news came back to the 
 New-England States, it was as if the "fiery cross" had 
 been lighted, and passed from hand to hand, calling anew 
 to battle the clans of freemen who were ready to rally 
 for liberty and law. 
 
 Gen. Butler (Cceur de Lion), with the dauntless 
 Eighth Massachusetts, ably seconded by the New- York 
 Seventh, followed in the sanguinary wake of the Sixth 
 
 * Greeley's " History," &c. t Bayard Taylor. 
 
 } Their death called forth the historic telegram from Gov. Andrew to Mayor 
 Brown: " I pray you to cause the bodies of our Massachusetts soldiers, dead in 
 Baltimore, to be laid out, preserved in ice, and tenderly sent forward by ex- 
 press to me. All expenses will be paid by the Commonwealth." Their early 
 martyrdom in the dear cause of Liberty unsheathed many a sword that else had 
 remained in its scabbard, and awoke the music of many a poet's lyre. Said 
 one (Mary Webb), with prophetic utterance, 
 
 " Peace to their ashes I they sleep well, 
 Our Massachusetts dead, who fell 
 In march to Freedom's citadel; 
 First-fruits of that lull vintage i -d, 
 Awaiting War's all-crushing tr-;iU; 
 Our owu, our JJas^achua 'Us dead I "
 
 90 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 Massachusetts, whose blood, as in the days of Revolu- 
 tionary struggle, was the first to be shed for liberty ; 
 and soon the Capitol was in safety from the threatening 
 parricides of the South.* 
 
 But the first blood was not the last ; and the pride of 
 New-England homes was mown down upon many a bat- 
 tle-field, as we all know too well, during these troublous 
 times. Ellsworth and Lyon and Baker were early laid 
 in patriot-graves. Bull Run, Ball's Bluff, Antietam, Fred- 
 ericksburg, Gettysburg, and many a battle-field besides, 
 call up the memories of the loved and lost, who bravely 
 gave their lives for their country : we think of gallant 
 Dix who died exclaiming, " The Iowa Third never sur- 
 renders ! " of the brave young captain Derby, who led 
 his men undauntedly, till he 
 
 " By the wayside fell and perished ; " 
 
 of the heroic chaplain Fuller, who felt that he " must 
 do something for his country," and shouldered a musket 
 in her defence : we think of many, many brave, true 
 hearts that throb no more on earth, all fallen victims 
 to the relentless war which has scourged our nation into 
 a repentance of its vilest sin ; and we feel as if Presi- 
 dent Lincoln needed to have " the spirit of wisdom, and 
 counsel, and of ghostly strength " given to him, almost 
 " without measure," that he might know how to deal 
 with the various problems which came up to be solved 
 by him. Gen. Butler aided to solve one, when he pro- 
 nounced the slaves of the rebels " contraband of war." 
 Our arms knew victory, and knew also disaster. It 
 
 * While our country had a Judas in the person of every rebel chief, it was 
 not without its Peter. " An officer who called at the White House during the 
 dark dajs when Washington was isolated, and threatened from every side, and 
 mid to Mr. Lincoln, ' Every one else may desert you, but I never will,' two 
 days after absconded, and b^aa eft*-^-* a Confederate major-geueraL"
 
 TROUBLOUS TIMES. 91 
 
 was doubtless well that we had some reverses, or we 
 should have been too confident, and less careful about 
 purging the nation from its gross iniquity. Slowly the 
 wheels of time rolled on ; and as slowly, but as surely 
 also, travelled the President in his ideas of what was 
 his duty and that of the nation. Some thought him an 
 u old fogy ; " some were ready to label him as a fossil, 
 and put him on the shelf. One sneeringly said he was 
 " not to be blamed for incapacity ; " but, unmoved by 
 slights or frowns or jeers, the man of the people sought 
 to benefit the people, and do the work that God had given 
 him to do. Mistakes he might make, for he was human ; 
 but none that were irretrievable. Mordecai asked Esther, 
 "Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for 
 such a time as this ? " And the same might have been 
 a^ked of our late President, sure that the answer would 
 indicate a willingness to " spend and be spent '' in the 
 discharge of duty.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE COURSE PURSUED. 
 
 " Stand by the flag, all doubt and treason scorning . 
 
 Believe, with courage firm and faitli sublime, 
 That it will float until the Eternal Morning 
 Pales with its glories all the lights of Time." 
 
 " The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed 
 me to preach good tidings unto the meek: he hath sent me to bind up the broken- 
 hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them 
 that are bound." ISA. Ixi. 1. 
 
 THE years went on. Once more our nation knew by 
 bitter personal experience the meaning of the phrase, 
 "Times that tried men's souls." President Lincoln 
 marched abreast of the times, perhaps, not infrequently, 
 cautious about being far in advance. 
 
 This volume is not intended to be a history of the 
 war, or even a record of all the acts of the President in 
 regard to the war; for then it must exceed the designed 
 limits: but it may give brief hints of the course pur- 
 sued; not a panorama of the whole path, but stereo- 
 scopic views, it may be, here and there. 
 
 It was no easy thing to conduct the civil war which 
 was inaugurated in 1861 to its triumphal close in 1865. 
 But God was alike with the nation which was in the 
 caldron, and the man who, in one sense, bore the bur- 
 den of that nation's woes. 
 
 As Bancroft, our great historian, has said, after refer- 
 ring to the uprising of the loyal North, "In some re- 
 spects Abraham Lincoln was peculiarly fitted for his task, 
 in connection with the movement of his countrymen. 
 
 M
 
 Tttn co ens K rtrnstTBD. 93 
 
 He was of the North-west; and this time it was the 
 Mississippi River, the needed outlet for the wealth of 
 the North-west, that did its part in asserting the neces- 
 sity of the Union. He was one of the mass of the 
 people ; he represented them because he was of them ; 
 and the mass of the people, the class that lives and 
 thrives by self-imposed labor, felt that the work which 
 was to be done was a work of their own, the assertion 
 of equality against the pride of oligarchy ; of free labor 
 against the lordship over slaves ; of the great industrial 
 people against all the expiring aristocracies of which 
 any remnants had tided down from the middle ages. 
 Tie was of a religious turn of mind, without superstition ; 
 and the unbroken faith of the mass was like his own. 
 As he went along through his difficult journey, sounding 
 his way, he held fast by the hand of the people, and 
 ' tracked his footsteps with even feet.' ' His pulse's beat 
 twined with their pulses.' "* 
 
 The war was, as we have said, a necessity, which the 
 President accepted because he could not do otherwise. 
 It was " majestic, resistless, as when God flings out the 
 banner of the storm, and bids it move. It swept on. No 
 man guided it, no man could foretell its duration or its 
 issues. So tumultuous and perplexed were the move- 
 ments, that the avowed and wise policy of the President 
 was to have no policy, but simply an end sought as 
 wisdom might be given moment by moment. It came 
 to this, that all that men knew was that there was noth- 
 ing to do but to fight on. And they did fight. And oh 
 the ngony of those days ! ' We waited for light, but, be- 
 hold, obscurity ; for brightness, but we walked in dark- 
 ness.' We cried out, ' thou sword of the Lord ! how 
 
 " Atlantic Monthly," June, 1866.
 
 94 ABRAHAM LIXCOLIT. 
 
 long will it be ere them be quiet ? Put thyself up into 
 thy scabbard ; rest, and be still.' But the voice came, 
 ' How can it be quiet, seeing the Lord hath given it a 
 charge ? ' And what that charge was, those who watched 
 began, after a time, to discover. It was first to lift the 
 negro up into manhood by bringing him into line with 
 the white man in fighting the battles of freedom. We 
 all know how this was resisted and scoffed at. It could 
 not be. But the pressure did not lift; it waxed heavier 
 and heavier ; and it was done. The negro fought and 
 was welcomed. A second charge was to make the Proc- 
 lamation of Emancipation, ridiculed as the Pope's bull 
 against the comet, to make that as the breath of the Al- 
 mighty to sweep away slavery. That was done. Again 
 the charge was to bring the South, the chivalry, to recog- 
 nize by public act the manhood of the negro by making 
 him a soldier, and by confessing the dependence of 
 their cause upon him. This was all : it was enough. 
 When this was done, the war ceased." * 
 
 The course pursued by the President Avas just such 
 as to secure the results above mentioned. He was em- 
 phatically the " right man in the right place." Gov. 
 Andrew has so well described the man and his course in 
 regard to the affairs of the nation, that no other words 
 seem needed. lie says of the President, " He had the 
 rare gift of discerning and setting aside whatevei is ex- 
 traneous and accidental, and of simplifying an inquiry 
 or an argument by just discriminations. The purpose 
 of his mind waited for the instruction of his deliberate 
 judgment; and he was never ashamed to hesitate until 
 he was sure it was intelligently formed. Not greatly gift 
 ed in what is called the intuition of reason, he was, never- 
 
 * Rev. Mark Hopkins, D.D., President of Williams College, in n sermon on 
 "Providence and Revelation," before tlie graduating class of 1666.
 
 covnsK punsUBD. 95 
 
 theless, of so honest an intellect, that, by the processes 
 of methodical reasoning, he was often led so directly 
 to his result, that he occasionally seemed to rise into that 
 peculiar sphere which we assign to those who by origi- 
 nal constitution are natural leaders among men. Not by 
 nature a leader, neither was he by nature a follower ; 
 and by force of his rare union ai_d balance of certain 
 qualities, both intellectual and moral, he was enabled to 
 rise to the dignity of master of his own position in a 
 place exacting and difficult almost beyond the prece- 
 dents of history. Educated wholly as a civilian, his 
 fame will be forever associated with his administration 
 of public affairs in a civil war, unexampled in its pro- 
 portions, and conducted on his own side with such suc- 
 cess as to command his own re-election by the free will 
 of a free people. . . . Possessed of a will of unusual 
 firmness and tenacity, his heart was placable, humane, 
 and tender. He exerted powers the most extensive and 
 various, stretching into that undefined and dangerous, 
 region of administrative jurisprudence, where the rights 
 and duties of military commander-in-chief limit and 
 merge into themselves the functions of the civil magis- 
 trate, and even of the judicial tribunal. And yet, if we 
 should concede to his enemies all that disappointed ani- 
 mosity and defeated disloyalty have been able to allege 
 against him, we should still be able to challenge all hu- 
 man history to produce the name of a ruler more just, 
 unselfibh or unresentful. Cheerful, patient, and without 
 egotism, he regarded and treated himself as the servant 
 of the people, using his powers only for their cause ; 
 using no more than the cause seemed clearly to demand, 
 and using them alike without passion and without per- 
 turbation. 
 " It were premature for us to assert how, or how far,
 
 96 A6HA&AM LINCOLN. 
 
 during the four years of his administration, he led the 
 American people. The unfolding of events in the his- 
 tory we are yet to enact will alone determine the limits 
 of such influence; It is enough for his immortal glory 
 that he faithfully represented this people, their confidence 
 in democratic government, their constancy in the hour 
 of adversity, and their magnanimity in the hour of 
 triumph." 
 
 Yet whether fully acknowledged as a leader by all, or 
 not, Al raham Lincoln was truly great, and his course one 
 of profoundest wisdom. He was " great in clearness of 
 thought, great in calm deliberation, great in earnestness, 
 in unaffectedness, in unselfish devotion to duty. . . . 
 
 "Raised moderately to the station which Washington 
 was the first to fill, his sudden elevation sent a pang to 
 the hearts of many, as though a sad degeneracy had 
 fallen on our times; while others shuddered at the un 
 equalness of the man for the most critical position which 
 had yet arisen in American affairs. 
 
 " Four years have so changed all this, that his name is 
 universally revered ; the great qualities which he really 
 possessed, his knowledge of men, his uprightness and 
 honesty, his kindness of heart, his extreme caution in the 
 unnumlsred difficulties that daily arose in the constant 
 civil and military emergencies, with a firmness that was 
 never swerved by flattery or fear, all these, and the 
 great results effected under his administration, have 
 given him in the heart of the people a place second only 
 to that of the father of his country." * 
 
 Not always did the President find a hearty co-opera- 
 tion in his plans, or a rightful appreciation of his course. 
 We can see the straightforward, positive, yet peaceful 
 
 * " Lincoln Memorial."
 
 THE COURSE PURSUED. 97 
 
 character of the man in his words to some such cavillers. 
 Said he, in August, 1863, 
 
 " To those who are dissatisfied with me, I would say, 
 You desired peace, and you blame me that we do not 
 have it. But how can we attain it? There are but 
 three conceivable ways. First, to suppress the Rebellion 
 by force of arms. This I am trying to do. Are you for 
 it ? If you are, so far we are agreed. If you are not for 
 it, a second way is to give up the Union. I am against 
 this. Are you for it? If you are, you should say so 
 plainly. If you are not for force, nor yet for dissolution, 
 there only remains some imaginable compromise." 
 
 And as to compromise, he could only say, " I do not 
 believe that any compromise, embracing the maintenance 
 of the Union, is now possible. All that I learn tends to 
 a directly opposite belief. The strength of the Rebellion 
 is its military, its army. In any compromise, we should 
 waste time, which the enemy would improve to our dis- 
 advantage ; and that would be all." 
 
 Again : in reference to his course, he uttered, not an 
 apology, but words of manly defence, saying, in April, 
 1864, "Was it possible to lose the nation, and yet pre- 
 serve the Constitution? By general law, life and limb 
 must be protected : yet often a limb must be amputated to 
 save a life ; but a life is never wisely given to save a 
 limb. I felt that measures otherwise unconstitutional 
 might become lawful by becoming indispensable to the 
 preservation of the nation. Right or wrong, I assumed 
 this ground, and now avow it. I could not feel, that, to 
 the best of my ability, I had ever tried to preserve the 
 Constitution, if, to save slavery or any minor matter, I 
 should permit the wreck of Government, Country, and 
 Constitution altogether." 
 
 It was not his party, it was not himself, but it was hi*
 
 98 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 country, for which he labored. The course he pursued 
 while President had only the good of the united whole 
 in view. Hence, on one occasion, he advised that all 
 work together for the nation's good, in these words : 
 
 " Let the nation take hold of the larger works, and the 
 States the smaller ones ; and thus, working in a meeting 
 direction, discreetly, but steadily and firmly, what is made 
 unequal in one place may be equalized in another, ex- 
 travagance avoided, and the whole country put on that 
 career of prosperity which shall correspond with its ex- 
 tent of territory, its natural resources, and the intelligence 
 and enterprise of its people." 
 
 Hear the words of the senator whose personal wounds 
 from the minions of slavery give him the right to be 
 known as Liberty's champion. What says he of Abraham 
 Lincoln in the troublous times, and of the course he 
 pursued ? This : 
 
 " He was placed by Providence at the head of his 
 country during an unprecedented crisis, when the foun- 
 tains of the great deep were broken up, and men turned 
 for protection to military power. Multitudinous armies 
 were mustered. Great navies were set on foot. Of all 
 these he was the constitutional commander-in-chief. As 
 the war proceeded, all his prerogatives enlarged, and 
 others sprang into being, until the sway of a Republican 
 President became irnperatorial and imperial. But not 
 for one moment did the modesty of his nature desert him. 
 His constant thought was his country, and how to serve 
 it. Personal ambition at the expense of patriotism was 
 as far removed from the simple purity of his nature as 
 poison from a strawberry. And thus with equal cour- 
 age in the darkest hour he continued on, heeding as 
 little the warnings of danger as the temptations of power. 
 ' It would not do for a President,' he said, ' to have guards
 
 TBK COURSS PURSUED. 99 
 
 with drawn sabres at his door, as if he fancied he were, 
 or were trying to be, or were assuming to be, an emperor.' 
 And in the same simplicity, he spoke of his return at 
 morning to his daily duties as ' opening shop.' 
 
 " When he became President, he was without any con- 
 siderable experience in public affairs ; nor was he much 
 versed in history, whose lessons would have been most 
 valuable. As he became more familiar with the place, 
 his facility evidently increased. He had * learned the 
 ropes,' so he said. But his habits of business were 
 irregular, and they were never those of despatch. He 
 did not see at once the just proportions of things, and 
 allowed himself to be too much occupied by details. 
 Even in small things, as well as in great, there was in 
 him a certain resistance to be overcome. There were 
 moments when this delay caused impatience, and im- 
 portant questions seemed to suffer. But, when the blow 
 was struck, there was nothing but gratitude; and all con- 
 fessed the singleness with which he had sought the 
 public good. There was also a conviction, that, though 
 slow to reach his conclusion, he was inflexible in main- 
 taining it. Pompey boasted that by the stamp of his 
 foot he might raise an army. The President might have 
 done the same ; but, according to his own words, he ' put 
 his foot down,' and saved a principle." 
 
 Let it be remembered evermore that the course of 
 events beyond his control, and the course he pursued 
 when the power was in his hands for a season, both 
 culminated in the triumph of freedom in our liberty 
 boasting land. In a letter dated April 4, 1864, President 
 Lincoln declared, " If slavery is not wrong, nothing is 
 wrong ; " and as an English divine has well said, 
 
 " This wrong of slavery, he, more than any other man 
 of our diy, has been instrumental in removing. It was
 
 100 AJiRABAM LINCOLN. 
 
 his well-known hostility to it, which, on his election, was 
 the proximate and avowed cause of the Rebellion. As 
 far as his pledges to the law and the course of events 
 permitted, he steadily pursued this great object. Under 
 his auspices, slavery was speedly abolished in Columbia, 
 and prohibited in the Territories. The slave-trade was 
 declared penal, and the right of search fully granted. 
 The loyal States were invited to emancipate their slaves, 
 full compensation being offered. Then the proclamation 
 was issued by which all slaves in rebel States were de- 
 clared free ; and though, for a season, this was inoperative 
 over a large district, it is now not only law, but fact. 
 During the war, two millions of slaves actually gained 
 their freedom, and were protected wherever the power 
 of the President extended. And now throughout those 
 Southern States, long a house of cruel bondage, the 
 jubilee trumpet is sounding deliverance to the captive, 
 and the opening of the prison to them that are bound." 
 
 The President was not only nominally the commander- 
 in-chief of the Union forces, but he assumed active com- 
 mand, and gave evidence of his independence and fear- 
 lessness in the discharge of duty by promulgating three 
 important military orders, ordering a general and com- 
 bined movement of the forces on land and sea, requiring 
 that the Army of the Potomac be organized into corps ; 
 confining Gen. McClellan to the command of the De- 
 partment of the Potomac ; and organizing the Depart- 
 ment of the Mississippi and the Mountain Department. 
 
 This was in March, 1862. On the 19th of the previous 
 month, he had issued a proclamation requesting the peo- 
 ple of the United States to assemble on the anniversary 
 of Washington's birth, and celebrate the day by reading 
 the memorable "Farewell Address." This was done in 
 almost every town and city of the loyal States.
 
 THE COURSE PURSUED. 101 
 
 ID July, 1862, the President conferred with the loyal 
 governors, and yielded to their desire that more men 
 should be summoned to the defence of the country. 
 The senators and representatives of the border States 
 were at this time invited to a personal conference ; ami 
 the President talked freely with them in regard to grad- 
 ual emancipation, reading to them a letter which he had 
 prepared, in which he stated his views explicitly, and 
 closed it with the following eloquent appeal : " You are 
 patriots and statesmen ; and, as such, I pray you con- 
 sider this proposition, and, at the least, commend it to 
 the consideration of your States and people. As you 
 would perpetuate popular government for the best peo- 
 ple in the world, I beseech you that you do in no wise 
 omit this. Our common country is in great peril, de- 
 manding the loftiest views and boldest action to bring a 
 speedy relief. Once relieved, its form of government 
 is saved to the world, its beloved history and cherished 
 memories are vindicated, and its happy future fully as- 
 sured, and rendered inconceivably grand. To you, more 
 than to any others, the privilege is given to assure that 
 happiness and swell that grandeur, and to link your own 
 names therewith forever." 
 
 An able article in the leading Review* of our land 
 expatiates upon the progress of the country towards an 
 acknowledgment of freedom and equality fur all, without 
 distinction of color, and says, 
 
 " While every day was bringing the people nearer to 
 the conclusion which all thinking men saw to be inevita- 
 ble from the beginning, it was wife in Mr. Lincoln to 
 leave the shaping of his policy to events. In this coun- 
 try, where the rough and ready understanding of tho 
 
 " North-American Review " for January,
 
 102 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 people ia sure at last to be the controlling power, a pro- 
 found common sense is the best genius for statemanship. 
 Hitherto the wisdom of the President's measures has 
 been justified by the fact that they have always resulted 
 in more firmly uniting public opinion." 
 
 It is manifestly evident to candid minds that slavery 
 was the cause of our troublous times, and that the course 
 pursued by the President, under divine direction, was 
 such as to overthrow slavery, and thus secure peace. 
 There could be no permanent peace or prosperity with 
 that accursed system among us, which the great Metho- 
 dist, John Wesley, declared to be " the sum of all vil- 
 lanies." 
 
 President Hopkins, of Williams College, has summed 
 up the proofs of the direful effects of slavery in the fol- 
 lowing words : 
 
 " Slavery may stand as the type and culmination of alJ 
 oppressive systems, and the testimony consists in a mani- 
 festation of its legitimate and matured fruits. 
 
 " Till our armies went South, and Southern prisoners 
 came North, there was but a slight impression among us 
 of the general ignorance under such a system ; of the 
 number who ccoild not read, or sign their names. But 
 for this ignorance, there could have been no rebellion. 
 There had been no adequate conception of the want of 
 thrift and general behind-handedness, nor of the per- 
 vading spirit at once of license and of despotism. What 
 were called the abuses of the system were more frequent 
 and foul than had been supposed. But these are little 
 compared with the spirit of the system as revealed, 
 first by atrocities in the treatment of Southern Union 
 men, net exceeded by any thing in the Sepoy Rebellion ; 
 second by the massacre at Fort Pillow, intended to be 
 the inauguration of a policy ; third by the preparations 
 tp blow up Libby Prison : fourth by the Deliberate, sys-
 
 THE COURSE PURSUED. 10? 
 
 tematic, long-continued exposure, neglect, and starvation 
 of Union prisoners ; and, finally, by the assassination of 
 the President. These things we do not charge to all 
 the people of the South. They are like other men. Many 
 are better than their system : but we do charge them 
 to the spirit of the system ; and we say, that by these 
 exposures and revelations, culminating as they did in a 
 way to send a thrill of horror through the civilized world, 
 God has pilloried the system before the nations, and all 
 that has affinity with it. 
 
 " That there were atrocities on our side we do not deny. 
 They are incident to war. But we do deny any thing that 
 can be at all an offset to such a record. It is to be said 
 further on the part of the North, that the war was car- 
 ried on here chiefly without proscription ; and that, in 
 connection with it, there were the Sanitary and Christian 
 Commissions that furnished by voluntary contribution 
 millions for the aid of wounded and sick soldiers, to be 
 applied equally, so far as might be, to friend and foe. 
 Any thing like these, in connection with war, no insti- 
 tutions or form of government had ever before de- 
 veloped." 
 
 We of the North could not, then, be accused of bar- 
 barism further than war necessarily involves. We fought 
 under a coinmander-in-chief whose heart was as tender 
 as a father toward his soldiers, and who was as lenient 
 towards his enemies as He could desire who said, " Bless 
 them that curse you." But he was a magistrate, and it 
 was not for him to " bear the sword in vain." 
 
 God knew the heart of our beloved Lincoln ; and He, 
 who prepared him for the glorious work before him, un- 
 doubtedly approved of the course he pursued while the 
 country of his patriot love was writhing like a second 
 l^aocoon in the terrible folds of the serpent Treason.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 PECULIAR TRIALS. 
 
 " Trials make the promise sweet, 
 Trials give new life to prayer, 
 Bring me to my Saviour's feet, 
 Lay me low, and keep me there." 
 
 * These are they that came up out of great tribulation, and have washed theli 
 robes, and marie them white iu the blood of the Lamb." REV. vii. 14. 
 
 ALL great and noble natures have their great and pe- 
 culiar trials ; and no name stands on the heights of his- 
 tory, as a beacon for the nations, which has not been 
 fitted for its position by trial and suffering. One far- 
 seeing woman of our land has said, " Whatever is high- 
 est and holiest is tinged with melancholy. The eye of 
 genius has always a plaintive expression, and its natural 
 language is pathos. A prophet is sadder than other 
 men ; and He who was greater than all prophets was a 
 man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. " * And 
 another, whose own experience has taught her the taste 
 of Marah's waters, and whose "Uncle Tom" was the 
 creature of her sympathy with sorrow, as well as the 
 truthful exponent of the woes of slavery, has said, with 
 the force of highest wisdom, " Sorrow is the great birth- 
 agony of immortal powers ; sorrow is the great searcher 
 and revealer of hearts, the great test of truth ; . . . sor- 
 row reveals forces in ourselves of which we never 
 dreamed ; . . . sorrow is divine. Sorrow is reigning o 
 
 * Mrs. Lydia Maria Child-
 
 PECULIAR TRIALS. 105 
 
 the throne of the universe, and the crown of all crowns 
 has been one of thorns." * 
 
 It is evident that the ministry of sorrow to the human 
 soul is one which elevates, strengthens, purifies. It is 
 among the " all things " that " work together for good " 
 to the child of God. Abraham Lincoln was among those 
 favored ones for whom the " light afflictions '' of this 
 world were to " work the far more exceeding and eter- 
 nal weight of glory." Of some peculiar trials which his 
 great soul experienced during the years of his presi- 
 dency, it is here designed to speak ; though it may be 
 true that other weights were upon his expanding spirit, 
 and other trials, even more grievous, oppressed his soul : 
 for, evermore, the hidden sorrow is deepest, and only 
 the human heart itself knoweth its own bitterness. By 
 the very greatness of Lincoln's character, we may mea- 
 sure the discipline of trial and sorrow through which he 
 had to pass while a sojourner on earth. This life is the 
 childhood of our existence ; and God deals with us all as 
 a father with his children, wisely correcting us in need- 
 ed discipline, lor our highest good. 
 
 We know some of the trials of his early life, his bitter 
 grief at the loss of a beloved mother, his struggles amid 
 poverty and other discouragements. And, when he be- 
 came the President of the vast Republic, there was laid 
 upon him the burden of responsibility which must rest 
 upon a leader in the time of civil war. 
 
 His personal friend Col. Deming declares, "The hour 
 when doubt and hesitancy first yielded to the stern com- 
 mand of remorseless duty must have been the soberest, 
 saddest, solemnest of his faithful life, not from doubt of 
 the result, though that was sufficiently perplexing ; not 
 
 >Jr. Stowe's" Minister's Wooiu."
 
 106 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 from fear of the consequences, though these were appall- 
 ing enough; not from the weight of responsibility, though 
 that might have staggered the most unyielding deter- 
 mination ; but it was sad and solemn, because Abraham 
 Lincoln above and beyond all other men loved peace, and 
 hated war ; because sieges, battles, strife, swords, bayo- 
 ets, rifles, cannon, all the paraphernalia and instruments 
 of brute force, were abhorrent to his enlightened and 
 benevolent nature. Shall we raise the latch, and enter 
 into the secret chamber of that capacious and genial 
 soul when this fell resolve was first reached ; when the 
 frightful vision of war,' in all its terrors clad, supplants 
 there the hope of conciliation and the dream of peace ? 
 I speak what I heard from his own lips, when I say, 
 that it was reached after sleepless nights, after a severe 
 conflict with himself, and with extreme reluctance. By 
 a strange and cruel freak of fate, the duty of waging 
 the bloodiest war in history was imposed upon the most 
 peace-loving and amiable ruler in all time ; upon a man 
 whose maxim was, in the language of one of his favorite 
 texts, ' Let the potsherd strive with the potsherds of the 
 earth ; ' and into whose mind had been thoroughly in- 
 grained that traditional notion of our politics, that the 
 first drop of blood shed in a sectional strife was the 
 death-knell of the American Union. 
 
 "Let us enter in where that now disembodied spirit 
 was, in the recesses of its clay tenement, in stormy 
 debate with itself. What throes, what agony, do we 
 witness ! what heart-rending sobs, what heaven-pier- 
 cing prayers, that the cup may pass from his lips ! Here 
 was that conservative mind, trained to habits of profes- 
 sional caution, with the strongest bias towards legality 
 and moderation, which had uniformly steered itself by the 
 gertain lights of jurisprudence; which had invoked QO
 
 PECULIAR TRIALS. 107 
 
 remedies but the peaceful ones of the courts, the Constitu- 
 tion, and the law ; which had never combated error but 
 with reason and persuasion alone, and had abjured the 
 ordeal of battle, and the arbitrament of force, as absolute 
 and heathenish enormities, here are all these mature, 
 earnest opinions, and prepossessions, all dominant from 
 fifty years of independent sway, wrestling impotently 
 with the war ideas, and the overmastering war revela- 
 tion, of yesterday. What an unwelcome intruder the 
 conviction is to the serene virtues, which had hitherto 
 exclusively occupied this holy sanctuary ! Domesticated 
 here are Justice and Mercy (and ' earthly power is likest 
 God's when Mercy seasons Justice ' ), Justice and Mer- 
 cy, which hold the balances quite evenly, but the hair's 
 weight which oscillates them uniformlj- found in Mercy's 
 scale ; and how repulsive it is to these righteous and dis- 
 criminating attributes to let loose upon the people a wild 
 and furious avenger that devours alike innocence and 
 guilt ! 
 
 " Here, too, dwell sensibilities and affections so acute, 
 that they fling wide open the doors of the soul to every 
 one who approaches in misfortune's name, grant the 
 prayer of sorrow before it is half uttered, and which the 
 inarticulate wail of infancy instantly melts into tears of 
 most compassionate tenderness. How are these sensitive 
 fibres wrung and tortured when it suddenly flashes upon 
 them that the loving hand, which has learned ouly to 
 soothe and relieve the miserable, is commissioned by in- 
 exorable fate to break the fourth seal of the Apocalypse, 
 and, ' behold, a pale horse ! and his name who sat OD him 
 was Death, and Hell followed him ; and power was p w en 
 unto them over the fourth part of the earth to kill ?nth 
 the sword and with hunger and with death, and with' he 
 beasts of the eartV
 
 108 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 " Movelessly, movclessly rooted also in this great heai t 
 is a superfine sense 'of humor, craving hilarity and harm- 
 less mirth, and joy-inspiring wit and anecdote, as the 
 only effectual relief to an over-anxious spirit and an over- 
 taxed brain ; and how reluctantly does this part of his 
 nature admit to close companionship the gloomy fore- 
 bodings, the little memories, the dreadful uncertainties, 
 the everlasting shrieks, dirges, vengeful tragedies, and 
 heart-rending atrocities, of war 1 " 
 
 This vivid portrayal of Lincoln's character and feel- 
 ings shows us one of his peculiar trials. He suffered 
 during the struggle which preceded his decision that 
 the war must be prosecuted ; and he suffered during its 
 continuance by the constant jarring of the machinery 
 he was seeking to keep in motion. His motives were 
 misunderstood, his character maligned, and his plans 
 often frustrated, by those whose best good he was contin- 
 ually studying. 
 
 In common with his loyal countrymen, he felt the gloom 
 of those hours of the war when defeat lowered our beauti- 
 ful banner ; but he felt it with peculiar force because he, 
 was the leader. " How nobly the President bore him- 
 self during this interval of darkness that could be felt, 
 when bold men trembled at every click of the telegraph, 
 let two tributes, offered by unfriendly voices to his 
 stoicism, attest : the first is from no less a master of it 
 than Napoleon the Third, who epigrammatically says, 
 'Mr. Lincoln's highest claim upon my admiration is a 
 Roman equanimity, which has been tried by both ex- 
 tremes of fortune, and disturbed by neither.' The second 
 is from a hostile Englishman, who says, that, ' tried by 
 years of failure, without achieving one great success, he 
 not only never yielded to despondency or anger, but, 
 what is most marvellous, continually grew in self-posses- 
 lion a.nd magnanimity.'
 
 PECULIAR f RIALS. 109 
 
 "I once myself ventured to ask the President if he had 
 ever despaired of the country ; and he told me, that, when 
 the Peninsular campaign terminated suddenly at Harri- 
 son's Landing, he was as nearly inconsolable as he could 
 be, and live. In the same connection, I inquired if there 
 had ever been a period in which he thought that better 
 management upon the part of his commanding-general 
 might have terminated the war : and he answered that 
 there were three; that the first was at Malvern Hill, when 
 McClellan failed to command an immediate advance upon 
 Richmond; that the second was at Chancellorville, where 
 Hooker failed to re-enforce Sedgwick after hearing his 
 cannon upon the extreme right; and that the third was 
 after Lee's retreat from Gettysburg, when Meade failed 
 to attack him in the bend of the Potomac. After this 
 commentary, J waited for an outburst of denunciation, for 
 a criticism, at least, upon the delinquent officers; but I 
 waited in vain : so far from a word of censure escaping his 
 lips, he soon idded, that his first remark might not appear 
 uncharitably ' I do not know that I could have given 
 different orders had I been with them myself: I have 
 not fully made up my mind how I should behave when 
 Minie-balls were whistling, and those great oblong shells 
 shrieking, in my ear. I might run away.' " * 
 
 He spoke and acted with the wisdom of the serpent 
 and the harmlessness of the dove whenever practicable. 
 In August, 1862, he said, when, as one of the peculiar 
 trials incident to his position, he stood, as it were, be- 
 tween contending parties, " Gen. McClellan's attitude 
 is such, that, in the very selfishness of his nature, he can- 
 not but wish to be successful, and I hope he will ; and 
 the Secretary of War is in precisely the same situa- 
 
 * Col. Deminij's Address.
 
 110 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 tion. . . . Gen. McClellan has sometimes asked for things 
 which the Secretary of War did not give him. Gen. 
 McClellan is not to blame for asking what he wanted and 
 needed ; and the Secretary of War is not to blame foi 
 not giving when he had none to give." Thus he sought 
 to conciliate opposera and fault-finders-; but still he must 
 have suffered from the unrest such cavilling induces. He 
 had a similar trial when he removed Gen. Curtis ; and 
 so in March, 1863, he wrote, " Your despatch is received. 
 It is very painful to me that you, in Missouri, cannot or 
 will not settle your factional quarrel among yourselves. 
 I have been tormented with it beyond endurance, for 
 mouths, by both sides. Neither side pays the least 
 respect to my appeals to your reason : I am now com- 
 pelled to take hold of the case." 
 
 When he issued his immortal proclamation, there were 
 fault-finders to whom he was compelled to reply : " If, 
 now, the pressure of war should call off our forces from 
 New Orleans to defend some other point, what is to pre- 
 vent the masters from reducing the blacks to slavery 
 again? for I am told, that whenever the rebels take any 
 black prisoners, free or slave, they immediately auction 
 them off (they did so with those they took from a boat 
 in the Tennessee River a few days ago) ; and then I am 
 very ungenerously attacked for it. For instance : When, 
 after the late battles at and near Bull Run, an expedition 
 went out from Washington, under a flag of truce, to bury 
 the dead and bring in the wounded, and the rebels 
 seized the blacks who went along to help, and sent them 
 into slavery, Horace Greeley said in his paper that 
 'the Government would probably do nothing about it.' 
 What could Idol" 
 
 It is plain that the President felt keenly the censures 
 of those" who misunderstood his motives, and did not 
 agree with his plans.
 
 PECULIAR TRIALS, 111 
 
 The President suffered, too, when the fate of war over- 
 took his personal friends, and they that drew the sword 
 perished by the sword. TVith his great heart of sym- 
 pathy, he felt for all who mourned the loss of father, son, 
 brother, husband, or friend ; but there must, of course, 
 have been for him peculiar trials in the death of those 
 whom he personally knew and loved. Col. Baker, the 
 senator from California, who deemed it his duty to lay 
 aside the toga, and buckle on the sword, was one of the 
 friends whom he was called to lose when our brave boys 
 were defeated at Ball's Bluff.* A lady correspondent of 
 the " San-Francisco Bulletin " thus alludes to a conver- 
 sation which she had with the President, at the Sol- 
 diers' Home, near Washington, in which they referred 
 to Col. Baker, and felt his loss : 
 
 " I had always noticed that the bare mention of our 
 California cemetery filled the minds of those who heard 
 it with a solemn sense of awe and sorrow, Lone Moun- 
 tain 1 It seemed to rise before them out of the quiet 
 sea, a vast mausoleum from the hand of God wherein 
 to lay the dead. I was not astonished, therefore, when 
 Mr. Lincoln alluded to it in this way, and gave, in a few 
 deep-toned words, a eulogy on one of its most honored 
 dead, Col. Baker. Having witnessed the impressive 
 spectacle of that glorious soldier's funeral, I gave him 
 the meagre outline one can convey in words, of some- 
 thing, which, having been once seen, must remain a liv- 
 ing picture in the memory forever. I tried to picture 
 the solemn hush that lay like a pall on the spirit of 
 the people while the grand procession wound its mourn- 
 ful length through the streets of the city, out on that 
 
 Once Lincoln said the keenest blow of all the war was at an early stage, 
 when the disaster of Ball's Bluff and the death of his beloved Baker srnoU 
 aim like a whirlwind from the desert.
 
 112 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 tear-stained road, to the gate of the cemetery, where 
 the body passed beneath the prophetic words of the 
 most eloquent soul, ' Hither, in the future ages, they 
 shall bring,' &c. 
 
 " When I spoke of the California apostle, Starr King, I 
 saw how strong a chord I had touched in the great ap- 
 preciative heart I addressed ; and, giving a weak dilution 
 of that wondrous draught of soul-lit eloquence, that 
 funeral hymn uttered by the priest of God over the 
 sacred ashes of the advocate and soldier of liberty, whose 
 thrilling threnody seems yet to linger in the sighing 
 wind that waves the grass upon the soil made sacred by 
 the treasure it received that day, I felt strangely im- 
 pressed as to the power and grandeur of that mind 
 whose thoughts at second-hand, and haltingly given from 
 memory, should move and touch the soul of such a man 
 as Abraham Lincoln, as I saw it touched when he listened. 
 It is the electric chain with which all genius and grand- 
 eur of soul whatsoever is bound ; the free-masonry by 
 which spirit hails spirit, though unseen. Now they all 
 three meet .where it is not seeing ' through a glass 
 darkly,' but in the light of a perfect day." 
 
 The President was also and earlier personally afflicted, 
 when, 
 
 " Down where the patriot-army, 
 
 Near Potomac's tide, 
 Guards the glorious cause of Freedom, 
 
 Gallant Ellsworth died." 
 -* 
 
 This brave and remarkably efficient young officer had 
 been associated with the President when in Illinois ; and 
 at his funeral, which took place at the White House, the 
 President was the chief mourner. 
 
 " Bold leader of the Zouave band! 
 A name not written in the sand, 
 Thou, dying, leav'st thy native land.
 
 PECULIAR TRIALS. 113 
 
 In Freedom's annals, side by side, 
 Thy name with Warren's is allied, 
 The tyrant's dread, the patriot's pride ! 
 
 The marble shaft for each we raise; 
 
 For each the poet pours his lays ; 
 
 Time wreathes for both unwithering bays." 
 
 But there was one stroke nearer home than all which 
 jeere among the peculiar trials of our beloved Chief 
 Magistrate. Once before, the nation sympathized with a 
 father and mother who must tread the halls of the White 
 House without the echoes of familiar footsteps at their 
 side. President Pierce and President Lincoln both 
 knew what it was to wear the robe of royalty, as it 
 were, over a bleeding heart. The nation sympathized 
 when little Willie Lincoln died ; and on the day when, all 
 over the land, citizens assembled, in response to the 
 President's request, that the " Farewell Address " of 
 Washington might be read, the head of the nation sat 
 bowed with grief over the dear remains of his darling 
 son. 
 
 The following was addressed to the Senate and House ; 
 but Congress had adjourned before it was delivered : 
 
 " The President of the United States was last evening 
 plunged into affliction by the death of a beloved child. 
 1 he heads of departments, in consideration of this dis- 
 tressing event, have thought it would be agreeable to 
 Congress and to the American people that the official 
 and private buildings occupied by them should not be 
 illuminated on the evening of the 22d inst. 
 
 " WILLIAM H. SEWARP. 
 SALMON P. CHASE. 
 E. M. STANTON. 
 GIDEON WELLES. 
 EDWARD P. BATES. 
 M. BLAIB." 
 Mary Webb.
 
 114 ABRAHAM LINCOLtT. 
 
 And this official communication was but one among 
 many tokens that the people felt deep sympathy with 
 their beloved President in his paternal grief. 
 
 One of the leading newspapers thus refers to the last 
 sad rites over the early-called : 
 
 " The funeral of Master William Wallace Lincoln oc- 
 curred yesterday at the White House, at two, P.M. His 
 friends and acquaintances were previously allowed the 
 sad pleasure of a last look in the Green Room, where 
 lay his remains, clothed in accustomed pants and jacket, 
 with white stockings and low shoes, with white collar 
 and wristbands turned over the dark cloth of the jacket. 
 
 " On. his breast rested a wreath of flowers ; another lay 
 near his feet ; while a beautiful bouquet was held in his 
 hand : the flowers composing the wreaths and bouquet 
 being the queenly camellias ; while azalias,arid sprigs of 
 mignonette, were disposed about the body. 
 
 " The beautiful bouquet in his hand was reserved for his 
 sorrowing mother. A plain, metallic case of imitation 
 rosewood was inscribed, ' William Wallace Lincoln, born 
 Dec. 21, 1850; died Feb. 20, 1802.' The frames of the 
 mirrors in the east and green rooms were covered with 
 black crape ; and the glass, with white crape. The 
 funeral-service was performed by the pastor of the Presi- 
 dent, Rev. Dr. Gurley, in a very impressive manner. 
 
 " There were present members of the Cabinet, foreign 
 ministers, members of Congress, army and navy officers, 
 and many citizens and ladies. After the services, the 
 body was placed m a vault at the Oak-Hill Cemetery, at 
 Georgetown." * 
 
 Little did any then assembled think, as they looked 
 upon the motionless form of the departed son, that, ere 
 
 * " National Republican."
 
 TRIALS. 115 
 
 many month?, that precious dust would be removed and 
 borne in a funeral procession, the like of which was 
 never seen before ; and that the father's form, now con- 
 vulsed with grief, would then be lying cold and still in 
 the sarcophagus where a nation had tearfully laid him, 
 and move, side by side with the son, in an almost 
 triumphal march, to a final resting-place in the Western 
 land they loved, and from whence they came to the 
 Nation's capitol and the Nation's heart. 
 
 At that far-off grave-side, the voice of the living 
 preacher proclaimed the fact, which all men had learned 
 by the rich experiences of four sad years, that the heart 
 of the martyred President was tenderness itself; and it 
 was pierced by the arrow of bereavement at the death 
 of "Little Willie." Said the bishop then officiating, 
 
 " In his domestic life, he was exceedingly kind and 
 affectionate. He was a devoted husband and father. 
 During his presidential term, he lost his second son 
 Willie. To an officer of the army he said, not long 
 since, 'Do you ever find yourself talking with the dead?' 
 and added, ' Since Willie's death, I catch myself every 
 day involuntarily talking with him, as if he were with 
 me.' " 
 
 Even that trial was a blessing to his spirit. Heaven 
 seemed nearer, doubtless, because Willie had passed 
 through the gate. And, most assuredly, all the trials 
 which our President was called to endure, though they 
 were " not joyous, but grievous," yet they wrought in 
 him "the peaceable fruits of righteousness," and day by 
 day he was ripening for the immortality into which he 
 was so soon to enter.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 
 
 " Now ' Onward to Fre dom ! ' let this be the cry ; 
 For justice and truth aiv born never to die : 
 Go, say to the minions 01 slavery's thrall 
 That all men are brothers, and God over all ! 
 Though stern be the struggle, the triumph we'll tell 
 In the jubilant peal of the Liberty-bell ! " 
 
 MARY WEBB. 
 
 * Heaven and earth shall pass away; but my words shall not pass away." THB 
 LORD JESUS (Lukexxi. 33). 
 
 THERE are some documents that will never be forgot- 
 ten, whose words will never lose their power. England's 
 " Magna Chauia " and America's " Declaration of Inde- 
 pendence " are among them. So also is the " Emanci- 
 pation Proclamation " of Abraham Lincoln. While this 
 volume is not to be crowded with official documents, a 
 chapter must, at least, be given to some papers written 
 by the hand that held the sceptre and the sword in this 
 nation during the stormy period of the Rebellion, and 
 which are unmistakably stamped with his own noble- 
 ness of soul. 
 
 First in order of time comes President Lincoln's 
 
 FIRST INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES, In com- 
 pliance with a custom as old as the Government itself, 
 I appear before you to address you briefly, and to take, 
 in your presence, the oath prescribed by the Constitution 
 of the United States to be taken by the President before 
 he enters on the execution of his office. 
 
 116
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 117 
 
 " I do not consider it necessary, at present, for ine to 
 discuss those matters of administration about which 
 there is no special anxiety or excitement. Apprehen- 
 sion seems to exist among the people of the Southern 
 States, that, by the accession of a Republican Adminis- 
 tration, their property, and their peace and personal 
 security, are to be endangered. There has never been 
 any reasonable cause for such apprehension. Indeed, 
 the most ample evidence to the contrary has all the 
 while existed, and been open to their inspection. It is 
 found in nearly all the published speeches of him who 
 now addresses you. I do but quote from one of those 
 speeches when I declare that '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. Those who nominated and elected me did so with 
 the full knowledge that I had made this and made many 
 similar declarations, and had never recanted them; and, 
 more than this, they placed in the platform, for my ac- 
 ceptance, and as a law to themselves and to me, the 
 clear and emphatic resolution which I now read: 
 
 " ' Resolved, That the maintenance inviolate of the 
 rights of the States, and especially the right of each 
 State to order and control its own domestic institutions 
 according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential 
 to that balance of power on which the perfection and 
 endurance of our political fabric depend; and we de- 
 nounce the lawless invasion, by armed force, of the soil 
 of any State or Territory, no matter under what pretext, 
 as among the greatest of crimes.' 
 
 " I now reiterate these sentiments ; and, in doing so, I 
 only press upon the public attention the most conclusive 
 evidence of which the case is susceptible, that the prop-
 
 118 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 erty, peace, and security of no section are to be in any 
 wise endangered by the now incoming Administration. 
 
 " I add, too, that all the protection which, consistently 
 with the Constitution and the laws, can be given, will be 
 cheerfully given to all the States when lawfully de- 
 manded, for whatever cause, as cheerfully to one section 
 as to another. 
 
 "There is much controversy about the delivering-up 
 of fugitives from service or labor. The clause I now 
 read is as plainly written in the Constitution as any 
 other of its provisions : 
 
 " 'No person held to service or labor in one State, under 
 the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in conse- 
 quence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged 
 from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on 
 claim of the party to whom such service or labor may 
 be due.' 
 
 "'It is scarcely questioned that this provision was in- 
 tended by those who made it for the reclaiming of what 
 we call fugitive slaves ; and the intention of the lawgiver 
 is the law. 
 
 "All members of Congress swear their support to the 
 whole Constitution, to this provision as Wj3ll as any 
 other. To the proposition, then, that slaves whose 
 cases come within the terms of this clause ' shall be de- 
 livered up/ their oaths are unanimous. Now, if they 
 would make the effort in good temper, could they not, 
 with nearly equal unanimity, frame and pass a law by 
 means of which to keep good that unanimous oath ? 
 
 "There is some difference of opinion whether this 
 clause should be enforced by National or by State autho- 
 rity ; but surely that difference is not a very material one. 
 If the slave is to be surrendered, it can be of but little 
 consequence to him or to others by which authority it is
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 119 
 
 done ; and should any one, in any case, be content that 
 this oath shall go unkept, on a merely unsubstantial con- 
 troversy as to how it shall be kept ? 
 
 " Again: in any law upon this subject, ought not all 
 the safeguards of liberty known in civilized and humane 
 jurisprudence to be so that a free man be not, in any 
 case, surrendered as a slave ? And might it not be well 
 at the same time to provide by law for the enforcement 
 of that clause in the Constitution which guarantees that 
 1 the citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the 
 privileges and immunities of citizens in the several 
 States ' ? 
 
 " I take the official oath to-day with no mental reserva- 
 tions, and with no purpose to construe the Constitution 
 or laws by any hypercritical rules. While I do not choose 
 now to specify particular acts of Congress as proper to 
 be enforced, I do suggest that it will be much safer for 
 all, both in official and private stations, to conform to, 
 and abide by, all those acts which stand unrepealed, than 
 to violate any of them, trusting to find impunity in hav- 
 ing them held to be unconstitutional. 
 
 " It is seventy-two years since the first inauguration 
 of a President under our National Constitution. During 
 that period, fifteen different and very distinguished citi- 
 zens have, in succession, administered the executive 
 branch of the Government. They have conducted it 
 through many perils, and, generally, with great success. 
 Yet, with all this scope for precedent, I now enter upon 
 the same task for the brief constitutional term of four 
 years under great and peculiar difficulties. A disrup- 
 tion of the Federal Union, heretofore only menaced, is 
 now formidably attempted. I hold that in the contempla- 
 tion of universal law, and of the Constitution, the Union 
 of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if
 
 120 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national gov- 
 ernments. It is safe to assert that no government proper 
 ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termi- 
 nation. Continue to execute all the express provisions 
 of our National Constitution, and the Union will endure 
 forever; it being impossible to destroy it, except by some 
 action not provided for in the instrument itself. Again: 
 if the United States be not a government proper, but an 
 association of States in the nature of a contract merely, 
 can it, as a contract, be peaceably unmade by less than 
 all the parties who made it? One party to a contract may 
 violate it, break it, so to speak ; but does it not require 
 all to lawfully rescind it ? Descending from these general 
 principles, we find the proposition, that, in legal contempla- 
 tion, the Union is perpetual, confirmed by the history of 
 the Union itself. The Union is much older than the 
 Constitution. It was formed, in fact, by the Articles of 
 Association in 1774. It was matured and continued in 
 the Declaration of Independence in 1776. It was further 
 matured, and the faith of all the then thirteen States ex- 
 pressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, 
 by the Articles of the Confederation in 1778; and finally, 
 in 1787, one of the declared objects for establishing the 
 Constitution was to form a more perfect Union. But, if 
 the destruction of the Union by one or by a part only of 
 the States be lawfully possible, the Union is less than 
 before, the Constitution having lost the vital element 
 of perpetuity. It follows from these views that no State 
 upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the 
 Union ; that resolves and ordinances to that effect are 
 legally void ; and that acts of violence within any State 
 or States against the United States are insurrectionary 
 or revolutionary, according to circumstances. I there- 
 fore consider, that, in view of the Constitution and the
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 121 
 
 laws, the Union is unbroken ; and, to the extent of my 
 ability, I shall take care, as the Constitution itself ex- 
 pressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union shah 1 
 be faithfully executed in all the States. Doing this, 
 which I deem to be only a simple duty on ray part, I 
 shall perfectly perform it, so far as is practicable, unless 
 my rightful masters, the American people, shall withhold 
 the requisition, or, in some authoritative measure, direct 
 the contrary. I trust this will not be regarded as a 
 menace, but only as the declared purpose of the Union, 
 that it will constitutionally defend and maintain itself. 
 In doing this, there need be no bloodshed or violence ; 
 and there shall be none, unless it is forced upon the na- 
 tional authority. The power confided to me will be used 
 to hold, occupy, and possess the property and places belong- 
 ing to the Government, and collect the duties and im- 
 posts; but, beyond what may be neceoeary for those 
 objects, there will be no invasion, no using of force 
 against or among the people anywhere. "Where hostility 
 to the United States shall be so great and so universal 
 as to prevent competent Federal citizens from holding 
 office, there will be no attempt to force obnoxious stran- 
 ger? upon the people who object. While the strict legal 
 right may exist of the Government to enforce the ex- 
 ercise of these offices, the attempt to do so would be so 
 irritating and so nearly impracticable withal, that I deem 
 it best to forego, for the time, the uses of such offices. 
 The mails, unless repelled, will continue to be furnished 
 in all parts of the Union. So far as possible, the people 
 everywhere shall have that sense of perfect security 
 which is most favorable to calm thought and reflection. 
 
 " The course here indicated will be followed, unless 
 current events and experience shall show a modification 
 or change to be proper; and, in every case and exigency,
 
 122 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 my best discretion will be exercised according to the 
 circumstances actually existing, and with a view and 
 hope of a peaceful solution of the national troubles, and 
 the restoration of fraternal sympathies and affections. 
 
 " That there are persons in one section or another who 
 seek to destroy the Union at all events, and are glad of 
 any pretext to do it, I will neither affirm nor deny. But, 
 if there be such, I need address no word to them. To 
 those, however, who really love the Union, may I not 
 speak before entering upon so grave a matter as the 
 destruction of our national fabric, with all its benefits, 
 its memories, and its hopes ? Would it not be well to 
 ascertain why we do it ? Will you hazard so desperate a 
 step, while any portion of the ills you fly from have no 
 real existence ? Will you, while the certain ills you fly 
 to are greater than all the real ones you fly from, will 
 you risk the commission of so fearful a mistake ? All 
 profess to be content in the Union if all constitutional 
 rights can be maintained. Is it true, then, that any 
 right plainly written in the Constitution has been de- 
 nied ? I think not. Happily the human mind is so con- 
 stituted, that no party can reach to the audacity of doing 
 this. 
 
 "Think, if you can, of a single instance in which a 
 plainly written provision of the Constitution has ever 
 been denied. If, by mere force of numbers, a majority 
 should deprive a minority of any clearly written con- 
 stitutional right, it might, in a moral point of view, 
 justify revolution : it certainly would if such right were 
 & vital one. But such is not our case. 
 
 "All the vital rights of minorities and of individuals 
 are so plainly assured to them by affirmations and nega- 
 tions, guaranties and prohibitions, in the Constitution, 
 that controversies never arise concerning them. But
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 128 
 
 00 organic law can ever be framed with a provision spe- 
 cifically applicable to every question which may occur 
 in practical administration. No foresight can anticipate, 
 nor any document of reasonable length contain, express 
 provisions for all possible questions. Shall fugitives from 
 labor be surrendered by National, or by State authorities ? 
 The Constitution does not expressly say. Must Congress 
 protect slavery in the Territories ? The Constitution 
 does not expressly say. From questions of this nature 
 spring all our constitutional controversies, and we divide 
 upon them into majorities and minorities. 
 
 " If the minority will not acquiesce, the majority must, 
 or the Government must cease. There is no alternative 
 for continuing the Government but acquiescence on the 
 one side or the other. If a minority in such a case will 
 secede rather than acquiesce, they make a precedent, 
 which, in turn, will ruin and divide them ; for a minority 
 of their own will secede from them whenever a majority 
 refuses to be controlled by such a minority. For in- 
 stance, why not any portion of a new confederacy a year 
 or two hence arbitrarily secede again^precisely as por- 
 tions of the present Union now claim to secede from it? 
 All who cherish disunion sentiments are now being edu- 
 cated to the exact temper of doing this. Is there such 
 perfect identity of interests among the States to com- 
 pose a new Union as to produce harmony only, and pre- 
 vent renewed secession ? Plainly the central idea of 
 secession is the essence of anarchy. 
 
 " A majority held in restraint by constitutional check 
 and limitation, and always changing easily with deliber- 
 ate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the 
 only true sovereign of a free people. Whoevej: rejects 
 it, does, of necessity, fly to anarchy or to despotism. 
 Unanimity is impossible : the rule of a majority, as a
 
 124 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 permanent arrangement, is wholly inadmissible ; so that, 
 rejecting the majority principle, anarchy or despotism, 
 in some form, is all that is left. 
 
 " I do not forget the position assumed by some, that 
 constitutional questions are to be decided by the Su- 
 preme Court; nor do I deny that such decisions must 
 be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit, as to 
 the object of that suit ; while they are also entitled to 
 a very high respect and consideration in all parallel 
 cases by all other departments of the Government : and 
 while it is obviously possible that such decision may be 
 erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect follow- 
 ing it being limited to that particular case, with the 
 chance that it may be overruled, and never become a 
 precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could 
 the evils of a different practice. 
 
 " At the same time, the candid citizen must confess, 
 that, if the policy of the Government upon the vital 
 question affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably 
 fixed by the decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant 
 they are made, a in ordinary litigation between parties 
 in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be 
 their own masters, unless having to that extent practi- 
 cally 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. One section of our coun- 
 try believes slavery is right, and ought to be extended, 
 while the other believes it is wrong, and ought not to be 
 extended ; and this is the only substantial dispute ; and 
 the fugitive-slave clause of the Constitution, and the luw
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 125 
 
 for the suppression of the foreign slave-trade, are each 
 as well enforced, perhaps, as any law can ever be in a 
 community where the moral sense of the people im- 
 perfectly supports the law itself. The great body of the 
 people abide by the dry legal obligation in both cases, 
 and a few break over in each. This, I think, cannot be 
 perfectly cured ; and it would be worse in both cases 
 after the separation of the sections than before. The 
 foreign slave-trade, now imperfectly suppressed, would 
 be ultimately revived, without restriction, in one sec- 
 tion ; while fugitive slaves, now only partially surren- 
 dered, would not be surrendered at all by the other. 
 
 u Physically speaking, we cannot separate ; we cannot 
 remove our respective sections from each other, nor 
 build an impassable wall between them. A husband and 
 wife may be divorced, and go out of the presence and 
 beyond the reach of each other ; but the different parts 
 of our country cannot do this. They cannot but remain 
 face to face ; and intercourse, either amicable or hostile, 
 must continue between them. Is it possible, then, to 
 make that intercourse more advantageous or more satis- 
 factory after separation than before ? Can aliens make 
 treaties easier than friends can make laws ? Can trea- 
 ties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than 
 laws can among friends? Suppose you go to war, you 
 cannot fight always ; and when, after much loss on both 
 sides, and no gain on either, you cease fighting, the iden- 
 tical questions as to terms of intercourse are again 
 upon you. 
 
 "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 con- 
 stitutional right of amending, or their revolutionary 
 right to dismember or overthrow it. I cannot be ig-
 
 126 ABRASAM LIXCOLX. 
 
 norant of the fact, that many worthy and patriotic citi- 
 zens are desirous of having the National Constitution 
 amended. While I make no recommendation of amend 
 ment, I fully recognize the full authority of the people 
 over the whole subject, to be exercised in either of the 
 modes prescribed in the instrument itself; and I should, 
 under existing circumstances, favor, rather than oppose, 
 a fair opportunity being afforded the people to act 
 upon it. 
 
 " I will venture to add, that, to me, the convention 
 mode seems preferable, in that it allows amendments 
 to originate with the people themselves, instead of 
 only permitting them to take or reject propositions 
 originated by others not especially chosen for the pur- 
 pose, and which might not be precisely such as they 
 would wish either to accept or refuse. I understand 
 that a proposed amendment to the Constitution (which 
 amendment, however, I have not seen) has passed Con- 
 gress, to the effect that the Federal Government shall 
 never interfere with the domestic institutions of States, 
 including that of persons held to service. To avoid mis- 
 construction of what I have said, I depart from my pur- 
 pose, not to speak of particular amendments, so far as to 
 say, that, holding such a provision now to be implied 
 constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made 
 express and irrevocable. 
 
 " The Chief Magistrate derives all his authority from 
 the people, and they have conferred none upon him to 
 fix the terms for the separation of the States. The 
 people themselves can do this if they choose ; but the 
 Executive, as such, has nothing to do with it. His 
 duty is to administer the present Government as it came 
 to his hands, and to transmit it, unimpaired by him, 
 to his successor. Why should there not be a patient
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 127 
 
 confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is 
 there any better or equal hope in the world ? In our 
 present differences, is either party without faith of being 
 in the right? If the Almighty Ruler of nations, with his 
 eternal truth and justice, be on your side of the North, 
 or on yours of the South, that truth and that justice will 
 surely prevail by the judgment of this great tribunal, 
 the American people. 
 
 "By the frame of the Government under which we live, 
 this same people have wisely given their public servants 
 but little power for mischief, and have, with equal wis- 
 dom, provided for the return of that little to their own 
 hunds at very short intervals. While the people retain 
 their virtue and vigilance, no administration, by any ex- 
 treme wickedness or folly, can very seriously injure the 
 Government in the short space of four years. 
 
 " My countrymen, one and all, think calmly and well 
 upon this whole subject. Nothing valuable can be lost 
 by taking time. 
 
 " If there be an object to hurry any of you, in hot haste, 
 to a step which you would never take deliberately, that 
 object will be frustrated by taking time ; but no good 
 object can be frustrated by it. 
 
 "Such of you as are now dissatisfied still have the old 
 Constitution unimpaired, and on the sensitive point, the 
 laws of your own framing under it ; while the new ad- 
 ministration will have no immediate power, if it would, 
 to change either. 
 
 "If it were admitted that you who are dissatisfied hold 
 the right side in the dispute, tliere is still no single 
 reason for precipitate action. Intelligence, patriotism, 
 Christianity, and a firm reliance on Him who has never 
 yet forsaken this favored land, are still competent to 
 adjust in the best way all our present difficulties.
 
 128 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 "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 am loath to close. 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 cords of memory, stretching from every 
 battle-field 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." 
 
 Inaugural addresses had been written by all his 
 predecessors ; but, in scarcely a month from the time 
 when he delivered that address, the President had occa- 
 sion to write a paper differing from any they had ever 
 written. It was a call for troops, and summoned Con- 
 gress to assemble ; for civil war had begun. How many 
 tears greeted that paper, as hearts that shrank from 
 scenes of carnage pictured to themselves, as they read 
 it, the horrors of a war which seemed inevitable ! 
 
 PROCLAMATION. 
 
 Whereas the laws of the United States have been 
 for some time past, and now are, opposed, and the execu- 
 tion thereof obstructed, in the States of South Carolina, 
 Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, and 
 Texas, by combinations too powerful to be suppressed by 
 the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, or by the 
 power vested in the marshals by law : now therefore, I,
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 129 
 
 A.BRAHAJH LINCOLN, President of the United States, in 
 virtue of the power in me vested by the Constitution 
 and the laws, have thought fit to call forth, and hereby 
 do call forth, the militia of the several States of the 
 Union, to the aggregate number of 75,000, in order to 
 suppress said combinations, and to cause the laws to be 
 duly executed. 
 
 The details for this object will be immediately com- 
 municated to the State authorities through the War De- 
 partment. I appeal to all loyal citizens to favor, facili- 
 tate, and aid this effort to maintain the honor, the integ- 
 rity, and existence of our National Union, and the 
 perpetuity of popular government, and to redress 
 wrongs already long enough endured. I deem it proper 
 to say that the first service assigned to the forces hereby 
 called forth will probably be to repossess the forts, 
 places, and property which have been seized from the 
 Union ; and in every event the utmost care will be ob- 
 served, consistently with the objects aforesaid, to avoid 
 any devastation, any destruction of or interference with 
 property, or any disturbance of peaceful citizens of any 
 part of the country ; and I hereby command the persons 
 composing the combinations aforesaid to disperse and 
 retire peaceably to their respective abodes within 
 twenty days from this date. 
 
 Deeming that the present condition of public affairs 
 presents an extraordinary occasion, I do hereby, in vir- 
 tue of the power in me vested by the Constitution, con- 
 vene both Ilouses of Congress. The senators and rep- 
 resentatives are, therefore, summoned to assemble at 
 their respective chambers at twelve o'clock noon, on 
 Thursday, the fourth day of July next, then and there 
 to consider and determine such measures as, in their 
 wisdom, the public safety and interest seem to demand.
 
 130 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and 
 caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 
 
 Done at the city of Washington, this fifteenth day of 
 April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hun- 
 dred and sixty-one, and of the independence of the 
 
 United States the eighty-fifth. 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 By the President : 
 
 WILLIAM II. SEWARD, Secretary of State. 
 
 This proclamation was followed by one ordering the 
 blockade of the Southern ports, and issued on the day 
 when the first blood was shed for Liberty and Union. 
 
 Subsequently, the President sent the following letter 
 (interesting particularly as showing his modesty and 
 peace-loving spirit) to the Governor of Maryland and 
 the Mayor of Baltimore : 
 
 WASHINGTON, April 20, 1861. 
 
 GOVERNOR HICKS AND MAYOR BROWN. Gentlemen, 
 Your letter by Messrs. Bond, Dobbin, and Brome, is 
 received. I tender you both my sincere thanks for your 
 efforts to keep the peace in the trying situation in which 
 you are placed. For the future, troops must be brought 
 here ; but I make no point of bringing them through 
 Baltimore. 
 
 Without any military knowledge myself, of course I 
 must leave details to Gen. Scott. He hastily said this 
 morning, in presence of those gentlemen, ' March them 
 around Baltimore, and not through it.' 
 
 I sincerely hope the general, on fuller reflection, will 
 consider this practical and proper, and that you will not 
 object to it. By this a collision of the people of Balti- 
 more with the troops will be avoided, unless they go out
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 131 
 
 of the way to seek it. I hope you will exert your influ- 
 ence to prevent this. Now and ever, I shall do all in my 
 power for peace, consistently with the maintenance of 
 government. Your obedient servant, 
 
 A. LINCOLN. 
 
 In July, the President sent his first message to Con- 
 gress, an interesting document, but too long to be in- 
 serted here. In it he remarked forcibly, " The Union 
 must be preserved, and hence all indispensable means 
 must be employed." It may be, that, even then, he was 
 looking forward to a day when he might pronounce sla- 
 very at an end in the United States ; for " there yet 
 remains in the minds of men who were acquainted with 
 Mr. Lincoln in the spring and summer of 1861 the recol- 
 lection of expressions made by him, which indicate that 
 there were then vague thoughts in his mind that it might 
 be his lot under Providence to bring the slaves of the 
 country out of their bondage."* 
 
 On the 12th of August, the President issued a pro- 
 clamation, eminently appropriate in expression, and 
 Christian in tone, for a day of fasting and prayer, as 
 follows : 
 
 " Wliereas a joint committee of both Houses of Con- 
 gress has waited on the President of the United States, 
 and requested him to ' recommend a day of public 
 humiliation, prayer, and fasting, to be observed by the 
 people of the United States with religious solemnities, 
 and the offering of fervent supplications to Almighty 
 God for the safety and welfare of these States, his 
 blessing on their arms, and a speedy restoration of 
 peace ; ' - 
 
 " And whereas it is fit and becoming in all people, at 
 
 Ex-Goveriior Boutwell't Eulogy.
 
 132 AKR All AM LINCOLN. 
 
 all times, to acknowledge and revere the supreme gov- 
 ernment of God; to bow in humble submission to hia 
 chastisements ; to confess and deplore their sins and 
 transgressions, in the full conviction that the fear of 
 the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and to pray, with 
 all fervency and contrition, for the pardon of their past 
 offences, and for a blessing upon their present ard 
 prospective action ; 
 
 "And whereas, when our own beloved country, once, 
 by the blessing of God, united, prosperous, and happy, 
 is now afflicted with faction and civil war, it is peculiarly 
 fit for us to recognize the hand of God in this terrible 
 visitation, and in sorrowful remembrance of our own 
 faults and crimes as a nation, and as individuals, to 
 humble ourselves before him, and to pray for his 
 mercy ; to pray that we may be spared further punish- 
 ment, though most justly deserved ; that our arms may 
 be blessed, and made effectual for the re-establishment 
 of law, order, and peace throughout the wide extent of 
 our country ; and that the inestimable boon of civil and 
 religious liberty, earned under his guidance and blessing 
 by the labors and sufferings of our fathers, may be re- 
 stored in all its original excellence : 
 
 " Therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the 
 United States, do appoint the last Thursday in Sep- 
 tember next as a day of humiliation, prayer, and fasting 
 for all the people of the nation. And I do earnestly 
 recommend to all the people, and especially to all minis- 
 ters and teachers of religion of all denominations, and to 
 all heads of families, to observe and keep that day ac- 
 cording to their several creeds and modes of worship, in 
 all humility, and with all religious solemnity, to the end 
 that the united prayer of the nation may ascend to the 
 throne of Grace, and bring down plentiful blessings 
 upon our country.
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. J33 
 
 " In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, 
 
 and caused the seal of the United States to be 
 
 [L. s.] affixed, this twelfth day of August, A.D. 1861, and 
 
 of the independence of the United States of 
 
 America the eighty-sixth. 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 " By the President : 
 
 " WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State" 
 
 The day was duly kept, and fervent prayers ascended, 
 asking safety for the nation, and wisdom for its head. 
 
 In the latter part of the same month, Gen. Fremont de- 
 clared martial law in Missouri, and ordered the property 
 of secessionists to be confiscated, and their slaves to be 
 declared free men ; but the President deemed it his duty 
 to so modify the order to liberate and confiscate, as not 
 to have Gen. Fremont transcend the provisions on that 
 theme contained in a Congressional act just passed. Mr. 
 Lincoln has been much censured for this ; but he acted 
 according to his best judgment. He did not think the 
 times were ripe for such a noble act of mercy and justice. 
 
 In December he sent another message to Congress, 
 which was an eminently conservative document, and gave 
 satisfaction to all loyal hearts. 
 
 In March following he sent another message, recom- 
 mending gradual emancipation; and on the 16th of April, 
 1862, he consummated an act which had for many years 
 been one of his most favorite projects by sending into 
 Congress the following message, announcing that his 
 signature was affixed to the document which abolished 
 slavery in the District of Columbia: 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS OP THE SENATE AND HOUSE OP 
 REPRESENTATIVES, The act entitled 'An act for the
 
 134 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 release of certain persons held to service or labor in 
 the District of Columbia ' has this day been approved 
 and signed. 
 
 " I have never doubted the constitutional authority of 
 Congress to abolish slavery in this District, and I have 
 ever desired to see the national capital freed from the 
 institution in some satisfactory way. Hence there has 
 npver been in my mind any question upon the subject, 
 except the one of expediency, arising in view of all the 
 circumstances. If there be matters within and about 
 this act which might have taken a course or shape more 
 satisfactory to my judgment, I do not attempt to specify 
 them. I am gratified that the two principles of compen- 
 sation and colonization are both recognized and practi- 
 cally applied in the act. 
 
 " In the matter of compensation, it is provided that 
 claims may be presented within ninety days from the 
 passage of the act, but not thereafter ; and there is no 
 saving for minors, femmes coverts, insane, or absent per- 
 sons. I presume this is an omission by mere oversight; 
 and I recommend that it be supplied by an amendatory 
 or supplemental act. " ABRAHAM LINCOLN." 
 
 The friends of freedom everywhere rejoiced when this 
 good deed was done ; and Wlrittier, the " poet of the 
 slave," poured out his soul in rhythmic words of exultant 
 joy. Still, though the President looked toward a day 
 of freedom, in his opinion the hour had not struck in 
 the belfry of the ages ; and, therefore, when Gen. Hun- 
 ter, like Gen. Fremont, transcended his powers in issu- 
 ing an emancipation order, the President repudiated it 
 in the following document : 
 
 " Whereas there appears in the public prints what 
 purports to be a proclamation of Major-Gen. Hunter, 
 in the words and figures following ; to wit,
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 135 
 
 " HEADQUARTERS, DEPARTMENT or THE SOUTH, 
 HILTON HEAD, S.C., May 9, 1862. 
 
 "GENERAL ORDERS, No. 11. 
 
 " The three States of Georgia, Florida, and South 
 Carolina, comprising the Military Department of the 
 South, having deliberately declared themselves no longer 
 under the protection of the United States of America, 
 and having taken up arms against the said United States, 
 it becomes a military necessity to declare them under 
 martial law. This was accordingly done on the twenty- 
 fifth day of April, 1862. Slavery and martial law in a 
 free country are altogether incompatible. The persons 
 in these three States, Georgia, Florida, and South Caro- 
 lina, heretofore held as slaves, are therefore declared for- 
 ever free. 
 
 " DAVID HUNTER, Major -Gen. Commanding. 
 
 " Official : 
 
 " ED. W. SMITH, Acting Asist. Adj. -Gen. 
 
 " And whereas the same is producing some excite- 
 ment and misunderstanding: 
 
 " Therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the Unit- 
 ed States, proclaim and declare that the Government 
 of the United States had no knowledge or belief of an 
 intention on the part of Gen. Hunter to issue such a 
 proclamation, nor has it yet any authentic information 
 that the document is genuine ; and further, that neither 
 Gen. Hunter, nor any other commander or person, has 
 been authorized by the Government of the United States 
 to make proclamation declaring the slaves of any State 
 free ; and that the supposed proclamation now in ques- 
 tion, whether genuine or false, is altogether void, so far 
 as respects such declaration. 
 
 " I further make known, that whether it be competent
 
 136 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 for me, as Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy, to 
 declare the slaves of any State or States free, and 
 whether at any time, or in any case, it shall have become 
 a necessity indispensable to the maintenance of the Gov- 
 ernment to exercise such supposed power, are questions 
 which, under my responsibility, I reserve to myself, and 
 which I cannot feel justified in leaving to the decision 
 of commanders in the field. These are totally different 
 questions from those of police regulations in armies and 
 camps. 
 
 " On the sixth day of March last, by a special message, 
 I recommended to Congress the adoption of a joint reso- 
 lution, to be substantially as follows : 
 
 "'Resolved, That the United States ought to co- 
 operate with any State which may adopt a gradual 
 abolishment of slavery, giving to such State in its dis- 
 cretion to compensate for the inconveniences, public and 
 private, produced by such change of system.' 
 
 " The resolution, in the language above quoted, was 
 adopted by large majorities in both branches of Con- 
 gress, and now stands an authentic, definite, and solemn 
 proposal of the nation to the States and people most im- 
 mediately interested in the subject-matter. To the peo- 
 ple of these States I now earnestly appeal. I do not 
 argue : I beseech you to make the arguments for your- 
 selves. You cannot, if you would, be blind to the signs 
 of the times. I beg of you a calm and enlarged con- 
 sideration of them, ranging, if it may be, far above per- 
 sonal and partisan politics. This proposal makes common 
 cause for a common object, casting no reproaches upon 
 any. It acts not the Pharisee. The change it contem- 
 plates would come gently as the dews of heaven, not 
 rending or wrecking any thing. Will you not embrace 
 1 ? So much good has not been done by one effort ij)
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 137 
 
 all past time, as, in the providence of God, it is now your 
 high privilege to do. May the vast future not have to 
 lament that you have neglected it ! 
 
 "In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, 
 
 9 +/ 
 
 and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 
 
 " Done at the city of Washington, this nineteenth day 
 of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hun- 
 dred and sixty-two, and of the independence of the Unit- 
 ed States the eighty-sixth. 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 " By the President : 
 
 " WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State." 
 
 On the 22d of September, Mr. Lincoln issued one of 
 the two most important proclamations ever issued in our 
 country. It announced to the slaves, who had been look- 
 ing for the great jubilee, and felt that 
 
 "'Twas long, long, long on the way ," 
 
 that, on the coming New-Year's Day, he should pronounce 
 them free. What human pen or voice can express the 
 joy with which the announcement was hailed by the 
 enslaved of our land ? It was as follows : 
 
 " I Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States 
 of America, and Commander-in-chief of the Army and 
 Navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that here- 
 after, as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the 
 object of practically restoring the constitutional relation 
 between the United States and the people thereof in 
 those States in which that relation is or may be sus- 
 pended or disturbed; that it is my purpose, upon the 
 next meeting of Congress, to again recommend the adop- 
 tion of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to 
 the free acceptance or rejection of all the slave States,
 
 138 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 so called, the people whereof may not then be in rebel 
 lion against the United States, and which States may 
 then have voluntarily adopted, or thereafter may volun- 
 tarily adopt, the immediate or gradual abolishment of 
 slavery within their respective limits; and that the effort 
 to colonize persons of African descent, with their con- 
 sent, upon the continent or elsewhere, with the pre- 
 viously obtained consent of the government existing 
 there, will be continued ; that on the first day of Jan- 
 uary, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hun- 
 dred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within 
 any State, or any designated part of a State, the people 
 whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United 
 States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever,free; and 
 the Executive Government of the United States, includ- 
 ing the military and naval authority thereof, will recog- 
 nize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will 
 do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, 
 in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom ; 
 that the Executive will, on the first day of January afore- 
 said, by proclamation, designate the States, and parts of 
 States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively 
 shall then be in rebellion against the United States ; and 
 the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on 
 that day be in good faith represented in the Congres3 
 of the United States by members chosen thereto, at 
 elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of 
 such State shall have participated, shall, in the absence 
 of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclu- 
 sive evidence that such State and the people thereof 
 have not been in rebellion against the United States. 
 
 " That attention is hereby called to an act of Congress, 
 entitled 'An act to make an additional article of war,' 
 approved March 13, 1862, and which act is in the words 
 figures following :
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS, 139 
 
 " l Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Represent 
 tatives of the United States of America in Congress as- 
 sembled, That hereafter the following shall be promul- 
 gated as an additional article of war for the government 
 of the army of the United States, and shall be observed 
 and obeyed as such : 
 
 " ' Article . All officers or persons of the military or 
 naval service of the United States are prohibited from 
 employing any of the forces under their respective com- 
 mauds for the purpose of returning fugitives from' ser- 
 vice or labor who may have escaped from any persons to 
 whom such service or labor is claimed to be due ; and 
 any officer who shall be found guilty by a court-martial 
 of violating this article shall be dismissed from the 
 service. 
 
 " ' Sect. 2. And be it further enacted, That this act 
 shall take effect from and after its passage.' 
 
 " Also to the ninth and tenth sections of an act, enti- 
 tled 'An act to suppress insurrection, to punish treason 
 and rebellion, to seize and confiscate property of rebels, 
 and for other purposes/ approved July 17, 1862 ; and 
 which sections are in the words and figures following: 
 
 " ' Sect. 9. And be it further enacted, That all slaves 
 of persons who shall hereafter be engaged in rebellion 
 against the Government of the United States, or who 
 shall in any way give aid or comfort thereto, escaping 
 from such persons and taking refuge within the lines of 
 the army, and all slaves captured from such persons or 
 deserted by them, and coming under the control of the 
 Government of the United States, and all slaves of such 
 persons found on (or being within) any place occupied 
 by rebel forces and afterwards occupied by the forces of 
 of the United States, shall be deemed ctiptives of war, 
 and shall be forever free of their servitude, and not agaiu 
 IjeM as slavey.
 
 140 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 " ' Sect. 10. And be it further enacted, That no slave 
 escaping into any State, Territory, or the District of 
 Columbia, from any of the States, shall be deli/ered up, 
 or in any way impeded or hindered of his liberty, except 
 for crime, or some offence against the laws, unless the 
 person claiming said fugitive shall first make oath that 
 the person to whom the labor or service of such fugitive 
 is alleged to be due is his lawful owner, and has not 
 been in arms against the United States in the present Re- 
 bellion, nor in any way given aid and comfort thereto ; 
 and no person engaged in the military or naval service 
 of the United States shall, under any pretence whatever, 
 assume to decide on the validity of the claim of any per- 
 son to the service or labor of any other person, or sur- 
 render up any such person to the claimant, on pain of 
 being dismissed from the service.' 
 
 u And I do hereby enjoin upon and order all persons 
 engaged in the military and naval service of the United 
 States to observe, obey, and enforce, within their respec- 
 tive spheres of service, the act and sections above 
 recited. 
 
 " And the Executive will in due time recommend that 
 all citizens of the United States, who shall have remained 
 loyal thereto throughout the Rebellion, shall (upon the 
 restoration of the constitutional relation between the 
 United States and their respective States and people, if 
 the relation shall have been suspended or disturbed) be 
 compensated for all losses by acts of the United States, 
 including the loss of slaves. 
 
 " In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and 
 caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 
 
 " Done at the city of Washington, this twenty-second 
 day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 141 
 
 eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the independence 
 of the United States the eighty-seventh. 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 t( By the President : 
 
 " WM. H. SEWAED, Secretary of State." 
 
 Then came, in due season, the proclamation, which 
 crowned its author with immortal fame, and made millions 
 rejoice on earth and in heaven. Then sang Whittier, 
 and all true hearts echoed : 
 
 " Ring and swing, 
 
 Bells of joy I on morning's wing 
 Send the song of praise abroad ; 
 
 With a sound of broken chains 
 Tell the nation that He reigns 
 
 Who alone is Lord and God I " 
 
 The following is 
 
 THE PROCLAMATION. 
 
 " Whereas on the twenty-second day of September, jn 
 the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
 sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of 
 the United States, containing, among other things, the 
 following ; to wit, 
 
 " ' That on the first day of January, in the year of our 
 Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all 
 persons held as slaves within any State, or designated 
 part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in re- 
 bellion against the United States, shall be, then, thence- 
 forth, and forever, free ; and the Executive Government 
 of tho United States, including the military and naval 
 authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the free- 
 dom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress 
 such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may 
 make for their actual freedom;
 
 142 ABRAHAM LItfCOLtf. 
 
 " l That the Executive will, on the first day of January 
 aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the States and 
 parts of States, if any, in which the people therein re- 
 spectively shall then be in rebellion against the United 
 States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, 
 shall on that day be in good faith represented in the 
 Congress of the United States by members chosen 
 thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified 
 voters of such States shall have participated, shall, in 
 the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be 
 deemed conclusive evidence that such State, and the 
 people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the 
 United States: ' 
 
 " Now, therefore, I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the 
 United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as 
 Commander-in-chief of the Army and Navy of the United 
 States in time of actual armed rebellion against the au- 
 thority and government of the United States, and as a 
 fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebel- 
 lion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our 
 Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in 
 accordance with my purpose so to do, publicly proclaimed 
 for the full period of one hundred days from the day 
 of the first above-mentioned order, designate as the 
 States, and parts of States, wherein the people thereof 
 respectively are this day in rebellion against the United 
 States, the following; to wit, Arkansas, Texas, Louisi- 
 ana, except the parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, 
 Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James, Ascension, 
 Assumption, Terre Bonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Mar- 
 tin, and Orleans, including the city of New Orleans, 
 Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, 
 North Carolina, and Virginia, except the forty-eight 
 counties designated as West Virginia, and also the coun-
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 143 
 
 tie of Berkeley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, 
 York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of 
 Norfolk and Portsmouth, and which excepted parts are, 
 for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation 
 were not issued. 
 
 "And by virtue of the power, and for the purpose 
 aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as 
 slaves within said designated States, and parts of States, 
 are, and henceforward shall be, free ; and that the Execu- 
 tive Government of the United States, including the 
 military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and 
 maintain the freedom of said persons. 
 
 " And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to 
 be free to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary 
 self-defence ; and I recommend to them, that in all cases, 
 when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages. 
 
 " And I further declare and make known that such 
 porsons of suitable condition will be received into the 
 armed service of the United States to garrison forts, po- 
 sitions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of 
 all sorts in said service. 
 
 "And upon this, sincerely believed to be an act of jus- 
 tice, warranted by the Constitution, upon military neces- 
 sity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind and 
 the gracious favor of Almighty God. 
 
 " In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, 
 and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 
 
 " Done at the city of Washington, this first 
 day of January, in the year of our Lord one 
 
 [L. s.] thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and 
 of the independence of the United States of 
 America the eighty-seventh. 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 " By the President : 
 
 " WILLIAM H. SEWARD Secretary of State."
 
 144 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 What is the estimate placed upon this proclamation? 
 Hear the words of him who was about to commit the re- 
 mains of its author to the tomb : 
 
 " The great act of the mighty chieftain, on which his 
 fame shall rest long after his frame shall moulder away, 
 is that of giving freedom to a race. We have all been 
 taught to revere the sacred characters. Among them 
 Moses stand pre-eminently high. He received the law 
 from God, and his name is honored among the hosts of 
 heaven. Was not his greatest act the delivering of three 
 millions of his kindred out of bondage ? Yet we may 
 assert that Abraham Lincoln, by his proclamation, liber- 
 ated more enslaved people than ever Moses set free, and 
 those not of his kindred or his race. Such a power or 
 such an opportunity God has seldom given to man. 
 When other events shall have been forgotten; when 
 this world shall have become a network of republics ; 
 when every throne shall be swept from the face of the 
 earth ; when literature shall enlighten all minds ; when 
 the claims of humanity shall be recognized everywhere ; 
 this act shall still be conspicuous in the ages of history. 
 We are thankful that God gave to Abraham Lincoln the 
 decision and wisdom and grace to issue that proclama- 
 tion, which stands high above all other papers which 
 have been penned by uninspired men." * 
 
 President Lincoln, as elsewhere shown, had always 
 advocated freedom for all. He distinctly declared his 
 views in regard to slavery as an evil which he would 
 have been glad to see removed, even if it had not been 
 a military necessity to pronounce the slaves of the ene- 
 my free. He says himself, "I am naturally antislavery. 
 If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong. I cannot 
 
 * Bishop Simpson.
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 145 
 
 remember when I did not see, think, and feel that it was 
 wrong ; and yet I have never understood that the presi- 
 dency conferred upon me an unrestricted right to act 
 officially upon this judgment and feeling. It was in the 
 oath I took, that I would, to the best of my ability, pre- 
 serve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United 
 States. I could not take the office without taking the 
 oath ; nor was it in my view that I might take an oath to 
 get power, and break the oath in using the power. I 
 understood too, that, in ordinary civil administration, 
 this oath even forbade me to practically indulge my pri- 
 mary abstract judgment on the moral question of slave- 
 ry. I had publicly declared this many times, and in 
 many ways ; and I aver, that, to this day, I have done no 
 official act in mere deference to my abstract judgment 
 and feeling on slavery. I did understand, however, that 
 my oath to preserve the Constitution to the best of my 
 ability imposed upon me the duty of preserving, 1-y 
 every indispensable means, that Government, that na- 
 tion, of which that Constitution was the organic law." 
 
 We see here the President's cautious adherence to the 
 path of duty. He would not allow even his convictions 
 of right under other circumstances to interfere with the 
 strict discharge of his duties as President. When some 
 who loved freedom, and pitied the slave, urged upon him 
 a more rapid stride toward emancipation, he answered 
 them in the spirit of the following letter, written by him 
 to Hon. Horace Greeley, Aug. 22, 1862:- 
 
 " DEAR Sm, I have just read yours of the 19th 
 inst., addressed to myself through the ' New- York Trib- 
 une.' 
 
 " If there be in it any statements or assumptions of 
 fact which I may know to be erroneous, I do not now 
 and here controvert them.
 
 146 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 " If there be any inferences which I may believe to 
 be falsely drawn, I do not now and here argue against 
 them. 
 
 " If there be perceptible in it an impatient and dicta- 
 torial tone, I waive it in deference to an old friend whose 
 heart I have always supposed to be right. 
 
 " As to the policy I seem to be pursuing, as you say, 
 I have not meant to leave any one in doubt. I would 
 save the Union. I would save it in the shortest way 
 under the Constitution. 
 
 " The sooner the national authority can be restored, the 
 nearer the Union will be the Union as it was. 
 
 " If there be those who would not save the Union un- 
 less they could at the same time save slavery, I do not 
 agree with them. 
 
 " If there be those who would not save the Union 
 unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do 
 not agree with them. 
 
 " My paramount object is to save the Union, and not 
 either to save or destroy slavery. 
 
 " If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, 
 I would do it ; if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, 
 I would do it ; and if I could do 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 saves this 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 when I be- 
 lieve doing more will help the cause. 
 
 " I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors, 
 and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear 
 to be true views.
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 147 
 
 " I have here stated my purpose according to my views 
 of official duty ; and I intend no modification of my oft- 
 expressed personal wish, that all men everywhere could 
 be free. " Yours, 
 
 "A, LINCOLN." 
 
 Here, again, we see the wisdom of the serpent, and 
 the harmlessness of the dove, in the letter which shows 
 him ready to follow the path of duty whenever clearly 
 seen, and that was all the men of any party could right- 
 fully ask. 
 
 When he could consistently plead for emancipation, 
 how earnest and outspoken were his words ! In his An- 
 nual Message he said, 4< We cannot escape history. We 
 of this Congress and this Administration will be remem- 
 bered in spite of ourselves. . . . We say we are for the 
 Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We 
 know how to save the Union. The world knows we 
 know how to save it. 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. Other 
 means may succeed : this could not, cannot fail. The 
 way is plain, peaceful, generous, just, a way which, if 
 followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must 
 forever bless." 
 
 The noble author of a glorious proclamation never re- 
 tracted it, never changed his views concerning it. In a 
 letter written in August, 1863, he said, referring to the 
 peace that he expected, but hardly lived to see, "And 
 then there will bo some black men who can romembei 
 that with silent tongue, and clinched teeth, and steady 
 eye, and well-poised bayonet, they have helped mankind
 
 148 ABRAHAM LIJVCOLir. 
 
 on to this great consummation ; while I icar that there 
 will be some white men unable to forget, that, with malig- 
 nant heart and deceitful speech, they have striven to 
 hinder it." 
 
 In his Annual Message, December, 1863, he referred 
 to the success which had attended the proclamation of 
 emancipation, and added, " While I remain in my present 
 position, I shall not attempt to retract or modify the Eman- 
 cipation Proclamation ; nor shall I return to slavery any 
 person who is free by the terms of that proclamation, or 
 by any of the acts of Congress." 
 
 More and more clearly will it be seen, as time rolls on, 
 that the President could not have done his duty, and yet 
 have failed to free the slave. 
 
 " Prom the first cannon-shot, it was plain that the Re- 
 bellion was nothing but slavery in arms ; but such was 
 the power of slavery, even in the free States, that months 
 elapsed before this giant criminal was directly attacked. 
 Generals in the field were tender with regard to it, as if 
 it were a church, or a work of the fine arts. It was only 
 under the teaching of disaster that the country was 
 aroused. The first step was taken in Congress after the 
 defeat at Bull Run. But still the President hesitated. 
 Disaster thickened and graves opened, until, at last, the 
 country saw that only by justice could we hope for di- 
 vine favor ; and the President, who leaned so closely 
 upon the popular heart, pronounced that great word by 
 which all slaves in the rebel States were set free. Let 
 it be named forever to his glory, that he grasped the 
 thunderbolt, even though tardily, under which the Re- 
 bellion staggered to its fall ; that, following up the blow, 
 he enlisted colored citizens as soldiers in the national 
 army ; and that he declared his final purpose never to 
 retract or modify the Emancipation Proclamation, nor to
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 149 
 
 return into slavery any person free by the terms of that 
 instrument, or by any of the acts of Congress, saying 
 loftily, 'If the people should, by whatever mode or 
 means, make it an executive duty to re-enslave such 
 persons, another, and not I, must be the instrument to 
 perform it.' 
 
 " It was sometimes said that the proclamation was of 
 doubtful constitutionality. If this criticism did not pro- 
 ceed from sympathy with slavery, it evidently proceeded 
 fomthe prevailing superstition with regard to this idol. 
 Future jurists will read with astonishment that once a fla- 
 grant wrong could be considered at any time as having any 
 rights which a court was bound to respect, and especial- 
 ly that rebels in arms could be considered as having any 
 title to the services of people whose allegiance was pri- 
 marily due to the United States. But, turning from 
 these conclusions, it seems to be plain, that slavery, 
 which stood exclusively on local law, without any support 
 in natural law, must have fallen with the local govern- 
 ment, both legally and constitutionally : legally, inasmuch 
 as it ceased to have any valid legal support ; and consti- 
 tutionally, inasmuch as it came at once within the exclu- 
 sive jurisdiction of the Constitution, where liberty is the 
 prevailing law. The President did not act upon these 
 principles; but, speaking with the voice of authority, he 
 said, ' Let the slaves be free ! ' What Court and Con- 
 gress hesitated to declare, ho proclaimed, and thus 
 enrolled himself among the world's emancipators." * 
 
 Little did that gentle mother, long vanished from her 
 dear son's earthly path, imagine, when she so desired that 
 he should learn to read and write, that his pen would ever 
 trace such life-giving, joy-inspiring words. Glad heartd 
 
 * lion. Charles Sumner.
 
 150 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 everywhere among true men and women welcomed (he 
 glorious decree. The pencil of the artist* and the pen 
 of the poetf vied in commemorating the event, and ex- 
 pressing their exultant joy; and human eloquence is 
 powerless to express the blissful gratitude with which 
 it was received by the long-oppressed race whom it lifted 
 from the degradation of slavery to the glorious heights 
 of freedom. 
 
 No document can tower above the last mentioned; for 
 its altitude will remain unsurpassed, till, in the fulness of 
 God's time, the chains of sin shall be broken, evil shall 
 be overcome with good, and the proclamation of uni- 
 versal freedom from sin and sorrow shall be uttered in 
 the words, " The kingdoms of this world have become 
 the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ," and " God 
 shall be all and in all." 
 
 This chapter may fittingly close with a document, than 
 which none more chaste and beautiful in style can be 
 found. It is a proclamation for a day of thanksgiving. 
 One has already been given which proclaimed a day of fast- 
 ing. A proclamation, recommending that the people in- 
 
 * W. T. Carleton of Loston painted an exquisite picture, entitled " Waiting 
 for the Hour," depicting their anxiety who waited for the time when the chains 
 would fall as the proclamation came in force on the first day of January, 
 1863. This picture was afterward presented to President Lincoln. 
 
 t Among other hearty tributes to the President was one entitled " God bless 
 Abraham Lincoln ! " It was written by Mrs. Caroline A. Ma<*on, whose touch- 
 Ing song, " Do they miss me at home? " has been sung by Union soldiers with 
 tearful eyes beside many a camp-fire and in many a hospital. Her poem closei 
 thus: 
 
 " God bless him : can we more ? In this, 
 The perfectiiess of human bliss, 
 All joy, all peace, all fulness is. 
 
 And so God bless him ! Once again 
 Take up the burden, voice and pen, 
 Wh/le all the people say, ' Amen I ' "
 
 REMARKABLE DOCUMENTS. 151 
 
 formally assemble and thank God for victories in East 
 Tennessee, was issued in December, 1863. One to 
 which allusion is here specially made was as follows: 
 
 " It has pleased Almighty God to hearken to the sup- 
 plications and prayers of an afflicted people, and to 
 vouchsafe to the army and the navy of the United States, 
 on the land and on the sea, victories so signal and so effec- 
 tive as to furnish reasonable grounds for augmented 
 confidence that the union of these States will be main- 
 tained, their constitutions preserved, and their peace 
 and prosperity permanently preserved. 
 
 " But these victories have been accorded not without 
 sacrifice of life, limb, and liberty, incurred by the brave, 
 patriotic, and loyal citizens. Domestic affliction in every 
 part of the country follows in the train of these fearful be- 
 reavements. It is meet and right to recognize and con- 
 fess the presence of the Almighty Father, and the power 
 of his hand, equally in these triumphs and these sor- 
 rows. 
 
 " Now, therefore, be it known that I do set apart 
 Thursday, the sixth day of August next, to be observed 
 as a day for national thanksgiving, praise, and prayer : 
 and I invite the people of the United States to assemble 
 on that occasion in their customary places of worship, 
 and, in the forms approved by their own conscience, ren- 
 der the homage due to the Divine Majesty for the won- 
 derful things he has done in the nation's behalf, and in- 
 voke the influence of his Etafy Spirit to subdue the 
 anger which has produced and so long sustained a need- 
 less and cruel rebellion ; to change the hearts of tho 
 insurgents ; to guide the counsels of the Government 
 with wisdom adequate to so great a national emergency ; 
 and to visit with tender care and consolation, throughout 
 the length and breadth of our land, all those who, through
 
 152 ABRAHAM LINCOLJT. 
 
 the vicissitudes of marches, voyages, battles, and sieges> 
 have been brought to suffer in mind, body, or estate, and 
 family ; to lead the whole nation through paths of repent- 
 ance, and submission to the Divine Will, back to the 
 perfect enjoyment of union and fraternal peace. 
 
 " In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, 
 and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. 
 
 " Done at the city of Washington, this 15th day of 
 July, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hun- 
 dred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the 
 United States of America the eighty-eighth. 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 " By the President : 
 
 " WILLIAM F. SEWAED, Secretary of State." 
 
 The documents contained in this chapter form a part 
 of our national history, which no true American will ever 
 ponder but with pride and satisfaction. All of them had 
 immediate results that were glorious and salutary ; and 
 one at least of them will exert an influence grand and 
 far-reaching as the march of Time, like to the echo of 
 God's voice of promise and hope amid the bowers of 
 Eaen, which will extend till the answering anthem of a 
 redeemed world and a rejoicing universe shall rise " to 
 Him that sitteth upon the throne, and to the Lamb for 
 ever."
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ANECDOTES. 
 
 " Thereby hangs a tale." SHAKSPEABE. 
 A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver." PROV. xxv. ^ 
 
 THEBE is a time to laugh, as well as a time to weep, if 
 we may credit the wise man ; and, of the two, the smile 
 is to be preferred to the tear, since it will help to send 
 more sunshine abroad in a world where needed spiritual 
 discipline, in consequence of sin, must bring many shad- 
 ows. Jacob Abbott has taught his thousands of readers 
 that " cheerfulness is a duty;" and one may well suspect 
 the long face of covering a bad heart. " Other things 
 being equal," the truest Christian is the most cheerful 
 one ; and that man or woman is highly favored who has 
 received that inheritance of mirthfulness which enables 
 him without effort to " look on the bright side." 
 
 President Lincoln was far from being a mirthful man, 
 in one sense; overflowing with fun and jollity. He had 
 borne too many burdens not to have lost some elasticity 
 of spirit ; and the natural buoyancy of youth was, as we 
 know, early lessened by the loss of his almost idolized 
 mother. Moreover, later life had brought those peculiar 
 trials we have mentioned ; and one would hardly expect 
 to see in President Lincoln the sportive, careless, mirth- 
 ful Donatello whom Hawthorne pictured ere he passed 
 away.* Nor would we like to see the restless buoyancy 
 of excessive animal spirits in one occupying the position 
 of the nation's head. 
 
 " Marble Fauu."
 
 154 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 President Lincoln had the happy medium. He was 
 cheerful without levity, as he was ofttimes sad without 
 being misanthropic. Emerson says of him, " His broad 
 good humor, running easily into jocular talk, in which 
 he delighted, and in which he excelled, was a rich gift 
 to this wise man. It enabled him to keep his secret ; 
 to meet every kind of man, and every rank in society ; to 
 take off the edge of the severest decisions ; to mask his 
 own purpose, arid sound his companion, and to catch with 
 true instinct the temper of every company he addressed. 
 And, more than all, it is to a man of severe labor, in 
 anxious and exhausting crises, the natural restorative, 
 good as sleep, and is the protection of the over-driven 
 brain against rancor and insanity. 
 
 " He is the author of a multitude of good sayings, so 
 disguised as pleasantries, that it is certain they had no 
 reputation at first but as jests; and only later, by the very 
 acceptance and adoption they find in the mouths of mil- 
 lions, turn out to be the wisdom of the hour. I am sure, 
 if this man had ruled in a period of less facility of print- 
 ing, he would have become mythological in a very few 
 years, like ^Esop or Pilpay, or one of the Seven Wise 
 Masters, by his fables and proverbs." 
 
 His cheerfulness of demeanor, and speech, sometimes 
 led strangers into an error in regard to him. They 
 thought him too careless of the dignity which belonged 
 to his position ; but they could not say he neglected the 
 " weightier matters of the law," even if he did some- 
 times seem to omit the " tithes of mint, anise, and 
 cumin." 
 
 One who knew him well* thus renders testimony to 
 the excellence of his character even in these particu 
 lars : 
 
 * Col. Doming.
 
 ANECDOTES. 155 
 
 " He was not over-careful of his dignity, feeling as- 
 sured that his dignity would take care of itself; and con- 
 senting to rend the web of official formalities, and to 
 waive all ceremony and precedence which might bar his 
 passage to a good deed by the most expeditious route, 
 lie has been convicted, in contempt of 'the divinity 
 which doth hedge a king,' of conferring with his coun- 
 sellors in a great emergency, and of performing an act 
 of kindness and mercy, enveloped in no robe of state 
 but a cotton night-gown of scanty proportions ; and on 
 one memorable occasion he even presumed to solve an 
 enigma, raised in a congress of ambassadors, by the little 
 story of 'root, hog, or die.' He was what Dr. Johnson 
 calls a thoroughly ' clubbable ' man ; eminently social and 
 familiar; in private interviews, and sometimes in public, 
 overflowing with illustrations of every theme ; always apt 
 and racy, and frequently humorous, with a habit, like the 
 doctor himself, of upsetting a pedantry or a sophism by 
 an epigram or an anecdote, and with a story-telling 
 method of reasoning like our own Dr. Franklin. While 
 unrivalled as a raconteur in the pith and variety of his 
 store, he was not half so broad in his narrations as many 
 an unassuming Chesterfield on both sides of the water. 
 ... I can adopt and indorse the precise language of Mr. 
 F. B. Carpenter, who, as an artist, had free access to Mr. 
 Lincoln's presence, and was for several months an inmate 
 of the White House, when ho says, ' I feel that it is due 
 to Mr. Lincoln's memory to state, that during my resi- 
 dence in Washington, after witnessing his intercourse 
 with all classes of people, including governors, senators, 
 members of Congress, officers of the army, and familiar 
 friends, I cannot recollect to have heard him relate a cir- 
 cumstance to any one of them all that would have been 
 out of place if uttered in a lady's drawing-room.' "
 
 158 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 The same gentleman speaks of an interview which he 
 had with the President just after Gen. Fremont had 
 declined to run against him for the presidency; and says, 
 " The magnificent Bible which the negroes of Washing- 
 ton had just presented him lay upon the table; and, 
 while we were both examining it, I recited the somewhat 
 remarkable passage from the Chronicles, ' Eastward were 
 six Levites, northward four a day, southward four a day, 
 and towards Assuppim two and two, at Parbar west- 
 ward, four at the causeway, and two at Parbar.' He im- 
 mediately challenged me to find any such passage as that 
 in his Bible. After I had pointed it out to him, and he 
 was satisfied of its genuineness, he asked me if I remem- 
 bered the text which his friends had recently applied to 
 Fremont ; and instantly turned to a verse in the First of 
 Samuel, put on his spectacles, arid read, in hia slow, 
 peculiar, and waggish tone, ' And every one that was 
 in distress, and every one that was in debt, and every 
 one that was discontented, gathered themselves unto 
 him ; and he became a captain over them : and there 
 were with him about four hundred men.' " 
 
 Here is a story which has been " going the rounds " 
 of the press, entitled 
 
 " LINCOLN'S FIRST DOLLAR." One evening, in the Ex- 
 ecutive Chamber, there were present a number of gen- 
 tlemen, among them Mr. Seward. 
 
 "A point in the conversation suggesting the thought, 
 Mr. Lincoln said, ' Seward, you never heard, did you, how 
 I earned my first dollar?' 'No,' said Mr. Seward. 'Well/ 
 replied he, * I was about eighteen years of age. I be- 
 longed, you know, to what they call down South " the 
 scrubs : " people who do not own land and slaves are 
 nobody there. But we had succeeded in raising, chiefly 
 by my labor, sufficient produce, as I thought, to justify 
 ino in taking it down the river to selL
 
 AXtCDOTES. 157 
 
 " ' After much persuasion, I got the consent of mother 
 to go, and constructed a little flat-boat large enough to 
 take the barrel or two of things that we had gathered, 
 with myself and little bundle, down to New Orleans. A 
 steamer was coming down the river. We have, you 
 know, no wharves on the Western streams ; and the cus- 
 tom was, if passengers were at any of the landings, for 
 them to go out in a boat, the steamer stopping, and tak- 
 ing them on board. 
 
 "' I was contemplating my new flat-boat, and wonder- 
 ing whether I could make it stronger or improve it in 
 any particular, when two men came down to the shore 
 in carriages with trunks, and, looking at the different 
 boats, singled out mine, and asked, "Who owns this?" I 
 answered, somewhat modestly, "I do." "Will you,'' said 
 one of them, " take us and our trunks out to the steam- 
 er ?" " Certainly," said I. I was very glad to have the 
 chance of earning something. I supposed that each 
 would give me two or three bits. The trunks were put 
 on my flat-boat, the passengers seated themselves on the 
 trunks, and I sculled them out to the steamboat. 
 
 " ' They got on board, and I lifted up their heavy 
 trunks, and put them on the deck. The steamer was 
 about to put on steam again, when I called out *hat they 
 had forgotten to pay me. Each of them took from his 
 pocket a silver half-dollar, and threw it on the floor of 
 the boat. I could scarcely believe my eyes as I picked 
 up the money. Gentlemen, you may think it was a very 
 little thing, and in these days it seems like a trifle; but 
 it was a most important incident in my life. I could 
 scarcely credit that I, a poor boy, had earned a dollar in 
 less than a day, that by honest work I had earned a 
 dollir. The world seemed brighter and fairer before me.
 
 158 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 I was a more hopeful and confident being from that 
 time. ' " 
 
 Carleton,* the favorite coriespoudent of the " Boston 
 Journal," narrated to the writer the following anecdote 
 concerning one of the President's humorous remarks : It 
 was during the week before Richmond was taken. The 
 President was with Gen. Grant and others at City-Point 
 headquarters. The party sat where they could see the 
 river. A flat-boat made its appearance, with apparently 
 a large family on board. The President was informed 
 that it was a planter of the vicinity, with his wife and 
 legitimate children, and not a few colored women with 
 their children, which were also supposed to be his own. 
 " Ah I yes," said the President, "I see. It is Abraham, 
 Isaac, and Ishmael, all in one boat." The aptness of 
 the Scripture allusion, and the quickness of the Presi- 
 dent in responding, woke a smile on every countenance. 
 
 The Hon. Charles Sumner, in his eulogy, thus refers to 
 the humor of the President : " His humor has also be- 
 come a proverb. He insisted sometimes that he had no 
 invention, but only a memory. He did not forget the 
 good things which he heard, and was never without a fa- 
 miliar story to illustrate his meaning. When he spoke, 
 the recent West seemed to vie with the ancient East in 
 apologue and fable." 
 
 A writer in " Harpers' Monthly " gives several anec- 
 dotes concerning the President, with whom he seems to 
 have been intimately acquainted. One of them is as fol- 
 lows : " Mr. Lincoln visited the Army of the Potomac in 
 the spring of 1863, and, free from the annoyances of of- 
 6ce, was considerably refreshed and rested; but even 
 there the mental anxieties which never forsook him 
 seemed to cast him down at times with a great weight. 
 
 * C. C. Coffin, Esq.
 
 AXCDOTES. 159 
 
 We left Washington late i the afternoon ; and, a snow- 
 storm soon after coming >n, the steamer was anchored, 
 for the night, off Indian lead, on the Maryland shore of 
 the Potomac. The Presient left the little knot in the 
 cabin, and, sitting alone ra corner, seemed absorbed in 
 the saddest reflections ir a time ; then, beckoning a 
 companion to him, said, ' ^hat will you wager that half 
 our iron-clads are at the bttom of Charleston Harbor?' 
 This being the first intimtion which the other had of 
 Dupont's attack, which ws then begun, he hesitated to 
 reply ; when the Presidet added, ' The people will ex- 
 pect big things when theyiear of this ; but it is too late, 
 too late I ' 
 
 " During that little voyae, the captain of the steamer a 
 frank, modest old sailor, /as so much affected by the 
 careworn appearance of thPresident, that he came to the 
 writer, and confessed thatie had received the same im 
 pression of the Chief Maghrate that many had. Hearing 
 of his ' little stories ' and hi humor, he had supposed him 
 to have no cares or sadnee ; but a sight of that anxious 
 and sad face had undeceivd him, and he wanted to tell 
 the President how much h had unintentionally wronged 
 him, feeling that he had coamitted upon him a personal 
 wrong. The captain was uly introduced to the Presi- 
 dent, who talked with hin privately for a space, being 
 touched as well as amusd at what he called ' Capt. 
 M 's freeing his mind.' 
 
 " An amusing yet touchig instance of the President's 
 pre-occupation of mind occired at one of his levees, when 
 he was shaking hands wh a host of visitors passing 
 him in a continuous strean An intimate acquaintance 
 received the usual converional hand-shake and saluta- 
 tion, but, perceiving that e was not recognized, kept 
 hia ground, instead of movig on, and spoke again; when
 
 160 ASRAffAM LINCOLN. 
 
 the President, roused by a dim consciousness that some- 
 thing unusual had happened, perceived who stood before 
 him, and, seizing his friend's hand, shook it again heartily, 
 saying, ' How do you do ? how do you do ? Excuse me 
 for not noticing you at first: the fact is, I was thinking 
 of a man down South.' He afterwards privately acknowl- 
 edged that the ' man down South ' was Sherman, then on 
 his march to the sea. 
 
 "Mr. Lincoln had not a hopeful temperament, and, 
 though he looked at the bright side of things, was always 
 prepared for disaster and defeat. With his wonderful 
 faculty for discerning results, he often saw success 
 where others saw disaster, but oftener perceived a failure 
 \\ ben others were elated with victory, or were tempo- 
 rarily deceived by appearances. Of a great cavalry raid, 
 which filled the newspapers with glowing exultation, but 
 failed to cut the communications which it had been de- 
 signed to destroy, he briefly said, 'That was good circus- 
 riding : it will do to fill a column in the newspapers ; but I 
 don't see that it has brought any thing else to pass.' He 
 often said that the worst feature about newspapers was 
 that they were so sure to be ' ahead of the hounds,' out- 
 running events, and exciting expectations which were 
 sure to be disappointed. One of the worst effects of a 
 victory, he said, was to lead people to expect that the 
 war was about over in consequence of it ; but he was 
 never weary of commending the patience of the Ameri- 
 can people, which he thought something matchless and 
 touching. . . . 
 
 "The world will never hear the last of the 'little stories' 
 with which the President garnished or illustrated his con- 
 versation and his early stump-speeches. He said, how- 
 ever, that, as near as he could reckon, about one-sixth of 
 ttnse which were credited to him were old accquaint-
 
 ANECDOTES. 161 
 
 ances : all of the rest were the productions of other and 
 better story-tellers than himself. Said he, 'I do generally 
 remember a good story when 1 hear it ; but I never did 
 invent any thing original : I am only a retail-dealer.' His 
 anecdotes were seldom told for the sake of the telling, 
 but because they fitted in just where they came, and shed 
 a light on the argument that nothing else could. He 
 was not witty, but brimful of humor ; and, though he was 
 quick to appreciate a good pun, I never knew of his mak- 
 ing but one, which was on the Christian name of a friend, 
 to whom he said, ' You have yet to be elected to the 
 place I hold ; but Noah's reign was before Abraham.' 
 He thought the chief characteristic of American humor 
 was its grotesqueness and extravagance ; and the story of 
 the man who was so tall that he was ' laid out ' in a rope 
 walk, the soprano voice so high that it had to be climbed 
 over by a ladder, and the Dutchman's expression of 
 ' somebody tying his dog loose,' all made a permanent 
 lodgement in his mind. . . . 
 
 " People were sometimes disappointed because he ap- 
 peared before them with a written speech. The best 
 explanation of that habit of his was his remark to a friend, 
 who noticed a roll of manuscript in the hand of the Presi- 
 dent as he came into the parlor, while waiting for the 
 serenade which was given him on the night following his 
 re-election. Said he, ' I know what you're thinking about; 
 but there's no clap-trap about me ; and I am free to say. 
 that, in the excitement of the moment, I am sure to saj 
 something which I am sorry for when I see it in print 
 so I have it here in black and white, and there are no 
 mistakes made. People attach too much importance to 
 what I say anyhow.' 
 
 " Upon another ocoasion, hearing that I was in the 
 parlor, he sent for me to come up into the library, where 
 11
 
 162 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 I found him writing on a piece of common stiff box- j>oard 
 with a pencil. Said he, after he had finished, ' Here is 
 one speech of mine which has never been printed, and I 
 think it worth printing. Just see what you think.' He 
 then read the following, which is copied verbatim from 
 the familiar handwriting before me : 
 
 "'On Thursday of last week two ladies from Tennessee 
 came before the President, asking the release of their 
 husbands, held as prisoners of war at Johnson's Island. 
 They were put off until Friday; when they came again, 
 and were again put off until Saturday. At each of the 
 interviews, one of the ladies urged that her husband was 
 a religious man. On Saturday, when the President 
 ordered the release of the prisoners, he said to this lady, 
 " You say your husband is a religious man: tell him, when 
 you meet him, that I say I am not much a judge of re- 
 ligion, but that, in my opinion, that religion that sets men 
 to rebel and fight against their Government, because, as 
 they think, that Government does not sufficiently help 
 some men to eat their bread in the sweat of other men's 
 faces, is not the sort of religion upon which people can 
 get to heaven." ' 
 
 " To this the President signed his name at my request, 
 by way of joke, and added for a caption, ' The President's 
 last, shortest, and best speech ; ' under which title it was 
 duly published in one of the Washington newspapers. 
 His message to the last session of Congress was first 
 written upon the same sort of white pasteboard above 
 referred to; its stiffness enabling him to lay it on his 
 knee as he sat easily in his arm-chair, writing and eras- 
 ing as he thought and wrought out his idea." 
 
 The author of the " Pioneer Boy" says of Mr. Lincoln, 
 "He never felt above his business. He was never 
 ashamed of his origin or his poverty. When consulted
 
 ANECDOTES. 163 
 
 with regard to the incidents of his early life, he remarked, 
 ' You can find the whole of my early life in a single line 
 of Gray's Elegy, 
 
 1 The short and simple annals of the poor.' " 
 
 Carpenter, the artist, has contributed to the " Xew- 
 York Independent" several chapters of reminiscences 
 of Mr. Lincoln, from which the following is taken: 
 
 SHAKSPEARE. Something was said about the play of 
 " Hamlet." Mr. Lincoln waked up with the mention of 
 the theme, and soon after said, and I have often 
 thought of his words with a sad interest since his own 
 assassination, " There is one passage of the play of 
 ' Hamlet ' which is very apt to be slurred over by 
 the actor, or omitted altogether, which seems to me the 
 choicest part of the play. It is," he went on to say, 
 " the soliloquy of the king after the murder. It always 
 struck me as one of the finest touches of nature in the 
 world." . . . 
 
 Remaining in thought for a few moments, he con- 
 tinued: 
 
 " The opening of the play of ' King Richard the Third ' 
 seems to me often entirely misapprehended. It is quite 
 common for an actor to come upon the stage, and, in a 
 sophomorical style, to begin with a flourish : 
 
 1 Now is the winter of our discontent 
 Made glorious summer by this sun of York, 
 And all the clouds that lowered upon our house 
 In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.' 
 
 Now," said he, " this is all wrong. Richard, you remem 
 her, had been, and was then, plotting the destruction of 
 his brothers, to make room for himself. Outwardly the 
 most loyal to the newly crowned king, secretly he could
 
 164 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 scarcely contain his impatience at the obstacles still in 
 the way of his own elevation. He appears upon the 
 stage, just after the crowning of Edward, burning with 
 repressed hate and jealousy. The prologue is the utter- 
 ance of the most intense bitterness and satire." 
 
 Then, unconsciously assuming the character, Mr. Lin- 
 coln repeated, also from memory, Richard's soliloquy, 
 rendering it with a degree of force and power that made 
 it seem like a new creation to me. Though familiar with 
 the passage from boyhood, I can truly say that never till 
 that moment had I fully appreciated its spirit. I could 
 not refrain from laying down my palette and brushes, 
 and applauding the President heartily upon bis conclu- 
 sion, saying at the same time, half in earnest, that " I 
 was not sure but that he had made a mistake in the 
 choice of a profession," considerably, as may be ima- 
 gined, to his amusement. 
 
 A PRESIDENTIAL MESSAGE. It will be remembered 
 that an extra session of Congress was called in July fol- 
 lowing Mr. Lincoln's inauguration. In the message then 
 sent in, speaking of secession, and the measures taken 
 by the Southern leaders to bring it about, there occurs 
 the following remark : " With rebellion thus sugar- 
 coated, they have been drugging the public mind of 
 their section for more than thirty years, until at length 
 they have brought many good men to a willingness 
 to take up arms against the Government," &c. Mr. De 
 Frees, the Government printer, told me, that, when the 
 message was being printed, he was a good deal dis- 
 turbed by the use of the term " sugar-coated," and finally 
 went to the President about it. Their relations to each 
 other being of the most intimate character, he told Mr. 
 Lincoln frankly that he ought to remember that a mes- 
 sage to Congress was a different affair from a speech at
 
 ANECDOTES. 165 
 
 ft mass-meeting in Illinois ; that the messages became a 
 part of history, and should be written accordingly. 
 
 " What is the matter now ? " inquired the President. 
 
 " Why," said Mr. De Frees, " you have used an undig- 
 nified expression in the message ; " and then, reading 
 the paragraph aloud, he added, "I would alter the struc- 
 ture of that if I were you." 
 
 "De Frees," replied Mr. Lincoln, " that word expresses 
 precisely my idea, and I am not going to change it. The 
 time will never corne in this country when the people 
 won't know exactly what sugar-coated means 1 " 
 
 The following anecdote was related by President Lin- 
 coln with great effect, and proves that he well under- 
 stood the deadly nature of the great conflict to come: 
 
 " ' I once knew,' he said, ' a good sound churchman, 
 whom we will call Brown, who was in a committee to 
 erect a bridge over a very dangerous and rapid river. 
 Architect after architect failed ; and, at last, Brown said 
 he had a friend named Jones, who had built several 
 bridges, and could build this. " Let us have him in," said 
 the committee. In came Jones. " Can you build this 
 bridge, sir?" "Yes," replied Jones, "I could build a 
 bridge to the infernal regions if necessary." The sober 
 committee were horrified. But, when Jones retired, 
 Brown thought it but fair to defend his friend. " I know 
 Jones so well," said he, " he is so honest a man, and so 
 good an architect, that, if he states soberly and positive- 
 ly that he can build a bridge to Hades, why, I believe it ; 
 but I have my doubts about the abutment on the in- 
 fornal side." So,' Mr. Lincoln added, ' when politicians 
 said they could harmonize the Northern and Southern 
 wings of the democracy, why, I believed them; but I 
 had my doubts about the abutment on the Southern 
 side.'"* 
 
 * Rev. Johi- S. C. Abbott's " History of the Civil W*.*
 
 166 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 The following is a characteristic short sermon, which, 
 it is stated, President Lincoln was in the habit of preach- 
 ing to his children : 
 
 " Don't drink, don't smoke, don't chew, don't swear, 
 don't gamble, don't lie, don't cheat ; love your fellow-men 
 as well as God; love truth, love virtue, and be happy !"
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 CHBISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 
 
 " Be good, sweet friend, and let who will be clever ; 
 
 Do noble deeds, not dream them all day long; 
 And so make life, death, and that vast Forever, 
 One grand, sweet song." 
 
 REV. CHARLES KLNGSLET. 
 
 " The law of truth was In his mouth, and iniquity was not found In his lips." - 
 MALACHI ii. 6. 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN was a Christian ; but no p'articular 
 branch of Zion can claim him. He belongs to that uni- 
 versal Church of which Christ alone is head, and all 
 whose members are imbued with their Master's spirit. 
 Under different names, or perhaps, like him, with no 
 denominational rank at all, the great souls that delight to 
 do good, and desire to live and act for the honor of God, 
 are moving forward at the command of one Leader, and 
 to one grand destiny. These are the world's workers. 
 Imbued with Christ's spirit of self-sacrificing love, they 
 act as if, like him, they came to earth, " not to be minis- 
 tered unto, but to minister." And who shall deny them 
 a place amid God's elect, or shut against them at last 
 the door of heaven ? It is not so much creed as life that 
 is to be weighed in the unerring scales of God's justice. 
 A man may profess to have a pure and noble creed, but 
 in daily deeds contradict it; and a man may have a 
 warped and narrow view of truth, and yet his life be 
 broader and better than his creed. But, generally, " as 
 a man thiiiketh, so is he." Men are biassed by their reli- 
 gious views and opinions ; and he who has profuundest 
 
 W
 
 168 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 faith in things unseen is most likely to labor assiduously 
 in doing God's will amid the things that are seen and 
 temporal. 
 
 Thus did our martyred President. He never joined 
 a church, because, as he said, he found difficulty in giv- 
 ing his assent, without mental reservation, to the long 
 complicated statements of Christian doctrine which 
 characterize their Articles of Belief, and Confessions of 
 Faith. 
 
 " When any church," he continued, " will inscribe over 
 its altar, as its sole qualification for membership, the 
 Saviour's condensed statement of the substance of both 
 law and gospel, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God 
 with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy 
 mind, and thy neighbor as thyself,' that church will I join 
 with all my heart and all my soul." 
 
 The President was a great reader of the Bible. The 
 last photograph taken of him represents him reading 
 that blessed volume, with little Thaddeus standing at 
 his side. 
 
 Rev. W. M. Thayer says of him in his youth, " For a 
 boy of his age, he was excelled by few in his acquaint- 
 ance with the Scriptures. The Bible, catechism, and the 
 old spelling-book named, being the only books in the 
 family at this time, and there being no papers, either 
 religious or secular, the Bible was read much more than 
 it would have been if other volumes had been possessed. 
 . . . That same Bible is still in the possession of a rela- 
 tive in the State, of Illinois." 
 
 As long as he lived, the President valued the Best of 
 Books. One who knew him intimately says, " The Bible 
 was a very familiar study with the President '; whole
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 169 
 
 chapters of Isaiah, the New Testament, and the Psalms, 
 being fixed in his memory : and he would sometimes 
 correct a misquotation of Scripture, giving generally the 
 chapter and verse where it could be found. He liked 
 the Old Testament best, and dwelt on the simple beauty 
 of the historical books. Once, speaking of his own age 
 and strength, he quoted with admiration that passage, 
 1 His eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated.' I 
 do not know that he thought then, how, like that Moses 
 of old, he was to stand on Pisgah, and see a peaceful 
 laud which he was not to enter." * It has been said that 
 the President was in the habit of rising early, and spend- 
 ing an hour in the reading of the Scriptures, and prayer. 
 It would be well if all in authority would imitate an ex- 
 ample so good and salutary : then might we hope that 
 our nation would speedily become " one whose God is 
 the Lord," and be" evermore a " praise in the earth." f 
 
 Shaping his life-course by the chart, which, emanating 
 from God himself, cannot be imperfect, the President 
 was always a temperate man. 
 
 " Through his whole life he remained the advocate of 
 temperance. He regretted the intemperance that ex- 
 isted in the army. In reply to a delegation of the Sons 
 
 * " Harpers' Monthly," July, 1865. 
 
 t Like Daniel Webster, Byron, and other writers, Lincoln drew largely on 
 the Bible for illustration. He sakl to a friend, that "many years ago, when 
 the custom of lecture-giving was more common than since, he was induced to 
 try his hand at composing a literary lecture, something which he thought 
 entirely out of his line. The subject, he said, was not defined; but his purpose 
 was to analyze inventions and discoveries, " to get at the bottom of things," 
 and to show when, where, how, and why such things were invented or discov- 
 ered; and, so far as possible, to find where the rirst mention is made of some 
 uncommon things. The Bible,, he s.-JiW, he fcm.tu.1 to be, the richest ttorehotut for 
 such knowledge ; and he then gave one or 'wo illustrations which were new to 
 his hearers. The lecture was naver finished, and was left among his loos* 
 papers at Springfield when he came to Washington." * 
 
 * " Harpers' Monthly."
 
 170 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 of Temperance on this subject, he said, in substance, 
 that " when he was a young man, long ago, before the 
 Sons of Temperance, as an organization, had an existence, 
 he, in a humble way, made temperance speeches ; and 
 he thought he might say, that, to this day, he had never> 
 by his example, belied what he then said. As to the 
 suggestions for the purpose of the advancement of the 
 cause of temperance in the army, he could not respond 
 to them. To prevent intemperance in the army is the 
 aim of a great part of the rules and articles of war. It 
 is a part of the law of the land, and was so, he presumed, 
 long ago, to dismiss officers for drunkenness. He was not 
 sure, that, consistently with the public service, more 
 could be done than has been done. All, therefore, he 
 could promise, was to have a copy of the address sub- 
 mitted to the principal departments, and have it consid- 
 ered whether it contains any suggestions which will im- 
 prove the cause of temperance and repress drunkenness 
 in the army any better than is already done. He thought 
 the reasonable men of the world have long since agreed 
 that drunkenness is one of the greatest, if not the very 
 greatest, of all evils among mankind. That is not a mat- 
 ter of dispute. All men agree that intemperance is a 
 great curse, but differ about the cure."* 
 
 One more extract only from Mr. Thayer's testimonial 
 to the great and good man. He says that a friend of Mr. 
 Lincoln, who had known him as a neighbor for many 
 years, writes thus to him : " I have known him long and 
 well; and I can say in truth, I think (take him altogether) 
 he is the best man I ever saw. Although he has never 
 made a public profession of religion, I nevertheless be- 
 lieve that he has the fear of God before his eyes, and that 
 he goes daily to a throne of grace, and asks wisdom, light, 
 
 " President's Worjs," p. JQ3-
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 171 
 
 and knowledge to enable him faithfully to discharge his 
 duties." 
 
 Bishop Simpson thus testifies of the departed Chief 
 Magistrate : " Abraham Lincoln was a good man. He 
 was known as an honest, temperate, forgiving man; a 
 just man ; a man of noble heart in every way. . . . 
 
 " As a ruler, I doubt if any President has ever shown 
 such trust in God, or, in public documents, so frequently 
 referred to divine aid. Often did he remark to friends 
 and to delegations, that his hope for our success rested in 
 his conviction that God would bless our efforts because 
 we were trying to do right. To the address of a large 
 religious body, he replied, ' Thanks be unto God, who, 
 in our national trials, giveth us the churches.' To a 
 minister, who said he hoped the Lord was on our side, he 
 replied that it gave him no concern whether the Lord 
 was on our side or not: 'For,' he added, 'I know the 
 Lord is always on the side of right ; ' and with deep feel- 
 ing added, ' But God is my witness that it is my constant 
 anxiety and prayer that both myself and this nation 
 should be on the Lord's side.' " 
 
 The following incident must not be omitted in this 
 mention of the President's Christian words and deeds. 
 During the visit of Mr. Lincoln to New York in 1860, he 
 visited a mission-school at the Five-Points' House of In- 
 dustry. The teacher thus narrates the circumstance : 
 
 " Our Sunday school in the Five Points was assembled 
 one Sabbath morning, when I noticed a tall, remarkable- 
 looking man enter the room, and take a seat among us. 
 He listened with fixed attention to our exercises; and his 
 countenance expressed such genuine interest, that I ap- 
 proached him, and suggested that he might be willing to 
 say something to the children. He accepted the invita- 
 tion with evident pleasure ; and, coming forward, begau
 
 172 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 a simple address, which at once fascinated every little 
 hearer, and hushed the room into silence. His language 
 was strikingly beautiful, and his tones musical with in- 
 tensest feeling. The little faces around him would droop 
 into sad conviction as he uttered sentences of warning, 
 and would lighten into sunshine as he spoke cheerful 
 words of promise. Once or twice he attempted to close 
 his remarks ; but the imperative shout of 'Go on 1 oh, 
 do go on ! ' would compel him to resume. As I looked 
 upon the gaunt and sinewy frame of the stranger, and 
 marked his powerful head and determined features, now 
 touched into softness by the impressions of the moment, 
 I felt an irrepressible curiosity to learn something more 
 about him ; and when he was quietly leaving the room, I 
 begged to know his name. He courteously replied, ' It is 
 Abraham Lincoln, from Illinois.' " 
 
 Thus did the future President spend a portion of his 
 Sabbath, while absent from his home, in a distant city ; 
 and thus, in doing and getting good, would he have 
 others keep the Sabbath. His deep and earnest rever- 
 ence for Christianity is seen in the following official 
 paper, issued on the 16th of November, 1862: 
 
 " The President, Commander-in-chief of the Army and 
 Navy, desires and enjoins the orderly observance of the 
 Sabbath by the officers. and men in the military and naval 
 service. The importance for man and beast of the pre- 
 scribed weekly rest, the sacred rights of Christian soldiers 
 and sailors, a becoming deference to the best sentiment 
 of a Christian people, and a due regard for the divine 
 will, demand that Sunday labor in the army and navy be 
 reduced to the measure of strict necessity. 
 
 " The discipline and character of the national forces 
 should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be imperilled, 
 by the profanation of the day or name of the Most High,
 
 CBRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 173 
 
 'At this time of public distress/ adopting the woids of 
 Washington in 1776, ' men may find enough to do in the 
 service of God and their country, without abandoning 
 themselves to vice and immorality.' The first general 
 order issued by the Father of his Country after the 
 Declaration of Independence indicates the spirit in which 
 our institutions were founded, and should ever be de- 
 fended : ' The General hopes and trusts that every offi- 
 cer and man will endeavor to live and act as becomes a 
 Christian soldier defending the dearest rights and liber- 
 ties of his country.' 
 
 "ABRAHAM LINCOLN." 
 
 Among the kindly and appreciative words of the 
 amiable President may be found his brief speech on the 
 18th March, 1864, at the close of the successful fair held 
 in the Patent Office in Washington. It was as follows: 
 
 "LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, I appear to say but a word. 
 This extraordinary war in which we are engaged falls 
 heavily upon all classes of people, but the most heavily 
 upon the soldier. For it has been said, all that a man 
 hath will he give for his life ; and, while all contribute of 
 their substance, the soldier puts his life at stake, and 
 often yields it up in his country's cause. The highest 
 merit, then, is due to the soldier. 
 
 " In this extraordinary war, extraordinary develop- 
 ments have manifested themselves, such as have not 
 been seen in former wars ; and, among these manifesta- 
 tions, nothing has been more remarkable than these fairs 
 for the relief of suffering soldiers and their families. 
 And the chief agents in these fairs are the women of 
 America. I am not accustomed to the use of the lan- 
 guage of eulogy ; I have never studied the art of paying 
 compliments to women : but I must say, that if all that
 
 l?4 AKn Alt AM 
 
 has been said by orators and poets, since the creation ol 
 the world, in praise of women, were applied to the women 
 of America, it would not do them justice for their con- 
 duct during this war. I will close by saying, God bless 
 the women of America ! " 
 
 Again: just before he wrote the immortal proclama- 
 tion, he said, " Do not misunderstand me : ... I have 
 not decided against a proclamation of liberty to the 
 slaves, but hold the matter under advisement. And I 
 can assure you that the subject is on my mind, by day 
 and night, more than any other. Whatever shall appear 
 to be God's will, I will do." * 
 
 And yet again : in words of living faith he says, " If we 
 have patience, if we restrain ourselves, if we allow our- 
 selves not to run off in a passion, I still have confidence 
 that the Almighty, the Maker of the universe, will, 
 through the instrumentality of this great and intelligent 
 people, bring us through this, as he has through all the 
 other difficulties of our country." f This was said in 
 1861. In 1864, the President's faith was lost in sight. 
 
 See the modesty of our late President in his own rec- 
 ord of his life, furnished for a " Dictionary of Congress.'* 
 
 Born Feb. 12, 1809, in Ilardin County, Ky. 
 
 " Education defective. 
 
 " Profession, a lawyer. Have been a captain of volun- 
 teers in the Black-Hawk War. 
 
 " Postmaster at a very small office. Four times a mem- 
 ber of the Illinois Legislature, and was a member of 
 the lower house of Congress. 
 
 " Yours, &c.j " A. LINCOLN." 
 
 H^re is the record of an act of kindness, from the pen 
 of a West^n editor : 
 
 " President Words," p. 118. t Ibid.
 
 WORDS Atft) DEEbS. if5 
 
 " I dropped in upon Mr. Lincoln on Monday last, and 
 found him busily engaged in counting green-backs. 
 ' This, sir,' said he, ' is something out of my usual line : 
 but a President of the United States has a multiplicity 
 of duties not specified in the Constitution, or Acts of 
 Congress ; this is one of them. This money belongs to 
 a poor negro, who is a porter in one of the depart- 
 ments (the Treasury), and who is at present very sick 
 with the small-pox. He is now in the hospital, and could 
 not draw his pay because he could not sign his name. 1 
 have been at considerable trouble to overcome the dif- 
 ficulty, and get it for him; and have at length succeeded 
 in cutting red tape, as you newspaper-men say. I am 
 now dividing the money, and putting by a portion, 
 labelled in an envelope with my own hands, according 
 to his wish." * 
 
 An English clergyman said in his eulogy, " One or two 
 illustrations of his personal kindness have just come to 
 my knowledge through a friend who has recently re- 
 turned from the United States. This gentleman told me 
 that he was one day conversing with the general in com- 
 mand of one of the armies, on the subject of desertion; 
 when the general said, ' The first week of my command, 
 there were twenty-four deserters sentenced by court-mar- 
 tial to be shot; and the warrants for their execution 
 were sent to the President to be signed : he refused. I 
 went to Washington, and had an interview. I said, 'Mr. 
 President, unless these men are made an example of, the 
 army itself is in danger. Mercy to the few is cruelty to 
 the many.' He replied, 'Mr. General, there are already 
 too many weeping widows in the United States. For 
 God's sake, don't ask me to add to the number; for I 
 
 " Chicago Tribune."
 
 176 A&RABAM LINCOLN. 
 
 won't do it.' A young sentry was found asleep on his 
 post: he was sentenced to be shot; but the President 
 came into camp, and granted the earnest petition of the 
 lad. The dead body of that youth was afterwards found 
 among the slain on the field of Fredericksburg ; and un- 
 der his waistcoat, next to his breast, was a photograph of 
 the President, beneath which the lad had written, ' God 
 bless President Lincoln ! ' Many similar incidents might 
 be cited to show how tender-hearted he was, and how 
 deeply he was beloved by multitudes who have received 
 from him personal marks of kindness." 
 
 At the time when the young soldier above mentioned 
 was under sentence of death, " Carleton" (C. C. Coffin), 
 of the " Journal," was in Washington. He became con- 
 vinced that the case was one deserving pardon ; that the 
 young man had been kept awake too long, and was not 
 desirous of failing in duty, but was absolutely over- 
 powered by fatigue. On the evening preceding the day 
 when he was to be shot, Mr. Coffin called on a Presby- 
 terian pastor, Rev. Mr. Smith, and found that he had 
 retired to his bed, sick on account of the approaching 
 doom for one whom he also deemed innocent. He rose, 
 and, proceeding to the parlor, told " Carleton " that he 
 heard the President had " made up his mind " to have 
 the young man executed, and forbade all admittance to 
 those who would plead for him : so the clergyman had 
 been asking for deliverance of One whose ear is ever 
 open. The two proceeded to the White House, were 
 denied admittance to the President, but wrote a note 
 to him, begging the young man's life, which the President 
 consented to receive ; and they left the White House 
 ignorant of the result. The next day the pardon was
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 177 
 
 announced ; and two hearts at least were happy at the 
 news, though they could not know how far they had 
 been instrumental in securing the pardon. One thing 
 they knew, that the President was as glad to pardon 
 as they to hear of it. 
 
 The following is from a newspaper correspondent, 
 and shows the President's appreciation of their efforts 
 who fought bravely for their country : 
 
 " That night I left the fortress, and got Worden safe 
 home in Washington City ; when, leaving him to the care 
 of my wife, I went with the Secretary to the President, 
 and gave him the particulars of the engagement. As soon 
 as I had done, Mr. Lincoln said, ' Gentlemen, I am going 
 to shake hands with that man;' and presently he walked 
 round with me to our little house. I led him up stairs to 
 the room where Worden was lying with fresh bandages 
 over his scorched eyes and face, and said, 'Jack, here's 
 the President, who has come to see you.' He raised 
 himself on his elbow as Mr. Lincoln took him by the hand, 
 and said, * You do me great honor, Mr. President ; and I 
 am only sorry that I can't see you.' The President was 
 visibly affected, as, with tall frame and earnest gaze, he 
 bent over his wounded subordinate ; but, after a pause, 
 he said, with a quiver in the tone of his voice, 'You have 
 done me more honor, sir, than I can ever do to you.' He 
 then sat down, while Worden gave him an account of the 
 battle; and, on leaving, he promised, if he could legally 
 do so, that he would make him a captain." 
 
 President Lincoln was accustomed to visit the hospit- 
 als, and speak kind words to the sick and wounded sol- 
 diers. True charity is shown not only in almsgiving, 
 but in kind words and pleasant smiles ; and many a poor 
 12
 
 178 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 soldier-boy, far away from home and dear ones whom he 
 longs to see, has been cheered by beholding the Presi- 
 dent's tall form enter the crowded hospital, and, with a 
 manner showing his fatherly interest, pass around among 
 his " boys," as he called them. They called him " Uncle 
 
 VISIT TO A HOSl'lTAL. 
 
 Abe;" and one such visit from him, in whose countenance 
 they could read the real interest he felt for them, was 
 enough to bind their loyal hearts still more firmly to him, 
 and to the cause which he represented. More than one 
 bereaved family to-day blesses the memory of Abraham 
 Lincoln as they remember how -he cheered in his hour 
 of sickness, and even, it might be, beneath the shadow- 
 ing wing of the death-angel, the dear soldier-boy whom 
 they gave to their country. 
 
 President Lincoln declares plainly, and in so doing 
 manifests his own faith in God, that a power beyond 
 himself led to many of the wisest acts of his administra 
 fcion. In the letter to A. G. Hodges, where he speaks
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 170 
 
 of his course in regard to slavery, saying, " Whsn, early 
 in the war, Gen. Fremont attempted military emanci- 
 pation, I forbade it, because I did not then think it an 
 indispensable necessity; when, a little later, Gen. Cam- 
 eron, then Secretary of War, suggested the arming of 
 the blacks, I then objected, because I did not yet think 
 it an indispensable necessity ; when, stHl later, Gen. 
 Hunter attempted military emancipation, I again forbade 
 it, because I did not yet think the indispensable neces- 
 sity had come," &c, he concludes with these words, 
 concerning the most Christian deed of his whole life : 
 
 "I claim not to have controlled events, but confess 
 plainly that events have controlled me. Now, at the. end 
 of three years' struggle, the nation's condition is not what 
 either party or any man desired or expected. God 
 alone can claim it. Whither it is tending seems plain. 
 If God now wills the removal of a great wrong, and 
 wills also that we of the North, as well as you of the 
 South, shall pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong, 
 impartial history will find therein new cause to attest 
 and review the justice and goodness of God." 
 
 No place may be more fitting, perhaps, than this chap- 
 ter, for those words spoken at Gettysburg, Nov. 19, 1863, 
 which indicate so plainly his deep appreciation of that 
 patriotism which was willing to die for country and God, 
 and which reveal the tenderness of his spirit. They 
 are as follows : 
 
 "Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought 
 forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in lib- 
 erty, 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 nation so con- 
 ceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met 
 on a great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedi-
 
 ISO AJIRAIIAM LINCOLN. 
 
 cate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those 
 who here gave their lives that a nation might live. It is 
 altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. 
 
 "But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot 
 consecrate, we cannot hallow, this ground. The brave 
 men, living or dead, who struggled here, have conse- 
 crated it far above any power to add or detract. The 
 world will little note, nor long remember, what we say 
 here ; but it can never forget what they did here. It is 
 for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the un- 
 finished work that they have thus far so nobly carried 
 on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great 
 task remaining before us, that from these honored dead 
 we take increased devotion to the cause for which they 
 here highly resolved that the dead shall not have died in 
 vain; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth 
 of freedom ; and that the government of the people, by 
 the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the 
 earth." 
 
 It is well known that the President was fond of a poem 
 entitled 
 
 " Oh! why should the spirit of mortal be proud? " 
 
 It is a poem, a love for which indicates a spirit of true hu- 
 mility on the part of one who prefers it. Mr. Carpenter 
 a} T s, "The circumstances under which this copy was 
 written are these : I was with the President alone one 
 evening in his room, during the time I was painting my 
 (arge picture at the White House last year. He presently 
 threw aside his pen and papers, and began to talk to me 
 of Shakspeare. He sent little 'Tad/ his son, into the 
 library to bring a copy of the plays, and then read to me 
 several of his favorite passages, showing genuine appre- 
 ciation of the great poet Relapsing into a sadder strain,
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 181 
 
 he laid his book aside, and, leaning back in his chair, said, 
 ' There's a poem which has been a great favorite with 
 me for years, which was first shown to me, when a young 
 man, by a friend, and which I afterwards saw, and cut 
 from a newspaper, and learned by heart. I would,' he 
 continued, ' give a great deal to know who wrote it ; but 
 I have never been able to ascertain.' " 
 
 Then, half closing his eyes, he repeated to me the lines 
 which I enclose to you. Greatly pleased and interested, 
 I told him I would like, if ever an opportunity occurred, 
 to write them down. He said he would some time try to 
 give them to me. A few days afterward, he asked me to 
 accompany him to the temporary studio of Mr. Swayne, 
 the sculptor, who was making a bust of him at the 
 Treasury Department. While he was sitting for the bust, 
 I was suddenly reminded of the poem, and said to him 
 that THEN would be a good time to dictate to me. He 
 complied ; and sitting upon some books at his feet, as 
 nearly as I can remember, 1 wrote the lines down, one 
 by one, as they fell from his lips." 
 
 The first stanza reads thus : 
 
 " Oh ! why should the spirit of mortal be proud? 
 Like a fast-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud, 
 A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, 
 He passes from life to his rest in the grave." 
 
 The closing stanza is as follows : 
 
 " 'Tis the twink of an eye, 'tis the draught of a breath, 
 From the blossom of health to the paleness of death, 
 From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud: 
 Oh! why should the spirit of mortal be proud? " 
 
 There may well be added to this chapter the following 
 letter written by the President to Mrs. Eliza P. Gurney, 
 an American lady, the widow of the late well-known
 
 182 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 Friend and philanthropist, Joseph John Gurney, one of 
 the wealthiest bankers of London : 
 
 " MY ESTEEMED FRIEND, I have not forgotten, prob- 
 ably never shall forget, the very impressive occasion 
 when yourself and friends visited me on a sabbath fore- 
 noon two years ago. Nor had your kind letter, written 
 nearly a year later, ever been forgotten. In all it has 
 been your purpose to strengthen my reliance in God. I 
 am much indebted to the good Christian people of the 
 country for their constant prayers and consolations, and 
 to no one of them more than to yourself. The purposes 
 of the Almighty are perfect and must prevail, though we 
 erring mortals may fail accurately to perceive them in 
 advance. We hoped for a happy termination of this 
 terrible war long before this ; but God knows best, and 
 has ruled otherwise. We shall yet acknowledge his wis- 
 dom and our own errors therein : meanwhile, we must 
 work earnestly in the best lights he gives us, trusting 
 that so working still conduces to the great end he or- 
 dains. Surely he intends some great good to follow 
 this mighty commotion, which no mortal could make, and 
 no mortal could stay. 
 
 " Your people, the Friends, have had, and are having, 
 very great trials, on principles and faith opposed to both 
 war and oppression. They can only practically oppose 
 oppression by war. In this hard dilemma, some have 
 chosen one horn, and some the other. 
 
 " For those appealing to me on conscientious grounds, 
 I have done, and shall do, the best I could and can, in 
 my own conscience, under my oath to the law. That 
 you believe this, I doubt not ; and, believing it, I shall 
 still receive for our country and myself your earnost 
 prayer to our Father in heaven. 
 
 " Your sincere friend, 
 
 "A. LINCOLN."
 
 CHRISTIAN WORDS AND DEEDS. 183 
 
 In closing this record of the Christian words and deeds 
 of our late President, it may be well to add that many 
 more incidents might be given, did the limits of this vol- 
 ume allow. Enough has been given to show, that, what- 
 ever his peculiar belief on religious topics of a doctrinal 
 character, at heart and in his life he was a child of God, 
 and " lived religion" 
 
 " For modes of faith, let graceless zealots fight: 
 His can't be wrong whose life is in the right." * 
 
 President Lincoln's life was right. He was ever giv- 
 ing the cup of cold water ; and, verily, he shall receive 
 a righteous man's reward. 
 
 * Pope's " Essay on Man."
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 CHOSEN AGAIN. 
 
 44 Not lightly fall beyond recall 
 
 The written scrolls a breath can float: 
 The crowning fact, the kingliest act 
 Of freedom, is the freeman's vote. 
 
 So shall our voice of sovereign choice 
 
 Swell the deep bass of duty done, 
 And strike the key of time to be, 
 
 When God and man shall speak as one." 
 
 WHtTTIER. 
 
 " But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way, for he is a chosen vessel unto me; 
 , . . for 1 will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake." 
 ACTS ix. 15, 16. 
 
 IN the sixth chapter, the course pursued by the Presi- 
 dent during the troublous times in which he governed 
 was traced up to a certain point; though, designedly, 
 not as minutely as a history of those times would re- 
 quire. The succeeding chapters have had reference 
 more particularly to the man whom God gave to those 
 times. Reference will now be had, briefly, to the course 
 of events. These were of various character ; sometimes 
 bright with victor} 7 , sometimes shadowed with defeat. 
 
 " The ten months which divide the fall of Fort Donel- 
 son (Feb. 1C, 1862) from the battle of Fredericksburg 
 (Dec. 13, 1862) constitute the depressing era of military 
 uncertainty. Administrative ability, executive resolu- 
 tion and hardihood, were never more impressively dis- 
 played than during this disheartening period ; but, in 
 spite of it, inconstant victory seemed to vibrate between 
 the hostile banners. 
 
 184
 
 CHOSEN AGAIN. 185 
 
 " The encouraging results of luka and Corinth, and the 
 opening of the Upper Mississippi, inspired the national 
 heart with new confidence in the protection of Heaven 
 and in the heroism of our Western soldiers. Brave old 
 Farragut earns the grade of Admiral," and the sobriquet 
 Salamander, by leading his thundering armada through the 
 feu d'enfer which belched from Fort Philip on the right, 
 and Fort Jackson on the left ; and the martial and finan- 
 cial heart of the Rebellion in the South-west is palsied 
 when the guns of his fleet sweep the streets of New Or- 
 leans, and the Tamer of Cities hangs up its scalp in his 
 wigwam. War surges and resurges over the devoted 
 plains of Missouri and Arkansas. The Peninsular cam- 
 paign, with its checkered fortunes, alternately excites 
 exultation and wailing; but its final failure plants in ths 
 national heart the seeds of despair, while the whirlwind 
 which devours the army of Pope constrains us to doubt 
 the justice of God. The victories of South Mountain 
 and Antietam, fairly costing their weight in gore, and 
 turning to ashes in our grasp, failed to re-animate our 
 hopes ; while Pittsburg Landing and Shiloh are more 
 than counterpoised by the heart-rending butchery of 
 Fredericksburg. . . . The definitive proclamation was 
 promulged on the first of January, 1863 ; and it seems 
 instantly to have been visited with that ' gracious favor ' 
 which it so reverently implores. From that eventfu' 
 date, Federal ascendency flows surely and steadily on to 
 the capture of Richmond and the surrender of Lee. Re- 
 verses and checks, it is true, intervene ; but they are 
 only eddies in the Amazon. During these twenty-seven 
 controlling months of the war, into which more general 
 engagements were crowded than into any equal period 
 of the world's history, the loss of but one attests the 
 advent of higher inspiration and divine re-enforcement
 
 186 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 to our struggling cause. The ink with which the 
 proclamation is written is scarcely dry upon the parch- 
 ment before the decisive victory of Murfreesborough ex- 
 pels invasion from Southern Tennessee. On the nation's 
 birthday which next follows it, propitious Heaven almost 
 visibly interfered by breaking the last barrier which 
 prevents the ' loyal Father of Waters ' from flowing free 
 and unobstructed through the divided Rebellion, and by 
 sweeping back from the bristling hills of Gettysburg 
 the army of the alien in its last desperate raid into the 
 bosom of the North. Away up in mid air, on the cloud- 
 capped crests of the South-eastern Alleghanies, there is 
 the roar and lurid flame of battle, as if the pent-up fires 
 of the caverns of earth were bursting from their thun- 
 der-riven summits; while down, down in the deep valley, 
 it seems as if the elements of Nature were battering 
 chasms arid pathways through their granite foundations. 
 The gates of Georgia yield to the flushed battalions of 
 the Cumberland; and, from the Altamaha to Cape Fear, 
 three great States of the Confederacy soon 
 
 " Feel the rider's tread, 
 And know the conquered knee." 
 
 Hood is hurled by his infatuated chieftain against the 
 battlements of Nashville, only to be dashed back broken 
 and destroyed. The vale of the Shenandoah is swept 
 by the besom and scourged by the wrath of Sheridan. 
 Over the forest which sweeps from the Rapidan to the 
 James, there hangs, in early spring-time, a dark and por- 
 tentous cloud : the Wilderness is red, as if untimely au- 
 tumn had purpled its foliage. We dimly hear, far in its 
 resounding depths, that awe-inspiring roll, that sharp, 
 suggestive rattle, which forewarns and terrifies na-
 
 CHOSRtf AGAIN. 187 
 
 tions ; and ever and anon a woe-begone messenger, 
 such as 
 
 ' Drew Priam's curtain at the dead of night, 
 And told him half his Troy was buried,' 
 
 breaks from the sequestered thicket, with a tantalizing 
 tale of the fierce, sanguinary, but indecisive shock and 
 recoil of embattled hosts. What weeks of heartrending 
 surprise ! But finally, from the saturnalia of death and 
 butchery, long rampant in its sombre and haunted re- 
 cesses, he of the iron will and inflexible tenacity at 
 length emerges in the resplendent robes of victory, and 
 day after day for persistent months, unmoved by clamor, 
 undismayed by failure, unwearied by resistance, slowly 
 tightens an irresistible coil round the wailing capital of 
 sin, until, faint and gasping, it falls into the arms of a 
 negro brigade. City after city, harbor after harbor, suc- 
 cumb. The coast is hermetically sealed from Norfolk to 
 Galveston, and the magazines and arsenals of England 
 and France no longer pour their strengthening tides into 
 the decaying veins of the worn-out Confederacy. Sheri- 
 dan rolls up the Confederate right like a scroll, and hangs 
 on its flying flank with the scent of a hound and the 
 snap of a terrier. Lee surrenders his decimated horde ; 
 and over the old, endeared, precious inheritance, from 
 the Rappahanock to the Sabiue, up flies the banner, down 
 droops the rag." * 
 
 A more eloquent description of the events which 
 transpired from the dawn of freedom for an enfranchised 
 race, to the dawn of peace for a redeemed nation, could 
 scarcely be permed. And, all the while that these events 
 were transpiring, President Lincoln was sending up from 
 the White House his fervent prayers, and forth to our 
 
 Hon. H. C. Demhig.
 
 188 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 brave soldiers his earnest sympathy. All the while 
 the Government was upheld, and unfaltering hearts 
 kept close to the national flag, though it was torn and 
 gory. 
 
 " Is there an element of stress and pressure that could 
 be brought to bear on any Government that was not 
 brought to bear upon ours ? Confessedly there was a 
 stress upon it which no other Government could have 
 borne. Upon a people, all whose habits and interests 
 and tastes were those of peace, there was suddenly 
 sprung a war, and not merely that, but a civil war, and 
 one unprecedented in its gigantic proportions. Then at 
 a moment, and under circumstances of the greatest dis- 
 advantage, came the call for men; and they went. It 
 came for more and more, 'six hundred thousand more;' 
 and the men were ready. Next, and to a people always 
 charged with loving money over-much, came the call for 
 money ; and the money was ready. Taxes came in new 
 forms ; but not only were they paid, the people were 
 clamorous for them. Money was poured out like water, 
 and as never before, for bounties, as a loan to the Govern- 
 ment, for the Sanitary and Christian Commissions, for the 
 refugees and freedmen. Meantime battles were disas- 
 trous ; faint-heartedness, and even treason, were not 
 wanting in the North ; our English friends pronounced 
 our cause hopeless, and did what they could to make it 
 so ; homes were desolated ; the wounded and maimed 
 walked our streets, and the sickening wail of exposure 
 and starvation came up from Southern prisons. In the 
 midst of all this came a new and unheard-of trial, the 
 popular election of a Chief Magistrate by a great nation 
 in time of civil war. How solemn, how grand, how 
 quiet, how decisive, was that day 1 It was* the noblest
 
 GBOSBIT AGAIN. 189 
 
 triumph of the war, its turning-point, the turning- 
 point in the destiny of our country." * 
 
 The presidential election took place on the 8th of No- 
 vember, 1864, and resulted in the triumph of Mr. Lincoln 
 in every loyal State except Kentucky, New Jersey, and 
 Delaware. In some of the States, their soldiers in the 
 field were allowed to vote; and the military vote was 
 almost invariably cast for Lincoln and Johnson. The 
 official returns for the entire vote polled summed up 
 4,034,789. Of these, Mr. Lincoln received 2,223,035, and 
 McClellan received 1,811,754 ; leaving a majority of 411,- 
 281 on the popular vote. Mr. Lincoln was elected by a 
 plurality in 1860. In 1864, his majority was decided and 
 unmistakable. 
 
 At a late hour on the night of the election, the Presi- 
 dent was serenaded by a club of Pennsylvanians, and he 
 thus responded : 
 
 " FRIENDS AND FELLOW-CITIZENS, Even before I had 
 been informed by you that this compliment was paid me 
 by loyal citizens of Pennsylvania friendly to me, I had 
 inferred that you were of that portion of my countrymen 
 who think that the best interests of the nation are to be 
 subserved by the support of the present Administration. 
 I do not pretend to say that you who think so embrace 
 all the patriotism and loyalty of the country ; but I do 
 believe, and, I trust, without personal interest, that the 
 welfare of the country does require that such support 
 and indorsement be given. I earnestly believe that the 
 consequences of this day's work, if it be as you assume, 
 and as now seems probable, will be to the lasting advan- 
 tage, if not to the very salvation, of the country. I can- 
 
 * Bey. Mark Hopkins, D.D.
 
 190 A6nAffAM LTtfCOLtf. 
 
 not at this hour say what has been the result of tie 
 election ; but, whatever it may be, I have no desire to 
 modify this opinion, that all who have labored to-day in 
 behalf of the Union organization have wrought for the 
 best interest of their country and the world, not only for 
 the present, but for all future ages. I am thankful to God 
 for this approval of the people ; but, while deeply grate- 
 ful for this mark of their confidence in me, if I know my 
 heart, my gratitude is free from any taint of personal 
 triumph. I do not impugn the motives of any one 
 opposed to me. It is no pleasure to me to triumph over 
 any one ; but I give thanks to the Almighty for this evi- 
 dence of the people's resolution to stand by free govern- 
 ment and the rights of humanity." 
 
 On the 6th of December, 1864, the President sent to 
 Congress his usual annual message. How little any one 
 dreamed that it was his last I It spoke of unchanged 
 views in regard to the slave, and expressed a desire for 
 peace in these decisive words : " In stating a single con- 
 dition of peace, I mean simply to say that the war will 
 cease on the part of the Government whenever it shall 
 have ceased on the part of those who began it." 
 
 On his way to Washington to fill the chair of the Presi- 
 dent, Mr. Lincoln spoke at Steubenville of the fact, that, 
 if a President should adopt a wrong policy, the oppor- 
 tunity to condemn him would occur in four years' time : 
 " Then," he added, " I can be turned out, and a better 
 man, with better views, be put in my place." But the 
 people were satisfied. They, the majority, knew of no 
 better man ; and so he whom God had appointed took 
 the chair a second time. The following is his second 
 inaugural address : 
 
 " FELLOW-CITIZENS, At this second appearing to take 
 the oath of the presidential office there is less occasion
 
 CffOSEff AGATtf. 191 
 
 for an extended address than there was at first. Then a 
 statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued 
 seemed very Ctting and proper. Now, at the expiration 
 of four years, during which public declarations have been 
 constantly called forth on every point and place of the 
 great contest which still absorbs the attention, and en- 
 grosses the energies, of the nation, little that is new could 
 be presented. 
 
 " The progress of our arms upon which all else 
 chiefly depends is as well known to the public as to 
 myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and en- 
 couraging to all. With high hopes for the future, no pre- 
 diction in regard to it is ventured. 
 
 " On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago, 
 all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending 
 civil war. All dreaded it ; all sought to avoid it. While 
 the inaugural address was being delivered from this 
 place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without 
 war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to 
 destroy it without war, seeking to dissolve the Union, 
 and divide the effects by negotiation. 
 
 " 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. 
 
 " One-eighth of the whole population were colored 
 slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but 
 located in the Southern part of it. These slaves con- 
 stituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that 
 this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To 
 strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the 
 object for which the insurgents would rend the Union by 
 war, while the Government claimed no right to do more 
 than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it.
 
 192 AZRAffAAI LINCOLN. 
 
 " Neither party expected for the war the mignitude or 
 the duration which it has already attained. Neither an- 
 ticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease, 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 should not be answered. 
 That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty 
 has his own purposes. Woe unto the world because of 
 offences ! for it must needs be that offences come ; but 
 woe to that man by whom the offence cometh ! If we 
 shall suppose that American slavery is one of these 
 offences, which in the providence of God must needs 
 come, but which, having continued through his ap- 
 pointed time, he now wills to remove, and that he gives 
 to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due 
 to those by whom the offence came, shall we discern 
 there is any departure from those divine attributes 
 which the believers in a living God always ascribe to 
 him ? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that 
 this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. 
 Yet if God wills that it continue until all tho wealth 
 piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of 
 unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of 
 blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another 
 drawn by the sword, as was said three thousand years 
 ago, so still it must be said, the judgments of the Lord 
 are true and righteous altogether. 
 
 " With malice towards none, with charity for all. with
 
 CHOSEN AGAIN. 193 
 
 firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, 
 let us strive on to finish the work we are in ; to bind 
 up the nation's wound ; to care for him who shall have 
 borne the battle, and for his widow and orphans ; to do 
 all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting 
 peace among ourselves and with all nations." 
 
 We see the spirit which breathes in this inaugural, 
 and we cannot but love the memory of the man who 
 wrote it. 
 
 " The most unsparing criticism, denunciation, and ridi- 
 cule never moved him to a single bitter expression, 
 never seemed to awaken in him a single bitter thought. 
 The most exultant hour of party victory brought no ex- 
 ultation to him. He accepted power, not as an honor, but 
 as a responsibility ; and when, after' a severe struggle, 
 that power came a second time into his hands, there was 
 something preternatural in the calmness of his accept- 
 ance of it. The first impulse seemed to be a disclaimer 
 of all triumph over the party that had strained their ut- 
 most to push him from his seat, and then a sober girding- 
 up of his loins to go on with the work to which he was 
 appointed. 
 
 " The last inaugural was characterized by a tone so 
 peculiarly solemn, and free from earthly passion, that it 
 seems to us now, who look back on it in the light of what 
 followed, as if his soul had already parted from earthly 
 things, and felt the powers of the world to come. It was 
 not the formal State-paper of the chief of a party in an 
 hour of victory, so much as the solemn soliloquy of a 
 great soul reviewing its course under a vast responsi- 
 bility, and appealing from all earthly judgments to the 
 tribunal of Infinite Justice. It was the solemn clearing 
 of his soul for the great sacrament of death ; and the 
 
 13
 
 194 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 words that he quoted in it with such thrilling power 
 were those of the adoring spirits that veil their faces 
 before the throne : ' Just and true are thy ways, thou 
 King of saints.' " * 
 
 The course pursued by the President is indorsed by 
 the people in the act of continuing him in the office 
 which he had so faithfully filled. This was the laurel 
 wreath with which they crowned him as a conqueror, 
 little dreaming that the angels were already preparing 
 a garland of immortelles for the brow of the people's Pre- 
 sident, whose brightness and beauty would remain un 
 dimmed forever. 
 
 * Mrs. Stowe, in " Atlantic Monthly," August, 186.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 LAST DAYS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 
 
 " This Duncan 
 
 Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
 So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
 Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, a^ain-st 
 The deep damnation of his taking-off." 
 
 SHAKSPEARE'S Macbeth. 
 
 "Man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets." 
 ECCLES. xii. 5. 
 
 THE hour of triumph arrives. Victory no longer 
 hovers between the contending forces, but settles down 
 upon the standard of freedom. Grant and Sherman and 
 Sheridan have done their work bravely ; and they and 
 their fellow-warriors, officers and privates, have won im- 
 mortal honor; for " Richmond is ours !" Lee retreats! 
 Grant pursues ! The Confederate President is a flying 
 fugitive; and he whom God called to be the savior of a 
 race is to tread the streets of the conquered city, the 
 Babylon that had fallen I 
 
 " Carleton " * narrates in his own graphic style the 
 visit of the President to Richmond, calling it " one of the 
 memorable events of the week." He says, ' There was 
 no committee of reception, no guard of honor, no grand 
 display of troops, no assembling of an eager multitude to 
 welcome him. He entered the city unheralded. .Six 
 sailors, armed with carabines, stepped upon the shore, 
 followed by the President, who held his little son by the 
 hand; and Admiral Porter: the officers followed, and six 
 more sailors brought up the rear." 
 
 C. C. Ctffin, Esq., in " Atlantic Monthly " for June, 1866. 
 
 185
 
 196 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 Mr. Coffin himself was there, and speaks throughout as 
 an eye-witness : 
 
 " There were forty or fifty freedmen, who had been sole 
 possessors of themselves for twenty-four hours, at work 
 on the bank of the canal, securing some floating timber, 
 under the direction of a lieutenant. Somehow they ob- 
 tained the information that the man who was head and 
 shoulders taller than all others around him, with features 
 large and irregular, with a mild eye and pleasant coun- 
 tenance, was President Lincoln. 
 
 " ' God bless you, sah ! ' said one, taking off his cap, and 
 bowing very low. 
 
 " ' Hurrah, hurrah ! President Linkum hab come ! ' was 
 the shout which rang through the street. 
 
 " The lieutenant found himself without a command. 
 What cared those freedmen, fresh from the house of 
 bondagej for floating timber and military commands? 
 Their deliverer had come, he who, next to the Lord 
 Jesus, was their best friend. It was not an hurrah that* 
 they gave, but a wild, jubilant cry of inexpressible joy. 
 
 " They gathered round the President, ran ahead, hov- 
 ered upon the flanks of the little company, and hung like 
 a dark cloud upon the rear. Men, women, and children 
 joined the constantly-increasing throng. They camo 
 from all the by-streets, running in breathless haste, shout- 
 ing, hallooing, and dancing with delight. The men threw 
 up their hats; the women waved their bonnets and hand- 
 kerchiefs, clapped their hands, and sang, ' Glory to God ! 
 glory, glory, glory ! ' rendering all the praise to God, 
 who had heard their waitings in the past, their moanings 
 for wives, husbands, children, and friends sold out of 
 their sight, had given them freedom, and, after long years 
 of waiting, had permitted them thus unexpectedly to be- 
 hold the face of their great benefactor.
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 197 
 
 " ' 1 thank you, dear Jesus, that I behold President 
 f:inkum!' was the exclamation of a woman who stood 
 upon the threshold of her humble home, and, with stream- 
 ing eyes and clasped hands, gave thanks aloud to the 
 savior of men. 
 
 "Another, more demonstrative in her joy, was jumping, 
 and striking her hands with all her might, crying, ' Bless 
 de Lord, bless de Lord, bless de Lord !' as if there could 
 be no end of her thanksgiving. 
 
 " The air rang with a tumultuous chorus of voices. 
 The streets became almost impassable on account of the 
 increasing multitude. Soldiers were summoned to clear 
 the way. How strange the event ! The President of 
 the United States he who had been hated, despised, 
 ma! igned, above all other men living; to whom the vilest 
 epithets had been applied by the people of Richmond 
 was walking their streets, receiving thanksgiving, bless- 
 ings, and prayers from thousands who hailed him as an 
 ally of the Messiah ! . . . 
 
 "Abraham Lincoln was walking their streets; and, 
 worst of all, that plain, honest-hearted man was recog- 
 nizing the 'niggers' as human beings by returning 
 their salutations ! The walk was long, and the President 
 halted a moment to rest. 'May de good Lord bless you, 
 President Linkum ! ' said an old negro, removing his hat, 
 and bowing, with tears of joy rolling down his cheeks. 
 The President removed his own hat, and bowed in silence; 
 but it was a bow which upset the forms, laws, customs, 
 and ceremonies of centuries. It was a death-shock to 
 chivalry, and a mortal wound to caste. Recognize a 
 nigger! Faugh! A woman in an adjoining house be- 
 held it, and turned from the scene in unspeakable dis- 
 gust. There were men in the crowd who had daggers 
 in their eyes ; but the chosen assassin was not there, the
 
 198 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 hour for the damning work had not come, and that grat 
 hearted man passed on to the Executive Mansion of the 
 Confederacy. 
 
 " Want of space compels us to pass over other scenes, 
 the visit of the President to the State House ; the jubi- 
 lant shouts of the crowd ; the rush of freedmen into the 
 Capitol grounds, where, till the appearance of their de- 
 liverer, they had never been permitted to enter ; the ride 
 of the President through the streets; his visit to Libby 
 Prison ; the distribution of bread to the destitute," &c. 
 
 While reminded of Washington returning the salute 
 of a negro because he would not be outdone in polite- 
 ness, none can fail to recognize even more than politeness 
 in Lincoln's act of courtesy. It was justice, strict, im- 
 partial justice, that lowered the brow of the conqueror to 
 the salutation of the delivered. 
 
 Joy filled the North. Bells were rung with jubilant 
 and untiring energy. Cannons bayed the nation's joy. 
 Everywhere there was gladness on human faces. Men 
 clasped hands joyously, and the words " victory " and 
 " peace " were on every tongue. Even those whose 
 dear ones would never return from the field of battle 
 thanked God, with tearful eyes and aching hearts, that 
 such precious blood had not been shed in vain. Draft- 
 ing and recruiting was stopped in the loyal States, and 
 " all went merry as a marriage-bell." Scarcely had the 
 people ceased shouting over the fall of Richmond, when 
 there came tidings of the surrender of Lee ; and again 
 the bells and cannon were heard, and glad hearts thanked 
 God for the news. 
 
 But, hark! the jubilant bells cease. On the air at 
 midnight, in more than one city in our land, comes the 
 solemn stroke of the death-knell. What can it portend 1 
 Housed from slumber by the unwelcome sound ? the peo-
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 199 
 
 pie learn the sad and shocking tidings that their beloved 
 President had been stricken down by an assassin's hand, 
 and lay bleeding and dying in the capital of the nation. 
 
 The morning papers tell in staring capitals the hor- 
 rid tale : " The President is insensible, life is slowly 
 ebbing away," is the telegraphic message from one who 
 watched at his side; and before nine A.M., on the 15th 
 of April, 1865, flags hang at half-mast, minute-guns are 
 sounding, bells toll, tears fill the eyes of strong men, and 
 women and children weep, as for their own beloved dead; 
 for President Lincoln is with us no longer. Slavery 
 struck its final blow, and orphaned the nation. 
 
 Wearied with the incessant cares of his office, the 
 President sometimes sought rest and relaxation from 
 stern duties by attending the theatre, listening to the 
 elocutional powers of the performers, and beholding the 
 success with which the actors " held the mirror up to 
 nature." 
 
 On the night of the 14th of April, 1865, he attended 
 Ford's Theatre in Washington, partly for a respite and 
 rest, and partly that the people, who expected his pres- 
 ence, might not be disappointed. He did not dream of im- 
 mediate danger. Many at the North were uneasy at the 
 fact that the President was exposed to danger in Rich- 
 mond ; but he did not fear. To a friend who expressed the 
 idea that the rebels might attempt his life, he said, step- 
 ping to a desk, and drawing from a pigeon-hole a package 
 of letters, "There, every one of these contains a threat 
 to assassinate me. I might be nervous if I were to 
 dwell upon the subject; but I have come to the conclu- 
 sion that there are opportunities to kill me every day of 
 my life, if there -are persons disposed to do it. It is not 
 possible to avoid exposure to such a fate, and I shall 
 not trouble myself about it."
 
 200 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 So he attended the theatre, without taking precautions 
 against the assassin who came, all unannounced, to his un- 
 guarded victim. " The play was ' Our American Cousin.' 
 While all were intent upon its representation, the report 
 of a pistol first announced the presence of the assassin,* 
 who uttered the word " Freedom ! " and advanced to- 
 ward the front. Major Rathbone having discerned the 
 murderer through the smoke, and grappled with him, 
 the latter dropped his pistol, and aimed with a knife at the 
 breast of his antagonist, who caught the blow on the up- 
 per part of his left arm, but was unable to detain the 
 desperado, though he immediately seized him again. 
 The villain, however, leaped some twelve feet down upon 
 the open stage, tangling his spur in the draped flag be- 
 low the box, and stumbling in his fall. 
 
 " Recovering himself immediately, he flourished his 
 dagger, shouted ' Sic semper tyrannis ! ' and ' The South 
 is avenged 1 ' then retreated successfully through the 
 labyrinth of the theatre perfectly familiar to him to 
 his horse in waiting below. Between the deed of blood 
 and the escape, there was not the lapse of a minute. 
 The hour was about half-past ten. There was but one 
 pursuer, and he from the audience ; but he was out- 
 stripped. 
 
 " The meaning of the pistol-shot was soon ascertained. 
 Mr. Lincoln had been shot in the back of the head, be- 
 hind the left ear, the ball traversing an oblique line to ths 
 right ear. He was rendered instantly unconscious, and 
 never knew friends or pain again. Having been con- 
 veyed as soon as possible to a house opposite the theatre, 
 he expired there the next morning at twenty-two min- 
 utes past seven o'clock, attended by the principal members 
 
 * J. Wilkes Booth.
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEP. 
 
 201 
 
 of his cabinet, and other friends ; from all of whom the 
 heart-rending spectacle drew copious tears of sorrow. 
 Airs. Lincoln and her son Robert were in an adjoining 
 ripnrtment : the former bowed down with anguish, the 
 
 THE DEATH OF MB. L1KCOU*. 
 
 latter strong enough to sustain and console her. Soon 
 after nine o'clock, the body was removed to the White 
 House under military escort." 
 
 There the body was embalmed, and prepared for the 
 grave. The paraphernalia of mourning, in this case no 
 heartless display, filled the house. In the east room, the 
 solemn funeral services were first performed. " Near 
 the centre of the room stood the grand catafalque, upon 
 which rested the mortal remains of the illustrious dead, 
 enclosed in a beautiful mahogany coffin lined with lead, 
 and with a white satin covering over the metal. It waa 
 finished in the most elaborate style, with four silver 
 handles on each side, stars glistening between the han- 
 dles, and a vein of silver winding around the whole case 
 in a' serpentine form. To the edges of the lid hung a
 
 202 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 nice silver tassel, making a chaste and elaborate fringe to 
 the whole case. The silver plate bore the simple in- 
 scription : 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN, 
 
 SIXTEENTH PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 Born February 12, 1809; 
 
 Died April 15, 1803. 
 
 "The catafalque stood lengthwise to the room, or north 
 and south, and immediately in front of the double doors 
 which lead to the side hall. The floor of the catafalque 
 was about four feet in height, and approached by one 
 step on all sides, making it easy to view the face of the 
 honored dead. Above this was a canopy, in an arched 
 form, lined on the under-side with white fluted satin, 
 covered otherwise with black velvet and crape. This 
 was supported by four posts, heavily incased with the 
 emblem of mourning. The canopy, the posts, and the 
 main body of the catafalque, were festooned with crape, 
 and fastened at each fold with rosettes of black satin. 
 
 " On the top of the coffin lay three wreaths of moss 
 and evergreen, with white plumes and lilies inter- 
 mingled. At the head of the coffin, standing upon the 
 floor of the catafalque, and leaning against the metallic 
 case, stood a beautiful cross, made of japonicas, lilies, 
 and other white flowers, as bright and blooming as 
 though they were still on their parent-stem, and had not 
 been plucked to adorn the house of the dead; its pure 
 and immaculate white furnishing a strong contrast with 
 the deep black on all sides. On the foot of the coffin lay 
 an anchor of flowers. Encircling the coffin, in a ser- 
 pentine form, was a vine of evergreens studded with 
 pure white flowers ; and within its meandering folds were 
 deposited several wreaths of the same material. These
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 203 
 
 had all been brought by some friendly hands, the tokens 
 of love and affection, and deposited around and near 
 the case that contained the mortal remains of the man 
 who had been near and dear to them. Here, then, were 
 the emblems of the dead, the marks of rank, the tokens 
 of grief, deep and sorrowful, and happiness hereafter, as 
 well as hope and immortality in the future. Surely the 
 scene in honor to the illustrious dead was a worthy ex- 
 hibition of the love, esteem, and pride of a free people 
 in their fallen chief, fallen, too, in the midst of his use- 
 fulness, and just when his greatness and goodness were 
 being recognized by all." * 
 
 A newspaper, speaking of those present at his funeral- 
 service, says, " Close by the corpse sat the relatives of 
 the deceased, plain, honest, hardy people, typical as 
 much of the simplicity of our institutions as of Mr. Lin- 
 coln's self-made eminence. No blood-relatives of Mr. 
 Lincoln were to be found. It is a singular evidence of 
 the poverty of his origin, and therefore of his exceed- 
 ing good report, that, excepting his immediate family, 
 none answering to his name could be discovered. Mrs. 
 Lincoln's relations were present, however, in some force : 
 Dr. Lyman Beecher Todd, Gen. John B. S. Todd, C. M. 
 Smith, Esq., and Mr. N. W. Edwards, the late President's 
 brother-in-law. Plain, self-made people were here, and 
 wore sincerely affected. Capt. Robert Lincoln sat 
 during the services with his face in his handkerchief, 
 weeping quietly ; and little Tad, his face red and heat- 
 ed, cried as if his heart would break. Mrs. Lincoln, 
 weak now, and nervous, did not enter the east room, nor 
 follow the remains. She was the Chief Magistrate's lady 
 yesterday ; to-day, a widow bearing only an immortal 
 name." 
 
 * " Lincoln Memorial,"
 
 204 ABRAHAM LINCOLN 
 
 Clergymen of different religious denominations, as 
 was eminently fitting, took part in the funeral exercises. 
 Rev. Dr. Hall, of the Episcopal Church in Washington, 
 opened the services by reading the beautiful service of 
 his church for the burial of the dead. Bishop Simpson, 
 of the Methodist-Episcopal Church of Illinois, then of- 
 fered prayer. The funeral oration was next delivered 
 by Rev. P. D. Gurley, D.D., a Presbyterian pastor, of 
 Washington, in whose church the President and family 
 were accustomed to worship. The services closed with 
 a prayer by Dr. Gray, chaplain of the United-States 
 Senate. In his oration, whose text was, " Have faith in 
 God" (Mark xi. 22), Dr. Gurley said,- 
 
 " As we stand here to-day, mourners around this coffin 
 and around the lifeless remains of our beloved Chief 
 Magistrate, we recognize and we adore the sovereignty 
 of God. ... It was a cruel, cruel hand, that dark hand 
 of the assassin, which smote our honored, wise, and no- 
 ble President, and filled the land with sorrow. But 
 above and beyond that hand there is another which we 
 must see and acknowledge, it is the chastening hand 
 of a wise and a faithful Father." 
 
 After continuing for some time in this strain, endeavor- 
 ing to comfort the mourners gathered there, he spoke of 
 the departed thus : " The people confided in the late la- 
 merted President with a full and loving confidence. 
 Probably no man since the days of Washington was 
 ever so deeply and firmly embedded and enshrined in 
 the very hearts of the people as Abraham Lincoln. Nor 
 was it a mistaken confidence and love. He deserved it, 
 deserved it well, deserved it all. He merited it by his 
 character, by his acts, and by the whole tenor and tone 
 and spirit of his life. He was simple and sincere, plain 
 and honest, truthful and just, benevolent and kind. His
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 205 
 
 perceptions were quick and clear, his judgments were 
 calm and accurate, and his purposes were good and pure 
 beyond question. Always and everywhere he aimed 
 and endeavored to be right and to do right. His integrity 
 was thorough, all-pervading, all-controlling, and incor- 
 ruptible. It was the same in every place and relation, in 
 the consideration and the control of matters great or 
 small, the same firm and steady principle of power 
 and beauty, that shed a clear and crowning lustre upon 
 all his other excellences of mind and heart, and lecom- 
 mended him to his fellow-citizens as the man, who in a 
 time of unexampled peril, when the very life of the na- 
 tion was at stake, should be chosen to occupy in the 
 country, and for the country, its highest post of power 
 and responsibility. How wisely and well, how purely 
 and faithfully, how firmly and steadily, how justly and 
 successfully, he did occupy that post, and meet its grave 
 demands, in circumstances of surpassing trial and diffi- 
 culty, is known to you all, known to the country and to 
 the world. He comprehended from the first the perils to 
 which treason had exposed the freest and best govern- 
 ment on the earth, the vasts interests of liberty and 
 humanity that were to be saved or lost forever in the 
 urgent impending conflict : he rose to the dignity and 
 rnomentousness of the occasion ; saw his duty as the 
 Chief Magistrate of a great and imperilled people ; and 
 he determined to do his duty, and his whole duty, seek- 
 ing the guidance and leaning on the arm of Him of 
 whom it is written, ' He giveth power to the faint; and 
 to them that have no might he increaseth strength.' 
 Yes: he leaned upon his arm. He recognized and re- 
 ceived the truth, ' that the kingdom is the Lord's, and he 
 is the Governor among the nations.' Ho remembered 
 tiiat ' God is in history,' and he felt that nowhere had 
 
 18
 
 206 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 his hand and his mercy been so marvellously conspicu- 
 ous as in the history of this nation. He hoped and he 
 prayed that that same hand would continue to guide us, 
 and that same mercy continue to abound to us in the 
 time of our greatest need. I speak what I know, and 
 testify what I have ofttn heard him say, when I affirm 
 that that guidance and mercy were the props on whi^h 
 he humbly and habitually learned ; they were the best 
 hope he had for himself and for his country. Hence, 
 when he was leaving his home in Illinois, and coming to 
 this city to take his seat in the Executive Chair of a dis- 
 turbed and troubled nation, he said to the old and tried 
 friends who gathered tearfully around him and bade him 
 farewell, 'I leave you with this request, pray for me.' 
 They did pray for him ; and millions of others prayed 
 for him ; nor did they pray in vain. Their prayer was 
 heard, and the answer appears in all his subsequent his- 
 tory : it shines forth with a heavenly radiance in the 
 whole course and tenor of his administration, from its 
 commencement to its close. God raised him up for a 
 great and glorious mission, furnished him for his work, 
 and aided him in its accomplishment. Nor was it mere- 
 ly by strength of mind, and honesty of heart, and purity 
 and pertinacity of purpose, that he furnished him. In 
 addition to these things, he gave him a calm and abiding 
 confidence in the overwhelming providence of God, and 
 in the ultimate triumph of truth and righteousness 
 through the power and blessing of God. This confidence 
 strengthened him in all his hours of anxiety and toil, 
 and inspired him with calm and cheering hope when oth- 
 ers were inclined to despondency and gloom. Never 
 shall I forget the emphasis and the deep emotion with 
 which he said, in this very room, to a company of cler- 
 gymen and others who called to pay him their respects
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEP. 207 
 
 in the darkest days of cnr civil conflict, ' Gentlemen, 
 my hope of success in this great and terrible struggle 
 rests on that immutable foundation, the justice and 
 goodness of God ; and, when events are very threat- 
 ening and prospects very dark, I still hope, that, in 
 oome way which man cannot see, all will be well in the 
 end, because our cause is just, and God is on our side.' 
 . . . God be praised that our fallen Chief lived long 
 enough to see the day dawn, and the day-star of joy and 
 peace rise upon the nation 1 He saw it, and was glad. 
 Alas, alas ! he only saw the dawn. "When the sun has 
 risen full-orbed and glorious, and a happy re-united peo- 
 ple are rejoicing in its light, it will shine upon his grave ; 
 but that grave will be a precious and a consecrated 
 spot. The friends of Liberty and of the Union will re- 
 pair to it, in years and ages to come, to pronounce the 
 memory of its occupant blessed ; and gathering from his 
 very ashes, and from the rehearsal of his deeds and vir- 
 tues, fresh incentives to patriotism, they will there re- 
 new their vows of fidelity to their country and their 
 God." 
 
 At the conclusion of the services, the body of the 
 President was borne to the capitol. The hearse was 
 built for the occasion, and was drawn by six gray 
 horses. 
 
 " The funeral cortege started with military precision 
 at ten o'clock. The avenue was cleared the whole 
 length from the Presidential Mansion to the Capitol. 
 Every window, house-top, balcony, and every inch of 
 the sidewalks, on either side, was densely crowded with 
 a living throng to witness the procession. In all this 
 dense crowd, hardly a sound was heard. People con- 
 versed with each other in suppressed tones. Presently 
 the monotonous thump of the funeral drum sounded
 
 208 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 upon the street, and the military escort of the funeral 
 car began to march past with solemn tread, muffled 
 drums, and arms reversed. 
 
 "A scene so solemn, imposing, and impressive as that 
 which the national metropolis presented, and- upon which 
 myriad eyes of saddened faces were gazing, was never 
 witnessed, under circumstances so appalling, in any por- 
 tion of our beloved country. Around us is the capital 
 city, clad in the habiliments of mourning ; above us, the 
 cloudless sky, so bright, so tranquil, so cheerful, as if 
 heaven would, on this solemn occasion, specially invite 
 us, by the striking contrast, to turn our thoughts from 
 the darkness and the miseries of this life to the light 
 and the joy that shine with endless lustre beyond it. 
 The mournful strains of the funeral dirge, borne on the 
 gentle zephyrs of this summer-like day, touch a respon- 
 sive chord in every human heart of the countless thou- 
 sands, that, with solemn demeanor and measured step, 
 follow to their temporary resting-place, in the National 
 Capitol, the cold, inanimate form of one, who, living, was 
 the honored Chief Magistrate of the American people, 
 and, dead, will ever be endeared in their fondest mem- 
 ories. Never did a generous and grateful people pay, 
 in anguish and tears, a tribute more sincere or merited 
 to a kind, humane, and patriotic chieftain ; never were 
 the dark and bloody deeds of crime brought out in relief 
 so bold, and in horror and detestation so universal, as in 
 the sublime and imposing honors this day tendered to 
 the corpse of Abraham Lincoln. Such a scene is the 
 epoch of a life-time. Strong men are deeply affected ; 
 gentle women weep; children are awe-stricken: none 
 will ever forget it. Memory has consecrated it on her 
 brightest tablet ; and it will ever be thought, spoken,
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 209 
 
 and written of, as the sublime homage of a sorrowing 
 nation at the shrine of the martyred patriot." * 
 
 Arrived at the Capitol, Rev. Dr. Gurley offered prayer, 
 and soon the services were over : the few who had been 
 permitted to enter were dismissed from the rotunda, 
 and silence reigned around the coffin of the honored 
 dead. 
 
 " The corpse of the President was placed beneath 
 the right concave, now streaked with the mournful trap- 
 pings, and left in state, watched by guards of officers 
 with drawn swords. This was a wonderful spectacle, 
 the man most beloved and honored, in the ark of the Re- 
 public. The storied paintings, representing eras in its 
 history, were draped in sable, through which they seemed 
 to cast reverential glances upon the lamented bier. The 
 thrilling scenes depicted by Trumbull, the commemora- 
 tive canvases of Leutze, the wilderness vegetation of 
 Powell, glared from their separate pedestals upon the 
 central spot where lay the fallen majesty of the country. 
 At night the jets of gas, concealed in the spring of the 
 dome, were lighted up, so that their bright reflection 
 upon the frescoed walls hurled masses of burning light, 
 like marvellous haloes, upon the little box where so 
 much that was loved and honored rested, on its way to 
 the grave; and so, through the starry night, in the fane 
 of the great Union he had strengthened and recovered 
 the ashes of Abraham Lincoln, zealously guarded, lay in 
 calm repose. "f 
 
 The acting Secretary of State (Secretary Seward 
 having been wounded in an attempt made to assassinate 
 him on the same night with the President), Mr. Hunter, 
 issued the following official document : 
 
 " Lincoln Memorial," p. 147. t Ibid., p. 188.
 
 2lO ABRAHAM LIUCOLti. 
 
 DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHncoroir, April 17, 1866. 
 
 To THE PEOPLE OF THE UMTED STATES : 
 
 The undersigned is directed to announce that the 
 funeral ceremonies of the lamented Chief Magistrate will 
 take place at the Executive Mansion, in this city, at 
 twelve o'clock, noon, on Wednesday, the 19tB inst. The 
 various religious denominations throughout the country 
 are invited to meet in their respective places of worship 
 at that hour, for the purpose of solemnizing the occasion 
 with appropriate ceremonies. 
 
 W. HUNTER, Acting Secretary of State. 
 
 Throughout the loyal States, the day of the funeral 
 was observed, and never with more sincerity. Churches, 
 streets, houses, stores, were draped in mourning: flags 
 were hung at half-mast, minute-guns were fired, and con- 
 gregations assembled, bowed with grief, in all the larger 
 towns, to join in services appropriate to the day.* 
 
 * In Beading, Mass., the following hymn, written by the author of the?* 
 pages, wa.i song by members of the Congregationalist, UniversalLst, and Bap- 
 tist choirs, in the largest church of the town, where, as one stricken, synjpa 
 thizing family, the inhabitants were gathered : 
 
 FUNERAL HTiEN'. Air, " Jfount Ternon" 
 Hashed to-day are sounds of gl .dness, 
 
 From the mountains to the sea; 
 And the plaintive voice of sadness 
 Rises, mighty God, to thee. 
 
 Freedom claimed another martyr; 
 
 Heaven received another saint : 
 Who are we, thy will to question? 
 
 Lord, we weep without complaint. 
 
 May we, to thy wisdom bowing. 
 
 Own thy love in this dart -pell, 
 While with tears a mighty nation 
 
 Buries one it loved so well I 
 
 And, O Thou who took oar leader, 
 
 With the Promised Land in view, 
 While on Pisgah's height we leave him. 
 
 Lead us, Lord, tbe Jordan throojrt.
 
 LASJ DAYS AND A NATION'S Gr.lBF. 211 
 
 While the people sympathized with the bereaved family 
 of the martyred President, and those who had been 
 made widows during the war sympathized deeply with 
 Mrs. Lincoln (to whom even the Queen of England sent 
 in autograph letter, assuring her of the sympathy of a 
 widowed heart), yet it was not only as those who felt for 
 others that the people mourned. They had themselves 
 lost a friend. They mourned with a sense of personal 
 bereavement. Many families, whose dear ones, though 
 exposed to the perils of the battle-field, the prison, and 
 the hospital, had yet returned safely to their homes, now 
 felt that they had some one for whom to weep ; since 
 President Lincoln belonged to all. Sublime utterances 
 of faith in God, tender expressions of love for the de- 
 parted, and words of solemn instruction, were heard on 
 this day of mourning; and each loyal hand that held 
 " the pen of a ready writer " was moved to add a tribute 
 to the memory of the nation's martyr. Mrs. Stowe, after 
 speaking of the rejoicings over victory, adds, 
 
 "But this our joy has been ordained to be changed 
 into a wail of sorrow. The kind hard hand that held 
 the helm so steadily in the desperate tossings of the storm 
 has been stricken down just as we entered port ; the 
 fatherly heart that bore all our sorrows can take no 
 earthly part in our joys. His were the cares, the watch- 
 ings, the toils, the agonies, of a nation in mortal struggle; 
 and God looking down was so well pleased with his hum- 
 ble faithfulness, his patient continuance in well-doing, 
 that earthly rewards and honors seemed all too poor for 
 him ; so he reached down, and took him to immortal 
 glories. 'Well done, good and faithful servant! enter 
 thou into the joy of thy Lord.' " * 
 
 Atlantic Monthly," Augiwt, 1866.
 
 212 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 The remains of the President were borne from Wash- 
 ington to Springfield, where they were finally deposited, 
 by way of Baltimore, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New 
 York, Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, and Chi- 
 cago, a distance in circuit of about eighteen hundred 
 miles. All along the route, the people gathered with va- 
 rious testimonials of respect, and evidences of grief that 
 was great and sincere. 
 
 The body rested, while in Philadelphia, in that hall, 
 around which cluster so many historical memories, and 
 over which, four years before, the President raised the 
 flag of our country. "The bier was close to the famous 
 old Liberty Bell, which first sounded forth, in 1776, the 
 tidings of independence. 
 
 " The interior of the hall, as well as the exterior, was 
 heavily draped and most artistically illuminated. Around 
 the remains were appropriate decorations, leaves of ex- 
 quisite evergreens, and flowers of an exquisite crimson 
 bloom. At the head of the corpse were bouquets ; 
 beneath, the flaming tapers at the feet ; from the elabo- 
 rately hung walls, the portraits of the great and good dead 
 were eloquent in their silence, and seemed to say that 
 not one of the great actors of other eras, preserved in 
 canvas, marble, and metal, looking down like living 
 mourners on that honored catafalque, ever filled his space 
 with more dignity than the dead Lincoln. Not Columbus 
 from his brazen door ; not De Soto planting his cross on 
 the Mississippi ; not Pocahontas ; not Miles Standish on 
 the " Mayflower ; " not William Penn making peace Avith 
 the Indians ; not Benjamin Franklin in his philosophy ; 
 not the fiery Patrick Henry as he ejaculated his war-cry 
 in the Virginia House of Delegates, nor John Adams as 
 he shouted it in Boston ; not Washington with his 
 sword ; nor Jefferson with his pen ; nor Hamilton with
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 213 
 
 his statesmanship ; nor John Jay ; nor John Marshall, the 
 purest jurist of our earlier or later history ; nor Perry, 
 the sea-king of 1812, riding on billows of blood througli 
 a line of blazing ships ; nor Jackson, with his triple tri- 
 umph over savage and Briton and the spirit of incipient 
 treason, not one was more worthy of the genius of the 
 poet, the painter, the sculptor, and the orator, than the 
 gentle and illustrious patriot whose virtues and whoso 
 genius the American people now mourn." * 
 
 The limits of this volume will not permit further men- 
 tion of the funeral honors. Suffice it to say that they 
 were such as were never paid to mortal before, and 
 showed, in some degree, the depth of the national 
 sorrow. 
 
 Foreign nations sympathized with us in our national 
 loss. While those who had voted against the President 
 now mourned as sincerely as any his sad and sudden 
 death, the event awoke sorrow in hearts abroad which 
 had sometimes throbbed in sympathy with our enemies. 
 England spoke through her press in terms of abhorrence 
 that such a crime had been committed, and in words of 
 eulogy concerning the martyred one. Earl Russell an- 
 nounced to the House of Lords the private letter of 
 Queen Victoria to the President's widow. Earl Dei by 
 followed with words of sympathy. 
 
 France joined in the general horror of the crime, and 
 sympathy with the mourners. Henri Martin, the histo- 
 rian, wrote an article, headed, " A great Martyr of De- 
 mocracy," commencing, " Slavery, before expiring, ha.-- 
 gathered up the remnants of its strength and rage tn 
 strike a coward blow at its conqueror." In Italy, Belgi 
 um, and Prussia, suitable notice was taken of the sorrow- 
 
 " Lincoln Memorial," p. !".
 
 214 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 fill event. In Portugal, a most eloquent address was de- 
 livered in the Chamber of Peers, at Lisbon, by Sr. 
 Rebello da Silva, from which is given the following 
 extract : 
 
 " Lincoln, martyr to the broad principle which he rep- 
 resented in power and struggle, belongs now to history 
 and to posterity. Like Washington, whose idea he con- 
 tinued, his name will be inseparable from the memorable 
 epochs to which he is bound, and which he expresses. 
 If the defender of independence freed America, Lincoln 
 unsheathed without hesitation the sword of the Republic, 
 and with its point erased and tore out from the statutes 
 of a free people the anti-social stigma, the anti-humani- 
 tarian blasphemy, the sad, shameful, infamous codicil of 
 old societies, the dark, repugnant abuse of slavery, which 
 Jesus Christ first condemned from the top of the cross, 
 proclaiming the equality of man before God, which nine- 
 teen centuries of civilization, reared in the gospel, have 
 proscribed and rejected as the opprobrium of our times." 
 
 " At the moment when he was breaking the chains of a 
 luckless race; when he was seeing in millions of rehabili- 
 tated slaves millions of future citizens ; when the bronze 
 voice of Grant's victorious cannon was proclaiming the 
 emancipation of the soul, of the conscience, and of toil ; 
 when the scourge was about to tall from the hands of 
 the scourgers ; when the ancient slave-pen was about to 
 be transformed, for the captive, into a domestic altar ; at 
 the moment when the stars of the Union, sparkling and 
 resplendent with the golden fires of Liberty, were wav- 
 ing over the subdued walls of Petersburg and Rich- 
 mond, . . . the sepulchre opens, and the strong, the 
 powerful, enters it. In the midst of triumphs and accla- 
 mations, there appeared to him a spectre like that of
 
 LAST DATS AND A NATION'S GRIEF. 215 
 
 Caesar in the Ides of March, saying to him, ' You have 
 lived ! ' 
 
 " Have lived ! Yes, Lincoln did live once, in the 
 body ; and thank God, who hath made man immortal, he 
 liveth still. He lives ! He lives 1 He lives to-day in hia 
 imperishable example, in his recorded words of wisdom, 
 in his great maxims of liberty and enfranchisement. 
 
 " The good never die ; to them belongs endurable im- 
 mortality ; they perish not upon the earth, and they exist 
 forever in heaven. The good of the present live in the 
 future, as the good of the past are here with us and in 
 us to-day. The great primeval lawgiver, entombed for 
 forty centuries in that unknown grave in an obscure vale 
 of Moab, to-day legislates in your halls of state, and 
 preaches on all your sabbaths in your synagogues. Sa- 
 lem's royal singer indites our liturgies, and leads our 
 worship. Socrates questions atheists in these streets. 
 Phidias sculptures the friezes of Christian temples ; the 
 desecrated tongue of mangled Tully arraigns our C-iti- 
 lines; against the Philip of to-day the dead Demosthe- 
 nes thunders ; the dead Leonidas guards the gates of 
 every empire which wrestles for its sovereignty ; the 
 dead Justinian issues in your country the living man- 
 dates of the law; the dead Martin Luther issues from 
 your press the living oracles of God ; the dead Napoleon 
 sways France from that silent throne in the Invalides : 
 the dead George Washington held together through 
 wrangling decades this brotherhood of States ; and the 
 dead ABRAHAM LINCOLN will peal the clarion of belea- 
 gured nations, and marshal and beckon on the wavering 
 battle line of liberty till the las 4 , generation of man 
 
 ' Shall crwition's death beholj 
 As Adam saw her prime-'
 
 218 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 His fame will grow brighter and grander as it descends 
 the ages, and posterity will regard him as the incarna- 
 tion of democracy in its pure childhood, as the embodi- 
 ment of those ideas of universal emancipation which 
 were the glory of its faithful epoch. 
 
 ..." When the race shall have finally climbed to the 
 lofty table-land of UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD, to which it 
 is inevitably destined by the paramount law of its own 
 development, and shall turn backward its wistful eye for 
 those who have led its weary pilgrimage through passes 
 the most perilous, and over wastes the most disheart- 
 ening, they will instinctively seek the uncourtly figure 
 of that forest-born LIBERATOR, who by one glorious edict 
 restored to humanity all the divine equalities enfeoffed 
 upon it when of one blood all the children of men were 
 made, and thus incorporated into harmonious fraternity 
 all the estranged and repellent complexions of mankind. 
 With reverent and grateful hearts they will pour their 
 choicest frankincense at his feet, crown with unfailing 
 amaranth the brow, and by eulogy, statue, column, and 
 obelisk, and every aid to enduring remembrance, trans- 
 mit to new and ever-rising futurities the irradiated 
 name, of the first President of the regenerated Republic, 
 that martyr to liberty and law, whom on this shore and 
 border of time's immensity we deplore to-day, ABRAHAM 
 LINCOLN."* 
 
 God gave this man, whom we " delight to honor." to 
 the world for a high and holy work : God has taken him 
 up to the society of the sin-freed and rejoicing ones of 
 all nations and of all time, when he had accomplished 
 his mission; and every loyal and every Christian heart 
 must add, " Blessed be the name of the Lord 1 " 
 
 Hon. H. C. Demiug
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 217 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 BO UN, 1509; DIED, 18C3, AGED 66. CAPTAIN IX THE BLACK 
 II AW 1C WAR. ELECTED TO THE ILLINOIS STATE LEG- 
 ISLATURE, 1831. AGAIN, 183C. ADMITTED TO THE BAR, 
 1837. ELECTED TO CONGRESS, 1846. MEMBER OF THE 
 COMMITTEE ON POST-OFFICES AND POST-ROADS AND 
 WAR-DEPARTMENT EXPENSES. MADE HIS FIRST SPEECH 
 IN CONGRESS, JAN. 12, 1848, IN OPPOSITION TO THE MEX- 
 ICAN WAR. SPEECH IN COOPER'S INSTITUTE, NEW YORK 
 CITY, I860. PRESIDENT, 18GO-18C5. 
 
 [" HE is the author of a multitude of good say- 
 ings, so disguised as pleasantries that it is certain 
 they had no reputation at first but as jests ; and 
 only later by the very acceptance and adoption 
 they find in the mouths of millions, turn out to be 
 the wisdom of the hour. I am sure if this man 
 had ruled in a period of less facility of printing, 
 he would have become mythological in a very few 
 years, like .ZEsop or Pilpay, or one of the Seven 
 Wise Masters, by his fables and proverbs. 
 
 " But the weight and penetration of many pas- 
 sages in his letters, messages, and speeches, hidden 
 now by the very closeness of their application to 
 the moment, are destined hereafter to a wide fame. 
 What pregnant definitions 1 what unerring coin-
 
 218 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 men-sense ! what foresight ! and, on great occa- 
 sions, what lofty, and, more than national, what 
 humane tone." Ralph Waldo Emerson. 
 
 How his quaint wit made home-truth 
 
 seeni more true. London Punch. ~\ 
 
 [From a Lecture before the Springfield Lyceum, on the 
 Perpetuation of our Free Institutions, January, 1837.] 
 
 ..... 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. 
 
 [Lett .f to Mr. Herndon.]* 
 
 WASHINGTON, February 1, 1848. 
 
 That vote affirms that the [Mexican] 
 
 war was unnecessarily and unconstitutionally com- 
 menced by the President ; and I will stake my 
 life, that, if you had been in nay place, you would 
 have voted just as I did. Would you have voted 
 what you felt and knew to be a lie ? I know you 
 would not. Would you have gone out of the 
 House, skulked the vote? I expect not. If 
 you had skulked one vote, you would have to 
 
 * Mr. Lincoln voted for Mr. Ashmun's amendment
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 219 
 
 skulk many more before the end of the session. 
 Richardson's resolutions, introduced before I made 
 any move, or gave any vote upon the subject, 
 make the direct question of the justice of the war ; 
 so that no man can be silent if he would. You 
 are compelled to speak ; and your only alternative 
 is to tell the truth or tell a lie. 
 
 [To the Same.] 
 
 WASHINGTON, July 10, 1848. 
 
 The way for a young man to rise is to 
 
 improve himself every way he can, never sus- 
 pecting that anybody wishes to hinder him. Allow 
 me to assure you that suspicion and jealousy never 
 did help any man in any situation. There may 
 sometimes be ungenerous attempts to keep a young 
 man down ; and they will succeed, too, if he allows 
 his mind to be diverted from its true channel, to 
 brood over the attempted injury. Cast about, and 
 see if this feeling has not injured every person you 
 have ever known to fall into it. 
 
 [From a Speech in Congress, July 27, 1848.] 
 
 The other day one of the gentlemen from 
 
 Georgia, an eloquent man, and a man of learning, 
 so far as I could judge, not being learned myself, 
 came down upon us astonishingly. He spoke in 
 what the Baltimore American calls the w scathing 
 and withering style." At the end of his second
 
 220 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 severe flash I was struck blind, and found myself 
 feeling with my fingers for an assurance of my 
 continued physical existence. A little of the bone 
 was left, and I gradually revived. 
 
 I say that no man is good enough to govern 
 another man without that other's consent. Oct. 
 1854. 
 
 [From a Speech in 1856.] 
 
 Twenty-two years ago, Judge Douglas and I 
 became first acquainted; we were both young 
 men he a trifle younger than I. Even then we 
 were both ambitious, I perhaps quite as much as 
 he. "With me the race of ambition has been a 
 failure a flat failure. With him it has been one 
 of splendid success. His name fills the nation, 
 and it is not unknown in foreign lands. I afiect 
 no contempt for the high eminence he has reached, 
 so reached that the oppressed of my species might 
 have shared with me in the elevation. I would 
 rather stand on that eminence than wear the richest 
 crown that ever pressed a monarch's brow. 
 
 [From a Speech delivered in 1857. Describing the helpless 
 state of the American slave, he said] : 
 
 They have him in his prison-house. They have 
 searched his person and left no prying instrument 
 with him. One after another they have closed tho 
 heavy iron doors ujo:i him, and now they have
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 221 
 
 him, as it were, bolted in with a lock of a hundred 
 key &, which can never be unlocked without the 
 concurrence of every key ; the keys in the hands 
 of a hundred different men, and they scattered to 
 a hundred different and distant places ; and they 
 stand musing as to what invention, in all the 
 dominions of mind and matter, can be produced 
 to make the impossibility of his escape more com- 
 plete than it is. 
 
 [From a Speech,* delivered at Springfield, Illinois, June 17, 
 18^8, before the Republican State Convention.] 
 
 If we could first know where we are, and whith- 
 er we are tending, we could better judge what to 
 do, and how to do it. We are now far into the 
 iifth year since a policy was initiated with the 
 avowed object and confident promise of putting an 
 end to slavery agitation. Under the operation of 
 that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased, 
 
 * Mr. Lincoln read this speech, before its public delivery, 
 to Mr. Ilerndon. When he had finished the first paragraph, 
 he asked his auditor, "How do you like that? What do you 
 think of it?" "I think," returned Mr. Ilerndon, "it is 
 true; but is it entirely politic to read or speak it as it is 
 written?" "What makes the difference?" Mr. Lincoln 
 said. "That expression is a truth of all human experience, 
 'A house divided against itself cannot stand; 1 and 'he that 
 runs may read.' The proposition is indisputably true, and 
 
 has been true for more than six thousand years; and 
 
 I will deliver it as written. I want to use some universally 
 known figure, expressed in simple language as universally
 
 222 ^ELECTIONS FROM SfEECBES AND LETTER*. 
 
 but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, ft 
 Avill not cease until a crisis sLall have been reached 
 and passed. " A house divided against itself can- 
 not stand." I believe this government cannot en- 
 dure 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. Either the opponents of slavery 
 will arrest the further spread of it, and place it 
 where the public mind shall rest in the belief that 
 it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its ad- 
 vocates will push it forward till it shall becomfl 
 alike lawful in all the states* old as well as new, 
 north as well GS south. 
 
 [In the same speech, Mr. Lincoln said that the 
 doctrine of "Squatter Sovereignty," otherwise 
 
 known, that may strike home to the minds of men, in order 
 to rouse them to the peril of the times. I would rather be 
 defeated with this exprecsion in the speech, and it held up 
 and discussed before the people, than to be victorious with- 
 out if." 
 
 Mr. Lincoln was not elected senator. In the summer of 
 1859, at a party of friends, the subject of this speech was 
 discussed. "We all insisted," says Mr. Swctt, who was one 
 of the company, "that it was a great mistake," losing him 
 his election. " Well, gentlemen," replied Mr. Lincoln, 
 "you may think that speech was a mistake; but I never 
 have believed it was, and you will see the day when you 
 will consider it was the nicest thing I ever said." See LA 
 MON's Life of Lincoln.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 2l>3 
 
 culled " sacred right of self-government," as ex- 
 pressed in the " Nebraska Bill," by which the right 
 of a slaveholder to hold slaves in any territory or 
 state, was affirmed, amounted to this:] "That 
 if any one man chose to enslave another, no third 
 man shall be allowed to object." 
 
 [From a Speech in reply to Mr. Douglas, July 10, 1858.] 
 
 We are now a mighty nation ; we are thirty, or 
 about thirty millions of people, and we own and 
 inhabit about one-fifteenth part of the dry land of 
 the whole earth. We run our memory back over 
 the pages of history for about eighty-two years, 
 and we discover that we were then a very small 
 people in point of numbers, vastly inferior to what 
 we are now, with a vastly less extent of country, 
 with vastly less of everything we deem desirable 
 among men, we look upon the change as extreme- 
 ly advantageous to us, and to our posterity, and 
 we fix upon something that happened away back, 
 as in some way or other being connected with this 
 rise of prosperity. We find a race of men living in 
 that day whom we claim as our fathers and grand- 
 fathers ; they were iron men ; they fought for the 
 principle that they were contending for ; and wo 
 understood that by what they then did it has fol- 
 lowed that the degree of prosperity which we now 
 enjoy has come to us. We hold this annual cel- 
 ebration to remind ourselves of all the good done
 
 '228ELECTIOXS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTE&S. 
 
 in this process of time, of how it was done, and 
 who did it, and how we are historically connected 
 with it ; and we go from these meetings in better 
 humor with ourselves ; we feel more attached the 
 one to the other, and more firmly bound to the 
 country we inhabit. In every way we are better 
 men in the age, and race, and country in which 
 we live, for these celebrations. 
 
 But after we have done all this we have not yet 
 reached the whole. . . . We have besides these 
 descended by blood from our ancestors, men 
 among us, perhaps half our people, who are not 
 descendants at all of these men ; they are men 
 who have come from Europe, German, Irish, 
 French, and Scandinavian, men that have come 
 from Europe themselves, or whose ancestors have 
 come hither and settled here, finding themselves 
 our equals in all things. If they look back 
 through their history to trace their connection 
 with those days by blood, they find they have 
 none ; they cannot carry themselves back into 
 that glorious epoch, and make, themselves feel 
 that they are part of us; but when they look 
 through that old Declaration of Independence, 
 they find that those old men say that " We 
 hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men 
 are created equal," etc., and then they feel that 
 that moral sentiment taught in that day evidences 
 their relation to those men, that it is the father of
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 225 
 
 all moral principle in them, and that they have a 
 right to claim it as though they were blood of the 
 blood and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote 
 that declaration; and so they are. That is the 
 electric cord in that declaration that links the 
 hearts of patriotic and liberty-loving men to- 
 gether, that will link those patriotic hearts as long 
 as the love of freedom exists in the minds of men 
 
 throughout the world 
 
 Those arguments that are made, that the inferior 
 race are to be treated with as much allowance as 
 they are capable of enjoying ; that as much is to 
 be done for them as their condition will allow. 
 What are these arguments? They are the argu- 
 ments that kings have made for enslaving the peo- 
 ple in all ages of the world. You will find that 
 all the arguments in favor of king-craft were of 
 this class ; they always bestrode the necks of the 
 people, not that they wanted to do it, but because 
 the people were better off for being ridden. That 
 is their argument, and this argument of the judge 
 is the same old serpent that says, You work, and I 
 eat; you toil, and I will enjoy the fruits of it. 
 Turn it whatever way you will, whether it come 
 from the mouth of a king, an excuse for enslaving 
 the people of his country, or from the mouth of 
 men of one race as a reason for enslaving the men 
 of another race, it is all the same old serpent, and 
 I hold if that course of argumentation that is made 
 
 15
 
 226 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTEH8. 
 
 for the purpose of convincing the public mind that 
 we should not care about this, should be granted, 
 it does not stop with the negro. I should like to 
 know, taking this old Declaration of Independence, 
 which declares that all men are equal upon princi- 
 ple, and making exceptions to it, where will it 
 stop? If one man says it does not mean the 
 negro, why not another say it does not mean some 
 other man? If that declaration is not the truth, 
 let us get the statute book in which we find it and 
 tear it out ! Who is so bold as to do it 1 If it is 
 not true, let us tear it out ! [Cries of " No, no 1 "] 
 Let us stick to it, then ; let us stand firmly by it, 
 then. 
 
 [From a letter to Mr. Speed, August 24, 1858.] 
 
 Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be 
 pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declar- 
 ing that " all men are created equal." We now 
 practically read it, " All men are created equal, 
 except negroes." When the Know-nothings get 
 control it will read, " All men are created equal, 
 except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics." 
 When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating 
 to some country where they make no pretence of 
 loving liberty ; to Russia, for instance, where des- 
 potism can be taken pure, and without the base 
 alloy of hypocrisy.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 227 
 
 [From a speech delivered October, 1858.] 
 
 The judge has alluded to the Declaration of In- 
 dependence, and insisted that negroes are not in- 
 cluded in that declaration ; and that it is a slander 
 upon the framers of that instrument to suppose 
 that negroes were meant therein ; and he asks you, 
 Is it possible to believe that Mr. Jefferson, who 
 penned the immortal paper, could have supposed 
 himself applying the language of that instrument 
 to the negro race, and yet held a portion of that 
 race in slavery ? Would he not at once have freed 
 them? I only have to remark, . . . that I believe 
 the entire records of the world, from the date of 
 the Declaration of Independence up to within three 
 years ago, may be searched in vain for one single 
 affirmation, from one single man, that the negro 
 was not included in the Declaration of Indepen- 
 dence ; . . . that Washington ever said so, that 
 any President ever said so, that any member of 
 Congress ever said so, or that any living man upon 
 the whole earth ever said so, until the necessities 
 of the present policy of the Democratic party, in 
 regard to slavery, had to invent that affirmation. 
 And I will remind Judge Douglas and this audi- 
 ence, that while Mr. Jefferson was the owner of 
 slaves, in speaking upon this very subject, he used 
 the strong language, that "he trembled for his 
 country when he remembered that God was just."
 
 228 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 . . . He supposed there was a question of God's 
 eternal justice wrapped up in the enslaving of any 
 race of men, or any man, and that those who did 
 so braved the arm of Jehovah ; that when a nation 
 thus dared the Almighty, every friend of that na- 
 tion had cause to dread His wrath. 
 
 [From a Speech delivered in 1858.] 
 
 Judge Douglas declares that, if any community 
 want slavery, they have a right to have it. He can 
 say that logically, if he says that there is no wrong 
 in slavery ; but if you admit that there is a wrong in 
 it, he cannot logically say that anybody has a right 
 to do wrong. He insists that, upon the score of 
 equality, the owners of slaves and owners of prop- 
 erty, of horse, and every other sort of property, 
 
 should be alike, and hold them alike, in a new 
 territory. That is perfectly logical if the species 
 of property are alike, and are equally founded in 
 right. But if you admit that one of them is wrong, 
 you cannot institute any equality between right 
 and wrong. And from this difference of sentiment, 
 
 the belief on the part of one that the institu- 
 tion is wrong, and a policy springing from that 
 belief which looks to the arrest of the enlargement 
 of that wrong ; and this other sentiment, that it is 
 no wrong, and a policy sprung from that sentiment 
 which will tolerate no idea of preventing that 
 wrong from growing larger, and looks to there
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 229 
 
 never being an end of it through all the existence 
 of things, arises the real difference between 
 Judge Douglas and his friends on the one hand, 
 and the Republicans on the other. Now I confess 
 myself as belonging to that class in the country 
 who contemplate slavery as a moral, social, and 
 political evil, having due regard for its actual ex- 
 istence amongst us, and the difficulties of getting 
 rid of it in any satisfactory way, and to all the 
 constitutional obligations which have been thrown 
 about it; but, nevertheless, desire a policy that 
 looks to the prevention of it as a wrong, and looks 
 hopefully to the time when, as a wrong, it may 
 come to an end. 
 
 [From a Speech at Alton, Illinois. To the question, "Is 
 slavery wrong?" Mr. Lincoln said] : 
 
 That is the real issue. That is the issue that 
 will continue in this country when these poor 
 tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be 
 
 O O ^ * 
 
 silent. It is the eternal struggle between these 
 two principles right and wrong throughout 
 the world. They are two principles that have 
 stood face to face from the beginning of time, and 
 will ever continue to struggle. The one is the 
 common right of humanity, and the other the di- 
 vine right of kings.
 
 230 SELECTION*) FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 a Speech at Springfield, Illinois.] 
 Judge Douglas is going back to the era of tho 
 
 o o o o 
 
 Revolution, and, to the extent of his ability, muz- 
 zling the cannon which thunders its * annual joy- 
 ous return. When he invites any people willing 
 to have slavery to establish it, he is blowing out 
 the moral lights around us. When he says he 
 " cares not whether slavery is voted down or voted 
 up," that it is a sacred right of self-government, 
 he is, in my judgment, penetrating the human 
 soul, and eradicating the light of reason and the 
 love of liberty in this American people. 
 
 JTrom a Speech in New York, at the Cooper Institute, Feb- 
 ruary 27, I860.] 
 
 ..... Wrong as we think slavery is, we can 
 yet afford to let it alone where it is, because that 
 much is due to the necessity arising from its actual 
 presence in the nation ; but can we, while our 
 votes will prevent it, allow it to spread into the 
 national Territories, and to overrun here in these 
 Free States? 
 
 If our sense of duty forbids this, then let us 
 stand by our duty fearlessly and effectively. Let 
 us be diverted by none of these sophistical con- 
 trivances wherewith we are so industriously plied 
 
 * The celebration of Independence, on the 4th of July.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 231 
 
 and belabored contrivances such as groping for 
 some middle ground between the right and the 
 wrong, vain as the search for a man who should be 
 neither a living man nor a dead man such a 
 policy of " don't care " on a question about which 
 all true men do care, such as Union appeals be- 
 seeching true Union men to yield to Disunionists, 
 reversing the divine rule, and calling, not the sin- 
 ners, but the righteous, to repentance such as 
 invocations to Washington, imploring men to un- 
 say what Washington said, and undo what Wash- 
 ington did. 
 
 Neither let us be slandered from our duty by 
 false accusations against us, nor frightened from it 
 by menaces of destruction to the government, nor 
 of dungeons to ourselves. 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. 
 
 [Farewell Speech to his neighbors, from the platform of the 
 car, as he was leaving Springfield for Washington, Feb- 
 ruary 11, 1861.] 
 
 Friends, No one who has never been placed 
 in a like position can understand my feelings at 
 this hour, nor the oppressive sadness I feel at tms 
 parting. For more than a quarter of a century I 
 have lived among you, and during that time I have 
 received nothing but kindness at your hands. Here 
 I have lived from my youth, until now I urn an old
 
 232 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS . 
 
 man. Here the most sacred ties of earth were 
 assumed. Here all my children were born ; and 
 here one of them lies buried. To you, dear 
 friends, I owe all that I have, all that I am. All 
 the strange, checkered past seems to crowd now 
 upon my mind. To-day I leave you. I go to as- 
 sume a task more difficult than that which devolved 
 upon Washington. Unless the great God, who 
 assisted him, shall be with and aid me, I must fail ; 
 but if the same omniscient mind and almighty arm 
 that directed and protected him, shall guide and 
 support me, I shall not fail, I shall succeed. 
 Let us all pray that the God of our fathers may 
 not forsake us now. To Him I commend you 
 all. Permit me to ask that, with equal sin- 
 cerity and faith, you will invoke His wisdom 
 and guidance for me. With these few words I 
 must leave you ; for how long I know not. Friends, 
 one and all, I must now bid you an affectionate 
 farewell. 
 
 [Tn an Address to the Legislature of New Jersey, on his 
 way to Washington, February, 1861, Mr. Lincoln said] : 
 
 I shall endeavor to take the ground I deem most 
 just to the North, the East, the West, the South, 
 and the whole country. I take it, I hope, in good 
 temper, certainly with no malice toward any sec- 
 tion. I shall do all that may be in my power to 
 promote a peaceful settlement of nil our difficulties.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 233 
 
 The man docs not live who is more devoted to 
 peace than I am none who would do more to 
 preserve it. But it may be necessary to put the 
 foot down firmly. And if I do my duty, and do 
 right, you will sustain me, will you not? Received 
 as I am by the members of a Legislature, the ma- 
 jority of whom do not agree with me in political 
 sentiments, I trust that I may have their assistance 
 in piloting the ship of State through this voyage, 
 surrounded by perils as it is ; for if it should suf- 
 fer shipwreck now, there will be no pilot ever 
 needed for another voyage. 
 
 [At Philadelphia, in " Independence Hall," from which was 
 issued the Declaration of Independence, in 1776, Mr. 
 Lincoln said] : 
 
 I am filled with deep emotion at finding myself 
 standing here, in this place, where were collected 
 the wisdom, the patriotism, the devotion to prin- 
 ciple, from which sprang the institutions under 
 which we live. You have kindly suggested to mo 
 that in my hands is the task of restoring peace to 
 the present distracted condition of the country. I 
 can say in return, sir, that all the political senti- 
 ments I entertain have been drawn, so far as I 
 have been able to draw them, from the sentiments 
 which originated and were given to the woild from 
 this hull. I have never had a feeling politically 
 that did not spring from the sentiments embodied
 
 234 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS, 
 
 in the Declaration of Independence. I have often 
 pondered over the dangers which were incurred 
 by the men who assembled here, and framed 
 and adopted the Declaration of Independence. 
 I have pondered over the toils that were en- 
 dured by the officers and soldiers of the army 
 who achieved that independence. I have often 
 inquired of myself what great principle or idea it 
 was that kept this confederacy so long together. 
 It was not the mere matter of the separation of the 
 colonies from the mother-land, but that sentiment 
 in the Declaration of Independence which gave 
 liberty, not alone to the people of this country, 
 but, I hope, to the world for all future time. It 
 was that which gave promise that in due time the 
 weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all 
 men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Decla- 
 ration of Independence. Now, my friends, can 
 this country be saved upon this basis? If it can, 
 I will consider myself one of the happiest men 
 in the world if I can help to save it. If it cannot 
 be saved upon that principle, it will be truly awful. 
 But if this country cannot be saved without giving 
 up that principle, I was about to say, I would 
 rather be assassinated on this spot than surrender 
 it. Now, in my view of the present aspect of af- 
 fairs, there need be no bloodshed or war. There 
 is no necessity for it. I am not in favor of such a 
 course, and I mav say, in advance, that there will
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 235 
 
 be no bloodshed unless it be forced upon the Gov- 
 ernment, and then it will be compelled to act in 
 self-defence. 
 
 My friends, this is wholly an unexpected speech. 
 ... I may, therefore, have said something in- 
 discreet. 1 have said nothing but what I am will- 
 ing to live by, and, if it be the pleasure of Al- 
 mighty God, to die by. 
 
 [From his Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861.] 
 
 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 ? 
 In our present differences, is either party without 
 faith of being in the right? If the Almighty Kuler 
 of nations, w T ith his eternal truth and justice, bo 
 on your side of the North, or on yours of the 
 South, that truth and that justice will surely pre- 
 vail, by the judgment of the great tribunal of the 
 
 American people 
 
 You can have no conflict without being your- 
 selves the aggressors. You have no oath regis- 
 tered in heaven to destroy the government, while 
 I shall have the most solemn one to " preserve, 
 protect, and defend " it. 
 
 I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but 
 friends. We must not be enemies. Though pas- 
 sion may have strained, it must not break our 
 bonds of affection. The mystic chord of memory, 
 W
 
 i&tt SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 stretching from every battle-field 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 it will 
 be, by the better angels of our nature. 
 
 [From a Message to Congress, July 4, 1861.] 
 
 It might seem, at first thought, to be of 
 
 little difference whether the present movement at 
 the South be called " secession," or " rebellion." 
 The movers, however, will understand the differ- 
 ence. At the beginning they knew they could 
 never raise their treason to any respectable mag- 
 nitude by any name which implies violation of law. 
 They knew their people possessed as much of 
 moral sense, as much of devotion to law and order, 
 and as much pride in, and reverence for, the his- 
 tory and government of their common country, as 
 any other civilized and patriotic people. They 
 knew they could make no advancement directly in 
 the teeth of these strong and noble sentiments. 
 Accordingly they commenced by an insidious de- 
 bauching of the public mind. They invented an 
 ingenious sophism, which, if conceded, was fol- 
 lowed by perfectly logical steps, through all the 
 incidents, to the complete destruction of the 
 Unioa. The sophism itself is, that any State of 
 the Union may, consistently with the National 
 Constitution, and therefore lawfully and peace-
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 237 
 
 fully, withdraw from the Union without the con- 
 sent of the Union, or of any other State. The 
 little disguise that tho supposed right is to be ex- 
 ercised only for just cause, themselves to be the 
 sole judge of its justice, is too thin to want any 
 notice. 
 
 With rebellion thus sugar-coated, they havo 
 been drugging the public mind of their section for 
 more than thirty years, and until at length they 
 have brought many good men to a willingness to 
 take up arms against the government the day after 
 some assemblage of men have enacted that farcical 
 pretense of taking their State out of the Union, 
 \vho could have been brought to no such thing tho 
 day before. 
 
 [Speaking of what was called the right of peaceful secession, 
 that is, secession in accordance with the National Con- 
 stitution, he said] : 
 
 This sophism derives much, perhaps the whole, 
 of its currency from the assumption that there is 
 some omnipotent and sacred supremacy pertaining 
 to a State to each State of our Federal Union. 
 Our States have neither more nor less power than 
 that reserved to them in the Union by the Consti- 
 tution, no one of them ever having been a Slate 
 out of the Union. The original ones passed into 
 the Union even before they cast off their British 
 colonial dependence, and tho new ones each came
 
 238 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS, 
 
 into the Union directly from a condition of depend- 
 ence, excepting Texas. And even Texas, in its 
 temporary independence, was never designated a 
 State. The new ones only took the designation 
 of States on coming into the Union, while that 
 name was first adopted for the old ones in and by 
 the Declaration of Independence. Therein the 
 " United Colonies " were declared to be " free and 
 independent States ; " but, even then, the object 
 plainly was not to declare their independence of 
 one another, or of the Union, but directly the con- 
 trary, as their mutual pledge, and their mutual 
 action, before, at the time, and afterward, abun- 
 dantly show. The express plighting of faith by 
 each and all of the original thirteen, in the arti- 
 cles of Confederation, two years later, that tho 
 Union shall be perpetual, is most conclusive. 
 Having never been States, either in substance or 
 in name, outside of the Union, whence this magi- 
 cal omnipotence of " State rights," asserting a claim 
 of power to lawfully destroy the Union itself? 
 Much is said about the " sovereignty " of the 
 States ; but the word even is not in the National 
 Constitution, nor, as is believed, in any of the 
 State Constitutions. What is a " sovereignty " in 
 the political sense of the term? Would it be far 
 wrong to define it a " political community, with- 
 out a political superior? " Tested by this, no one 
 of our States, except Texas, ever was a sover-
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. li.'JU 
 
 eignt y ; and even Texas gave up the character on 
 coming into the Union ; by which act she acknowl- 
 edged the Constitution of the United States, and 
 the laws and treaties of the United States made in 
 pursuance of the Constitution, to be, for her, the 
 supreme laws of the land. The States have their 
 status IN the Union, and they have no other legal 
 status. If they break from this, they can only do 
 so against law, and by revolution. The Union, 
 and not themselves separately, procured their 
 independence and their liberty. By conquest, or 
 purchase, the Union gave each of them whatever 
 of independence and liberty it has. The Union is 
 older than any of the States ; and, in fact, it 
 created them as States. Originally, some de- 
 pendent colonies made the Union, and, in turn, 
 the Union threw off their old dependence for them, 
 and made them States, such as they are. Not 
 one of them ever had a State constitution indepen- 
 dent of the Union. Of course, it is not forgotten 
 that all the new States framed their constitutions 
 before they entered the Union ; nevertheless de- 
 pendent upon, and preparatory to, coming into the 
 Union. 
 
 This relative matter of National power and State 
 rights, as a principle, is no other than the princi- 
 ple of generality, and locality. Whatever con- 
 cerns the whole should be confided to the whole
 
 240 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 to the general government; while whatever con- 
 cerns only the State should be left exclusively to 
 the State. This is all there is of original principle 
 about it. 
 
 Our adversaries have adopted some declarations 
 of independence, in which, unlike the good old 
 one penned by Jefferson, they omit the words, 
 w All men are created equal." Why? They have 
 adopted a temporary national constitution, in the 
 preamble of which, unlike our good old one signed 
 by Washington, they omit " We, the people," and 
 substitute " We, the deputies of the sovereign and 
 independent States." Why? Why this deliber- 
 ate pressing out of view the rights of men and the 
 authority of the people? This is essentially a 
 people's contest. On the side of the Union, it is 
 a struggle for maintaining in the world that form 
 and substance of government whose leading object 
 is to elevate the condition of men ; to lift artificial 
 weights from all shoulders ; to clear the paths of 
 laudable pursuit to all ; to afford all an unfettered 
 start, and a fair chance in the race of life. Yield- 
 ing to partial and temporary departures, from ne- 
 cessity, this is the leading object of the govern- 
 ment, for whose existence we contend. I am most 
 happy to believe that the plain people understand 
 and appreciate this.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 241 
 
 [Reply to a Letter of Horace Greeley, entitled, " The Prayer 
 of Twenty Millions," to President Lincoln.] 
 
 August 22, 18G2. 
 
 I have just read yours of the nineteenth, ad- 
 dressed to myself through the New York Tribune. 
 If there be in it any statement, or assumptions of 
 fact, which I may know to be erroneous, I do not 
 now and here controvert them. If there be in it 
 any inference, which I may believe to be falsely 
 drawn, I do not now and here argue against them. 
 If there be perceptible in it an impatient and dic- 
 tatorial tone, I waive it in deference to an old 
 friend, whose heart I have always supposed to bo 
 right. 
 
 As to the policy I " seem to be pursuing," as 
 you say, I have not meant to leave any one in 
 doubt. 
 
 I would save the Union. I would save it the 
 shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner 
 the National authority can be restored, the nearer 
 the Union will be " the Union as it was." If there 
 be those who would not save the Union unless they 
 could at the same time save Slavery, I do not 
 agree with them. If there be those who would 
 not save the Union unless they could at the same 
 time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. 
 My paramount object in this struggle is to save 
 the Union, and is not either to save or destroy 
 slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing 
 
 16
 
 242 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 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 
 do 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 this 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. I shall try to correct errors when 
 shown to be errors ; and I shall adopt new views 
 so fast as they shall appear to be true views. 
 
 I have here stated my purpose according to my 
 view of official duty, and I intend no modification 
 of my oft-expressed personal wish, that all men, 
 everywhere, could be free. 
 
 [To a delegation of clergymen from Chicago, who urged 
 him to issue a proclamation of emancipation, September 
 13, 1862.] 
 
 I do not want to issue a document that the 
 
 whole world will see must necessarily be inopera- 
 tive, like the pope's bull against the comet. . . . Do 
 not misunderstand me, because I have mentioned 
 these objections. They indicate the difficulties 
 which have thus far prevented my action in some 
 Buch way as you desire. I have not decided 
 against a proclamation of liberty to the slaves, but
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 243 
 
 hold the matter under advisement. And I can 
 assure you that the subject is on my mind, by day 
 and night, more than any other. Whatever shall 
 appear to be God's will, I will do. 
 
 [To strictures upon his conduct of the war by some Western 
 gentlemen, he replied] : 
 
 Gentlemen, suppose all the property you were 
 worth was in gold, and you had put it in the hands 
 of Blondin to carry across Niagara Falls on a tight- 
 rope, would you shake the rope while he was pass- 
 ing over it, or keep shouting to him, "Blondin, 
 stoop a little more ; " " Go a little faster? " No, I 
 am sure you would not. You would hold your 
 breath as well us your tongue, and keep your hands 
 off until he was safely over. Now the government 
 is in the same situation, and is carrying across a 
 stormy ocean an immense weight ; untold treasures 
 are in its hands ; it is doing the best it can ; don't 
 badger it ; keep silence, and it will get you safely 
 over. 
 
 [General Order respecting the observance of the Sabbath in 
 the army and navy.] 
 
 November 16, 1862. 
 
 The President, Commandcr-in-Chicf of the Army 
 and Navy, desires and enjoins the orderly observ- 
 ance of the Sabbath by the officers and men in 
 the military and naval sen-ice. The importance 
 for mail and beast of the prescribed weekly rest,
 
 24:4:8ELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 the sacred rights of Christian soldiers and sailors, 
 a becoming deference to the best sentiment of a 
 Christian people, and a due regard for the Divine 
 will, demand that Sunday labor in the army and 
 navy be reduced to the measure of strict neces- 
 sity. 
 
 The discipline and character of the national 
 forces should not suffer, nor the causo they defend 
 be imperilled, by the profanation of the day or 
 the name of the Most High. " At this time of 
 public distress," adopting the words of Washington 
 in 1776, "men may find enough to do in the ser- 
 vice of God and their country without abandoning 
 themselves to vice and immorality." The first 
 general order issued by the Father of his Country 
 after the Declaration of Independence, indicates 
 the spirit in which our institutions were founded 
 and should ever be defended : w The General hopes 
 and trusts that every officer and man will endeavor 
 to live and act as becomes a Christian soldier de- 
 fending the dearest rights and liberties of his conn- 
 try." 
 
 [To Mr. Colfax, on the evening of the day on which Mr. 
 Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, January 
 1, 1863.] 
 
 The South had fair warning, that if they did not 
 return to their duty, I should strike at this pillar 
 of their strength. The promise must now be 
 keDt. and I shall never recall one word.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. t>45 
 
 [Reply to an Address by the citizens of Manchester, Eng- 
 land, after the issuing of the Proclamation of Emanci- 
 pation.] 
 
 January 19, 18G3. 
 
 To the Workinginen of Manchester : . . . 
 When I came, on the fourth of March, 18G1, 
 through a free and constitutional election, to pre- 
 side in the Government of the United States, the 
 country was found at the verge of civil war. 
 Whatever might have been the cause, or whose- 
 soever the fault, one duty, paramount to all others, 
 was before me, namely, to maintain and preserve 
 at once the Constitution and the integrity of the 
 Federal Republic. A conscientious purpose to 
 perform this duty is the key to all the measures 
 of administration which have been, and to all 
 which will hereafter be pursued. Under our frame 
 of government and my official oath, I could not 
 depart from this purpose if I would. It is not 
 always in the power of governments to enlarge or 
 restrict the scope of moral results which follow 
 the policies that they may deem it necessary, for 
 the public safety, from time to time to adopt 
 
 I know, and deeply deplore, the sufferings which 
 the workingmen at Manchester, and in all Europe, 
 are called to endure in this crisis. It has been often 
 studiously represented that the attempt to over- 
 throw this Government, which was built upon the 
 foundation of human rights, and to substitute for
 
 246 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 it one which should rest exclusively on the basis 
 of human slavery, was likely to obtain the favor 
 of Europe. Through the action of our disloyal 
 citizens, the workingmen of Europe have been 
 subjected to severe trial, for the purpose of forcing 
 their sanction to that attempt. Under these cir- 
 cumstances I cannot but regard your decisive utter- 
 ances upon the question as an instance of sublime 
 Christian heroism which has not been surpassed in 
 any age or in any country. It is indeed an ener- 
 getic and re-inspiring assurance of the inherent 
 power of truth, and of the ultimate and universal 
 triumph of justice, humanity, ^and freedom. I do 
 not doubt that the sentiments you have expressed 
 will be sustained by your great nation ; and, on 
 the other hand, I have no hesitation in assuring 
 you that they will excite admiration, esteem, and 
 the most reciprocal feelings of friendship among 
 the American people. 
 
 I hail this interchange of sentiment, therefore, 
 as an augury that, whatever else may happen, 
 whatever misfortune may befall your country or 
 my own, the peace and friendship which now ex- 
 ist between the two nations will be, as it shall be 
 my desire to make them, perpetual.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 247 
 
 [From his Reply to Resolutions of the New York Demo- 
 crats, May 19, 18G3, protesting against his suspension of 
 the writ of habeas corpus, and arrest of Mr. Vallanding- 
 ham for the crime of seeking to prevent the enlistment 
 of troops.] 
 
 Prior to my installation here it had been 
 
 inculcated that any State had a lawful right to 
 secede from the National Union, and that it would 
 be expedient to exercise the right whenever the 
 devotees of the doctrine should fail to elect a 
 president to their own liking. I was elected con- 
 trary to their liking ; and accordingly, so far as it 
 was legally possible, they had taken seven States 
 out of the Union, had seized many of the United 
 States forts, and had fired upon the United States 
 flag, all before I was inaugurated, and of course 
 before I had done any official act whatever. The 
 rebellion thus begun soon ran into the present 
 civil war; and, in certain respects, it began on 
 very unequal terms between the parties. The in- 
 surgents had been preparing for it more than 
 thirty years, while the government had taken no 
 steps to resist them. The former had carefully 
 considered all the means which could be turned to 
 their account. It undoubtedly was a well-pon- 
 dered reliance with them that in their own unre- 
 stricted efforts to destroy Union, Constitution, and 
 law, all together, the government would, in great 
 degree, be restrained by the same Constitution
 
 248 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 and law from arresting their progress. Their 
 sympathizers pervaded all departments of the gov- 
 ernment and nearly all communities of the people. 
 From this material, under cover of " liberty of 
 speech," M liberty of the press," and habeas corpus, 
 they hoped to keep on foot amongst us a most effi- 
 cient corps of spies, informers, suppliers, and 
 aiders and abettors of their cause in a thousand 
 ways. They knew that in times such as they were 
 inaugurating, by the constitution itself, the habeas 
 corpus might be suspended ; but they also knew 
 they had friends who would make a question as to 
 who was to suspend it ; meanwhile their spies and 
 others might remain at large to help on their 
 cause. Or if, as has happened, the executive 
 should suspend the writ, without ruinous waste of 
 time, instances of arresting innocent persons might 
 occur, as are always likely to occur in such cases, 
 and then a clamor could be raised in regard to 
 this, which might be, at least, of some service to 
 the insurgent cause. It needed no very keen per- 
 ception to discover this part of the enemy's pro- 
 gramme so soon as by open hostilities their ma- 
 chinery was fairly put in motion. Yet, thoroughly 
 imbued with a reverence for the guaranteed rights 
 of individuals, I was slow to adopt the strong 
 measures which by degrees I have been forced to 
 regard as being within the exceptions of the 
 Constitution, and as indispensable to the public 
 safety
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 240 
 
 I understand the meeting, whose resolutions I 
 am considering, to be in favor of suppressing the 
 rebellion by military force by armies. Long 
 experience has shown that armies cannot be main- 
 tained unless desertion shall be punished by the 
 severe penalty of death. The case requires, and 
 the law and the Constitution sanction this punish- 
 ment. Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier-boy 
 who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of a 
 wily agitator who induces him to desert ? This is 
 none the less injurious when effected by getting a 
 father, or brother, or friend, into a public meeting, 
 and there working upon his feelings till he is per- 
 suaded to write the soldier-boy that he is fighting 
 in a bad cause, for a wicked administration of a 
 contemptible government, too weak to arrest and 
 punish him if he shall desert. I think that in such 
 a case to silence the agitator and save the boy, is 
 not only constitutional, but withal a great mercy. 
 
 Nor am I able to appreciate the danger appre- 
 hended by the meeting, that the American people 
 will, by means of military arrests during the rebel- 
 lion, lose the right of public discussion, the liberty 
 of speech and the press, the law of evidence, trial 
 by jury, and habeas corpus throughout the indefi- 
 nite peaceful future which, I trust, lies before 
 them, any more than I am able to believe that a 
 man could contract BO gtrong an appetite for
 
 250 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 emetics during temporary illness as to persist in 
 feeding upon them during the remainder of his 
 healthful life. 
 
 In giving the resolutions the earnest considera- 
 tion which you request of me, I cannot overlook 
 the fact that the meeting speak as "Democrats." 
 Nor can I with full respect for their known intel- 
 ligence, and the fairly presumed deliberation with 
 which they prepared these resolutions, be permit- 
 ted to suppose that this occurs by accident, or in 
 any way other than that they prefer to designate 
 themselves Democrats rather than American citi- 
 zens. In this time of national peril I would have 
 preferred to meet you on a level one step higher 
 than any party platform, because I am sure that 
 from such more elevated position we could do bet- 
 ter battle for the country we all love than we pos- 
 sibly can from those lower ones where, from the 
 force of habit, the prejudices of the past, and 
 selfish hopes of the future, we are sure to expend 
 much of our ingenuity and strength in finding 
 fault with, and aiming blows at, each other. But, 
 since you have denied me this, I will yet be thank- 
 ful, for the country's sake, that not all Democrats 
 have done so. 
 
 [Letter to James C. Conkling.] 
 
 August 16, 1863. 
 
 There are those who are dissatisfied 
 
 with me. To such I would say, You desire peace,
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 251 
 
 and you blame me that we do not have it. But 
 how can we obtain it? There are but three con- 
 ceivable ways. First, to suppress the rebellion 
 by force of arms. This I am trying to do. Are 
 you for it ? If you are so, we are agreed. If you 
 are not for it, a second way is to give up the 
 Union. I am against this. If you are, you should 
 say so plainly. If you are not for force, nor yet 
 for dissolution, there only remains some imaginary 
 compromise. I do not believe that any compro- 
 mise embracing the maintenance of the Union is 
 now possible. All that I learn leads to a directly 
 opposite belief. The strength of the rebellion is 
 its military, its army. The army dominate all the 
 country, and all the people within its range. Any 
 offer of terms made by any man or men within 
 that range in opposition to that army is simply 
 nothing for the present ; because such man or 
 men have no power whatever to enforce their side 
 of a compromise, if one w r ere made with them. 
 
 You dislike the Emancipation Proclamation, and 
 perhaps would have it retracted. You say it is un- 
 constitutional. I think differently. I think the Con- 
 stitution invests its Commander-in-chief with the 
 law of war in the time of war. The most that can 
 be said, if so much, is that slaves are property. 
 Is there, has there ever been, any question that by 
 the law of war property, both of enemies and 
 u
 
 252 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS, 
 
 friends, may be taken when needed? And is it 
 not needed whenever taking it helps us and hurts 
 the enemy I Armies the world over destroy ene- 
 my's property when they cannot use it ; and even 
 destroy their own to keep it from the enemy. 
 Civilized belligerents do all in their power to help 
 themselves and hurt the enemy, except a few 
 things regarded as barbarous or cruel. Among 
 the exceptions are the massacre of vanquished foes 
 and non-combatants, male and female. 
 
 But the Proclamation, as law, is valid, or is not 
 valid. If it is valid, it cannot be retracted any 
 more than the dead can be brought to life. Some 
 of you profess to think that its retraction would 
 operate favorably for the Union. Why better 
 after the retraction than before the issue ? There 
 was more than a year and a half of trial to sup- 
 press the rebellion before the Proclamation was 
 issued, the last one hundred days of which passed 
 under an explicit notice that it was coming, unless 
 averted by those in revolt returning to their 
 allegiance. The war has certainly progressed as 
 favorably for us since the issue of the Proclamation 
 as before 
 
 You say you will not fight to free negroes. 
 Some of them seem to be willing to fight for you. 
 But no matter. Fight you then exclusively to 
 save the Union. I issued the Proclamation on 
 purpose to aid you in saving the Union.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. O">3 
 
 Whenever wo shall have conquered all resist- 
 ance to the Union, if I shall urge you to continue 
 fighting, it will be an apt time then for you to de- 
 clare that you will not tight to free negroes. 
 
 I thought that in your struggle for the Union, to 
 whatever extent the negroes should cease helping 
 the enemy, to that extent it weakened the enemy 
 in his resistance to you. Do you think differently? 
 I thought that whatever negroes can be got to do 
 as soldiers leaves just so much less for white sol- 
 diers to do in saving the Union. Does it appear 
 otherwise to you? But negroes, like other peo- 
 ple, act upon motives. Why should they do any- 
 thing for us if we will do nothing for them? If 
 they stake their lives for us they must be 
 prompted by the strongest motive, even the 
 promise of their freedom. And the promise, be- 
 ing made, must be kept. 
 
 The signs look better. The Father of Waters 
 again goes unvexed to the sea. Thanks to the 
 great North-west for it. Nor yet wholly to them. 
 Three hundred miles up they met New England, 
 Empire, Keystone, and Jersey hewing their way 
 right and left. The sunny South, too, in more 
 colors than one, also lent a hand. On the spot 
 their part of the history was jotted down in black 
 and white. The job was a great national one, and 
 let none be banned who bore an honorable part in 
 it. And while those who have cleared the great
 
 254 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 river may well be proud, even that is not all. It 
 is hard to say that anything has been more bravely 
 or better done than at Antietam, Murfreesboro, 
 Gettysburg, and on many fields of lesser note. 
 
 Nor must Uncle Sam's web-foot be forgotten. 
 At all the waters' margins they have been present, 
 not only on the deep sea, the broad bay, and the 
 rapid river, but also up the narrow, muddy 
 bayou, and wherever the ground was a little 
 damp, they have been and made their tracks. 
 
 Thanks to all. For the great Republic, for 
 the principles by which it lives and keeps alive for 
 man's vast future, thanks to all. 
 
 Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I 
 hope it will soon come, and come to stay, and so 
 come as to be worth keeping in all future time. 
 It will then have been proved that among freemen 
 there can be no successful appeal from the ballot 
 to the bullet, and that they who take such appeal 
 are sure to lose their case, and pay the cost. 
 
 And then there will be some black men who can 
 remember that, with silent tongue, and clenched 
 teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bayonet, 
 they have helped mankind on to this great con- 
 summation, while I fear there will be some white 
 men unable to forget that, with malignant heart 
 and deceitful speech, they have striven to hin- 
 der it. 
 
 Still, let us not be over sanguine 0* a speedy
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. ^55 
 
 final triumph. Let us be quite sober. Let us> 
 diligently apply the means, never doubting that a 
 just God, in his own good time, will give us the 
 rightful result. 
 
 [To Mr. Colfax, in the winter of 1863, the morning after 
 unfavorable news from the army.] 
 
 How willingly would I exchange places to-day 
 with the soldier who sleeps on the ground in the 
 Army of the Potomac. 
 
 [From liis third Annual Message to Congress, December 8, 
 18G3.] 
 
 "When Congress assembled a year ago, 
 
 the war had already lasted nearly twenty months, 
 and there had been many conflicts on both land and 
 sea with varying results. The rebellion had been 
 pressed back into reduced limits ; yet the tone of 
 public feeling and opinion, at home and abroad, 
 was not satisfactory. With other signs, the popu- 
 lar election, then just passed, indicated uneasiness 
 among ourselves, while amid much that was cold 
 and menacing, the kindest Avords coming from Eu- 
 rope were uttered in accents of pity that we were 
 too blind to surrender a hopeless cause. 
 
 [From a Speech after his re-election, November 10, 1864.] 
 
 So long as I have been here I have not willingly 
 
 planted a thorn in any man's boboui. While 1 uui
 
 256 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 deeply sensible of the high compliment of a re- 
 election, and duly grateful, I trust, to Almighty 
 God for having directed my countrymen to a right 
 conclusion, as I think, for their own good, it adds 
 nothing to my satisfaction that any other man may 
 be disappointed or pained by the result. 
 
 [To a Committee of the New York Workingmen's Republi- 
 can Association, March 21, 1864.] 
 
 The strongest bond of human sympathy, 
 
 outside of the family relation, should be one unit- 
 ing all working people, of all nations, tongues, and 
 kindreds. Nor should this lead to a war upon 
 property or the owners of property. Property is 
 the fruit of labor ; property is desirable, is a posi- 
 tive good in the world. That some should be rich 
 shows that others may become rich, and hence is 
 just encouragement to independence and enter- 
 prise. 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 as- 
 suring that his own shall be safe from violence 
 when built. 
 
 [From a letter to Colonel Hodges, of Kentucky.] 
 
 WASHINGTON, April 4, 1864. 
 
 You ask me to put in writing the substance of 
 what I verbally said the other day in your pres- 
 ence to Governor Bramlette and Senator Dixon.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 257 
 
 It was about as follows: "I am naturally anti- 
 tslavery. If slavery is not wrong, nothing is 
 wrong. I cannot remember when I did not so 
 think and feel, and yet I have never understood 
 that the Presidency conferred upon me an unre- 
 stricted right to act officially upon this judgment 
 and feeling. It was in the oath I took that I would 
 to the best of my ability preserve, protect, and 
 defend the Constitution of the United States. I 
 could not take the office without taking the oath. 
 Nor was it in my view that I might take an oath 
 to get power, and break the oath in using the 
 power. I understand, too, that in ordinary and 
 civil administration this oath even forbids me to 
 practically indulge my primary abstract judgment 
 on the moral question of slavery. I had publicly 
 declared this at many times and in many ways. 
 And I aver that, to this day, I have done no offi- 
 cial act in mere deference to my abstract judgment 
 and feeling on slavery. I did understand, how- 
 ever, that my oath to preserve the Constitution to 
 the best of my ability imposed upon me the duty 
 of preserving, by every indispensable means, that 
 Government that nation of which the Consti- 
 tution was the organic law. Was it possible to 
 lose the nation, and yet preserve the Constitution? 
 By general law, life and limb must be protected ; 
 yet often a limb must be amputated, to save a life ;
 
 258 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 but a life is never wisely given to save a limb. I 
 felt that measures, otherwise unconstitutional, 
 might become lawful by becoming indispensable to 
 the preservation of the Constitution, through the 
 preservation of the nation. Right or wrong, I as- 
 sumed this ground ; and now avow it. I could 
 not feel that, to the best of my ability, I had even 
 tried to preserve the Constitution, if, to save 
 slavery, or any minor matter, I should permit the 
 wreck of government, country, and constitution 
 all together. ... I add a word which was not in 
 the verbal conversation. In telling this tale, I at- 
 tempt no compliments to my own sagacity. I 
 claim not to have controlled events, but confess 
 plainly that events have controlled me. Now at 
 the end of three years' struggle the nation's con- 
 dition is not what either party or any man devised 
 or expected. God alone can claim it. Whither 
 it is tending seems plain. If God now wills the 
 removal of a great wrong, and wills also that we 
 of the North, as well as you of the South, shall 
 pay fairly for our complicity in that wrong, impar- 
 tial history will find therein new causes to attest 
 and revere the justice and goodness of God,"
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 259 
 
 [From Carpenter's "Six Months at tlio White House," 
 1865.] 
 
 I put the draft of the Emancipation Proclama- 
 tion* aside, waiting for a victory. Well, the next 
 news we had was of Pope's disaster at Bull Run. 
 Things looked darker than ever. Finally came 
 the week of the battle of Antictam [September 17, 
 18G2]. I determined to wait no longer. The 
 news came, I think, on Monday, that the advan- 
 tage was on our side. I was then staying at the 
 Soldiers' Home. Here I finished writing the sec- 
 ond draft of the proclamation ; came up on Satur- 
 day ; called the cabinet together to hear it, and it 
 was published the following Monday. I made a 
 solemn VOW T before God, that if General Lee was 
 driven back from Maryland, I would crown the 
 result by the declaration of freedom to the slaves. 
 
 As affairs have turned, it is the central act of 
 my administration, and the great event of the 
 nineteenth century. 
 
 [From Noah Urooks's " Reminiscences."] 
 
 I should be the most presumptuous blockhead 
 upon this footstool, if I, for one day, thought that 
 I could discharge the duties which have come upon 
 
 * The original draft was prepared in the July preceding 
 when the Federal forces were in the midst of reverse*.
 
 260 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTEKS. 
 
 me since I came into this place, without the aid 
 and enlightenment of One, who is stronger and 
 wiser than all others. 
 
 [From " Six Months," &c.] 
 
 I have never united myself to any church, be- 
 cause I have found difficulty in giving my assent, 
 without mental reservation, to the long, compli- 
 cated statements of Christian doctrine which char- 
 acterize their Articles of Belief and Confessions of 
 Faith. When any church will inscribe over its 
 altar, as its sole qualification for membership, the 
 Saviour's condensed statement of the substance 
 of both law and gospel, " Thou shalt love the Lord 
 thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, 
 and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thy- 
 self," that church will I join with all my heart and 
 all my soul.* 
 
 You say your husband is a religious man ; tell 
 him, when you meet him, that I say I am not 
 much of a judge of religion, but that, in my opin- 
 ion, the religion which sets men to rebel and fight 
 against their government, because, as they think, 
 that government does not sufficiently help some 
 men to eat their bread in the sweat of other men's 
 
 Said to Hon. 11. C. Deming.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 261 
 
 faces, is not the sort of religion upon which people 
 can get to heaven.* 
 
 Here are twenty-three ministers, [of Spring- 
 field, Illinois,] of different denominations, and all 
 of them are against me f but three ; and here are 
 a great many prominent members of the churches, 
 a very large majority are against me. Mr. Bate- 
 man, I am not a Christian, God knows I would 
 be one, but I have carefully read the Bible, and 
 I do not so understand this book.J These men 
 well know that I am for freedom in the Territories, 
 freedom everywhere as free as the constitution and 
 the laws will permit, and that my opponents are 
 for slavery. They know this, and yet, with this 
 book in their hands, in the light of which human 
 bondage cannot live a moment, they are going to 
 vote ajrainst me ; I do not understand it at 
 
 o 
 
 all 
 
 Doesn't it appear strange that men can ignore 
 the moral aspect of this contest? A revelation 
 could not make it plainer to me that slavery or 
 the government must be destroyed. The future 
 would be something awful, as I look at it, but for 
 this rock on which I stand, [alluding to the Testa- 
 
 * Said to a lady from Tennessee, who asked the release 
 of her husband, N. Brook, held as prisoner of war. 
 t In the canvass for United States senator. 
 J He had in his hand a copy of tliu New Testament.
 
 262 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS 
 
 ment, which he still held in his hand,] especially 
 with the knowledge of how these ministers are 
 going to vote. It seems as if God had borne with 
 this thing [slavery] until the very teachers of reli- 
 gion had come to defend it from the Bible, and to 
 claim for it a divine character and sanction ; and 
 now the cup of iniquity is full, and the vials of 
 wrath will be poured out.* 
 
 [With reference to a remark made by a lady : " Some men 
 seem able to do what they wish in any position, being 
 equal to them all," Mr. Lincoln replied] : 
 
 Versatility is an injurious possession, since it 
 can never be greatness. It misleads you in your 
 calculations from its very agreeability, and it inev- 
 itably disappoints you in any great trust from its 
 want of depth. A versatile man, to be safe from 
 execration, should never soar ; mediocrity is sure 
 of detection. c. 
 
 There is no more dangerous or expensive anal- 
 ysis than that of trying a man. c. 
 
 [From an article in the New York Citizen, by Colonel 
 Charles G. Halpine, containing an account of an inter- 
 view with President Lincoln. The reference is to pres- 
 idential receptions.] 
 But the office of President is essentially 
 
 a civil one. For myself, I feel though the tax 
 
 * Said privately to Mr. Newton Bateman, Superintendent 
 for Public Institutions for the State of Illinois, residing at 
 Springfield. Holland's Life of Abraham Lincoln.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. :(}:* 
 
 on my time is heavy that no hours of my day 
 are better employed than those which thus bring 
 me again within the direct contact and atmosphere 
 of the average of our whole people. Men moving 
 only in an official circle are apt to become merely 
 official not to say arbitrary in their ideas, and 
 are apter and apter, with each passing day, to for- 
 get that they only hold power in a representative 
 capacity. Now this is all wrong. I go into these 
 promiscuous receptions of all who claim to have 
 business with me twice each week, and every ap- 
 plicant for audience has to take his turn, as if 
 waiting to be shaved in a barber's shop. Many 
 of the matters brought to my notice are utterly 
 frivolous, but others are of more or less impor- 
 tance, and all seem to renew in me a clearer and 
 more vivid image of that great popular assemblage 
 out of which I sprung, and to which, at the end 
 of two years, I must return. I tell you that I 
 call these receptions my public-opinion baths; for 
 I have but little time to read the papers, and 
 gather public opinion that way ; and though they 
 may not be pleasant, in all their particulars, tho 
 effect, as a whole, is renovating and invigorating 
 to my perceptions of responsibility and duty. 
 
 [In reply to the remark of a clergyman that he " hoped the 
 Lord was on our side," Mr. Lincoln said] : 
 I am not at all concerned about that, for I know 
 
 that the Lord is always on the side of the right.
 
 264 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I 
 and this nation should be on the Lord's side. o. 
 
 [After the repeal of the Fugitive-slave law, in June, 1864, 
 Mr. Lincoln said] : 
 
 " There have been men base enough to propose 
 to me to return to slavery our black warriors of 
 Port Hudson and Olustee, and thus win the respect 
 of the masters they fought. Should I do so, I 
 should deserve to be damned in time and eternity. 
 Come what will, I will keep my faith with friend and 
 foe. My enemies pretend I am now carrying on 
 this war for the sole purpose of abolition. So long 
 as I am President it shall be carried on for the sole 
 purpose of restoring the Union; but no human 
 power can subdue this rebellion without the use 
 of the emancipation policy, and every other policy 
 calculated to weaken the moral and physical forces 
 of the rebellion." 
 
 [In the Annual Message to Congress, December 6, 1864, Mr. 
 Lincoln said] : 
 
 "In presenting the abandonment of armed re- 
 sistance to the national authority on the part of 
 the insurgents as the only indispensable condition 
 to ending the war on the part of the government, 
 I retract nothing heretofore said as to slavery. 
 
 " I repeat the declaration made a year ago, that 
 while I remain in my present position I shall not 
 attempt to retract or modify the Emancipation
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 265 
 
 Proclamation. Nor shall I return to slavery any 
 person who is free by the terms of that proclama- 
 tion or by any of the acts of Congress. If the 
 people should, by whatever mode or means, make 
 it an executive duty to re-enslave such persons, 
 another, and not I, must be their instrument to 
 perform it. In stating a single condition of peace, 
 I mean simply to say that the war will cease on 
 the part of the government whenever it shall have 
 ceased on the part of those who began it." 
 
 [Of his second inaugural address, the London Spectator 
 said: "We cannot read it without a renewed conviction that 
 it is the noblest political document known to history, and 
 should have for the nation and the statesmen he left behind 
 him something of a sacred and almost prophetic character. 
 Surely, none was ever written under a stronger sense of the 
 reality of God's government And certainly none written 
 in a period of passionate conflict ever so completely ex- 
 cluded the partiality of victorious faction, and breathed 
 BO pure a strain of mingled justice and mercy." 
 
 " No statement of the true objects of the war more com- 
 plete than this has ever been made. It includes them all 
 Nationality, Liberty, Equal Rights, and Self-Government. 
 These are the principles for which the Union soldier fought, 
 and which it was his aim to maintain and to perpetuate." - 
 President Hayes, September, 1878. 
 
 Of Mr. Lincoln's second inaugural, M. Edouard Labou- 
 laye said : " His inaugural address shows us what progress 
 had been made in his soul. This piece of familiar elo- 
 quence is a masterpiece ; it is the testament of a patriot. 
 ... I do not believe that any eulogy of the President
 
 266 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 would equal this page, in which he has depicted himself in 
 all his greatness and in all his simplicity."] 
 
 [Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865.] 
 
 Fellow Countrymen : At this second appearing 
 to take the oath of the Presidential office, there is 
 less occasion for an extended address than there 
 was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in 
 detail of a course to bo pursued seemed very 
 fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of 
 four years, during which public declarations 
 have been constantly called forth on every point 
 and phase of the great contest which still absorbs 
 the attention and engrosses tho energies of the 
 nation, little that is new could be presented. 
 
 The progress of our arms, upon which all else 
 chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as 
 to myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory 
 and encouraging to all. With high hope for the 
 future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured. 
 
 On the occasion corresponding to this, four 
 years ago, all thoughts were anxiously directed 
 to an impending civil war. All dreaded it; all 
 sought to avoid it. While the inaugural address 
 was being delivered from this place, devoted alto- 
 gether to saving the Union without war, insurgent 
 agents were in the city, seeking to destroy it with- 
 out war, seeking to dissolve the Union and 
 divide the effects by negotiation. Both parties
 
 ABRAHA.If LINCOLN. 267 
 
 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. 
 
 One eighth of the whole population were colored 
 slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, 
 but localized in the Southern part of it. These 
 slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. 
 All knew that this interest was somehow the cause 
 of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and ex- 
 tend this interest, was the object for which the 
 insurgents would rend the Union, even by war, 
 while the government claimed no right to do more 
 than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. 
 
 Neither party expected for the war the magni- 
 tude 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 prayer of 
 both could not be answered. That of neither has 
 been answered fully. The Almighty has his own 
 purposes. "Woe unto the world because of of- 
 u
 
 268 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 4 
 
 fences, for it must needs be that offences come ; 
 but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh." 
 If we shall suppose that American slavery is one 
 of these offences which, in the providence of God, 
 must needs come, but which, having continued 
 through his appointed time, he now wills to re- 
 move, and that he gives to both North and South 
 this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom 
 the offence came, shall we discern therein any de- 
 parture from those divine attributes which the 
 believers in a living God always ascribe to him ? 
 
 Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that 
 this mighty scourge of war may soon pass away. 
 Yet if God wills that it continue until all the 
 wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and 
 fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and 
 until every drop of blood drawn with the lash 
 shall be paid with another drawn with the sword ; 
 as was said three thousand years ago, so still it 
 must be said, "The judgments of the Lord are 
 true and righteous altogether." 
 
 With malice toward none, with charity for all, 
 with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see 
 the right, let us strive on 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 orphans, to do all which may achieve 
 and cherish a just and a lasting peace among our- 
 selves and with all nations.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. l>(i9 
 
 [From an Address, March 7, 1865.] 
 
 I have always thought that all men should be 
 free; but if any should be slaves, it should be 
 first those who desire it for themselves, and sec- 
 ondly, those who desire it for others. 
 
 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 do order and declare that all persons held as 
 slaves . . . shall be free. . . . And upon this 
 act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, 
 warranted by the Constitution upon military ne- 
 cessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of 
 mankind and the gracious favor of Almighty 
 God. 
 
 [The Emancipation Proclamation in the Cabinet. From 
 the Diary of Secretary Salmon P. Chase, September 22, 
 1862.] 
 
 Gentlemen, I have, as you are aware, thought a 
 great deal about the relation of this war to slavery, 
 and you all remember that, several weeks ago, I 
 read to you an order I had prepared upon the sub- 
 ject, which, on account of objections made by 
 some of you, was not issued. Ever since then 
 
 From Holland's " Life of Lincoln."
 
 270 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 my mind has been occupied with this subject, and 
 I have thought all along that the time for acting 
 on it might probably come. I think the time has 
 come now. I wish it was a better time. I wish that 
 we were in a better condition. The action of the 
 army against the rebels has not been quite what I 
 should have best liked. But they have been driven 
 out of Maryland, and Pennsylvania is no longer in 
 danger of invasion. When the rebel army was at 
 Frederick, I determined, as soon as it should be 
 driven out of Maryland, to issue a proclamation 
 of emancipation, such as I thought most likely to 
 be useful. I said nothing to any one, but I made 
 a promise to myself and [hesitating a little] to 
 my Maker. The rebel army is now driven out, 
 and I am going to fulfil that promise. 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. This I say 
 without intending anything but respect for any 
 one of you. But I already know the views of 
 each on this question. They have been heretofore 
 expressed, and I have considered them as thor- 
 oughly and carefully as I can. What I have 
 written is that which my reflections have deter- 
 mined me to say. If there is anything in the ex- 
 pressions I use, or in any minor matter, which any 
 one of you thinks had best be changed, I shall be 
 glad to receive your suggestions. One other ob-
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 07 \ 
 
 servation I will make. I know very well that 
 many others might, in this matter as in others, 
 do better than I can ; and if I was satisfied that 
 the public confidence was more fully possessed by 
 any one of them than by me, and knew of any 
 constitutional way in which he could be put in my 
 place, he should have it. I would gladly yield it 
 to him. But though I believe that I have not so 
 much of the confidence of the people as I had 
 sometime since, I do not know that, all things con- 
 sidered, any other person has more ; and, however 
 this may be, there is no way in which I can have 
 any other man put where I am. I am here. I 
 must do the best I can, I bear the responsibility 
 of taking the course which I feel 1 ou^ht to take. 
 
 t? o 
 
 [From " Six Months," etc.] 
 
 Many of my strongest supporters urged eman- 
 cipation before I thought it indispensable, and, I 
 may say, before I thought the country ready for it. 
 It is my conviction, that, had the proclamntion 
 been issued even six monlhs earlier than it was, 
 public sentiment would not have sustained it. 
 Just so as to the subsequent action in reference to 
 enlisting blacks in the Border States. The step, 
 taken sooner, could not, in my judgment, have 
 been carried out. A man watches his pear-tree 
 day after day, impatient for the ripening of the 
 fruit. Let him attempt to force the process, and
 
 272 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 he may spoil both fruit and tree. But let him 
 patiently wait, and the ripe pear at length falls 
 into his lap 1 We have seen this great revolution 
 in public sentiment slowly but surely progressing, 
 so that, when final action came, the opposition was 
 not strong enough to defeat the purpose. I can 
 now solemnly assert that I have a clear conscience 
 in regard to my action on this momentous ques- 
 tion. I have done what no man could have helped 
 doing, standing in my place. 
 
 [Dedicatory Address at Gettysburg.*] 
 Four score and seven years ago our fathers 
 brought forth upon this continent a new nation, 
 conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the propo- 
 sition that all men are created equal. 
 
 Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing 
 whether that nation, or any nation so conceived 
 and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met 
 on a great battle-field of that war. We are met 
 to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place 
 of those who here gave their lives that that nation 
 might live. It is altogether fitting and proper 
 that we should do this. 
 
 * " His brief speech at Gettysburg will not easily be sur- 
 passed by words on any recorded occasion. This, and one 
 American speech, that of John Brown to the court that 
 tried him, and part of Kossuth's speech at Birmingham, 
 can only be compared with each other, and with no fourth." 
 B. W. Emcrsvn.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. *J73 
 
 But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we 
 cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. 
 The brave men, living and dead, who struggled 
 here, have consecrated it far above our power to 
 add or detract. The world will little note nor 
 long remember what we say here, but it can never 
 forget what they did here. It is for us the living 
 rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work 
 that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It 
 is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great 
 task remaining before us that from these honored 
 dead we take increased devotion to the cause for 
 which they here gave the last full measure of 
 devotion that we here highly resolve that the 
 dead shall not have died in vain ; that the nation 
 shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, 
 and that the government of the people, by the 
 people, and for the people, shall not perish from 
 the earth. 
 
 [When Mr. Lincoln had ended his speech, which 
 had been preceded by a long and eloquent one by 
 Edward Everett, he turned and congratulated the 
 latter on having succeeded so well. "Ah, Mr. 
 Lincoln," was the reply, "how gladly would I 
 exchange all my one hundred pages, to have been 
 the author of your twenty lines."]
 
 274 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, July 13, 1863.* 
 
 To MAJOR GENERAL GRANT. 
 
 My Dear General : I do not remember that 
 you and I ever met personally. I write this now 
 as a grateful acknowledgment for the almost 
 inestimable service you have done the country. I 
 wish to say a word further. When you first 
 reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I thought you 
 should do what you finally did, march the troops 
 across the Neck, run the batteries, with the trans- 
 ports, and thus go below. I never had any faith, 
 except a general hope, that you knew better than I 
 did ; that the Yazoo Pass Expedition, and the like, 
 could succeed. When you got below, and took 
 Port Gibson, Grand Gulf and vicinity, I thought 
 you should go down the river and join Gen. Banks ; 
 and when you turned northward, east of the Big 
 Black, I feared it was a mistake. I now wish to 
 make a personal acknowledgment that you were 
 right and I was wrong. 
 
 Yours very truly, A. LINCOLN. 
 
 [Written after the Battle of Chattanooga, 18G3.] 
 
 To GENERAL GRANT : . . . Understanding that 
 your lodgment at Chattanooga and at Knoxville 
 is now secure, I wish to tender you and all under 
 your command my more than thanks, my pro- 
 
 * After the capture of Vicksburg.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. ' 275 
 
 foundest gratitude for the skill, courage, and per- 
 severance with which you and they, over so great 
 difficulties, have effected the important object. 
 God bless you all. 
 
 [To General Grant, April 30, 1861.] 
 
 LIEUTENANT-GENERAL GRANT: Not expecting 
 to see you before the Spring campaign opens, I 
 wish to express, in this way, my entire satisfaction 
 with what you have done up to this time, so far as 
 I understand it. The particulars of your plans I 
 neither know nor seek to know. 
 
 You are vigilant and self-reliant, and, pleased 
 with this, I wish not to obtrude any restraints 
 or constraints upon 3 r ou. While I am very anx- 
 ious that any great disaster or capture of our men 
 in great numbers shall be avoided, I know that 
 these points are less likely to escape your attention 
 than they would be mine. If there be anything 
 wanting which is within my power to give, do not 
 fail to let me know it. And now, with a brave 
 army and a just cause, may God sustain you. 
 
 [In reply to a deputation from the National Union 
 League, June 8, 1864, who congratulated him upon 
 his re-nomination for the Presidency, Mr. Lincoln 
 said:] . . . "I have not permitted myself, gentle- 
 men, to conclude that I am the best man in the 
 country ; but I am reminded in this connection of
 
 276 SELECTIONS FROM SPEECHES AND LETTERS. 
 
 a story of an old Dutch farmer, who remarked to 
 a companion once, that 'it was not best to swop 
 horses when crossing streams.' " 
 
 [From a letter written December 11, 1864] : 
 
 w You say you are praying for the war to end. 
 So am I, but I want it to end right. God alone 
 knows how anxious I am to see these rivers of 
 blood cease to flow ; but they must flow until trea- 
 son hides its head." 
 
 It matters not to me whether Shakespeare be 
 well or ill acted ; with him the thought suffices. 
 
 There is one passage of the play of " Hamlet " 
 which is very apt to be slurred over by the actor, 
 or omitted altogether, which seems to me the 
 choicest part of the play. It is the soliloquy of 
 the king after the murder. It always struck me 
 as one of the finest touches of nature in this world. 
 
 The opening of the play of " King Richard the 
 Third " seems to me often entirely misappre- 
 hended. It is quite common for an actor to come 
 upon the stage, and, in a sophomoric style, to be- 
 gin with a flourish : 
 
 " Now is the winter of our discontent 
 Made glorious summer by this sun of York, 
 And all the clouds that lowered upon our house, 
 In the deep bosom of the ocean buried."
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 277 
 
 Now this is all wrong. Richard, remember, 
 had been, and was then, plotting the destruction 
 of his brothers, to make room for himself. Out- 
 wardly, the most loyal to the newly-crowned king, 
 secretly, he could scarcely contain his impatience 
 at the obstacles still in the way of his own eleva- 
 tion. He appears upon the stuge, just after the 
 crowning of Edward, burning with repressed hute 
 and jealousy. The prologue is the utterance of 
 the most intense bitterness and satire. 
 
 [From a letter written just before the assassination.] 
 
 I assure you that as soon as the business of this 
 war is settled, the Indians shall have my first at- 
 tention ; and I will not rest until they shall have jus- 
 tice with which both you and they will be satisfied. 
 
 There are some quaint, queer, verses, written, I 
 think, by Oliver Wendell Holmes, entitled, "The 
 Last Leaf," one of which is to me inexpressibly 
 touching : 
 
 ' The mossy marbles rest 
 On the lips that he has pressed 
 
 In their bloom ; 
 
 And the names he loved to hear 
 Have been carved for many a year 
 On the tomb." 
 
 For pure pathos, in my judgment, there is noth- 
 ing finer than those six lines in tlie English lan- 
 guage.