LINCOLN ROOM 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 MEMORIAL 
 
 the Class of 1901 
 
 founded by 
 
 HARLAN HOYT HORNER 
 
 and 
 
 HENRIETTA CALHOUN HORNER 

 
 St. Gaudens' Statute of Lincoln, in Lincoln Tark, Chicago.
 
 HEADLIGHTS 
 
 OF 
 
 AMERICAN HISTORY 
 
 No. 2. 
 
 LINCOLN. 
 
 BY 
 
 REV. A. M. BULLOCK, Ph. D. 
 
 Author of "MORMONISM AND THE MORMONS," 
 "SEARCH LIGHTS/' "STUDIES IN REVELA- 
 TION," "WASHINGTON." 
 
 "We cannot escape history." Lincoln. 
 
 "He was a leader without seeming to be. * * * 
 He died as he had lived, a great Statesman." 
 
 Ghief Justice Watte. 
 
 "The Pericles of the American Republic." 
 
 Goldwin Smith. 
 
 "He was the greatest man I ever knew." 
 
 U. 8. Qrant. 
 
 "A great man, great in what he did even 
 greater in what he was." James Bryce. 
 
 "Raised up by God, inspired of God was Abra- 
 ham Lincoln ; and a thousand years hence, no 
 drama, no epic, will be read with greater interest 
 than that which tells of his life and death." 
 
 Henry Watterson. 
 
 "The name of Lincoln will remain one of the 
 greatest that history has to inscribe on its pages." 
 
 D'AuMgne. 
 
 Lincoln! "Mothers shall teach thy name to 
 their lisping children. The youth of our land 
 shall emulate thy virtues. Statesmen shall study 
 thy record, and from it learn lessons of wisdom." 
 
 Bishop Simpson. 
 
 APPLETON, WISCONSIN. 
 January, Nineteen Hundred and Thirteen.
 
 Copyrighted by A. M. Bullock, 
 
 1913. 
 First Edition.
 
 ALONZO MANSFIELD BULLOCK, PH. D.
 
 FOREWORD. 
 
 A few words of explanation are due the 
 subscribers to " Lincoln. " 
 
 Mr. Bullock, who had put such faith- 
 ful loving work in this book, did not live 
 to see it published. He dropped by the 
 wayside, literally, and I, his wife, took 
 out of his dead hand a package containing 
 photographs that he was about to send to 
 the engravers for this work. I also took 
 an unfinished page from his typewriter, 
 and put it with the last pages of the copy 
 to send to the printer. 
 
 As no one but Mr. Bullock knew all 
 the details of his plans for the finished 
 book, it is impossible to escape making 
 some mistakes, and I ask pardon for such 
 from you, the subscribers to "Lincoln,' 1 
 "Friends who have made it possible to 
 publish the book," as Mr. Bullock often 
 said. 
 
 We, my son and I, have done the best 
 we could to carry out Mr. Bullock's 
 plans so far as we knew them, and any 
 failures are due to lack of understanding 
 and not to lack of will. 
 
 GEORGIA B. BULLOCK.
 
 To "UNCLE ABE'S PETS" "The 
 Tenth New York Artillery,'' Comrades, 
 living and dead; to the Hon. Robert T. 
 Lincoln; to Egbert J. Scott, boyhood 
 friend, who was captured at Chickamauga 
 and died at Anderson ville; and to the 
 late Hon. Z. G. Simmons, honorary 
 member of the National Encampment, 
 G. A. R., and friend of the author in his 
 early manhood, this book is affectionately 
 dedicated.
 
 Z. G. SIMMONS.
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 The weary form that rested not, 
 
 Save in a martyr's grave; 
 The care-worn face that none forgot, 
 
 Turned to the kneeling slave. 
 
 We rest in peace, where his sad eyes 
 
 Saw peril, strife and pain ; 
 His was the awful sacrifice, 
 
 And ours, the precious gain. 
 
 Whittier.
 
 AUTHOR'S STATEMENT. 
 
 Carlyle once said: "Had the carvers of marble 
 chiseled a faithful statue of the Son of Man, and 
 shown us what manner of man He was like, what 
 His height, what was His build, and what the fea- 
 tures of His sorrowing face, I for one would have 
 thanked the sculptor with all the gratitude of my 
 heart for the portrait, as one of the most precious 
 heirlooms of the ages." It is well to bear in mind 
 that the real character and mission of the Christ 
 were but faintly understood while yet living. So in 
 a minor sense contemporaries of great men cannot 
 fully estimate the place these men are to occupy in 
 the years to follow. 
 
 A few men are living to-day who saw and knew 
 Abraham Lincoln. These even did not know him 
 then as they know him now. They were in the 
 midst of whirling events, the full meaning of 
 which could not then be understood. "God had 
 built him in the back-yard of the Nation, and there 
 wrapped in homely guise, had preserved and ma- 
 tured his pure humanity." The exposure of years 
 was needful to uncover his compelling and enduring 
 greatness, and to rightly show that what was called 
 grotesque and awkward was but the natural grace 
 and ease of a man of conscious power, devoid of 
 personal vanity. 
 
 Photography has given us Lincoln, with features 
 in mental action, in various moods and at great 
 moments in his life. But no one sitting, however 
 true to life at that particular time, can show the 
 record of the life entire. Of the hundreds of pic-
 
 tures which appear all are not reliable. Some 
 years ago I came into possesion of a picture pur- 
 porting to be that of Lincoln. I had been familiar 
 with Lincoln portraits of almost every type, but 
 with this there was something which somehow 
 seemed unnatural ; just what it was seemed diffi- 
 cult for me to decide. The face and features fairly 
 represented those of Lincoln, but aside from these 
 it seemed unnatural. The dress, the attitude, the 
 form and general posture and things otherwise did 
 not seem to correspond. I could not help to ques- 
 tion what it meant. At last I learned the secret. 
 Some would be artist, who knew but little of the 
 man, or cared but little, a fake withal, who 
 thought to gain a little money, had put the head of 
 Lincoln onto the neck and body of John C. Calhoun. 
 Such portraitures of Lincoln are not unknown in 
 print. The following pages, it is hoped, will not 
 thus be judged. They have been submitted for 
 correction and criticism, as to matters of fact, to 
 Robert T. Lincoln and Mr. Sweet, his long time 
 private Secretary, who permitted the examination 
 of manuscripts and original data and documents of 
 the martyred President, and otherwise greatly fa- 
 vored the author in his work. To these men and to 
 many others who have interested themselves, and 
 rendered valuable assistance, the author wishes to 
 acknowledge himself thankfully indebted. 
 
 A. M. BULLOCK.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Mr. Bullock has written of Lincoln in a manner 
 calculated to give the reader a new idea of the 
 great President. The result of his research in pre- 
 paring the work shows that he has pretty thor- 
 oughly exhausted the subject. His familiarity 
 with the antecedents of Lincoln ; his knowledge of 
 the early life and surroundings of the boy, his 
 parental home and a mother's invaluable help, are 
 notably manifest. Lincoln's determination to ac- 
 quire learning, his devotion to duty, his excep- 
 tionally good qualities from childhood on, and his 
 unyielding opposition to slavery all prophetic of 
 the man and the leader to be, are so told as to be 
 of marked value to the young people of to-day. 
 The picture of the man needed in the Nation's 
 crisis; the Lincoln-Douglas debates; the nomina- 
 tion of Lincoln for the Presidency, his great service 
 through the War, his death and the summary of 
 the man and his work, can but hold the closest at- 
 tention of the reader, and must leave an impression 
 that canot fail to be of real value to present day 
 life and activities. 
 
 Dr. Bullock makes it plain that Lincoln was a 
 man of fine literary attainments, a leader, a states- 
 man and an exemplary Christian. If I were able 
 I should write of this portraiture of Lincoln as 
 Dr. Warren has written, which is equivalent to 
 saying I indorse what Dr. Warren says. 
 
 It is a work that will live and work for the 
 Nation's good for generations. 
 
 J. A. WATBOUS, 
 Lieutenant-Colonel, U. S. Army, retired. 
 
 8
 
 LIEUT. COL. J. A. WATROUS, 
 U. S. A. Retired.
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Each new moment of each new hour, new human 
 lives are being added to our human family. Rapid 
 as is the melting away of our citizenship at the 
 summons of death, the oncoming of fresh recruits 
 is yet more rapid. And what can the patriot more 
 desire than to see the great characters and great 
 lives of our country's history so depicted, and ever 
 freshly re-depicted, that no generation of Ameri- 
 cans, and no generation of their contemporaries in 
 other lands, can ever fail to derive from those 
 characters and lives a fitting inspiration. 
 
 High and sacred is the task of those called to 
 this ever new utilization of the past. Whoever 
 really succeeds in transmitting and interpreting to 
 successors the silenced voices of great pathfinding 
 predecessors in world-leadership, and thus effec- 
 tively contributes to ennoble the world's future by 
 forces drawn from the world's past, achieves a 
 work of more than temporal or spatial significance. 
 He has won a place in the very laboratory of that 
 Power Unseen, who upholds and governs the Uni- 
 verse. 
 
 Among all the great lives which render our na- 
 tional heritage luminous and inspiring, what one is 
 more worthy of ever repeated study than that to 
 whose portraiture the following pages are devoted? 
 Gratitude should suffice to cause each future son 
 of the Republic to acquaint himself with so great 
 a benefactor. A Persian poet has said : 
 
 Nothing adorns us humans 
 More than humanity. 
 
 9
 
 In whom more than in Lincoln was humanity 
 embodied? Is self-sacrificing altruism the crown- 
 ing excellence and glory of humanity ; how it 
 shines forth in him 
 
 Whose mighty task was done 
 
 Through blood and tears, that we might walk in 
 joy. 
 
 Any honest study of the man who was known 
 world-wide as the embodiment of honesty, has little 
 need of commendatory introductions. 
 
 The writer of the volume here given to the public 
 has unusual qualification for the task he has un- 
 dertaken. In not a few psychological peculiarities 
 and principles of action he is akin to the man 
 whom he has aimed to picture. Then he was him- 
 self a soldier in those dark days of the Civil 
 War, one of the brave young men, who in answer 
 to the call of the hard pressed President, promptly 
 and valorously responded, 
 
 We are coming, Father Abraham, 
 Three hundred thousand more! 
 
 He furthermore wields a practiced pen, and has 
 previously made uncommonly extensive studies in 
 the beginnings of our national history. With the 
 Lincoln literature he has thoroughly familiarized 
 himself ; and in his use of the material selected he 
 ever keeps the personality of the central figure so 
 in view that even young readers of history will be 
 likely to be carried forward from the first page to 
 the last by the charm of the heroic and personal 
 touches continually coming to light. 
 
 When Augustus Saint-Gaudens passed from 
 earth, his friend, Richard Watson Gilder, solaced 
 
 10
 
 his own poignant grief by remembering that it had 
 been the sculptor's high privilege to work with 
 Lincoln as a subject, and so to link his name to 
 one assured of immortality. These are his words: 
 
 O fateful stars! that lit the climbing way 
 
 Of that dear, martyred son of fate and fame, 
 
 The supreme soul of an immortal day, 
 
 Linked with his name is our great sculptor's name ; 
 
 For now in art eternal breathes again 
 
 The gaunt, sweet presence of our chief of men 
 
 That soul of tenderness; that spirit stern, 
 
 Whose fires divine forever flame and burn. 
 
 While yet living, my friend, the author of this 
 book is to be congratulated on a like good fortune. 
 He has linked his name to Lincoln's, and in an art 
 more expressive than that of the sculptor, caused 
 to breathe again 
 
 The gaunt, sweet presence of our chief of men 
 That soul of tenderness ; that spirit stern 
 Whose fires divine forever flame and burn. 
 
 WILLIAM FAIEFIELD WARREN. 
 Boston University. 
 
 America has gained one more ideal character. 
 He (Lincoln) has the wisdom which happily be- 
 longs to a perfectly honest and simple character. 
 He never was led by cupidity, vanity or selfishness 
 of any kind. He had the result of a naturally 
 sympathetic nature, a remarkable power of reading 
 public sentiment and keeping himself in touch with 
 what he called the common people. * * * He 
 would have done nothing unconstitutional to effect 
 immediate emancipation. He did not, as President, 
 allow himself to be led into premature and illogical 
 
 11
 
 measures. But biding his time, with patient 
 sagacity, he struck it, (slavery) deliberately and 
 legally the blow of which it died. It struck him 
 in return the blow which will make him live in the 
 love of the Nation and of mankind forever. 
 
 GOLDWIN SMITH. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Lincoln never posed or put on airs or attempted 
 to make any particular impression. * * * He 
 seemed to see every side of everything. He had 
 the most comprehensive, the most judicious mind, 
 least faulty in his conclusions, of any man I ever 
 knew. * * * This unerring judgment, this patience 
 which waited and which knew when the right time 
 had arrived, is an intellectual quality that I do 
 not find exercised upon any such scale, and with 
 such unerring precision by any other man in 
 history. * * * He developed into a great military 
 man, that is to say, a man of superior military 
 judgment. After three or four years of constant 
 practice in the science and art of war he arrived 
 at this extraordinary knowledge of it so that Von 
 Moltke was not a better General, or an abler 
 planner or expounder of a campaign than was 
 President Lincoln. To sum it up he was a born 
 leader of men. He knew human nature ; he knew 
 what chord 1 to strike, and was never afraid to 
 strike it, when he believed the time had arrived. 
 CHARLES A. DANA. 
 
 12
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 Some years ago, in one of our Eastern cities, a 
 guide was conducting a company of visitors through 
 a celebrated Art gallery. Near the entrance of the 
 gallery hung a large painting. Daubs of color here 
 and there made that painting, near at hand, appear 
 anything but comely and attractive. Said one of 
 the visitors in passing: "What an amateur piece 
 of work ! what could have been the object in placing 
 such a specimen in a gallery like this?" There were 
 artists in that company ; but the remark passed un- 
 heeded. The visitors strolled on, admiring now 
 this, then that. Returning after a time on the 
 opposite side of the gallery, and at some distance 
 from the entrance, the one who had criticised the 
 painting named, turned suddenly and said : "Look 
 there! see that magnificent painting! how did we 
 come to miss it in passing?" Smiling, the guide 
 responded : "Why, madam, that is the 'amateur 
 painting' noted as we entered." That painting was 
 the work of a master artist, intended however, for 
 a distant view. An Angelo, a Raphael, a Kaulbach, 
 could comprehend the value of that rare painting 
 near at hand, but to see its worth, and the blend- 
 ing tints and harmony of its parts, it was needful 
 for the untrained eye to see it from the distance. 
 
 So it is at times with men and women of real 
 worth and greatness. Fifty years ago or so, at the 
 entrance way of our Civil War, there appeared a 
 
 13
 
 strange and unpretentious man, who, to the neat- 
 sighted and to the casual observer, seemed illy 
 suited for the place of leadership assigned him in 
 that eventful crisis. The few could see and did 
 know his worth, but the masses, to understand, 
 must see him in the focal light of deeds accom- 
 plished. 
 
 We are apt to judge of men by the pleasing pres- 
 ence, by the seemly face and symmetry of form, by 
 what they wear and how they wear it; by what 
 society calls genteel, and what the world calls 
 bright and brilliant. We shun the haggard face, 
 the graceless form, the awkward carriage, the sad, 
 the sorrowing and the stricken. But could we see 
 more clearly, and could we judge more accurately, 
 the rough and repulsive exterior, like shells of 
 oysters, like dingy sands, like rugged foothills, like 
 treeless mountains, would prove at times the way 
 marks to the richest gems; to the Johannesburgs, 
 the Melbournes, the Yosemites, the Gardens of the 
 Gods in human history. 
 
 The Seer of ancient Israel gives us a partial 
 portraiture of some of the human qualities of the 
 Son of Man : "He shall grow up as a tender plant 
 and as a root out of a dry ground. * * * He hath 
 no form nor comeliness ; and when we shall see Him 
 there is no beauty that we should desire Him. * * * 
 A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and 
 we hid as it were our faces from Him. * * * He 
 was despised and we esteemed Him not. * * * He 
 was oppressed and He was afflicted, yet He opened 
 not His mouth. * * * For the transgression of my 
 people was He stricken. * * *" These were some 
 
 14
 
 of the human qualities and some of the character- 
 istics of the sacred mission, of the matchless Son 
 of man, whose name was destined to stand above 
 every name in all history ; and yet He was misun- 
 derstood. It is true we understand these charac- 
 teristics now in the converging light and facts of 
 centuries. This portraiture, in a minor sense, is 
 almost a photogravure of some of the great leaders 
 in the world's history. 
 
 It matters little how the externals may have ap- 
 peared, men whose lives have been consecrated to 
 the welfare of the race and coupled with great 
 events never die. They may be buried and pass 
 from mortal sight, but their deeds and thoughts 
 and influence live in the hearts and memory of the 
 world. So it has been, so it is and so it always will 
 be. Such characters and names stand forth in bold 
 relief and can no more be lost to historic record 
 than the erosions of time can wear away the epochs 
 in which they lived and wrought. In this record 
 of enduring fame appears Abraham Lincoln. 
 
 We seek to commemorate the work and charac- 
 ter of this man. For him no claim is made for 
 charm of face, or beau ideal of physical form ; for 
 the aesthetic in person or in vesture; for faultless 
 dress, or stately carriage, or grace of bearing. No 
 claim is made of influence, power or prestige from 
 an illustrious ancestry ; no claim of inherited 
 wealth or place of honor. He was born in the 
 cabin of a pioneer, and was reared in want and 
 poverty. The surroundings of his early life and 
 manhood were dark and forbidding and gave no 
 promise of his future fame and greatness. 
 
 15
 
 Strange, indeed, appears the story of this man. 
 Strange, I am persuaded, because the hand of God 
 marked out the way, guarded the child, and led 
 the boy, the man, in ways he did not know or un- 
 derstand; and when the crucial moment came 
 raised him to supreme command and intrusted him 
 with the destiny of the Nation. Only a mighty 
 soul, inspired of God, could breast the adverse tides 
 and stem the difficulties and the dangers which 
 were in the way ; only a mighty soul, imbued with 
 wisdom from on high, could take the helm when 
 the storm of generations had gathered, and was 
 already opening in its fury, and guide the Ship of 
 State through the raging sea of strife, and anchor 
 her at last in the harbor of united peace, WITH 
 
 COLORS, O SIGHT! PITEOUS BUT SUB- 
 LIME! DIPPED IN THE BLOOD OF A 
 NATION'S NOBLEST SONS! ! YET WAVING 
 IN CRIMSON GLORY TO THE BREEZE OF 
 UNIVERSAL FREEDOM! ! ! 
 
 Over and Underestimate of Men Misconception. 
 
 Sir William Taylor has said : "The world 
 knows not its greatest men." This comes about, 
 sometimes, because there lacks the greatness of 
 events to bring them out ; sometimes, because of 
 the dimness of the light ; sometimes, because of 
 toning up or toning down the facts of history, and 
 adding to or taking from the background of the real 
 life. 
 
 Many indeed are the uncrowned kings of earth, 
 unknown to wordly fame, but future kings unto 
 
 16
 
 our God, and destined, like the stars, to shine for- 
 ever. From this point of view, I take it, Dr. 
 Cuyler has said: "In the sight of God, Lincoln 
 was no more precious, than the humblest drummer 
 boy who bled away his young life on the sod of 
 Gettysburg or Chattanooga." This declaration of 
 Dr. Cuyler was no disparagement to Lincoln, but 
 an earnest protest against the custom of hero- 
 worship. There is a fashion of picturing men who 
 come within the lime-light of great events as some- 
 thing more than men. In this we do these men a 
 wrong, we do ourselves a wrong. Shakespeare 
 puts into the mouth of Antony at the funeral of 
 Caesar; "The evil that men do lives after them, 
 the good is oft interred with their bones." Biog- 
 raphers and eulogists of our great men some- 
 times take the opposite as their rule, picturing the 
 good without spot or blemish, and losing sight en- 
 tirely of frailties and defects. This may be gen- 
 erous, but not just to historic record. It is not 
 necessary to make our heroes demi-gods or to tres- 
 pass upon the impossible. When we consider the 
 talents and characteristics of our great men, as re- 
 flected in their life and work, with visions unac- 
 customed to the peculiar brightness, we are able 
 to see only the salient points, jutting in the glamour, 
 as something more than human, and to overlook 
 our own high kinship and heritage. It is some- 
 thing great, greater than we sometimes think, to be 
 a man, and the undulations of greatness as we see 
 them are only the outcroppings of God's image. 
 It is only human that God somehow touches man 
 and that man somehow touches God. "He made us 
 
 17
 
 a little lower than the angels and crowned us with 
 glory and honor." There is ample scope, I am 
 sure, within the limits of true manhood to give full 
 weight and measure to the richest gems of human 
 kind, even when we leave them in their proper 
 settings. 
 
 Lincoln Intensely Human. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was a man of like passions 
 with ourselves. It is not our purpose to deify him, 
 or to hold him up as perfect and free from defects, 
 to strip him of those qualities which give us 
 the feeling of attachment for him. He was one of 
 ourselves. "He was human to the core."i He had 
 qualities of mind and soul which made him equal 
 to the best born of earth. He had those charac- 
 teristics which made him one of the plain common 
 people. He moved in touch with strongest, the 
 highest and the best, and was never overmatched. 
 He walked on a plain with the lowliest and was 
 esteemed as their counsellor and their friend. He 
 was the great American Commoner, the friend and 
 the servant of the people. 
 
 Who his ancestors were, or what his genealogy 
 we may not question minutely here. Being asked 
 concerning his grandfather, Lincoln himself once 
 said: "I am more concerned to know what his 
 grandson will be."2 Enough for us to know that 
 
 1 "Abraham Lincoln's greatness and worth lay in his 
 simple manhood. So that the excuse that we offer tot 
 the faults and failings of some great men : 'They were 
 only human,' was the very crown of his excellence. He 
 was a whole man, human to the core of his heart." 
 Robert Collier. 
 
 Lincoln Memorial Album, p. 203. Robert Collier. 
 
 18
 
 WM. F. WARREN, LL. D.
 
 noble blood coursed in his veins, the blood of 
 the Puritan and of the Cavalier. Where or how 
 he got his genius we may not query. As well 
 might we inquire where Phidias, or Shakespeare, 
 or Burns, or Mozart, got theirs. A well known 
 teacher once said : "What is ordinarily known as 
 genius is but the result of application and hard 
 work."3 I am persuaded that much of the halo 
 gathering around our Lincoln has its solution here. 
 He had his special qualities of mind and heart and 
 mother wit. He was born with noble powers, with 
 ideals and ambition to utilize those powers, a 
 heart, a soul to govern and to rule. The times in 
 which he lived and the school of experience through 
 which he passed, rough and forbidding though they 
 were, had their star of destiny and their ray of 
 light and hope. But Divine wisdom and the hand 
 of Providence can best explain the way from the 
 shadows, the sorrows, and the trials of the lowly 
 cabin to the Nation's Capitol and the martyr's 
 tomb. 
 
 The Men and the Spirit of '76. 
 
 When Lincoln was born in Kentucky, only 
 twenty-five had passed since the War for Inde- 
 pendence. Veterans of Lexington, and Valley 
 Forge, and Trenton and Yorktown, were in the 
 land. The blood of Revolutionary fathers coursed 
 in his veins. Washington had been dead less than 
 ten years. The spirit of Colonial heroism was 
 abroad. Adams and Jefferson and others were still 
 alive. The heroes of the Revolution were the ideals 
 
 8 Dr. Luther J. Jeronsens. 
 
 19
 
 of that generation. Lincoln revered the fathers 
 and looked upon the Declaration and the Constitu- 
 tion of the Nation as almost sacred. Washington 
 was his ideal of a man, a patriot and a statesman. 
 To this spirit of reverence for the great Declara- 
 tion, for the Nation and its principles, together 
 with his inborn hatred for slavery, may be traced, 
 no doubt, the inspiration of the Emancipation Pro- 
 clamation, which, perhaps above all other acts per- 
 formed by him, has made his name imperishable in 
 the history of the Nation and of the world. To- 
 day, with nearly fifty years between us and his 
 death, posterity offers at the shrine of Abraham 
 Lincoln the universal tribute of true greatness, and 
 pronounces him the "man for the times" in which 
 he lived. 
 
 God in History. 
 
 Here we observe, if we look closely, the foot- 
 prints of God are everywhere visible in human 
 history. His eye is upon the world, and His hands 
 upon the nations. In the centuries gone by He 
 spoke through the prophet, a hundred and fifty 
 years before Cyrus was born "Thus saith the Lord 
 to His annointed, to Cyrus whose right hand I have 
 holden, to subdue nations before Him. I will give 
 thee the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches 
 of secret places, that thou mayest know that I am 
 the Lord which call thee by thy name, even the 
 God of Israel. * * * I will gird thee though 
 thou hast not known me." 
 
 When God wants men for some special work, He 
 first endows them with the powers and qualities 
 needed for the work He wants accomplished. He 
 
 20
 
 then puts them through a course of training and 
 educates them for their special work. God wanted 
 a man to lead the children of Israel out of Egyptian 
 bondage. For forty years He leaves Moses at the 
 court of Pharaoh, then takes him out into the 
 rough and wild and barren desert of Arabia. There 
 He further fits him for the work. Then He sum- 
 mons him back to Egypt. So He did with Lincoln. 
 His official training was in the wilds of Kentucky, 
 amid pinching poverty in Indiana and on the virgin 
 prairies of Illinois. When the time was fit, how- 
 ever, and God was ready, He summoned him to the 
 front. He placed in his hand the sceptre of author- 
 ity, which he wielded with that ease, power and 
 wisdom which astonished the world, and won for 
 him immortal fame. 
 
 Environments. 
 
 In tracing the life of this illustrious man, a faith- 
 ful portraiture requires that we keep in mind the 
 times and places where he lived ; his environ- 
 ments, and those of the people with whom he 
 mingled. Unity and just relations should be pre- 
 served between the subject and his surroundings. 
 To picture the early life of Washington, for in- 
 stance, other than in a wild and sparcely settled 
 colony, is to lose sight of the interspersed realities 
 in which his genius, his wisdom, his greatness ap- 
 peared, would be to lose sight of the real man. To 
 speak of Lincoln as practically alone in the trials, 
 and struggles and sorrows of his early life, savors 
 more of romance than reality, makes the contrast 
 out of place and deprives us of a kindred touch. 
 
 21
 
 The story of his early life has become inseparable 
 from the rude and shabby and cheerless cabin 
 where he was born, the pole shed, or "half faced 
 camp," as such were called, where he lived 
 awhile when a better home was being fitted up; 
 the low and open attic where he slept ; the wooden 
 pegs which served the purpose of a ladder ; the 
 bunks made of poles, and beds of boughs and leaves, 
 with quilts and coverings of skins of wild beasts ; 
 coats and clothing made of the hides of wolves, and 
 bears and deer ; stools of slabs, tables of riven 
 logs, earthen floors, and chimneys made of sticks 
 and logs. But it savors of unreal life when we 
 speak of these environments of want and penury, 
 as something unusual in pioneer life, and as though 
 in, the case of Lincoln, they dropped down in the 
 midst of plenty and in an old and settled country. 
 There may be those who read this sketch, now aged 
 and infirm, who, as pioneers, in the early days, 
 built the one roomed shanties, chinked the cracks 
 with sticks and mud, and covered them over with 
 riven logs, or barks and boughs of trees, and lived 
 long years with scanty means and plainest food, 
 and thought it luxury when their larder was some- 
 thing more than potatoes and salt, corn dodgers 
 and the like. 
 
 Especially were these conditions prevalent among 
 the pioneers on the far frontier at the beginning of 
 the last century. Then North-central Kentucky was 
 on the extreme limits of civilization. The effect of 
 the then recent barbarous and savage surroundings 
 were still apparent in the rude hovels, primitive 
 customs, the ignorance and uncouth manners of 
 
 22
 
 some of the early settlers. It were not strange if 
 the Lincolns shared to some extent in parts of this 
 heritage. 
 
 The parents of Lincoln were poor ; but it was not 
 the poverty of city slums and crowded rookeries, 
 or that of sloth and shiftless loafers. It was the 
 poverty of the American pioneer, out on the far 
 frontier in the wilderness of the West. 
 
 Ancestry. 
 
 Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks were married 
 in Washington County, Kentucky, June 12th, 1806. 
 The families of this couple had been attracted to 
 these new lands by the alluring reports of Daniel 
 Boone, and his adventures. They had emigrated 
 from the Shenandoah Valley near the close of the 
 eighteenth century, Kentucky was then a part of 
 Virginia. Abraham Lincoln, grand-father of the 
 future President, and Daniel Boone were personal 
 friends and were related by marriage and inter- 
 marriage. This Lincoln when a young man went 
 from the Shenandoah Valley to North Carolina. 
 He was there married, and from thence removed 
 with his family to Kentucky. 
 
 The story of Lincoln's parentage and early life 
 as told in a thousand volumes, booklets and pamph- 
 lets and sometimes on the rostrum, is so often re- 
 plete with misrepresentaions, incongruities and con- 
 tradictions that it is no easy task to separate the 
 truth from falsehood. Careless and unwarranted 
 statements, and groundless tales, and ignorant as- 
 sumptions have sometimes won belief among the 
 credulous and uninformed, while scandal mongers, 
 
 23
 
 ever ready to imagine evil rather than good are 
 always lurking to inflame the unwary and the evil 
 minded. The lack of evidence, too, has been no 
 small hindrance in ascertaining facts. The long 
 hidden secrets of the Egyptian Sphynx may illus- 
 trate, in a minor way, the confusion and miscon- 
 ception touching Lincoln's ancestry ; and even his 
 own uncertainty concerning his parents' marriage 
 have added to the confusion. We have it from au- 
 thority which is beyond all question that Lincoln 
 himself sought diligently, but in vain to discern the 
 legal proof of his parents' marriage, but died with- 
 out the proof positive that he was born in honest 
 wedlock. He caused to be made a careful search 
 of records in Hardin County, while since, it has 
 developed that the marriage took place in another 
 country and not in Hardin.4 It is now known that 
 Jesse Head, a well to do minister of the Methodist 
 Episcopal church performed the ceremony. Lin- 
 coln's parents on both sides were of lineage of 
 which he had no cause to be ashamed. 
 
 The grand-father of Lincoln was fifth in line 
 from one of the brothers who left Old England in 
 1736 to rid themselves of an odious government. 
 They founded the Hingham colony in the State of 
 Massachusetts. The blood of a noble liberty loving 
 ancestry coursed in the veins of Thomas Lincoln. 
 
 * Statement to the author by Mr. Stceet, Robert Lin- 
 coln's Priv. Sec'y. The following statement, given at 
 Louisville, Ky., under oath may be noted : "I was present 
 at the marriage of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks, in 
 Washington County, Kentucky, near the town of Spring- 
 field ; one Jesse Head, a Methodist preacher, performed 
 the ceremony. I knew the said Thomas Lincoln and 
 Nancy Hanks well, and knew the said Nancy Hanks to 
 have been virtuous and respectable, and of good parent- 
 age." Christopher Columbus Graham. 
 
 24
 
 His ancestors were among the Puritans of Massa- 
 chusetts, the Friends of Pennsylvania and the Cava- 
 liers of the South, while General Lincoln of Revolu- 
 tionary fame, and the two Governors Lincoln of 
 Massachusetts were of the same blood and lineage, 
 as was also Att'y General Lincoln in Jefferson's 
 Cabinet. 
 
 Nor was the ancestry of Nancy Hanks less worthy 
 and respected. Back in English history the Com- 
 moners' rights were awarded, it is claimed, to a 
 couple of brothers by the name of Hanks because 
 of valiant service rendered in war against the 
 Danes. The deed of title was signed by the grand- 
 son of Alfred the Great. A grandson of one 
 Thomas Hanks, a descendant of one of the above, 
 who fought for the Commonwealth under Cromwell, 
 came to America in 1699, Joseph Hanks by name. 
 Benjamin Hanks, the fifth in line, moved south 
 and westward from the Shenandoah with the tide 
 of emigration. They were prosperous townfolk. 
 Four years later the father and mother died leav- 
 ing Nancy, the youngest child, an orphan at the age 
 of nine years. The latter found a home with an 
 uncle and aunt, her mother's sister. It is interest- 
 ing to scan the history and incidentally note the 
 will of Joseph Hanks which settles once and for all 
 the parentage of Lincoln's mother as also her 
 worthy, upright and stainless character^ 
 
 There is a hidden secret in the story of Lincoln 
 which it is well we do not overlook. His father 
 Thomas was the youngest of five children in his 
 
 "Jefferson's Attorney General was of this family and 
 refused a place on the Supreme Bench of U. S. Waiter- 
 son. 
 
 25
 
 father's family. When Thomas was hut six years 
 of age he was with his father in the field. An In- 
 dian came upon them unawares and killed the 
 father. An elder brother, near the home, saw the 
 father fall ; he rushed into the house, snatched a 
 loaded musket, which perhaps he had never shot 
 before, aimed through a loop hole, and shot the In- 
 dian dead, just as he was stooping to take the 
 younger brother as a captive. Who shall say that 
 God had nought to do with that bullet and its aim, 
 which saved the child, destined in the years to 
 come to be the father of him, who, eighty years 
 thereafter, was to be looked upon as the leader and 
 the savior of a free and independent nation. And 
 is it not quite out of place to denounce this orphan 
 boy, when grown to manhood, which is sometimes 
 done, as among the low and shiftless and most de- 
 graded of the "white trash" socalled, and especially 
 so when the facts do not confirm or warrant the 
 charged 
 
 After the nomination of Lincoln for the Presidency, 
 as Is so often the case In political campaigns, scandalous 
 stories were circulated about the worthlessness of the 
 father and mother of Abraham Lincoln. Twenty years 
 later, through the efforts of Dr. J. M. Buckley, Miss Ida 
 Tarbell and others, these stories were sifted and their 
 utter falsity shown through documentary and other un- 
 questionable evidence. In the vicinity of the Lincoln 
 home in Kentucky there had never been any question as 
 to the respectability of Thomas Lincoln and Nancy 
 Hanks. The marriage record and certificate, signed by 
 Rev. Jesse Head, a prominent and highly respected Meth- 
 odist Minister, who performed the ceremony, are now 
 matters of history. An account of the marriage feast, 
 with a detailed description and menu of the feast, re- 
 markable for those times, has been put on record by 
 parties present at the wedding. * * * "Tom Lincoln was 
 a carpenter, and a good one for those days, when a cabin 
 was built mainly with the axe, and not a nail or bolt 
 or hinge in it, only leathers and pins at the door, and no 
 glass, except in watches and spectacles and bottles. Tom 
 
 26
 
 o 
 pa 
 
 02 
 4) 
 
 O 
 O 
 
 a 
 
 5 
 
 H- 1 
 I I 
 
 H 
 
 D 
 
 O 
 S
 
 Birth and Frontier Life. 
 
 When Thomas Lincoln and Nancy Hanks began 
 their married life, few, very few indeed were the 
 comforts of life in that then far frontier. The ad- 
 vantages of school and church and culture, even in 
 their rudest form, were extremely limited. There 
 were no established schools; and school terms, at 
 the best, were haphazard and irregular, of short 
 duration and far between, depending largely upon 
 itinerant masters happening along. Here in the 
 wilds of Kentucky, in this poor cabin home of the 
 pioneer, on February 12th, 1809, came the child 
 who was destined to grace and honor our Nation's 
 history, and to stand forever among the foremost 
 characters in all agesJ 
 
 The child was strong and active and full of life, 
 but outside a few stray incidents, a snap shot now 
 
 had the best set of tools in what was then and now Wash- 
 ington County. * * * I saw Nancy Hanks Lincoln at 
 her wedding, a fresh-looking girl. Tom was a respectable 
 mechanic and could choose, and she was treated with 
 respect. * * * It is all stuff about Tom Lincoln keep- 
 ing his wife in an open shed in a winter. * * * William 
 Hardesty, who was there too, can say with me that 
 Tom Lincoln was a man and took care of his wife." 
 From affidavit, Dr. Christopher Columbus Graham, Louis- 
 ville, Ky., 1881. 
 
 7 The morals, the religious training and the manly and 
 womanly characteristics of much of the rugged pioneer 
 times, do not suffer in comparison with much of our 
 modern and socalled refined society. The highest char- 
 acter is not usually developed in ease and luxury and In 
 the flowery pathways of life. 
 
 We are indebted to Leonard Swett, a lawyer friend of 
 Mr. Lincoln, for an account given to him by Lincoln 
 himself of his early life. "It was told," says Mr. Swett, 
 "with mirth and glee. His biographers have given to his 
 early life the spirit of suffering and want. Mr. Lincoln 
 gave no such description, nor is such description true. 
 His was Just such a life as has always existed and now 
 exists in frontier States." 
 
 27
 
 and then of the home, the mother and the father, 
 an account or two of youthful mates, and a flash 
 light here and there to break the monotony of the 
 fearful solitude, very little is known of the first 
 seven years of that young life. The cheerless cabin 
 of a poor frontiersman ; the meager record of a 
 migratory father, with the allurements of the rifle 
 and wild game ; a mother's love and prayers and 
 oversight ; a sister's care and companionship ; 
 some boyish sports with friends like Dennis Hanks 
 and Austin Gallaher; a few days schooling off 
 and on in an old log hut some miles away ; a 
 Christian service now and then in some log cabin, 
 or wooded grove; the heart throbs at the un- 
 marked grave of a younger brother ; the tokens 
 of restless vigor of strong physique, an active brain 
 and a noble heart, are rifts in the cloudy darkness 
 which must tell the story of those formative years. 
 To secure good titles to Kentucky lands in those 
 days was most difficult, * * * Because of this 
 Daniel Boone lost all his Kentucky possessions. 
 Largely for this reason, and because of incoming 
 slavery, to which the Lincolns were bitterly op- 
 posed, and because of attractions farther west, a 
 new home is sought, down and across the Ohio 
 River. Indiana, then, was scarcely more than one 
 grand stretch of wilderness, (though that year it 
 was admitted as a State into the Union) inhabited 
 by roving Indians and the wild beasts of the forest. 
 Here again we find the boy of eight years in the 
 rude cabin of the pioneer ; and here, on the frontier 
 of southern Indiana, he spent his youth and early 
 manhood. In these frontier homes, his life and 
 
 28
 
 character do not lose by extreme contrast, as In 
 some fairy tale, with the children of other pio- 
 neers.s Through these common experiences of 
 privation and hardship of pioneer life there is in- 
 deed a warmer touch of heart and soul as we en- 
 ter the poverty-stricken home of the future Presi- 
 dent, and trace his course and difficulties, sorrows 
 and discouragements, together with the defeats and 
 triumphs of succeding years. His home was poorer, 
 the comforts less, the privations greater, and the 
 hardships more severe, no doubt, than in some of 
 the homes even in those early times and frontier 
 places.9 
 
 Home Life, Parents and Characteristics, 
 
 Influences. 
 
 Thomas Lincoln, like most of the other settlers, 
 was illiterate. There were no schools and he had 
 no advantages of schooling. After his marriage, 
 his wife taught him to write. He had good com- 
 mon sense. In some respects he lacked thrift and 
 ambition, but he was not wanting in self respect. 
 He worked with a will when work came his way 
 without the seeking and was determined and ener- 
 getic when decision was once made. "He was not 
 
 8 Thomas and Nancy were good common people, not 
 above or below their neighbors. Dr. Graham, Louisville, 
 Ky., as above. 
 
 9 1 am only suggesting the outline story of some who 
 may read these pages, no doubt, when I say that my own 
 parents were not owners of a city mansion. My sisters 
 and brothers were born in a little log house, and I only 
 escaped the disgrace, if disgrace it is, because I chanced 
 to be the youngest of the family. And yet, was born In 
 the State of New York, and scarcely a generation before, 
 Lincoln was born in the far off and much newer frontier 
 of Kentucky. 
 
 29
 
 lazy, but one of those old fellows peculiar to those 
 pioneer times."io He liked to fish and hunt, and 
 living, in those times depended much upon this. 
 He had learned the carpenter's trade, but there was 
 comparatively little of that to do. He was peace- 
 ful and accommodating, friendly, openhearted and 
 jovial. He was slow to take affront, but when once 
 arousedl was well nigh invincible. He was a little 
 above the medium height, strong and muscular and 
 fearless. He was a man of good morals and in 
 his way religious. He did not drink intoxicating 
 liquors, or swear, or gamble, or play at games of 
 chance. Withal he had good, strong natural abili- 
 ties. He was easy-going and inclined to take things 
 as they came, when he might, sometimes, perhaps 
 have made them better. 
 
 In the infancy and childhood of Lincoln his life- 
 lines were dark and unpromising. His secluded life 
 in the wilds of Kentucky, and the early years in 
 Indiana had nothing unusual to cheer and to glad- 
 den save the companionship of a loving sister, and 
 the tender oversight of a devoted mother, who was 
 possessed of rare qualities of mind and heart. 
 Though born to drudgery and hardship, she was 
 superior in culture and refinement to much of her 
 surroundings, and was possessed, too, in a marked 
 degree, of the higher ideals of life. The poorly clad 
 and tender-hearted boy wins our sympathy and 
 affection. He seems determined to make a friend 
 of frowning fortune. He appears to have been 
 born with the birth-mark of sorrow and disappoint- 
 ment, and this undertone of sadness made his life, 
 
 "Statement made to the author by Robert T. Lincoln. 
 
 30
 
 at times, most touching and pathetic. "All his life 
 long," we are told, "he put barriers between himself 
 and the world through the medium of his humor." 
 Mirth and sadness seemed to hold determined 
 contest for control, but "mirth and melancholy are 
 twins cradled in the hearts of all great men." In 
 the case of Lincoln they grew together in sur- 
 passing strength and union, yet showed but little 
 trace of kinship. His cabin home offered but few 
 comforts, and his chief amusements were to sit in 
 his mother's lap, lean upon her arm and be 
 caressed ; taught of her to read and write, and sit 
 by her side and listen to Bible tales, and the re- 
 hearsing of country legends. His mother cautioned 
 and encouraged him against growing up in ignor- 
 ance, vice and squalor, and pictured to him the 
 future he might make for himself. These lessons 
 were well directed, carefully learned and faithfully 
 observed, as the sequel of his life fully shows. He 
 owed to his mother some of the finest traits of his 
 character, and the cultivation of some of those 
 qualities which distinguished him as a man and en- 
 deared him to the people. Dr. Holland has said : 
 "She had much in her nature that was truly heroic, 
 and much that shrank from the rude life around 
 her. A great man never drew his infant life from 
 a purer and more womanly bosom than her son." 
 To her he owed, largely, his thorough knowledge of 
 Scriptures ; and he never spoke of her without in- 
 voking a blessing upon her memory. In after years 
 he referred to her as his "Angel mother." To his 
 father he owed some of the manly qualities of his 
 nature, as also his vein of humor and his talent for 
 story telling. 
 
 31
 
 Let the curtain here fall. We will not here pause 
 to witness the hopeless, almost broken-hearted little 
 boy as he stands beside the outstretched form of 
 his lifeless mother. The secret pain and sorrow of 
 that orphan heart cannot be told. The mother had 
 been taken sick with a deadly fever.n "There was 
 no physician," says Mr. Watterson, "within thirty- 
 five miles, nor a preacher within one hundred 
 miles. * * * Placing her hand on the head of the 
 little boy, nine years old, she said 'I am going away 
 from you, Abraham, and I shall not return. I know 
 that you will be a good boy ; that you will be kind 
 to Sarah and to your father. I want you to live 
 as I have taught you and to love your heavenly 
 Father.' " 
 
 In after years Providence opens the way, and an- 
 other earnest, wise, sweet-spirited and tender- 
 hearted woman is to do him service as a mother 
 and a guide. How much he owed to her the world 
 may never know. 
 
 Note married life. 
 
 Hidden Life and Worth Disclosed. 
 
 Inborn aspiration, stimulated, encouraged and 
 directed by this wise and unbroken maternal in- 
 fluence, from earliest childhood to manhood, are 
 quickened in his soul by the possibilities to which 
 applied industry and an upright life may lead. 
 
 The boy dreams ; he lives his dreams. He is de- 
 termined to know something and to make something 
 of himself. He weighs his talents and measures his 
 strength by surmounting obstacles which confront 
 
 11 Milk sickness. 
 
 32
 
 him, and by conquering difficulties in the way. He 
 makes himself master of the situation where occa- 
 sion leads, or duty calls, and by shaping his course 
 and conduct always with the standard of right and 
 justice. 
 
 The boy thus reared is kept in touch with the 
 common people. He reads and studies and thinks. 
 His soul becomes permeated with the principles of 
 the Government and its free institutions. He cul- 
 tivates the sense of justice, and has an intense love 
 and sympathy for the people. He shares the con- 
 fidence and sympathy of the masses. He knows 
 neither race nor rank, and has a wonderful grasp 
 upon the spirit of our institutions and the character 
 and motives of men. He has a keen sense of the 
 wants and judgment of the people. He becomes a 
 living proclamation of the declaration, "All men 
 are created free and equal." He illustrates in his 
 own life the dignity of labor and the nobility of 
 the COMMON PEOPLE. He stands for true and 
 honest men and women anywhere and everywhere, 
 who are seeking to better their lives and their con- 
 ditions. 
 
 A priceless jewel is here in the rough. God sets 
 his seal upon him. Coming from the common 
 people, born and reared in the humblest walks of 
 life, God leaves him in touch with the masses to 
 be ground, and shaped, and polished for his high 
 and unique place of honor in the crown of Ameri- 
 can glory. 
 
 33
 
 Intellectual and Moral Equipments. 
 
 There was something remarkable in the intellec- 
 tual and moral life and vigor of Abraham Lincoln. 
 His school privileges were limited. It is asserted 
 that altogether his school life would not more than 
 equal one year in our public schools. We are told 
 that when at school he studied hard and was quick 
 to learn, and was comprehensive, as well, in his 
 grasp of truth ; and withal he had a wonderful 
 memory. It may not be forgotten, however, that 
 his mother was a woman of more than ordinary 
 culture for those times. Largely she performed the 
 office of teacher and preceptress, and in this was 
 far more efficient than the itinerant masters. She 
 died while the boy was young; but she lived long 
 enough to lay deep the foundation of his moral 
 aspirations, and the principles of his character. 
 Nature's gifts were sealed with a mother's hand 
 and a mother's heart. Unsullied conscience, per- 
 fect honesty, absolute truthfulness, righteous am- 
 bition, gentle selfcontrol, love of justice, considera- 
 tion and respect for the rights of others, reverence 
 for, and obligation to God ; and all surcharged with 
 good common sense. These were so carefully laid 
 and cemented that they remained as adamant, 
 forming the substratum of his entire life. When 
 President he once said : "All that I am or hope 
 to be I owe to my sainted mother." With the 
 foundation thus carefully laid, when other means 
 failed, he became his own professor, and as every- 
 where he mastered the obstacles in his way. For 
 lack of other means he would cipher and practice 
 the art of composition on pieces of boards, or a 
 
 34
 
 wooden shovel, with a piece of charcoal, before a 
 spice-wood fire. Books were scarce and difficult 
 to obtain ; but such as he could secure he master- 
 ed. When called upon to do work where special 
 lines of service were required, he took it up and 
 mastered it. The great Declaration was his hand- 
 book, and the Bible, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress 
 and ^Esops Fablesi were his chosen companions. 
 In his case the itinerant preacher of those days 
 was no small or indifferent means in his education. 
 Though not instructed in the schools, he was not 
 unlearned. I hazard nothing in the statement, he 
 was a scholar far beyond the age in which he 
 lived and the people with whom he mingled. His 
 art of expression and his wondrous power of speech 
 are all attested in documents left on record, and 
 speeches here and there in public life. From early 
 childhood on through life he did not cease to study 
 books, and men, the Nation's interests and the is- 
 sues of the day. Senator Cullum, speaking of his 
 educational qualifications, says : "Lincoln was in 
 one sense the best educated man of the country, for 
 his mind was trained to grasp great subjects." It 
 would be well for the student of to-day to heed the 
 thought more carefully, that the benefit of an 
 Academic course is more in developing the talents, 
 and the training how to think than in the multitude 
 of facts acquired. To illustrate Lincoln's growing 
 breadth of culture. He was an ardent admirer of 
 the leading poets, and was one of the best Shakes- 
 pearean scholars of the Iand.i2 As to mental grasp 
 
 12 Lincoln began the study of Shakespeare while at New 
 Salem, under one Kelso a Shakespearean student and 
 scholar. 
 
 35
 
 and keen discernment, his thorough knowledge of 
 human nature is in proof. There is no greater hu- 
 man study than man himself. The venerable Nott, 
 long time President of Union College, New York, 
 was once asked what were the three most essential 
 studies needful to secure a knowledge of mankind. 
 His answer : "First man himself, next the Bible, 
 next Shakespeare." Here Lincoln's knowledge was 
 of the highest grade, and he proved himself a mas- 
 ter of the theme. There was great truth in Dr. 
 Cuyler's statement : "He was graduated from the 
 grand College of Free Labor, whose works were the 
 Flat-boat, the Farm and Back-woods' Lawyer's 
 office." Before he became President in 1860, Knox 
 College, on whose campus Douglas and Lincoln 
 measured arms in one of their great debates, con- 
 ferred upon Lincoln the degree of Doctor of Laws. 
 Later, in 1864, Princeton conferred upon him the 
 same degree. 
 
 Want and hardship and difficulties, when bravely 
 met, have their compensation. In the case of Lin- 
 coln, they sharpened his ambition, and his appetite 
 for knowledge, awakened to activity his wonderful 
 powers of mind, stirred the depths of his great soul 
 and armed him with power almost divine. He 
 made disappointment, difficulties and defeats his 
 friends to spur him to greater energy, and fit him 
 better for the ends and objects sought, and to make 
 him worthy of the people's trust.
 
 Physical Strength and Courage. 
 
 The physical strength of Lincoln was phenomenal. 
 His parents, especially his father, had a strong 
 physical organization. Lincoln himself was an 
 athlete of remarkable proficiency and skill. It is 
 claimed, and with good evidence, that he never met 
 his superior in point of physical strength. As a 
 boy and a young man, wherever he chanced to be, 
 he was the leader in physical sports; but he never 
 played the bully or the braggart. It is asserted 
 that he could lift a weight of twelve hundred 
 pounds. "Had he lived in England, or Normandy, 
 centuries ago," says Mr. Arnold, "he would have 
 been the founder of some great baronial family, 
 possibly of a royal dynasty. He could have wielded 
 with ease the two handed sword of Guy, the great 
 Earl of Warwick, or the battle axe of Richard of 
 the Lion heart."is When he became angry, which 
 was not often, his nerves were as iron and his 
 muscles as bars of steel. 
 
 An Army officer had been discharged for misde- 
 meanor. He had repeatedly tried to be reinstated. 
 Finally he went to the President, even the second 
 time, and during the interview insolently said to 
 him : "I see that you are fully determined not to 
 do me justice." The President, angered, deliber- 
 ate arose, laid down his papers, took hold of him 
 by the collar, and walked him to the door saying : 
 "Sir, I give you fair warning, never to show your- 
 self in this room again. I can bear censure, but 
 not insult."i4 
 
 "Arnold, 52. 
 "Stowe, 58. 
 
 37
 
 Conversation and Story-Telling. 
 
 For conversation and story-telling Lincoln has had 
 an enviable reputation; in conversation instruc- 
 tive and entertaining ; in story-telling an adept, 
 in wit, humor, sarcasm, repartee, invective, simile 
 and illustration, he seemed almost without an 
 equal. Myriads of stories have been attributed to 
 him unjustly and without warrant. He is some- 
 times charged with telling stories coarse and in- 
 decent. This charge is not true. He had no taste 
 for the low and vile. His stories and illustrations 
 always had a point, and his love for the humorous 
 was such that if a story was pointed he would 
 sometimes give it, even if the outlines might seem 
 quaint, homespun, and ieven objectionable to the 
 prudish. In his "Six Months at the White House," 
 F. B. Carpenter, painter of "Lincoln Reading the 
 Emancipation Proclamation to His Cabinet," has 
 said: "Every foul-mouthed man in the country 
 gave currency to the slime and filth of his own 
 imagination by attributing it to the President. It 
 is but simple justice to his memory that I should 
 state, that during the entire period of my stay in 
 Washington, after witnessing his intercourse with 
 nearly all classes of men, embracing Governors, 
 members of Congress, officers of the Army and in- 
 timate friends, I cannot recollect to have heard 
 him relate a circumstance to any one of them, 
 which would have been out of place in a ladies 
 drawing-room." Dr. Stone, Lincoln's family phy- 
 sician, once said to Mr. Carpenter: "It is the 
 province of a physician to probe deeply the inner 
 lives of men ; and I affirm that Mr. Lincoln is the 
 
 38
 
 purest hearted man with whom I ever came in con- 
 tact." Mr. Seward once said to Dr. Bellows: "Mr. 
 Lincoln is the best man I ever knew." 
 
 Mr. Lincoln once said to Noah Brooks : "I re- 
 member a good story when I hear it, but I never 
 invent anything original ; I am only a retail 
 dealer." 
 
 Judge Bates, referring to Lincoln's fund of anec- 
 dotes, said: "The character of the President's 
 mind is such that his thoughts habitually take on 
 the form of illustration, by which the point he 
 wishes to enforce is inevitably brought home with 
 a strength and clearness impossible in hours of ab- 
 stract reasoning." 
 
 In story-telling Lincoln had various objects in 
 view at different times. Ordinarily these stories 
 were not told as jokes, or as 1 good stories for the 
 sake of the stories, but rather illustrative, or to 
 sharpen the point of an argument ; to answer a 
 question, or to expose the weakness on the part of 
 an adversary. Sometimes he told a story or read 
 a funny article to serve as a friction saving oil in 
 the press of overburdening tasks. Sometimes for 
 fun, pure and simple, as it might seem, but always 
 with a point, in which he seemed to lose himself in 
 the aptness of the simile or the story. No one 
 was likely to get more enjoyment and satisfaction 
 out of a story he might tell than Lincoln himself; 
 and his laugh at the climax was so naturally his 
 own, and spontaneous, that it seemed the explosion 
 of a mine of humor which was sure to become in- 
 fectious. As in the face of Lincoln, humor and 
 pathos sometimes strangely met in the stories told 
 
 39
 
 and the tasks to be accomplished. Says a recent 
 writer: "Had Apollo called upon him there is no 
 doubt he would have compelled him to listen to a 
 story of quaint human foibles perchance designed- 
 ly before settling the affairs of some new world." 15 
 
 On calling his Cabinet together to read that most 
 important document, the Emancipation Proclama- 
 tion, to the wonder of some, he opened the meeting 
 by suggesting the reading of one of Artemus Ward's 
 funnygraphs. An Ohio Congressman, a personal 
 friend, called upon Lincoln upon an important mat- 
 ter. Before making response Lincoln began by 
 telling a humorous story which semeed to fit. The 
 Congressman arose, saying: "I did not come this 
 morning to hear stories; it is too serious a time!" 
 "Ashley," said Lincoln quickly, "sit down ! I respect 
 you as an earnest, sincere man; you cannot be 
 more anxious than I have been constantly, since the 
 beginning of the War, and I say to you that were 
 it not for this occasional vent, I should die!" 
 
 To illustrate his power of invective, (seldom 
 used,) repartee, sarcasm, simile, illustration, etc., 
 a few well authenticated instances may be noted. 
 
 Joshua Speed has given us an account of an elec- 
 tioneering speech made by Lincoln in 1836. Lin- 
 coln's opponent was one George Forquer who had 
 ben a Whig and turned his coat and received the 
 position of Register of the Land Office, and had 
 his house rodded with lightning rods. Forquer be- 
 gan his speech by saying that the young man would 
 have to be taken down. Lincoln responding, said : 
 **I am not so young in years as I am in the tricks 
 
 lB Gutzon Borglum. 
 
 40
 
 and trades of a politician ; but live long or die 
 young, I would rather die now than, like the gentle- 
 man, change my politics and simultaneously with 
 the change receive an office worth three thousand 
 dollars a year, and then have to erect a lightning 
 rod over my house to protect a guilty conscience 
 from an offended God." 
 
 Some wise men from New York at one time urged 
 him to draw away Confederate forces from Wash- 
 ington by naval attacks upon Southern seaports. 
 "It reminds me," said Lincoln, "of a New Salem, 
 Illinois, girl who was troubled with a singing in 
 her head, for which there seemed to be no remedy ; 
 but a neighbor promised a cure, if they would make 
 a plaster of psalm tunes and apply to her feet, and 
 draw the singing down." 
 
 While sitting for the Proclamation Picture, one 
 day, some newspaper attacks upon the President 
 were referred to, when he told the following to Mr. 
 Carpenter : "A traveler on the frontier found him- 
 self out of his reckoning one night, in an inhos- 
 pitable region. A terrific thunderstorm came up, to 
 add to his trouble. He floundered along until his 
 horse at length gave out. The lightning afforded 
 him the only clew to his way, but the peals of thun- 
 der were frightful. One bolt which seemed to crash 
 the earth beneath him brought him to his knees. 
 By no means a praying man, his petition was short 
 and to the point, 'Oh Lord, if it is all the same to 
 you, give us a little more light and a little less 
 noise." 
 
 A man went to Lincoln with bitter denunciation 
 of Secretary Stanton and his management of the 
 War Department. "Go home, my friend," inter- 
 
 41
 
 rupted the President, "and read the tenth verse of 
 the 30th Chapt. of Proverbs." (Accuse not a servant 
 to his master, lest he curse thee and thou be found 
 guilty.) 
 
 At the time Seward and Lincoln met the rebel 
 commissioners at Hampton Roads, February, 1865, 
 Mr. Stephens, who was a very small man, had 
 taken the precaution to protect his frail body with 
 numerous coats and wraps, from the mid-winter 
 cold. On entering the cabin of the River Queen he 
 began to take off his wraps one layer after another. 
 When Stephens had finally emerged from all, Lin- 
 coln quietly turned to Seward, saying: "Seward, 
 that is the largest shucking for so small a nubbin 
 that I ever saw." 
 
 At one time Lincoln and Seward were in an am- 
 bulance on the way to a camp of the Army. Hav- 
 ing crossed the Long Bridge the mules and the am- 
 bulance were in the almost bottomless red mud 
 of Virginia; the driver was urging on the mules, 
 cursing and swearing at a fearful rate, when Lin- 
 coln protruding his head, said to the driver : "Say 
 driver, you belong to the Episcopal church, don't 
 you?" "No, I don't belong to any church," replied 
 the driver, "when at home I usually attend the 
 Methodist church." "Excuse me," said Lincoln, "I 
 thought you must belong to the Episcopal church, 
 for you swear just like Seward and he is a church 
 warden." 
 
 Early in the War, Ship Island, near New Orleans, 
 was taken by Federal troops. The General in com- 
 mand issued a somewhat bombastic proclamation 
 freeing the slaves. Lincoln took no notice of it. 
 
 42
 
 After a time he was taken to task about it by a 
 friend. "Well," said Lincoln, "I feel about that a 
 good deal as a man whom I will call 'Jones,' whom 
 I once knew, did about his wife. He was one of 
 your meek men, and had the reputation of being 
 badly henpecked. At last one day his wife was 
 seen switching him out of the house. A day or two 
 afterwards a friend met him in the street, and 
 said: 'Jones, I have always stood up for you, as 
 you know ; but I am not going to do so any longer. 
 Any man who will stand quietly and take a switch- 
 ing from his wife, deserves to be horsewhipped.' 
 Jones looked up with a wink, patting his friend on 
 the back. 'Now don't,' said he, 'why, it didn't hurt 
 me any ; and you've no idea what a power of good 
 it did Sarah Ann.' " 
 
 Senator Wade of Ohio was a member of the War 
 Committee. He once went to see Lincoln to de- 
 mand the removal of Grant. Lincoln began in 
 reply : "Senator, that reminds me of a story," 
 "Yes, yes !" replied Wade, "it is with you all story, 
 story. You are the father of every military blunder 
 that has been made during the War. You are on 
 your road to hell, sir! and you are not a mile off 
 this minute." Said Lincoln : "Senator, that is just 
 about the distance from here to the Capitol is it 
 not?" 
 
 Lord Lyons went to Washington to announce the 
 marriage of the Prince of Wales. He made the 
 customary speech. The President responded, and 
 then taking the Diplomat by the hand, (Lyons was 
 unmarried) he said: "And now Lord Lyons, go 
 thou and do likewise." 
 
 43
 
 General Wilson gives the following : "A little time 
 before his death, Lincoln, his wife, Wilson then 
 Colonel and a lady friend, were at Ford's Theater : 
 "Mr. Lincoln seemed to be taking but little interest 
 in the proceedings. 'You are not taking any in- 
 terest in the play,' said the Colonel. 'Oh, no,' re- 
 plied Lincoln, 'I came to rest. I am hounded to 
 death by office seekers. Here I can get a few hours 
 relief from them.' He closed his eyes and I turned 
 to the ladies. Suddenly I felt his heavy hand upon 
 my shoulder, * * * and with his well remembered 
 sweet smile he said : 'Colonel, did I ever tell you the 
 story of Grant and the circus?' No, Mr. President, 
 I am sorry to say you never did.' 'Well, when 
 Grant was about ten years old a circus came to 
 Point Pleasant, Ohio, where the family resided, 
 and the small boy asked his father for a quarter to 
 see the circus. The old screw would not give it 
 to him, so Ulysses crawled in under the canvas, as 
 I used to do, for I never saw a quarter when I was 
 a little chap. The ring master announced that any 
 one who would ride the mule that was brought in, 
 once around the ring without being thrown would 
 be presented with a silver dollar. A number tried 
 for the dollar, but all were thrown over the mule's 
 head. Finally the ring master ordered the mule 
 taken out of the ring, when in walked Master 
 Grant, saying, 'I'll try that mule.' The boy mounted, 
 holding; on longer than any of the others till at 
 length the mule succeeded in throwing the boy into 
 his father's tan bark, for the old man was a tanner. 
 Springing to his feet and throwing off his cap and 
 coat, Ulysses shouted with a determined air, 'I'd 
 
 44
 
 like to try that mule again.' This time he resorted 
 to strategy. He faced to the rear, took hold of the 
 beast's tail instead of his head, which rather de- 
 moralized the mule. The boy went round the ring 
 and won the dollar. 'Just so,' added the President, 
 'Grant will hold on to Bob Lee.' Fourteen days 
 later General Lee surrendered at Appomattox." 
 
 Intemperance. 
 
 Intemperance is one of the greatest issues of our 
 day. This question is forging itself to the front as 
 never before. It is enlisting the earnest attention 
 of the entire civilized world. 
 
 A few months ago the liquor interests of Illinois 
 and elsewhere sought to shadow itself behind the 
 death mask of Abraham Lincoln. In this old 
 Bacchus strangely sought to mistake himself for 
 one of the most consistent temperance men, in high 
 position, this Nation has ever known. In this 
 Mr. Lincoln had the precept and example of both 
 father and mother. His father, though from earli- 
 est childhood, living in Kentucky, where whisky 
 was exchangable currency, never drank intoxi- 
 cating liquors. Both father and mother impressed 
 upon his young mind the evils of intemperance. In 
 one of his debates with Stephen A. Douglas, the 
 latter charged him with belonging to a temperance 
 society. Lincoln replied : "If the Judge means by 
 this, being a temperance man, I may say, I never 
 drink," meaning intoxicating liquors. In talking 
 with a lawyer friend not more than a year before 
 his election to the Presidency, he remarked that he 
 had never tasted liquor in his life. "What!" said 
 
 45
 
 Mr. Swett, "do you mean to say that you never 
 tasted it?" "Yes, I never tasted it." In 1842, be- 
 fore the Washingtonian society in Springfield, he 
 delivered an address on temperance, which has sel- 
 dom, if ever been surpassed. In closing this ad- 
 dress he says : "Let us make it as unfashionable 
 to withhold our names from the temperance pledge 
 as for husbands to wear their wives' bonnets to 
 church. * * * The demon of intemperance ever 
 seems to have delighted in sucking the blood of 
 genius and of generosity. * * * He ever seems 
 to have gone forth, like the Egyptian angel of death, 
 commissioned to slay if not the first, the fairest 
 born of every family. * * * When the victory 
 shall be complete when there shall be neither a 
 slave nor a drunkard on the earth how proud the 
 title of that Land which may truly claim to be the 
 birth-place and the cradle of those revolutions, that 
 shall have ended in that victory."i6 
 
 All are familiar with the incidents connected 
 with the reception, at Mr. Lincoln's home in Spring- 
 field, of the Committee appointed at the Chicago 
 convention, to notify him, officially of his nomina- 
 tion for the Presidency.*? 
 
 It had previously been suggested to Mr. Lincoln 
 that some kind of entertainment, refreshments, 
 wine and other liquors would be needed. "But," 
 said Mr. Lincoln, "I have no liquor in the house." 
 "We will furnish it then," was the response. "I 
 thank you for your kind intentions," said Mr. Lin- 
 
 16 See Letters and Addresses. Nicolay and Hay, and 
 elsewhere. 
 
 "Memorial Album. Charles Carlton Coffin, Remin- 
 iscences, (166-167.) 
 
 46
 
 Talford Jeffers. 
 
 Charles C. Abell. Almont J. Sprague. 
 
 Albert Laurence. 
 
 J. L. Wilkinson. 
 
 F. B. Johnson. Martin D. Swan. 
 
 Men Who Fought for the Union in the Author's Regiment.
 
 coin, "but I cannot permit my friends to do for me 
 what I will not myself do." 
 
 After the formal notification and the reply, "With 
 the utterance of the last syllable," says Mr. Coffin, 
 "his whole manner instantly changed." A smile, like 
 the sun shining through the rift of a passing cloud 
 sweeping over the landscape, illumined his face, 
 lighted up every homely feature, as he grasped the 
 hand of Mr. Kelley. "You are a tall man, Judge. 
 What is your height?" "Six feet three." "I beat 
 you. I am six feet four, without my high heel 
 boots." "I am glad," replies Mr. Kelley, "we have 
 found a candidate for the Presidency whom we 
 can look up to, for we have been informed that 
 there were only 'Little Giants' in Illinois." This 
 opened the way for unembarrassed entertainment. 
 "Mrs. Lincoln will be glad to see you gentlemen," 
 said the host. "You will find her in the other room. 
 You must be thirsty after so long a ride. You will 
 find a pitcher of water in the Library," and added, 
 "Gentlemen, we must pledge our mutual healths, 
 in the most healthy beverage God ever gave to man. 
 It is the only beverage I have ever used, or allowed 
 in my family. It is pure Adam's ale from the 
 spring."is 
 
 Such a standard, on the part of candidates for 
 high office, is not common even in these days of 
 agitation and temperance reform ; but was far more 
 rare fifty and seventy years ago. 
 
 "Lincoln never used liquor or tobacco in any 
 form. He is said to have preached the following 
 
 18 See Dr. D. D. Thompson. N. W. C. A., Feb. 3d, 1909. 
 (p. 5-6-133.) 
 
 47
 
 federate cause. But as a matter of fact Mrs. Lin 
 coin was ever loyal to her husband and to the 
 cause of the Union, notwithstanding the heart- 
 throbs for her cherished loved ones slain. Lincoln 
 himself had relatives on the other side ; and so did 
 many others who fought for the Union. The sick- 
 ness and death of promising little Willie, too, fell 
 as heavily upon the mother as upon the father. 
 Surmounting it all came the tragedy of her hus- 
 band's death, which at last dethroned her reason, 
 and made the balance of her life a living death. 
 "There is nothing in American history," says Mr. 
 Arnold, "so unmanly, so devoid of every chivalric 
 impulse, as the treatment of that poor, broken 
 hearted woman, whose reason was shattered by 
 the great tragedy of her life. One would have sup- 
 posed it to be sufficient to secure the forbearance, 
 the charitable construction, or the silence of the 
 press, to remember that she was the widow of 
 Abraham Lincoln. When the Duke of Burgundy 
 was uttering his coarse and idle jests concerning 
 Margaret of Anjou, the Earl of Oxford rebuked 
 and silenced him by saying: "My Lord, whatever 
 may have been the defect of my mistress, she is 
 in distress, and almost disconsolate."20 
 
 In numberless letters and telegrams, and in 
 countless other ways, Lincoln's love and devotion 
 to his home and family are attested. "In his domes- 
 tic life," says Bishop Simpson, a close personal 
 friend, "Lincoln was exceedingly kind and affec- 
 tionate." His deference to the wishes of his wife 
 was habitual with him ; between them there was 
 
 "Arnold 439-440. 
 
 50
 
 deep affection and the closest confidence. The 
 mutual heart-opening of husband and wife, on the 
 last afternoon of his life, is attractive and touch- 
 ing.21 Miss Helen Nicolay, daughter of Lincoln's 
 private Secretary, tells us: "The President's atti- 
 tude toward his wife had something of the paternal 
 in it, almost as though she were a child under his 
 protection."22 
 
 In the Executive Mansion there was no place too 
 sacred, and no time otherwise too fully occupied, 
 for the presence of "Tad" and Willie, and in the 
 lull of executive duties he was often their willing 
 play-fellow ; and especially so with "Tad" when 
 Willie had gone. Attorney General Bates has left 
 on record a memoranda touching the death of 
 Willie : "A fine boy of eleven years, too much idol- 
 ized by his parents. The Government departments 
 were closed on the day of his funeral the only 
 time perhaps that the death of a child has been 
 so observed in the history of our country."23 
 
 The native sympathy and inborn kindness of 
 Lincoln's nature, always manifest, and especially 
 in his treatment of suppliants during the War, was 
 but the outburst of his heart, the reflection of his 
 own tender care, affection and consideration for 
 
 21 In his drive with Mrs. Lincoln, after the Cabinet 
 meeting (Apr. 14th) in which he wished no one to ac- 
 company them, he said : "Mary we have had a hard time 
 of it since wo came to Washington, but the War is over, 
 and with God's blessing we may hope for 1 four years of 
 peace and happiness, and then we will go back to Illinois 
 and pass the rest of our lives in quiet. * * * We must 
 both be more cheerful in the future. Between the War 
 and the loss of our darling Willie we have been very 
 miserable." 
 
 82 Personal Traits 205. 
 
 "Personal Traits 201. The body of Willie was taken 
 to Springfield along with that of his father. 
 
 51 
 
 LIBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF
 
 his own wife and children; the outflow from the 
 fountain head of his own domestic sympathy and 
 affection. 
 
 Slavery. 
 
 "O thou great Wrong, that through the slow-paced 
 
 years, 
 
 Didst hold thy millions fettered, and didst wield 
 The scourge that drove the laborer to the field, 
 And turn a stony gaze on human tears, 
 Thy cruel reign is o'er; 
 Thy bondmen crouch no more 
 In terror at the menace of thine eye; 
 
 For he who marks the bounds of guilty power, 
 Long suffering, hath heard thy captive's cry, 
 
 And touched his shackles at the appointed hour, 
 And lo ! they fall, and he whose limbs they galled 
 Stands in his native manhood, disenthralled. 
 
 "Well was thy doom deserved ; thou didst not spare 
 Life's tenderests ties, but cruelly didst part 
 Husband and wife, and from the mother's heart 
 Didst wrest her children, deaf to shriek and prayer ; 
 Thy inner lair became 
 The haunt of guilty shame ; 
 
 The lash dropped blood, the murderer, at thy side, 
 Showed his red hands, nor feared the vengence 
 
 due. 
 Thou didst sow earth with crimes, and, far and 
 
 wide, 
 
 A harvest of uncounted miseries grew, 
 Until the measure of thy sins at last 
 Was full, and then the avenging bolt was cast!" 
 
 The death of slavery, which Bryant sings so 
 touchingly and so forcefully, was the logical out- 
 come of the War, as the institution itself was its 
 fundamental cause. In that dark stretch of years, 
 when the mandate of slavery was "rigid as the will
 
 Caleb B. Smith. 
 
 Simon Cameron. Montgomery Blair. 
 
 Gideon Welles. 
 
 A. Lincoln. 
 
 Edward Bates. 
 
 Edwin M. Stanton. NVilliam II. Seward. Salmon P. Chase. 
 
 MEMBERS OF LINCOLN'S FAMOUS WAR CABINET.
 
 of Fate," there were those who could not be cowed, 
 who shrank not from, the task, or quailed before 
 the gruesome plague of negro slavery! to such 
 belongs unstinted honor! but to him 
 
 "At whose command the manaclesi were burst, 
 And the sad slave come forth forever free." 
 
 to him, God's master workman, must henceforth 
 be given the chieftest honor. 
 
 Lincoln was a consistant and uncompromising 
 opponent of slavery. This opposition was inborn 
 and life-long, and increased as the years advanced. 
 Both father and mother were pronounced against 
 it. One of the chief reasons for their leaving Ken- 
 tucky was the increasing inflow of planters with 
 their slaves. A warm, personal and influential 
 friend of the Lincolns was Jesse Head, a man of 
 prominence, and a Methodist minister, who per- 
 formed their marriage ceremony. He was free and 
 outspoken in his talk and sermons on the subject 
 of slavery. Dr. C. O. Graham, an old acquaintance 
 of the Lincolns and who was present at their wed- 
 ding, has left a memoranda in which he says : 
 "Tom Lincoln and Nancy, and Sally Bush were 
 just steeped full of Jesse Head's notions of the 
 wrongs of slavery, and the rights of man as ex- 
 plained by Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Paine."24 
 Thus generated and quickened, this birth-right of 
 
 24 Abe Lincoln the Liberator was made In his 1 mother's 
 womb and father's brain and in the prayers of Sally 
 Bush ; by the talks and sermons of Jesse Head. Rev. or 
 Judge Jesse Head, the Methodist circuit rider, assistant 
 County Judge, printer-editor, and cabinet maker, was 
 one of the most prominent men there (Lincoln-Hanks 
 wedding), as he was able to own slaves, but did not on 
 principle." Dr. C. C. Graham. McClure, 1806. 
 
 53
 
 the future 'Liberator,' with proper care and sub- 
 sequent culture, came to be an inheritance incor- 
 ruptable and measureless in value, and whose 
 assets to the Nation and to the world have proven 
 to be of incalculable worth. 
 
 Lincoln was not an Abolitionist of the school of 
 Garrison, and Phillips and John Brown. Like Dr. 
 Lyman Beecher he did not think it best to burn 
 down the house to get rid of the rats. He was 
 none the less determined, however, in his anti- 
 slavery sentiments. He has most emphatically de- 
 clared: "If slavery is not wrong, nothing is 
 wrong!" In an address in Cincinnati, in 1859, he 
 said: "I think slavery is wrong, morally, and 
 politically." In 1854, in a letter to Mr. Codding, 
 of the Illinois State Central Committee, he said: 
 "I suppose my opposition to the principles of slav- 
 ery is as strong as that of any member of the Re- 
 publican party."25 AS far back as 1839, a strange 
 presentiment seems to have confronted him, when 
 of the slave power he said: "Broken by it I, too, 
 may be, bow to it I never will. * * * With- 
 out contemplating consequences, before high 
 heaven, and in the face of the world, I swear eter- 
 nal fidelity to the just cause, as I deem it, of the 
 land of my life, my liberty, and my love." "And 
 yet secretly," Bishop Simpson tells us, before the 
 War was ended, "he said to more than one: 4 I 
 never shall live out the four years of my term. 
 When the Rebellion is crushed, my work is done."26 
 
 25 You know I dislike slavery. * * * I hate to see the 
 poor creatures, hunted down and caught and taken back 
 to their stripes and to their unrequited toil, but I bite 
 my lips and keep qniet. Letter to Joshua F. Speed. 
 
 M Life of Bishop Simpson. 
 
 54
 
 The Hon. Owen Lovejoy, a radical Abolitionist, 
 who had knelt upon the green sod that covered the 
 grave of his murdered brother, and had there 
 sworn eternal warfare against slavery, once said : 
 "I tell you Mr. Lincoln is at heart as strong an 
 anti-slavery man as any of them, but he is com- 
 pelled to feel his way. * * * I say to you 
 frankly, I believe his course is right." 
 
 To confine slavery within the limits designated 
 in the compromise of 1820 (the Missouri Compro- 
 mise), meant, as Mr. Lincoln believed, its ultimate 
 extinction.27 While he looked upon slavery as 
 wrong, morally, socially, and politically, he re- 
 garded the Constitution as the fundamental law 
 of the Nation, and that the rights guaranteed to 
 slavery under the Constitution must be respected. 
 The aim of Lincoln in the debate with Douglas was 
 to prevent the spread of slavery into free States 
 and Territories. In that remarkable address de- 
 livered in Springfield, in 1856, he said: "Let us 
 draw a cordon, so to speak, around the slave States, 
 and the hateful institution, like a reptile poisoning 
 itself, will perish by its own infamy. * * *" He 
 spoke in Kansas in December, 1859. In this speech 
 he declared: "We must not disturb slavery in 
 States where it exists, because the Constitution, 
 and the peace of the Country both forbid it. * * * 
 But we must, by a national policy, prevent the 
 spread of slavery into new Territories, or free 
 
 Fl have always hated slavery, I think, as much as any 
 Abolitionist, have been an Old-line Whig I have always 
 hated it, but I have always kept quiet about it until this 
 new era of the introduction of the Nebraska bill began. 
 I always believed! * * * that it was in course of ulti- 
 mate extinction. Speech, Chicago, July 10. 2858 Ad- 
 dresses, 2,252. 
 
 55
 
 States, because the Constitution does not forbid 
 us, and the general welfare does demand such pre- 
 vention." And again, in the Cooper Institute Ad- 
 dress: "In relation to slavery, as those fathers 
 marked it, so let it again be marked as an evil not 
 to be extended, but to be tolerated and protected 
 only because, and so far as, its actual presence 
 among us make that toleration and protection a 
 necessity." 
 
 What to do with slavery ?28 That was the su- 
 preme question. Was the hateful Octupus to reach 
 out its slimy tentacles to the separate States until 
 the entire Nation should be within its strangling 
 grasp? or was some unseen, some unknown Hercu- 
 les to give it battle, and strip it of its power? One 
 or the other it must be; so thought Lincoln. The 
 Fates were merciful indeed, for none could see 
 the awful drama just ahead, and none could divine 
 with accuracy the outcome. "John, if I ever get 
 a chance to strike that institution, I'll hit it 
 hard ! !" The echo comes floating faintly from the 
 past! He who spake abides his time, and when 
 that time has come, he is true to his word. He is 
 President now ! Slavery has gone to war ! The 
 Nation is in arms ! The world is looking on ! ! ! 
 
 It is interesting, marvelous even, to trace the 
 manner in which the Constitution of the Nation, 
 so long the strong bulwark of defense for slavery, 
 becomes, in the hand of a cautious, far-seeing, mas- 
 terly statesman, the impregnable tower of eman- 
 
 28 Lincoln's cherished method of ridding the Nation of 
 slavery, and the disposition of the purchased slaves, was 
 compensated emancipation and colonization. 
 
 56
 
 cipation, and the freedom of a race.29 The Dec- 
 laration of Independence was the announcement of 
 liberty, ^Emancipation, with its outcome, was the 
 
 29 On April 6th, 1864, an English anti-slavery orator, 
 Mr. George Thompson, gave an address in the House of 
 Representatives. On the following morning, Mr. Thomp- 
 son In company with Rev. John Pierepon and others, 
 called upon the President. Greeting them Mr. Lincoln 
 said : "Mr. Thompson, the people of Great Britain, and 
 of the foreign government were in one great error in 
 reference to this conflict. They seemed to think that, the 
 moment I was President, I had the power to abolish 
 slavery, forgetting that before I could have any power 
 whatever, I had to take the oath to support the Constitu- 
 tion of the United States, and execute the laws as I found 
 them. When the Rebellion broke out, my duty did not 
 admit of a question. That was, first, by all strictly law- 
 ful means to endeavor to maintain the integrity of the 
 government. I did not consider that I had a right to 
 touch the 'State' institution of 'Slavery' until all' other 
 measures for restoring the Union had failed. The para- 
 mount idea of the Constitution is the preservation of the 
 Union. * * * It seems clear, then, that in the last ex- 
 tremity, If any local institution threatened the existence 
 of the Union, the Executive could not hesitate as to his 
 duty. In our case, the moment came when I felt that 
 slavery must die that the nation might live. * * * 
 
 "Many of my strongest supporters urged Emancipation 
 before I thought it indispensable, and, I may say, before 
 I thought the country was ready for it. It is my convic- 
 tion that, had the proclamation been issued even six months 
 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. * * * 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 question." F. B. Carpenter, in Six 
 Months In the White House. 
 
 30 (1) The first draft was written on board the steam- 
 boat returning from Harrison's Landing. July 8th, 1862. 
 
 Cabinet meeting called to lay before the members the 
 subject matter of the Proclamation, having previously 
 resolved upon the step, on July 22nd, 1862. Suggestions 
 were made by different members of the Cabinet, Mr. 
 Chase thought it should be stronger in reference to arm- 
 ing the Blacks : Mr. Blair thought it would cost the 
 Administration the fall elections. Until Mr. Seward's ob- 
 jection was given the others had been anticipated and 
 settled. Seward thought it would be considered "our 
 
 57
 
 demonstration completed. On signing the Procla- 
 mation the President said to Mr. Seward : "If my 
 name ever gets into history, it will be for this act; 
 my whole soul is in it."3i Soon after the issue of 
 the Proclamation, Governor Morgan of New York 
 was in Washington. Mr. Lincoln, referring to the 
 matter, said : "We are a good deal like whalers 
 
 last shriek," and should be postponed, "While I approve 
 the measure, I suggest, sir, that you postpone its issue, 
 until you can give it to the country supported by military 
 success." "This suggestion was adopted. The second 
 draft of the preliminary proclamation was finished at the 
 summer residence, Soldiers Home. The Cabinet was 
 called together on Saturday, Sept. 20th. The Proclama- 
 tion was published and signed Sept. 22nd, 1862, one bun 
 dred days before the final Proclamation." 
 
 (2 1 ) "No member of the Cabinet dissented from the 
 policy in any conversation with me." Lincoln. 
 
 (3) "I made a solemn vow before God, that if General 
 Lee was driven back from Pennsylvania, I would crown 
 the result by the declaration of freedom to the slaves." 
 Lincoln to Secretary Chase. 
 
 (4) "The South had been fairly warned, that if they 
 did not return to their duty, I should strike at this pillar 
 of their strength. The promise must now be kept, and 
 I shall never recall one word." Lincoln. 
 
 (5) "If the people should, by whatever mode or means, 
 make it an Executive duty to re-inslave such persons, 
 another, not I, must be their instrument to perform it." 
 Annual Message, Dec. 6, 1864. 
 
 (6) "The Proclamation * * * as an expression of the 
 spirit of the people, and the policy of the Administration, 
 had become both a moral and a military necessity." 
 George W. Julian. 
 
 (7) "There have been those base enough to propose to 
 return to slavery the 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. * * *" 
 
 Lincoln to Oov. Randall of Wis., Aug., 
 
 81 (1) "As affairs have turned, it is the central act of 
 my administration, and the great event of the nineteenth 
 cen tury" Lincoln. 
 
 (2) "The great act of our dead President, on which his 
 fame shall rest long after his frame shall moulder away, 
 is that of giving freedom to a race." Bishop Simpson. 
 
 (3) " * * * The most sublime moral event in our 
 history." F. B. Carpenter. 
 
 58
 
 who have been long on a chase. At last we have 
 got our harpoon fairly into the monster ; but we 
 must now look how we steer or with one flop of his 
 tail, he will send us all into eternity." 
 
 Those years, so full of tragedy and of history, 
 suggest a Moses, selected of God and chosen by the 
 people, to lead a nation from bondage to liberty! 
 and as though on Nebo's mountain, overlooking the 
 Promised Land, "On being notified that the reso- 
 lution in Congress, abolishing slavery had passed, 
 Mr. Lincoln, in a speech for the occasion, said : 
 'The job is finished. I cannot but congratulate all 
 present, myself, the country, and the whole world, 
 on this great moral victory.' " 
 
 Reconstruction.32 
 
 The years of reconstruction, following the War, 
 was, and must always remain one of the great and 
 important periods in the Nation's history. Whether 
 the best was done that could have been done by 
 the Government during that pivotal period is not 
 easy to determine. Whether Lincoln could have 
 done better had he lived to direct, is uncertain. To 
 question minutely is to reckon without the host. A 
 good deal of speculation has been had as to what 
 would have been done had he lived. (Parenthet- 
 
 82 It is not our aim here to consider reconstruction in 
 Its entirety as it stands in the history of our Nation. It 
 is not in place here to review President Johnson's evolu- 
 tion on reconstruction, from wholesale punishment to 
 wholesale pardon. Nor yet the bitter and long drawn 
 out controversy in Congress, and the consequent mani- 
 fested spirit in the South ; but Lincoln's thought and 
 attitude on reconstruction is here sought, which in its 
 negative and positive characteristics must embrace an 
 investigation of views, rightfully or wrongfully ascribed 
 to him. 
 
 59
 
 ically, do we bear in mind that God who could 
 provide a leader for the years of War was not 
 powerless in garnering the fruits of victory?) At 
 the time of Lincoln's death, outside of general prin 
 ciples, to determine the work of reconstruction was 
 much like determining what the War was to be 
 before it began. There were undetermined move- 
 ments, unforseen perplexities, and unexpected ob- 
 stacles which had to be met. It had to deal with 
 human nature not willing always to brook control. 
 It involved the rights and the authority of the Na- 
 tional Government, on the part of the North, and 
 the giving up on the part of the South the cher- 
 ished idea of the mere Confederation of States, and 
 the institution of Negro slavery, slavery in sub- 
 stance as well as in form, together with the spirit 
 and the prejudices these had engendered. It in- 
 volved the moral, social and political transforma- 
 tion of the South, in so far as National integrity, 
 human liberty, and the rights of American citizen- 
 ship were represented by Abraham Lincoln, and 
 declared valid at Appomattox, and this as over- 
 against States' sovereignty and the accompanying 
 propaganda represented by Jefferson Davis, which 
 ran counter to the social, moral and political prog- 
 ress of the age. It involved the consideration for 
 and the rights of those in the South, who, under 
 difficulties most trying, bad remained true and 
 loyal to the Union. It involved the rights and 
 privileges of four millions of bondmen, just out 
 from centuries of unrequited toil, and their right- 
 ful avenues to citizenship. It involved as well a 
 new condition of things for former masters, and 
 
 60
 
 an adjustment to untried conditions. From a 
 human standpoint these things were, at the best, 
 impossible without friction and discomfort some- 
 where. In the hazy outlook upon the future, while 
 the War was still in progress, some of these matters 
 were being considered ; reconstruction, in fact, had 
 its full share of the President's thought. Lincoln 
 had been noting the outlines and examining some 
 of its intricacies. 
 
 After Lincoln's death a persistent effort was 
 made during the reconstruction period, and later, 
 to show that his plan of reconstruction would have 
 been practically to reinstall the dominance of the 
 South, and thus (from the Southern outlook or 
 viewpoint) have eliminated the hardships accruing, 
 and the crimes committed ; or as Mr. Gorham puts 
 it: "An effort to make it appear that Mr. Lincoln 
 favored a loose policy, under which those so lately 
 under arms against the Government would be cer- 
 tain of an advantage over those who had sustained 
 it." To think thus of Lincoln, when National in- 
 tegrity had been asserted and its validity won in a 
 four years war, is to confess to ignorance of his 
 real character and manhood. 
 
 Reconstruction was not the settlement of a chil- 
 dren's quarrel. Fundamental truths and lasting 
 principles were involved. No one realized the im- 
 portance of things ahead, and difficulties involved, 
 more keenly than did President Lincoln. 
 
 When the War was practically over, Mr. Stanton 
 offered his resignation as Secretary of War. Lin- 
 coln refused to accept it, saying: "Stanton, you 
 cannot go. Reconstruction is more difficult than 
 
 61
 
 construction or destruction. You have been our 
 main reliance; you must help us through the final 
 act. The bag is full. It must be tied and tied 
 securely. Some knots slip; yours do 1 not. You 
 understand the situation better than anybody else. 
 It is my wish and the country's wish that you re- 
 main."33 
 
 It is idle, perhaps, for us to presume too much 
 what Lincoln would have done. We may remember, 
 however, that though consummated nominally, but 
 not in spirit altogether, some twelve years after 
 his death he had much to do with reconstruction; 
 for his thoughts, his works and his plans entered 
 into it. Enough is known, at least, to give general 
 tenor to his probable course of action. In 1866, 
 Charles A. Dana, for two years Asst. Secy, of War, 
 wrote a letter to Mr. Arnold in which he said : 
 "At the time of Mr. Lincoln's death, a printed paper 
 was under consideration in the Cabinet, providing 
 ways and means for restoring state government in 
 Virginia. In that paper it was stated that all loyal 
 men, white or black, were to be called upon to vote 
 in holding a state convention, while all rebels were 
 to be excluded. I could not affirm that Mr. Lincoln 
 had definitely adopted that policy with respect to 
 black suffrage, but that I knew that his mind was 
 tending to it, and I was morally certain he would 
 have finally adhered to it."34 in a letter to Gen- 
 eral Wadsworth before the Wilderness campaign, 
 Mr. Lincoln said: "You desire to know, in the 
 event of our complete success in the field, the same 
 being followed by a loyal and cheerful submission 
 
 "Flower's Staaton, 310-312; Rothchild, 286. 
 "See Arnold's Lincoln, 416. 
 
 62
 
 on the part of the South, if universal amnesty 
 should not be accompanied with universal suffrage? 
 Now since you know my private inclinations as to 
 what terms should be granted to the South in the 
 contingency mentioned, I will here add, that if our 
 success should thus be realized, followed by such 
 desired results, I cannot see if universal amnesty 
 is granted, how, under the circumstances, I can 
 avoid exacting universal suffrage, or at least suf- 
 frage on the basis of intelligence and military 
 service. 
 
 "How to better the condition of the colored race 
 has long been a study which attracted my serious 
 attention ; hence I think I am clear and decided as 
 to what course I shall pursue, regarding it as a 
 religious duty, as the Nation's guardian of these 
 people who have so heroically vindicated that man- 
 hood on the battlefield, where, in assisting to save 
 the life of the Republic, they have demonstrated in 
 blood their right to the ballot, which is but the 
 humane protection of the flag they have so fear- 
 lessly defended."35 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's idea of reconstruction was based 
 upon the assumption that the Rebellion had de- 
 stroyed the State governments of States in rebel- 
 lion, but not the States themselves. That the Con- 
 stitution of the United States requires that every 
 State be guaranteed a republican form of Govern- 
 ment, and that to make this guarantee good, United 
 States governments must needs be established to 
 take the place of those State governments operat- 
 ing under the Confederacy. Reconstruction must 
 
 36 Carpenter, Six Months in the White House, pp. 270- 
 
 .! 
 
 63
 
 begin at the foundation. "No man has the author- 
 ity to give up the rebellion for any other man. We 
 must simply begin with and mold from disorgan- 
 ized and discordant elements." Existing govern- 
 ments in rebellious States must have no place in 
 the reconstructed State governments. He thought 
 it unwise to have an inflexible rule for all the 
 States. He did not think it best to discourage the 
 loyal citizens of Louisiana and Arkansas who had 
 framed legal State governments in accord with the 
 proclamation of December, 1863.36 An oath test 
 was prescribed for those who might be eligible to 
 participate in the formation of such government; 
 those, too, who should be debarred from taking 
 part in the formation of the new government. Ex- 
 ecutive pardon was to be extended to those other- 
 wise eligible, and who met the prescribed require- 
 ments : "But no man in the rebel States had any 
 right to vote at that time until he had secured the 
 Presidential pardon by taking the required oath." 
 And further he says : "An attempt to guarantee 
 and protect a revived State government con- 
 structed, in whole, or in preponderating part, from 
 the very element against whose hostility and vio- 
 lence it is to be protected, is simply absurd." In 
 his address three days before his death, referring 
 to the proclamation, December, 1863, he said : 
 "I distinctly stated that this is not the only plan 
 which might possibly be acceptable." 
 
 The amnesty proclamation issued Dec. 8th, 
 1863,37 that of July, 1864, the message of February 
 llth, 1865, and his last public address, three days 
 
 3(5 See Lincoln's Address, April llth, 1865. 
 "Letters and ad's., Vol. 12, 442-444. 
 
 64
 
 before his death, 38 all abound in reconstruction 
 ideas, and are worthy of careful perusal, as also 
 various other documents, directly and indirectly 
 referring to this subject. 
 
 On the 3d of February, 1865, at Hampton Roads, 
 occurred one of the famous episodes of the War.39 
 Mr. Seward bore the following instructions to the 
 Confederate commissioners appointed by Mr. 
 Davis : "You will make known to them that three 
 things are indispensable, to-wit : first, the restora- 
 tion of the Nation's authority throughout all the 
 States ; second, no receding by the Executive of the 
 United States on the slavery Question from the 
 position assumed thereon in the last annual mes- 
 sage to Congress, and in preceding documents ; 
 third, no cessation of hostilities short of the end 
 of the War, and the disbanding of all forces hos- 
 tile to the Government."40 
 
 38 Letters and addresses. Vol. 2, 672. 
 
 39 The Hampton Roads conference was projected by 
 Francis P. Blair, Sr. Mr. Blair procured a pass from the 
 President to go to Richmond and return. He went, how- 
 ever, on his own initiative and responsibility, and with- 
 out any authority to act or speak for the President. He 
 secured a letter from Mr. Davis, expressing a willingness 
 and desire for a conference looking towards relations of 
 peace. In the answer by the President, "The explicit 
 condition prescribed by Mr. Lincoln's note, sent through 
 Mr. Blair, was that he would only receive an agent sent 
 him with the view of securing peace to the people of our 
 common country!" Mr. Davis substituted the two coun- 
 tries in place of our common country, and appointed com- 
 missioners, though he fully understood Lincoln's ultima- 
 tum. (Nicolay & Hay, Vol. 10, 111-112). Mr. Benjamin, 
 the rebel Secretary of State advised Davis to say, 
 "Upon the subject to which it relates," but "he could not 
 forego masquerading as a champion," insisted on his own 
 phraseology, appointed the commissioners, and with ab- 
 surd duplicity, and sent them on terms rejected before- 
 hand by Mr. Lincoln. Nicolay & Hay, Vol. 10, 108-112. 
 See Addresses, Vol. 2, 630-652. 
 
 40 Nicolay & Hay, Vol. 10, 115. 
 
 65
 
 The President joined Mr. Seward at Fortress 
 Monroe. The four hours' conference between them 
 and the Confederate commissioners Messrs. Ste- 
 vens, Hunter and Campbell on the River Queen, 
 disclosed anew the frank, honest and kindly heart 
 of the President towards the erring South ; but It 
 demonstrated, as well, his uncompromising atti- 
 tude as to official duties and personal dignity. No 
 agreement could be entered into which might, in 
 any way, recognize the States then in arms against 
 the National Government, as a separate power, or 
 what would tend to lessen the power of that Gov- 
 ernment. No terms could be entertained or con- 
 sidered which would violate in the least the great 
 cardinal principles of the Administration. 
 
 Military, Judicial and Executive powers were 
 sharply delineated. In harmony with the other 
 branches of authority, together with right and jus- 
 tice, the Executive power, in case of reconciliation, 
 would be administered with the utmost liberality. 
 
 "In stating a single condition of peace," said Mr. 
 Lincoln, "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." 
 
 So far as the Emancipation Proclamation was a 
 judicial question, he would leave to the courts to 
 decide; *i but 'so far as he was concerned, "he 
 would never change or modify the terms of the 
 Proclamation in the slightest particular." An 
 
 tt Reverdy Johnson pronounced the act judicially cor- 
 rect. 
 
 66
 
 armistice, in any form, was absolutely refused. 
 West Virginia would remain a separate State.42 
 
 His active, urgent and unyielding efforts for a 
 Constitutional amendment abolishing slavery 
 throughout the Union was rewarded by an act of 
 Congress, passed three days before the Hampton 
 
 42 Nicolay & Hay, Vol. 10. 118-131. 
 
 The Conference was informal. No memorandum was 
 made at the time. No detailed report was given by Mr. 
 Lincoln or Mr. Seward. The President reported to Con- 
 gress the methods and means and conditions and cor- 
 respondence by which the conference was brought about, 
 together with the vital questions considered at the Con- 
 ference. On their return to Richmond, the rebel com- 
 missioners gave a brief account, written from memory, to 
 Mr. Davis. Davis sent a message, embracing this report, 
 to the Confederate Congress, with bitter and inflamma- 
 tory statements, showing his chagrin and animosity. In 
 his "War between the States," Mr. Stepnens writes quite 
 fully on the Hampton Roads Conference and the discus- 
 sions entered into, as also the result of the outcome at 
 Richmond. A valuable and instructive article, from the 
 pen of Hon. A. S. Colyar of Knoxville, Tenn., at the time 
 of the Conference a member of the Confederate Congress, 
 appeared in the Self Culture Magazine for May, 1900 ; 
 also an article of value in the Forum for March, 1900. 
 From these and other reliable sources we are able to secure 
 a good idea of the Conference Itself and Its effect upon 
 the South. An Inside view of the hopelessness of General 
 Lee and other leaders and other authorities is open to us. 
 It appears that Hampton Roads Commissioners had come 
 to the conclusion that independence was Impossible for 
 them, and that the South should secure the best terms 
 possible for settlement and that the Confederate Con- 
 gress, the lower house especially were practically of the 
 same opinion. The authorities at Richmond generally 
 were disheartened at the failure of the Conference. Mr. 
 Davis was chagrined and exasperated. He was for con- 
 tinuing the War. His bitterness, defiance and treasonable 
 spirit were at their height. His bellicose bravado found 
 titterance in most inflammatory speeches. Lincoln was 
 denounced in the bitterest of terms, and titled as "His 
 Majesty Abraham the First." 
 
 Upon the action and course taken by Mr. Davis, Mr. 
 Stevens gave up the Confederate cause as hopeless, with- 
 drew from Richmond, abandoned the Rebellion and went 
 into retirement. His signature to the brief public report 
 of the commissioners stating the result of the Hampton 
 Roads Conference was his last participation in the ill- 
 starred enterprise." 
 
 67
 
 Roads conference. Of this the Commissioners were 
 informed. 
 
 On the President's persistent refusal, as a mat- 
 ter of executive authority, or right, to enter into 
 any agreement upon reconstruction, or other like 
 matters, against rightful authority, with parties in 
 arms against the Government, Mr. Hunter referred 
 to such like instances between Charles I. of Eng- 
 land and those in arms against him. Mr. Lincoln 
 replied : "I do not profess to be posted in history. 
 On all such matters I will turn you over to Seward. 
 All I distinctly remember about the case of Charles 
 the I. is that he lost his head." 
 
 In predicting what Lincoln's plan of reconstruc- 
 tion would have been, much stress has sometimes 
 been laid upon the pronunciamento These States 
 were never out of the Union and constructing 
 therefrom an easy, tolerant plan presumably Lin- 
 coln's by which the so-called seceded States might 
 be restored, practically by a w r ay of their own 
 choosing. The following from the Christian Advo- 
 cate of New York43 i s in the point: "At the be- 
 ginning of the reconstruction period immediately 
 following the Civil War there was a disposition to 
 wheel the seceded States back into the Union under 
 any pretext, in order to secure the Southern vote 
 for Andrew Johnson in the election of 1868. Even 
 William H. Seward was infected with the desire. 
 'How many States do we want on the flag'? he 
 asked. 'Shall we not have them air? 'Yes,' replied 
 James Russell Lowell, 'as many fixed stars as you 
 please, but no more shooting ones.' " 
 
 July 25, 1912. 
 
 68
 
 Lincoln was no stickler for technicalities, only 
 that just and proper ends might be reached. 
 
 In the matter of adjusting reconstruction accord- 
 ing to the status of the States, Lincoln is his own 
 best interpreter. In his last public address 1 , April 
 llth, 1865, he says : "We all agree that the seceded 
 States, so-called, are out of their proper relation 
 with the Union, and that the sole object of the 
 Government, civil and military, in regard to those 
 States as again to get them into that practical 
 proper relation. I believe that it is not only pos- 
 sible, but in fact easier, to do this without decid- 
 ing, or even considering whether these States have 
 ever been out of the Union, than with it. * * * 
 Finding themselves safely at home it would be 
 utterly immaterial whether they have ever been 
 abroad. Let us all join in doing the acts neces- 
 sary to restore the proper practical relations be- 
 tween these States and the Union, and each forever 
 after innocently indulge his own opinion whether in 
 doing the acts he brought the States from without 
 into the Union, or only gave them proper assistance, 
 they never having been out of it." 
 
 It is interesting and instructive to consider his 
 comments on and approval of the Louisiana recon- 
 struction act. The free-State constitution adopted 
 in Louisiana gave benefit of public schools equally 
 to black and white, and empowered the Legislature 
 to confer the franchise on the colored man.44 
 
 It might be instructive for those thinking Lincoln 
 would have been loose in his methods to remember 
 that in 1866 the Constitution of Louisiana, adopted 
 
 "State Tapers, 674. 
 
 69
 
 In 1869 in accord with Lincoln's proclamation of 
 December, 1863, was pronounced fraudulent by 
 those assuming power under Johnson. 
 
 Gleaning thus Reconstruction ideas of Lincoln 
 it is safe to note the following: 
 
 The Union must be accepted, not as a confedera- 
 tion of independent States, but States inseparably 
 united under one general Government whose laws 
 and Constitution are supreme. Rebel State gov- 
 ernments regarded as public enemies, not to be 
 tolerated, but to give place to those established in 
 accord with the laws and Constitution of the Na- 
 tional Government. Until such rule becomes oper- 
 ative, provisional governments should be estab- 
 lished, and Courts provided for "all such parts of 
 insurgent States and Territories as may be under 
 control of the Government, whether by voluntary 
 return to its allegiance and order, or by the power 
 of our armies." Martial law to govern until other 
 and proper government be provided. 
 
 Freedom for the colored race, with guarantees 
 of citizenship and proper elective franchise. 
 
 Loyalty and fidelity to the National Government 
 and the Constitution, including the Emancipation 
 Proclamation and the amendment prohibiting slav- 
 ery. Pardon and amnesty to follow sincere peni- 
 tence, as shown by satisfactory evidence. In his 
 own words : "When a man is sincerely penitent 
 for his misdeeds and gives satisfactory evidence of 
 it he can safely be pardoned." 
 
 It was not in the heart of Lincoln to retaliate, to 
 confiscate or to make desolate unless the exigencies 
 of the case required it. The spirit here manifest is 
 mirrored in the second Inaugural. 
 
 70
 
 W. W. Perry. 
 
 Frank J. Harwood. R. N. Rasmussen. 
 
 E. Underbill. 
 
 Dr. J. G. Vaughan. 
 
 Louis Jacquot. L. B. Allan. Frank Harrington. 
 
 To the Advice and Assistnm-o of These Men the Author 
 Wiahed to Offer Hi* ThnnkN.
 
 At the shrine of Lincoln, with nearly fifty years 
 stretching out between us and the War, marvelous 
 progress in the Nation, and strange events in polit- 
 ical history confront us. Time has somewhat 
 dimmed the memory. The rancor of those crimson 
 years of war has lost its keenness. The dire per- 
 plexities of the reconstruction years were now for- 
 gotten, save in the archives of our history, but for 
 the spirit of the ante-bellum South, which some- 
 times reasserts itself and brings to life and recol- 
 lection what the Nation had to do to protect the 
 loyal and the innocent, and to keep its plighted 
 faith with a race of Freedmen; and also, in its 
 long drawn out attainment, deplorable but true, 
 recall to mind unprincipled and tactless men who 
 sometimes found place among officials appointed for 
 that delicate, difficult and momentous work. But 
 to forget that all, or the greater part of Federal 
 officials in Reconstruction times were not men of 
 graft and greed; that "Carpet-baggers"* 5 were 
 
 45 "How maligned has been that grandest word of the 
 age carpet-bagger. How Northern pen and tongue have 
 Joined with Southern tongue and pen In abusing these 
 martyrs of to-day, chosen of God and precious. That 
 word means your best civilization, carried by more cour- 
 ageous souls than any who bore arms In the same field. 
 * * * See your soldiers marching homeward, and rest- 
 Ing on his laurels deservedly resting on deserved laurels. 
 What shall lift up that despoiled land? That redemption 
 must come from without. * * * See that vessel loading 
 in this city for Hilton Head as soon as Beaufort is 
 captured. See the applicants for passage as teachers. 
 See the delicate, the youthful men, the ministers and 
 teachers crowding the office and clamoring to go for 
 nothing, or the merest pittance. See aid societies or- 
 ganizing in New York, Boston, Chicago and elsewhere. 
 See the host pouring in almost as numerous as the host 
 that toas left. Bearing their carpet-bags, as they their 
 knapsacks. They plant schools, they build churches. * * 
 They are assailed with insult and revolver ; fair maidens 
 insulted with every damning epithet, yet serenely braving 
 all for Christ and his poor children. O ye ribald revllers 
 
 71
 
 It is safe, however, to believe that Lincoln would 
 have met the requirements of the advancing situa- 
 tion as it developed. 
 
 Lincoln's plan of reconstruction, it is certain, 
 did not contemplate that unrepentant rebels should 
 be placed in power and control, or that such should 
 help to frame the laws and decide the ways and 
 means by which the wayward States might claim 
 full fellowship in the Nation's life and work. It 
 did not contemplate nursing treason in the minds 
 and hearts of growing generations. It did not con- 
 template such like acts as the rearing of a monu- 
 ment of honor to the monster fiend of Andersonville, 
 whose conviction of untold murders of Union soldiers 
 sent him to the felon's death.47 it did not contem- 
 plate making sacred the flag and the emblems of se- 
 cession, and the opening for them and their adoration 
 the hall of National honor. It did not contemplate 
 making a farce of Donaldson, and Shiloh, and 
 Vicksburg, and Chattanooga, and Atlanta, of Bull 
 Run, and Antietam, and Fredericksburg, and the 
 Wilderness, of Cold Harbor, of Petersburg, and 
 Appomattox; of Hampton Roads, and Fort Fisher, 
 and Mobile Bay. It did not comtemplate falsifying 
 history,48 and making mockery of the tomb-covered 
 
 4T See Tragedy of Andersonville, etc. 
 
 48 There are women authors in the South whose writings 
 are attractive, readable, and in ways valuable, women 
 like Myrtle L. Avey of Virginia and Mary Helm of Ken- 
 tucky, but whose pen-picturing of reconstruction in t>te 
 South, and the fancifully drawn ideas of Lincoln-wov&clr- 
 have-been-attitude-concerning-it-had-he-Uved, has no right- 
 ful place in authentic history. This picturing sometimes 
 reminds one of a wayward child and an overindulgent 
 parent. 
 
 The author once knew a father who by thrift and 
 care and the aid of wife and children had secured a sub- 
 stantial fortune. One of the boys was wayward and had 
 
 74
 
 field of Gettysburg, and the heaven-inspired words 
 of the consecration: "The mystic chord of mem- 
 ory, stretching from every battlefield and patriotic 
 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." 
 
 It did contemplate, rather, the "Olive Branch," 
 not as a compromise but as a token of ratified vic- 
 tory of the Union, of enduring peace and of brother- 
 hood, exemplified, as it were, at Appomattox. It 
 contemplated lasting honor to patriots who gave 
 themselves to save the Union. It contemplated 
 that the South-land should be "done forever 
 
 caused the parents and the balance of the family no little 
 expense and trouble, but all obstacles were surmounted 
 and the father succeeded, * * * The wayward child 
 came to want and was in distress. The father-heart 
 went out to the son. He was invited back to take his 
 place in the home with the sole conditions of parental 
 and filial allegiance. The boy was head-strong and put 
 on an air of injured innocence. He played upon the 
 father's sympathy, and suggested and even urged that he 
 of all the family was the one best fitted to manage the 
 estate according to his liking. The father was persu- 
 aded. Without bonds, or guaranty, or legal provisions 
 for the rights and the care of others In the family, the 
 transfer was made, though marks of waywardness were 
 still in evidence to the casual observer. THE OUT- 
 COME The wayward boy repentant only in the seem- 
 ing "or in spots," or restimulated to former spirit by a 
 stubborn disloyal wife; the parents and other members 
 of the family were turned adrift with what the re- 
 instated boy and his companion might choose to give 
 them. 
 
 To think thus of Lincoln, successful In saving a Na- 
 tion, for whose integrity and safety he had risked all, 
 is to misunderstand the man who parallelled his mercy 
 and tender-heartedness with commonsense integrity, judg- 
 ment and honor. He had the legal acumen, to demand 
 bonds and legal guarantees of the wayward South before 
 turning over to her the National inheritance. These 
 bonds and guarantees he did demand ; and there is no 
 evidence that the strings of his sympathetic heart could 
 have been so played upon that he would have done other- 
 wise had he lived.
 
 with secession ; that the children of Southern 
 veterans, and the children's children, forever 
 on, should keep the pledge their fathers made, 
 and swear anew devotion and allegiance to the old 
 Flag of the Nation. It contemplated the spirit of 
 Watterson and Gordon and Joseph Wheeler and 
 Henry Grady, and a host of others, who pledged 
 anew the loyalty of the South, and swore lasting 
 allegiance to the Stars and Stripes, and fealty to 
 the Union. 
 
 Let the memory of those dreadful years of car- 
 nage; let the graves of more than a million 
 heroes, who, with no uncertain aim, marched to 
 battle ; let Confederate veterans, who furled for- 
 ever the ensign of Secession, and then, with loyalty 
 as undying as our own, swore fealty and allegiance 
 to the Nation and its Flag ; let the intelligence of 
 the South which repudiates the antiquated order 
 of things in Government ;*9 let the crimes of 
 
 49 The South is becoming more tolerant of a free dis- 
 cussion of its past and present policies. * * * This new 
 spirit of liberality towards opposing views when expressed 
 with sincerity and befitting decorum is perhaps the 
 greatest incipient triumph of the twentieth century South. 
 * * * We have reached the conclusion that calm history 
 will not justify, however much it may explain, the seces- 
 sionist movement of the sixties. Prof. E. M. Banks, Uni- 
 versity of Florida. 
 
 On the fall of Richmond, Juda P. Benjamin, Davis' 
 Secretary of State, went to England. When Davis was 
 running away, Lincoln was asked, what course he (Lin- 
 coln) would likely take should Davis be caught. The 
 case reminded him of a story ; "There was a boy in 
 Springfield who saved up his money and bought a coon, 
 which after the novelty wore off became a great nuisance. 
 He was one day leading him through the streets and had 
 his hands full to keep c'ear of the little vixen, who had 
 torn the clothes half off him. At last he sat down on 
 the curb-stone completely fagged out. A man passing by 
 was stopped by the lad's disconsolate appearance, and 
 asked what was the matter. 'O,' was the reply, 'this 
 
 76
 
 coon is such a trouble to me ;' 'Why don't you get rid of 
 him then ?' said the gentleman. 'Hush !' said the boy ; 
 'don't you see he's gnawing his rope off? I am going to 
 let him do it, and then I'll go home and tell the folks he 
 got away from me!' " 
 
 In the afternoon of the day on which Mr. Lincoln 
 was murdered, Charles A. Dana, Assistant Secretary of 
 War, had received a telegram from the Provost Marshall 
 of Portland, Maine, that Jacob Thompson was to be in 
 that city that night, and to leave for Liverpool. Mr. 
 Dana took the dispatch to the President, after having 
 notified Stanton, and asked for orders. "What does 
 Stanton say?" said Mr. Lincoln. "Arrest him!" was the 
 reply. "Well," continued the President, "I rather guess 
 not. When we have an elephant on hand, and he wants 
 to run away, better let him run." Charles A. Dana; 
 Reminiscences, 375-876. 
 
 A prominent lawyer, a friend of mine, once said to me : 
 "It is said that at the Conference between Lincoln, 
 Seward, and the rebel commissioners near Fortress Mon- 
 roe, that 'Lincoln took a blank sheet of paper and wrote 
 at the top UNION, then handed it to Stephens, saying : 
 'You may write underneath whatever terms you choose, 
 not conflicting with that, and I will sign it.' Is that 
 true, did Lincoln do that?" My reply was, "No, I think 
 not. It is like many of the stories attributed to Lincoln, 
 somebody's imagination." 
 
 For this story, I am sure there is no substantial evidence, 
 or warrant in fact. On the contrary what we can glean 
 from that conference is irreconcilable with anything of 
 the kind. 
 
 Presumably, and emphatically, it would have been con- 
 trary to Lincoln's way of doing things. There was, be- 
 sides too great importance pending upon that Conference, 
 and there is nothing to corroborate it. 
 
 At the opening of the Conference it was decided that 
 there should be no notes, or record of the meeting taken. 
 
 While an undivided Union was an absolute requirement, 
 there were other requirements held as Indispensible, and 
 so named in the President's instructions to Mr. Seward. 
 
 The communication to Congress a week and more later 
 bear no trace of such a thought, or incident. On the 
 other hand there is strong contradictory evidence. Some 
 ten years ago, Senator Tillman in an address in the 
 Senate referred to this historic interview at Hampton 
 Roads, and alleged the occurrence of the incident noted. 
 Senator Vest of Missouri, the only surviving Confederate 
 Senator, in answer, said : "John H. Regan of Texas, the 
 only living member of Davis' Cabinet, had denied the 
 statement, and that he, Mr. Vest, knew, though not 
 present at the Conference, that the incident was without 
 the slightest foundation, for he had heard the report of 
 Mr. Stephens and Mr. Hunter from their own lips and 
 the details of the Conference." 
 
 77
 
 Wirz and Jacob Thompson, and Jefferson Davis, 
 who died "without a country," because he would 
 not take tbe oath, but left his legacy to tbe child- 
 hood and the women of the South, whom he 
 charged to redeem Secession, and to rock anew its 
 cradle ; let the meaning of the War, with its fear- 
 ful warning and its victory, come back to us from 
 the graves of Lovejoy, and Crittenden, and Doug- 
 las, and Logan, and Farragut, and Sherman, and 
 Seward, and Grant, and Stanton, and a host of 
 others; let the spirit of our martyr chieftain, 
 whose life and work and character are the Nation's 
 treasure, who was the unyielding champion of Na- 
 tional integrity, who was in harmony with the age 
 and interests of an advancing civilization, and the 
 true course of political and social progress ; let 
 these confront the sycophant and the flattering 
 eulogist, who would turn back the dial of history, 
 discredit the Nation's victory, and hush to silence 
 the patriot who objects to maudling sympathy for 
 the "Lost Cause," and its worshiping adherents ! ! 
 
 Religious Life and Character. 
 
 Lincoln was a believer in the Christian Religion, 
 and died in the intelligent acceptance of a personal 
 
 Saviour. This assertion is made with sufficient evi- 
 dence in proof, and in the face of claims which 
 
 have been made that he was sceptical, a Free- 
 thinker, a Deist and even an Atheist. 
 
 That there were times in the life of Lincoln when 
 he doubted we do not care to question. In this he 
 probably had the experience of thousands of others, 
 and that too without permanent detriment to his 
 religious character. A successful candidate for the 
 
 78
 
 ISAAC STEPIIENSON. 
 United States Senator of Wisconsin.
 
 Presidency of one of our Colleges was charged with 
 some kind of religious heresy. The writer knew 
 the man intimately, had been his roommate for two 
 years, during our Theological studies, and was 
 quite aware of the shallowness of such accusation. 
 One of the College trustees questioned the accuser : 
 "Doctor, did you never doubt?" "I never had a 
 doubt in my life," was the reply. "I pity you then 
 most sincerely," said the official. Most men with 
 keen, logical minds, want reasonable and substan- 
 tial foundation for their conclusions, and not un- 
 frequently are compelled to stop and doubt on the 
 way. "There lives more faith in honest doubt," 
 says Tennyson, "believe me, than in half the 
 creeds." The young man Lincoln came in contact 
 with books,so a nd men, and things in nature, mys- 
 terious providences of God, and his own inner 
 thoughts, which caused him to stop and question 
 and doubt. But we may not forget, Thomas 
 doubted and refused to believe without satisfactory 
 evidence. Paul doubted, even to madness, as he 
 himself declares. But he tells us how he lost his 
 doubts, and came to recognize himself as a chosen 
 vessel of the Master, whose followers he was on 
 his way to persecute. Others, in the early cen- 
 turies, doubted, who afterwards tested their faith 
 in horrid death struggles in Roman amphitheaters. 
 Thousands, down through the centuries, have 
 doubted, but who, with doubts dispelled, have 
 proven themselves men and women indeed of God. 
 Some of you have doubted, but in spite of things 
 you could not understand and the subterfuge of 
 
 '"'Meth. Quart. Rev., Jan.-Feb., 1907, pp. 103-104. 
 See Inshop Simpson's address. 
 
 79
 
 false profession and mere pretense, perhaps, you 
 became anchored, at last, to the Eternal Rock, 
 Christ Jesus. 
 
 From earliest childhood to his majority, Lincoln 
 was in the limelight of the best possible Christian 
 instruction a Christian home and a devout and 
 intelligent Christian mother. Late in life he said : 
 "All that I am or hope to be I owe to my angel 
 mother blessings on her head."5i After he be- 
 came President, speaking of his mother, he said : 
 "I remember her prayers, and they have always 
 followed me. They have clung to me all my life."52 
 His step-mother was greatly attached to him, and 
 spared no pains in her care for his religious train- 
 ing, and character upbuilding. This love and care 
 of a mother were duly reciprocated in lasting filial 
 regard and affection.53 
 
 From childhood on he was a reader and a student 
 of the Bible. Says Mr. Arnold, a life-long friend 
 of Mr. Lincoln : "I never yet have seen the man 
 more familiar with the Bible than Abraham Lin- 
 coln. At the Executive Mansion, the early morn- 
 ing hour, while others were at rest, was spent in 
 prayer and Bible reading."54 Says Dr. Holland : 
 "I can never think of that toil-worn man, rising 
 long before his household and spending an hour 
 with his Maker and his Bible, without tears. * * * 
 Aye, what tears, what prayers, what aspirations, 
 what lamentations, what struggles have been wit- 
 nessed by the four walls of that quiet room ! There 
 day after day while we have been sleeping has he 
 
 M D. D. Thompson, N. W. C. A., Feb. 3, 1908, p. 5, 133. 
 62 D. D. Thompson, N. W. C. A., Feb. 3, 1908, p. 5, 133. 
 n M. J. Evan Jones Lincoln Stanton Grant, p. 3. 
 
 M Arnold's Album. 
 
 80
 
 knelt and prayed for us, prayed for the country, 
 prayed for wisdom and guidance, prayed for 
 strength for his great mission. * * * The man 
 who was so humble and so brotherly among men 
 was bowed in filial humility before God. * * * 
 A praying President! A praying statesman! A 
 praying Commander-in-Chief of the armies and the 
 navies ! Our foremost man, our noblest dignitary, 
 kneeling, a simple hearted child before his heavenly 
 Father ! He was a consecrated man consecrated 
 to his country and his God."55 
 
 Bishop Simpson, and Bishop Ames whom he had 
 known before the War, were among his closest 
 friends and counselors, and often, at his invita- 
 tion at the White House, they bowed with him in 
 prayer. His confidence in God and in the efficacy 
 of prayer, and his individual consecration to God, 
 are well attested in the account he gives to Gen- 
 eral Sickles, at the hospital, after the battle of 
 Gettysburg.56 
 
 ^Orations, Vol. 19, 8079. 
 
 Literary Digest, April 10, 1895. 
 
 68 A member of General Sickle's staff, General Rusllng 
 was called to see him, (Sickles,) and while there Mr. 
 Lincoln called, with his son Tad. We let General J. R. 
 Rusling tell the story in brief: 
 
 "He (Mr. Lincoln) greeted Sickles very heartily and 
 kindly, of course, and complimented him on his stout 
 fight at Gettysburg, * * * but Sickles was dubious and 
 diplomatic, as became so astute a man. * * * Presently, 
 General Sickles turned to him, and asked what he thought 
 during the Gettysburg campaign, and whether he was not 
 anxious about it? 
 
 "Mr. Lincoln gravely replied, no, he was not ; that 
 some of his Cabinet and many others in Washington 
 were, but that he himself had no fears. General Sickles 
 inquired how this was, and seemed curious about it. Mr. 
 Lincoln hesitated, but finally replied : 'Well, I will tell 
 you how it was. In the pinch of your compaign up there, 
 when everybody seemed panic-stricken, and nobody could 
 tell what was going to happen, oppressed by the gravity 
 
 81
 
 The Emancipation Proclamation was born in 
 prayer, and in consultation with such men as 
 Bishop Simpson ; and its execution was in fulfill- 
 ment of a promise made to God in prayer.57 
 
 Our highest, our foremost man was not too great 
 to ask advice of others, nor was he too small to 
 ask counsel of the King of kings. 
 
 "Lincoln was a man of strong religious convic- 
 tions," says Mr. McCulloch, "but he cared nothing 
 for dogmas of churches, and had but little respect 
 for their creeds."58 Had some of us lived seventy 
 
 of our affairs I went into my room one day and locked 
 the door, and got down on my knees before Almighty 
 God, and prayed to him mightily for victory at G3ttys- 
 burg. I told him this was his war, and our cause hia 
 cause. * * * And I then and there made a solemn vow 
 to Almighty God that if he would stand by our boys at 
 Gettysburg I would stand by Him. And He did, and I 
 will. And after that (I don't know how it was and I 
 can't explain it) but soon a sweet comfort crept into my 
 soul that things would go all right at Gettysburg, and 
 that is why I had no fears about you.' He said this 
 solemnly and pathetically, as if from the very depths ot 
 his heart, and both Sickles and I were deeply touched by 
 his manner." Gcril James R. Rusltng. 
 
 Of course, I do not give his exact words, but very 
 nearly his words, and his ideas precisely. 
 
 6T See Maj. E. A. Jones, p. 48; Raymond's Life and 
 State Papers, p. 765. 
 
 68 Hugh McCulloch, Comptroller of Currency, afterward 
 Sec'y Treasury under Lincoln. 
 
 "The church (in Springfield) was filled that morning. 
 It was a good-sized church, but on that day all the seats 
 were filled. I had chosen for my text the words : 'Ye 
 must be born again,' and during the course of my ser- 
 mon I laid particular stress on the word 'must.' Mr. 
 Lincoln came into the church after the services had com- 
 menced. * * * I noticed that Mr. Lincoln appeared to 
 be deply interested in the sermon. A few days after 
 that Sunday Mr. Lincoln called on me and informed me 
 that he had been greatiy impressed with my remarks on 
 Sunday and that he had come to talk with me further on 
 the matter. I invited him in, and my wife and I talked 
 and prayed with him for hours. Now, I have seen many 
 persons converted ; I have seen hundreds brought to 
 Christ, and if ever a person was converted, Abraham Lin- 
 coln was converted that night in my house. His wife 
 
 82
 
 years ago, or even less, when churches were bat- 
 tling with each other over non-essentials of their 
 creeds, and seemed to care far more for the letter 
 than the spirit of the Gospel, we might have looked 
 as Lincoln did upon non-essential dogmas. 
 
 Recent evidence conies to us, which is beyond all 
 question, that years before the War, even in his 
 young manhood, Lincoln was a converted man, and 
 that he recognized the fact. This is the keystone 
 long lost to sight, but which was thought must be 
 somewhere buried in the relics of the years. It 
 completes the symmetry of a life inexplicable with- 
 out it.59 
 
 was a Presbyterian, but from remarks he made to me lie 
 covUd not accept Calvinism. He never joined my church, 
 but I will always believe that since that night Abraham 
 Lincoln lived and died a Christian gentleman." 
 
 60 See N. Y. C. Adv. 
 
 See Farewell address on leaving Springfield. 
 
 "Answer to Illinois Clergymen." 
 
 "Talk with Mrs. Pomeroy, while Tad is sick, after 
 Willie's death ; talk with State Supt. Bateman. 
 
 "Mr. Lincoln said in trembling voice, and cheeks wet 
 with tears : 'I know there is a God, and that He hates 
 injustice and slavery. I see the storm coming, and I 
 know that His hand is in it. If He has a place and a 
 work for me, and I think He has I believe I am ready. 
 I am nothing, but truth is everything. I know I am 
 right, because I know liberty is right ; for Christ teaches 
 it, and Christ is God." 
 
 Jacques, Statement C. A., Nov. 15, 1909. 
 
 Rev. James F. Jacques, at the time noted, pastor of the 
 Methodist Episcopal church in Springfield, 1839, late 
 Pres. of Quincy College, and during the War, Colonel of 
 the Preachers' Regiment the 73d 111. Vols. See Chris- 
 tian Advocate, Nov. 11, 1809 and report of the Eleventh 
 Annual Re-union, Survivors of the Seventy-third Regt. 
 
 The surmise that Lincoln was an unbeliever, hasi been 
 handed down, largely, in the Judgment of the author, 
 directly and indirectly from the representation of Mr. 
 Herndon, Mr. Lincoln's law partner. Mr. Herndon was 
 a rank "free thinker," and sought, as is shown in his 
 representation of Lincoln's religious views, to picture 
 him in this respect as a man of his own thinking. Direct 
 evidence is all against such representation. Robert Lin- 
 coln, the President's son modestly declares against It. 
 
 83
 
 Literary Style and Oratory. 
 
 Four hundred years ago, under the corporate 
 management of Oxford University, Brasenose Col- 
 lege was founded. On the walls of this historic 
 school there hangs today an engrossed fac-simile 
 copy of Abraham Lincoln's letter to Mrs. Bixby of 
 Boston, "As a specimen of the purest English and 
 most elegant diction extant. It is said that as 
 model of expressive English, it has rarely, if ever, 
 been surpassed." 
 
 On the 19th of November, 1863, the Battlefield 
 of Gettysburg was dedicated as a National Ceme- 
 tery. Edward Everett was the chosen orator, and 
 he delivered a most scholarly address. Weeks be- 
 fore, Governor Curtain of Pennsylvania, and the 
 Governors of sixteen other States, whose soldiers 
 had participated in the battle, urgently requested 
 Mr. Lincoln, as Chief Executive, to be present, to 
 participate in the ceremonies, and to consecrate the 
 grounds. President Lincoln followed Mr. Everett 
 with a few brief sentences. The following day 
 Mr. Everett wrote to Mr. Lincoln: " * * * 
 Permit me to express my great admiration of the 
 thoughts expressed by you, with such eloquent sim- 
 plicity and appropriateness, at the consecration of 
 the Cemetery. I should be glad if I could flatter 
 myself that I came as near to the central idea of 
 
 Being asked In reference to this, he replied : "I cannot 
 undertake to verify any questions or statements made 
 from authors of works upon his life, and least of all those 
 emanating from William Herndon." Declining to speak 
 at length ("It would take all my time were I to answer 
 all queries.") he referred to the life of his father writ- 
 ten by Hon. Isaac N. Arnold as being the best he had 
 seen respecting it. 
 
 84
 
 o 
 tf 
 p 
 
 P3 
 
 02 
 
 B 
 
 H 
 H 
 O 
 
 fa 
 O 
 
 PQ 
 
 B 
 
 ffi 
 H
 
 the occasion, In two hours, as you did in two 
 minutes." 
 
 Gladstone said of this address: "Its ideals are 
 loftier than have been uttered from a throne in all 
 the annals of history." 
 
 After the first Inaugural, comments were being 
 made, and suggestions that Seward had to do with 
 it. Judge Jeremiah Black, a man of the highest 
 culture, the brains of the Buchanan administration, 
 and one of the greatest of lawyers, said : "Gentle- 
 men, we have underrated the man from Illinois. 
 There is but one man in America that could write 
 that document, and that is not William H. Seward. 
 We shall find Mr. Lincoln the brainiest man on the 
 continent." 
 
 Of the second Inaugural, Mr. Gladstone said: 
 "I am led captive by so striking an utterance as 
 this. * * * It gives evidence of a moral eleva- 
 tion most rare in statesmen or in any other man." 
 A prominent London paper at the time pronounced 
 that Inaugural : "The noblest political document 
 known in history." While Mr. Emerson said: "It 
 will outlive anything that has been printed in the 
 English language." 
 
 Whence and where and how came that power of 
 thought and speech which gives utterance to golden 
 sentences which have become classic, and are pro- 
 nounced by the best literary critics of the world as 
 among the few great masterpieces of human 
 speech? Mr. Choate gives direction to our search 
 when, noting the Cooper Institute address, he 
 says: "It was marvelous to see how that un- 
 tutored man, by mere self discipline and chastening 
 
 85
 
 of his own spirit, had outgrown all meretritious 
 arts and found his way to the grandeur and 
 strength of absolute simplicity."60 
 
 The key that unlocks that mystery is not the 
 miracle, or some freak of human nature, but the 
 genius of the man, with native powers equal to the 
 best, wisely and carefully cultivated, under Divine 
 direction, and kept in use. He lived in vigorous 
 contact with men and events. These he mastered 
 and made the truth a part of himself. When he 
 wrote or spoke it was usually after mature delib- 
 eration, and straight to the point. Says Mr. Choate : 
 "What Lowell calls the great simplicities of the 
 Bible, with which he was so familiar, were re- 
 flected in his discourses." 
 
 Lincoln took as his literary model, and constant 
 study, his mother's gift to him, the Book most read, 
 and the greatest masterpiece of literature the world 
 has ever known, the Bible. In his letters and in 
 his speeches the spirit of the Bible was always 
 manifest, and its language was at his tongue's end. 
 Like Shakespeare, too, he had the grasp of thought 
 and human nature and trained himself to speak 
 in the simple, clear and effective Anglo Saxon 
 the language of the Common people. 
 
 80 Mr. Joseph H. Choate has told something of the occa- 
 sion and of the address of Lincoln at Cooper Institute : 
 "It was a great audience, including all the noted men 
 all the learned and cultured of his party In New York, 
 editors, clergymen, statesmen, lawyers, merchants, critics. 
 * * * For an hour and a half he held his audience in the 
 hollow of his hand." After the address, a Yale professor, 
 who was present and heard the address, sought him out 
 at his hotel. He stated; that he had been greatly inter- 
 ested in listening to him and was anxious to know when 
 and where he had acquired his marvelous power as a pub- 
 lic speaker. Surprised at being thus approached. Lin- 
 coln could only answer that his sole training had been 
 In the School of Experience. 
 
 86
 
 An incident for illustration may be in point. Col. 
 J. G. Wilson was dining with, the President, when 
 late in the evening, Secretary Seward and E. B. 
 Washburn were announced. "Mr. Seward said 
 'they had desired to show the President the large 
 gold medal just received from the Philadelphia 
 Mint, voted by Congress to General Grant for the 
 capture of Vicksburg.' Mr. Lincoln, approaching a 
 small center table on which there was a drop light, 
 opened the morocco case containing the medal up- 
 side down. After a long pause Col. Wilson ven- 
 tured to remark, 'What is the obverse of the medal, 
 Mr. President'? He looked up and turning to Mr. 
 Seward, said : 'I suppose the Colonel means 'tother 
 side.' There was no sting in this and Mr. Wilson 
 joined in the general laugh."6i 
 
 A Wonderful Era and Its Crisis. 
 
 A marvelous era is in forming; an era of vast 
 significance and of world-wide importance. Free 
 government is under trial. The foundations are 
 being tested, and the whole world, with credulous 
 eye, is looking on to see the experiment. Through 
 somewhat clarified skies we may now look back 
 upon a National drama, with the crisis of an era, 
 and judge as we could not when the clouds were 
 gathering and the storm was bursting in its fury. 
 
 A Nation conceived by the wisdom of God, 
 brought forth in the pain and suffering poverty of 
 patriots, cradled in the rude, but bounteous lap of 
 a new continent and nourished by the wholesome 
 truths of the Declaration of '76 and the Constitu- 
 
 81 Putnam's Magazine, February, 1909. 
 
 87
 
 tion of '87. Rising from her cradle, she lays aside 
 her swaddling clothes, looks out upon her Eastern 
 seaboard, and adds to it the Summer gardens of 
 the Gulf; and in her youthful vigor steps out be- 
 yond majectic water-ways, touches the Rio Grande, 
 crosses broad plains which touch the horizon at 
 every point; climbs mountain ranges, colossal in 
 size, full of costly treasures, and which challenge 
 the world for scenes sublime and grand, then 
 crosses plateaus and valleys, the very garden of 
 the world, quaffs the breeze of the Western Ocean, 
 and claims the better portion of a Continent as 
 its own. 
 
 Such, in brief, is the material outline of a youth- 
 ful Nation, bequeathed to us by the fathers, and 
 won by her own inherent powers; a promising 
 child, with inner life most vigorous, with heart and 
 brain in touch with the accumulated wisdom of the 
 ages, and calculated to satisfy the political wants 
 and temporal longings of aspiring humanity. 
 
 Valuable treasures and worthy ends, however, 
 are not easy to attain and are sometimes costly in 
 the winning. The Government bequeathed to us 
 was the masterpiece of the ages past, but it was 
 not without its inborn weakness and outward para- 
 sites. For seventy years and more the people had 
 to grapple with questions which threatened to de- 
 stroy, and only won at last in the supreme fight of 
 history. Conflicting ideas of Colonial rights and 
 Federal control, which played so large a part in 
 the Federal Convention of 1787, were nursed to 
 abnormal strength by the growing power of slavery, 
 until compromise added to compromise, and laws 
 
 88
 
 unsavory and unjust gave place to threats of dis- 
 union and the maturing plans of secession. 
 
 The Presidential election of 1860 precipitated the 
 movement. The doctrine of State sovereignty re- 
 asserted itself and caused eleven states to attempt 
 secession. The innate and fundamental incentive, 
 however, was the antiquated but cherished institu- 
 tion of the South, Negro slavery. 
 
 Talents and Qualifications Needed. 
 
 To meet the culminating issues, and to lead in 
 the final conflict, a man of rare talents and those 
 of the highest order was needed ; a man fitted by 
 the keenest perceptions, by the most stable powers 
 of the intellect, by the best qualities of the heart, 
 by the noblest traits of character, and by proper 
 education for the work ; a man possessed of rea- 
 soning powers of the first order, but who could so 
 control his reason as not to allow it to become the 
 slave of feeling ; a man with singleness of purpose 
 and uncompromising allegiance to the Federal 
 Union ; a man in touch with humanity at its 
 various points, and charitable for those who might 
 differ with him in' opinion ; a man who could 
 weigh with marked accuracy the logic of passing 
 events, with the foundation principles of the Gov- 
 ernment ; a man with prophetic insight to grasp 
 something of God's purpose in the continued mis- 
 sion of the Nation. For this rare and perilous 
 work which meant so much to the Nation, to the 
 entire world and to the welfare of coming genera- 
 tions, a leader proportionate to the work was 
 needed. A Wilberforce in unruffled ardor and "in-
 
 tense fellow feeling for others ;" a Columbus in 
 persistency ; a Hastings in ambition, but unsullied 
 by lust of gain or power ; a Phillips in devotion 
 to human rights; a Nehemiah in wise and con- 
 servative action ; a Hampden in honesty and de- 
 termination ; a William the Silent in sagacity ; 
 a Winkleried in patriotism; in political acumen a 
 more than Pitt, Mirabeau or Mazzini ; in high 
 moral purpose and lofty heroic will a Gustavus 
 Adolphus ; an Abraham in faith ; in statesman- 
 ship a Cromwell, a Cavour, a Bismark ; in courage, 
 integrity and justice a Washington ; a Moses in 
 leadership. 
 
 The Man, the Discovery, the Selection. 
 
 God alone could divine the man and give direc- 
 tion to the training. The Kentucky cabin, the In- 
 diana forest, the river flat-boat, the shambles of 
 New Orleans, the prairies of Illinois, the back- 
 woods and rustic society, rude and sometimes boor- 
 ish mates ; the shoeless feet, the buckskin pants, 
 the coonskin cap ; the bashful mien, the weeping 
 orphan, the rollicking boy, the champion athlete, 
 the sorrowing lover, the pioneer farmer lad, the 
 rail splitter, the rural tradesman, the lawyer's 
 office, the successful suiter, the mirthful melancholy 
 face, did not hide from God the man he wanted. 
 In due time the people of the West discovered the 
 leader, the East discerned his ability and the Na- 
 tion selected even better than it knew. No nation 
 in the world can boast of greater men, and greater 
 statesmen than the founders of our Nation, and 
 their successors. We are proud of the record; but 
 
 90
 
 it was reserved for Abraham Lincoln to lead in the 
 culmination of the conflict for free government and 
 a united Nation. 
 
 Promethius Unbound. 
 
 "Truth shall restore the light by Nature given, 
 And like Promethius, bring the fire from heaven." 
 
 Campbett. 
 
 Reader, you have seen, perchance, a captive eagle 
 and watched him looking out upon his native ele- 
 ment and struggling to be free. His piercing eye 
 turns here and there, and upward, and then meets 
 yours as though to beg your help to set him free. 
 The way at last is open, the captive monarch moves 
 out into his native air, looks around as though to 
 thank his benefactor, and then moves out in trial 
 of his powers of flight. He lights upon some lofty 
 tree and prunes his plumage, then soars aloft to 
 the distant crag and prunes again his wings for an- 
 other flight He takes survey of his surroundings, 
 turns witsfully to the mountain heights, then floats 
 out upon the air and mounts upward in his flight, 
 higher, and higher, and higher still, until at last 
 he's lost to sight in the blue of the upper sky. 
 
 So it seems with Lincoln. The splendid powers 
 of his remarkable intellect, the noble qualities of 
 his great heart, the vigorous elements of his aspir- 
 ing soul, were hemmed in by the environments of 
 his early life; but little by little, mainly by his 
 own exertions, and the opening ways of Providence, 
 the barriers give way, and a great soul, as yet 
 ignorant of its mighty powers, moves out upon its 
 upward flight. 
 
 91
 
 Statesmanship. 
 
 More than four hundred years before the 
 Christian Era, Hippocrates, the father of Medical 
 science, laid down this axiom : "He seems to me 
 to be the best physician who knows how to know 
 beforehand what will happen" This axiom of that 
 famous old Greek is as true of statesmanship as of 
 Medical science. In our day Carl Schurz has said: 
 "Profound conviction of right and wrong is the 
 basis of true statesmanship." Lowell declared : 
 "A profound common sense is the best genius for 
 statemanship." Abraham Lincoln was pre-eminent- 
 ly endowed with each and all of these qualities. 
 Politics, or statesmanship, in this higher sense, was 
 his native element. The Kentucky frontier, the 
 Indiana farm, the grove and itinerant meetings, the 
 Boonville courts, the river and flat boats, the coun- 
 try store, the Black-Hawk war, the Legislature, 
 and Congress even, were but the stopping places 
 for him to prune his marvelous gifts and fit him 
 for something yet to come. 
 
 Lincoln the Lawyer. 
 
 Lincoln had not a broad legal education. He 
 had not the ability to handle the wrong side of a 
 case as well as the right ; nor had the inclination 
 to do so. He hated sophistry and quibbles and 
 crooked reasoning. He would not stoop to them 
 himself or tolerate them in others. He was quick 
 to grasp the vital point at issue, and to leave aside 
 the nonessentials. It is a recognized fact, I believe, 
 that one of the chief characteristics of a great law- 
 yer is his ability in the statement of the case. 
 
 92
 
 Judge Jeremiah S. Black was one of the great 
 lawyers of our country. Before the War he was 
 trying a case before the Supreme Court of the 
 United States. Juda P. Benjamin, later a member 
 of the Cabinet of Jefferson Davis, and known as 
 "the Brains of the Confederacy," was on the oppo- 
 site side. Going out to lunch one day, one of the 
 Judges ,( Judge Story) and Mr. Black were walking 
 together. "Black," said the Judge, "That little 
 Jew will state you out of court, if you aren't 
 careful." Lincoln was pre-eminent here. He would 
 often state a case with such clearness and concise- 
 ness that argument thereafter was hardly neces- 
 sary. He was unsurpassed as a jury lawyer, and 
 had but few equals in the higher courts. His lucid 
 statements and demonstration of facts, illustrated 
 often with striking similes and pointed anecdotes, 
 together with his unquestioned honesty, won for 
 him the confidence of jurymen ; while his remark- 
 able quickness in seeing the pivotal point, avoiding 
 unimportant details and freeing from technicalities, 
 and keeping to the front the vital points of a case 
 were sure to secure the weighty consideration of 
 the Bench. He had the moral instincts, the rigid 
 honesty, the mental grasp, the keen analysis, the 
 pitiless logic of a great lawyer. And in his prac- 
 tice he rose as the peer of the ablest in his pro- 
 fession, and stood indeed at the head of the Spring- 
 field Bar.2 
 
 62 He had a clearness of statement which was Itself an 
 argument. * * * He was one of the most successful 
 lawyers we ever had In the State. Judge Thoa. Drum- 
 mond. 
 
 Frequently the Court would stop him any say : "If 
 that is the case, Brother Lincoln, we will hear the other 
 side." The strongest Jury lawyer in the State. 
 
 93
 
 Lincoln was indeed a great lawyer ; so his con- 
 temporaries have attested and so history will ever 
 record. But even his success and leadership at the 
 Bar proved but the place to prune his splendid 
 powers for a higher flight and a greater end. 
 
 He had the ability to perceive with almost intuitive 
 quickness the decisive point in the case. Isaac N. 
 Arnold. 
 
 In order to bring into activity his great powers, it was 
 necessary he should be convinced of the right and justice 
 of the case he advocated. * * * In all elements that 
 constituted the great lawyer, he had few equals. * * * 
 He seized the great points of a case, and presented them 
 with clearness and great compactness. Judge David 
 Davis. 
 
 He neglected details because his thought, which "was 
 as direct as light," passed instinctively to the vital spot, 
 and all else seemed unimportant. "If I can free this 
 case from technicalities and get it properly before the 
 jury, I'll win it," he used to say. Frederick Trever Hill. 
 
 To illustrate the esteem in which he was held as a 
 lawyer, Senator Cullum has said : "I knew Lincoln from 
 the time I was a mere lad, ten or twelve years old, and 
 then before that time I remember that men came twenty 
 or thirty miles to ask my father's judgment as to whom 
 to employ as a lawyer in important cases. My father 
 would say to them, 'If Stephen A. Logan is there employ 
 him ; if not, there is a young man by the name of Lin- 
 coln who will do almost as well.' ' 
 
 Says McKinley : "He frequently defeated some of the 
 most powerful legal minds in the West. In the higher 
 courts he has won great distinction in the important 
 cases committed to his charge." 
 
 In his practice of more than twenty years, we are 
 told, he had no less than one hundred and sixty-nine 
 cases in the highest courts of Illinois ; a record unsur- 
 passed by his contemporaries. 
 
 His knowledge of human nature played an important 
 part in his success. He tried more cases in the eighth 
 circuit (his own the Springfield) than any other mem- 
 ber of that Bar. 
 
 Lincoln had no apologies to make for the legal profes- 
 sion ; he believed in his calling. He had no patience 
 with the idea that honesty was not compatible with the 
 practice of the law. He once said : "Let no young man 
 choosing the law as a calling yield to that popular be- 
 lief. Resolve to be honest, at all events. If in your 
 Judgment you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be 
 honest without being a lawyer. Choose some other occu- 
 pation rather than one in the choosing of which you do, 
 in advance, consent to be a knave." 
 
 94
 
 Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. 
 
 When Lincoln entered the Legislature of Illinois 
 he was a young man. Douglas, the idol of his 
 party, and later known as "The Little Giant of 
 Illinois," was the Attorney General, and later mem- 
 ber of the Legislature. Years pass on, Douglas is 
 a member of the United States Senate. The slave 
 power is becoming more and more aggressive. 
 Douglas joins in the issue. He introduces the bill 
 for the repeal of the Missouri Compromise ; which 
 action was designed to open Kansas and Nebraska 
 for the extension of slavery. 
 
 This action of Congress was the fateful turning 
 point which resulted in the formation of the new 
 Republican party. Lincoln is again summoned to 
 the front. He leaves his law office and joins in the 
 issue, hand in hand with Bissell and Lovejoy and 
 Palmer and Logan and a host of others. Late in 
 1854 he is pitted in the controversy against the 
 author and champion of the act. He had pre- 
 viously been known as the leader of his District, 
 henceforth he is known as the foremost man of the 
 State. * * * 
 
 Bloomington Convention. 
 
 In the spring of 1856 the opponents of slavery 
 meet in State Convention, at Bloomington.cs "A 
 group," says Mr. Curtis, "of earnest, zealous, sin- 
 cere men, willing to make tremendous sacrifles and 
 to undertake Titanic tasks." 
 
 "First Republican State convention, held at Blooming- 
 ton, 111., May 29, 1856, composed of Abolitionists, Free 
 Soil Whigs and Free State Democrats. Lincoln a dele- 
 gate from Sangamon County. 
 
 95
 
 Various theories were entertained. Most had set 
 ideas and clung to their own specialties and 
 methods of work, and advocated such ideas as to 
 ways and means ; such indeed as to augur dis- 
 aster and threaten defeat. While attending Court 
 on his district, Lincoln had been elected as a dele- 
 gate from Sangamon County. He was called upon 
 to address the convention. He saw the danger of 
 discord and disunited ideas as to means and meth- 
 ods and the need as well of united and concerted 
 action to reach the common purpose. He saw the 
 crisis in the history of the Nation and sought to 
 harmonize and combine the humane and patriotic 
 emotion of this liberty-loving assembly of earnest 
 and determined men. He rose sublimely to the full 
 requirements and the occasion of the hour. He 
 thrilled the audience as with a tongue of fire. It 
 was a masterpiece of oratory and carried conviction 
 to the hearts of the people. Here it is said : "Un- 
 der the influence of Lincoln's eloquence all the re- 
 porters lost their heads." I cannot refrain from 
 quoting here a few scattering sentences from this 
 speech, so long supposed to have been lost. It gives 
 expression to fundamental principles which swayed 
 his thoughts and controlled his political action as a 
 citizen and to which he adhered as Chief Executive 
 of the Nation.64 
 
 64 As one of the delegates from old Sangamon I am 
 here certainly as a sympathizer in this movement. * * * 
 I suppose we truly stand for the public opinion of Sanga- 
 mon on the great question of the repeal. * * * We are 
 in a trying time it ranges 1 above mere party * * * for 
 unless popular opinion makes itself very strongly felt, 
 and a change is made in our present course, blood will 
 flow on account of Nebraska, and brother's hand will be 
 raised against brother. * * * We must not promise 
 what we ought not, lest we be called on to perform what 
 
 96
 
 we cannot. * * * We are here to stand firmly for a 
 principle, to stand firmly for a right. * * * We have 
 seen today that every shade of popular opinion is repre- 
 sented here, with Freedom, or rather Free Soil, as the 
 basis. * * * We have together in some sort representa- 
 tives of popular opinion against the extension of slavery 
 into territory now free in fact as well as by law, and 
 the pledged word of statesmen of the Nation who are 
 now no more. * * * We are here to demand and de- 
 termine that slavery must be kept out or Kansas. * * * 
 By every principle of law, a negro in Kansas is free ; yet 
 the bogus legislature makes it an infamous crime to tell 
 him that he is free. * * * In the early days of the Con- 
 stitution slavery was recognized by the South and North 
 alike as an evil and the division of sentiment about it 
 was not controlled by geographical lines or consideration 
 of climate, but by moral and philosophical principle. 
 
 * * * In Kentucky my native State In 1849, on a 
 test vote, * * * the State of Boone, and Hardin, and 
 Henry Clay, with a nigger under each arm, took the 
 black trail to the deadly swamp of barbarism. Is there, 
 can there be any doubt? * * * Can any man doubt 
 that, even in spite of the people's will, slavery will tri- 
 umph through violence, unless that will be made manifest 
 and enforced? * * * The battle o* freedom is to be 
 fought out on principle. Slavery is a violation of the 
 eternal right. We have temporized with it from the 
 necessity of our condition ; but as sure as God reigns 
 and school children read, THAT BLACK FOUL LIE CAN 
 NEVER BE CONSECRATED INTO GOD'S HALLOWED 
 TRUTH. * * * Can we as Christian m<en, and strong 
 and free ourselves, wield the sledge or hold the iron 
 which is to manacle anew an already oppressed race? 
 
 The Union is undergoing a fearful strain, but it is a 
 stout old ship, and has weathered many a hard blow, 
 and "the stars in their courses," aye and invisible power, 
 greater than the puny efforts of men, will fight for us. 
 Let us revere the Declaration of Independence ; let us 
 continue to obey, the Constitution and the laws ; let us 
 keep step to the music of the Union ; let us draw a 
 cordon, so to speak, around the slave States, and the 
 hateful institution, like a reptile poisoning itself, will 
 perish by its own infamy. * * * We must reinstate the 
 birthday promise of the Republic. We must reaffirm the 
 Declaration of Independence. We must make good in 
 essence as well as in form Madison's avowal that the 
 word slave ought not to appear in the Constitution. 
 
 * * * But in seeking to attain these results, so indis- 
 pensable, if the liberty which is our pride and boast shall 
 endure, we will be loyal to the Constitution and to the 
 "Flag of the Union," no matter what our grievance, even 
 though Kansas shall come in as a slave State; and no 
 matter what theirs even though we restore the Com- 
 promise WE WILL SAY TO THE SOUTHERN DIS- 
 UNIONISTS : WE WILL NOT GO OUT OF THE 
 
 97
 
 Dred Scott Decision and Popular Sovereignty. 
 
 Soon after the inauguration of President Buchan- 
 an, followed the decision of the Supreme Court in 
 the Dred Scott case, which decision carried with it 
 the view that Congress itself could not prohibit 
 slavery in the Territories, as Bancroft puts it: 
 "The Chief Justice volunteers to come to the rescue 
 of slavery," while Buchanan himself gives his en- 
 dorsement that : "Kansas is as much a slave State 
 as South Carolina or Georgia ; slavery by virtue 
 of the Constitution exists in every Territory." The 
 danger signal is thus fully unfurled. Douglas finds 
 it necessary to attempt reconciliation between this 
 decision and his pronounced ideas of Popular 
 Sovereignty. To this end he returned from Wash- 
 ington July 1st and made elaborate addresses on 
 the subject at Springfield and elsewhere. Then 
 came the determined effort of the President to force 
 Kansas into the Union as a slave state under the 
 bogus Lecompton constitution. To this Douglas 
 shrewdly and strenuously objected and worthily led 
 the opposition in the United States Senate. Lin- 
 coln had watched the progress of affairs, carefully 
 measured the trend and logical outcome and pre- 
 pared himself for the battle. At the Republican 
 State convention at Springfield in June, 1858, where 
 he was declared to be the first and only choice of 
 the convention for United States Senator, he gave 
 his famous speech "A House divided against itself." 
 * * * "I believe this government cannot endure 
 
 UNION, AND YOU SHAN'T!!! * * * Our moderation 
 and forbearance will stand us in good stead when if 
 ever, WE MUST MAKE AN APPEAL TO BATTLE, AND 
 TO THE GOD OF HOSTS ! ! ! 
 
 98
 
 half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union 
 is to be dissolved I do not expect the house to fall 
 but I do expect it will cease to be divided. * * *" 
 These stentorian notes went forth through the land 
 and evoked wide-spread response. Shortly after he 
 was invited to be present at Clinton, where Doug- 
 las was to speak. An immense crowd had gathered. 
 The speaker was ingenius, evasive, forcible. He re- 
 ferred to Lincoln's Springfield address in a slurring 
 and critical manner. At the close there were loud 
 cries for Lincoln, and upon the urgent request of 
 the audience, he consented to speak in reply in 
 the evening on the Court House square which he 
 did. The address throughout was logical and con- 
 vincing. The closing sentence I may quote as a 
 declaration of lofty and inherent American States- 
 manship. "Judge Douglas charges me with being 
 in favor of Negro equality, and to the extent that 
 he charges me I am not guilty. I am guilty of 
 hating servitude and loving freedom ; and while I 
 would not carry the equality of the races to the ex- 
 tent charged by my adversary, I am happy to con- 
 fess before you that in some things the black man 
 is equal to the white. In the right to eat the bread 
 his own hands have earned he is the equal of Judge 
 Douglas or any other living man." 
 
 Lincoln-Douglas Debate. 
 
 In August, '58, Lincoln and Douglas meet in 
 forensic debate on "Squatter Sovereignty" the pre- 
 lude of the war of the Rebellion. The platform of 
 the debate was Lincoln's Springfield address. The 
 debate has come down to us without a parallel in 
 its kind, and as one of the greatest events in Polit- 
 
 99
 
 ical history. These speeches of Lincoln easily stand 
 amonj* the masterpieces of popular oratory and 
 groundwork of American statesmanship. Stephen 
 A. Douglas was a statesman. He had few equals 
 and perhaps no superior as a debater, and on the 
 hustings. They enter the arena as contestants for 
 the United States Senate.. It was a battle of 
 giants. The debate began at Ottawa, and at Free- 
 port Lincoln puts to Douglas the pivotal question 
 on Territorial rights to exclude slavery .65 Friends 
 of Lincoln had previously cautioned him against 
 this interrogatory, saying: "If you do you can 
 never be Senator." "Gentlemen," replied Lincoln, 
 "I am killing larger game ; if Douglas answers he 
 can never be President, and the battle of 1860 is 
 worth a hundred of this." Two years later the pre- 
 diction came true. This irksome question showed 
 the shrewdness and the foresight of the statesman 
 and resulted in the division of Douglas' party and 
 the election of Lincoln to the Presidency in 1860. 
 
 Mr. Watterson refers to the debate as : "The 
 most extraordinary spectacle the annals of our 
 party warfare affords. Lincoln enters the canvas 
 unknown outside the State of Illinois. He closed 
 it renowned from one end of the land to the other. 
 * * * He followed this central shot," continues Mr. 
 Watterson, "with volley after volley, of exposition 
 so clear, of reasoning so close, of illustration so 
 
 66 "Can the people of a United States Territory, in any 
 lawful way, against the wishes of any citizen of the 
 United States, exclude slavery from its limits, prior to 
 the formation of a State Constitution" ? 
 
 Lincoln is said to have characterized Douglas' reply 
 as follows : "It is thinner that homeopathic soup made 
 of the boiled shadow of a Pigeon that has died of star- 
 vation." 
 
 100
 
 pointed, at times with humor so incisive, that 
 though he lost the election, his defeat counted far 
 more than Douglas' victory; for it made him the 
 logical candidate for the Presidency of the United 
 States two years later." This deduction, as to re- 
 sults, was certainly true as to the West, and he 
 was thus favorably introduced to the East On his 
 return to Washington, Douglas said to Mr. Watter- 
 son: "He," (Lincoln,) "is the greatest debater I 
 have ever met either here or anywhere else." 
 After his election to the Presidency Douglas said 
 to a group of Republican statesmen: "Gentlemen, 
 you certainly have selected a very able and a very 
 honest man." 
 
 His speech at Cooper Institute was universally 
 recognized as a masterpiece of oratory and political 
 logic. Says Mr. Choate: "That wonderful speech 
 led directly to his nomination and election as Presi- 
 dent. * * * 'Let us have faith that right makes 
 might,' that closing sentence rang through the city 
 and the country."66 
 
 In his way upward, Lincoln never resorted to the 
 tricks of trade, legal, political or otherwise. He 
 never acted the part of a demagogue; he treated 
 his opponents with fairness and consideration ! He 
 never forgot the kindness and services of friends, 
 and never turned his back upon them. He never 
 sought to win by disparaging his opponents.67 He 
 
 88 J. H. Choate Abraham Lincoln. 
 
 ""Twenty years ago, Judge Douglas and I first be- 
 came acquainted ; we were both young then ; he is a trifle 
 younger than I. Even then we were both ambitious, I, 
 perhaps, quite as much as he. With me the race of am- 
 bition has been a flat failure. With him it has been a 
 splendid success. His name fills the Nation, and it is 
 
 101
 
 won through merit and the well-earned confidence 
 of the people. His Legislative experience, his legal 
 work and political movements, however, with their 
 increasing responsibilities, were an unconscious 
 preparation for the greater and graver responsibili- 
 ties awaiting him. 
 
 The Wigwam. 
 
 Some years ago, in student life, the writer 
 chanced to see an electric display, unique and beau- 
 tiful. It was a quiet evening. I had left my books 
 and wandered out for exercise and rest. Some- 
 how my eyes turned upward, and there before me 
 appeared a spectacle such as I never saw before or 
 since. Reader, you have seen the Northern Lights 
 play wondrous witcheries, but here they seemed 
 to burst their barriers. Above and nearly overhead, 
 appeared a crown of light, strong, glittering and 
 brilliant; and from that center, as from a blazing 
 sun, went forth the gold and silver spangling, until 
 the concave vault of heaven was draped with wav- 
 ing light of wondrous beauty. The heavens ap- 
 peared a jeweled crown. So I have thought the 
 famous Wigwam in Chicago and the Convention by 
 the lake, a crown of honor to the Nation, destined 
 to spread its mellow light over all this land, and for 
 ages yet to come. God's ways are sometimes 
 strange and hard to understand. So it seemed to 
 some at that Convention. But looking back through 
 the vista of the years, and taking measure of the 
 men, as later seen and known, and the ordeal 
 
 not unknown In foreign lands. * * * I had rather stand 
 on that eminence than to wear the richest crown that 
 ever pressed a monarch's brow." 
 
 102
 
 through which the Nation was to pass, we see be- 
 yond all question, in the choice of "Honest Old 
 Abe," the rail splitter of Sangamon Bottom, the 
 one whom God, foresooth, had chosen "to steer the 
 ship through the great crisis." 
 
 An incident or two in that Convention is here in 
 point. The Republican party was in its youth and 
 not yet homogeneous; there were differences of 
 opinion as to the slavery question, the means and 
 methods to be employed and the extent of inter- 
 ference; and there was grave danger of a rupture. 
 A grand old man from the Western Reserve, Ohio, 
 pleads for a sentence from the Declaration (All 
 men created free and equal, etc.) to be embodied in 
 the platform of the party. I see that grand old 
 man to-day as I saw him when a boy, speaking to a 
 class of students, and his earnest, eloquent words 
 touch me now as they touched me then. The 
 amendment was rejected, and Joshua R. Giddings, 
 the gray haired veteran, representative man of 
 the abolitionists, grieved and disappointed, left the 
 room. Just at this crisis an earnest, eloquent, 
 scholarly young man, appeared, and with a little 
 change, renewed the amendment of Mr. Giddings, 
 and in a speech most eloquent, stirred the entire 
 Convention, and in closing cried out in his sweet 
 stentorian voice: "Is this Convention prepared to 
 vote down the Declaration of our fathers, the char- 
 ter of American liberty?" The amendment was 
 carried almost unanimously and with great en- 
 thusiasm. 
 
 Mr. Giddings, having re-entered the hall, now 
 urged his way through the surging crowd to the 
 young man who had spoken, threw his arms around 
 
 103
 
 the neck of George William Curtis, and with tear? 
 coursing down his cheeks, exclaimed : "God blesl 
 you, my boy. You have saved the Republican party. 
 God bless you." This amendment was one of th 
 chief pillars of Lincoln's political creed. 
 
 In western New York, a little boy ,68 descended 
 from Colonial parents and destined, himself, to be- 
 come a man of letters, was watching the coming of 
 a train on the New York Central, and scheduled for 
 Chicago. The train went whirling by, and stretched 
 along its side was a breadth of canvas and painted 
 on it in large letters, GOING TO CHICAGO TO 
 NOMINATE NEW YORK'S FAVORITE SON, 
 WILLIAM H. SEWARD. 
 
 That little boy. grown to manhood, told to the 
 writer the story the other day and the impress 
 made upon his mind. That little story took me 
 captive, for it spread before me a living picture of 
 more than momentary interest. The snap-shot of 
 the little boy reached the climax of its develop- 
 ment, and received its boldest, richest, finest, magic 
 touch, at the Wigwam in Chicago. Senator Seward 
 was a scholar and a statesman. As Governor of 
 New York, and long time Senator of the United 
 States, he made an enviable record. He was widely 
 known as leader of his party. His "Irrepressible 
 Conflict," given in Rochester, Oct., 1858, was a 
 worthy companion of Lincoln's "House divided 
 against itself," given at Springfield in June pre- 
 ceding. That canvas display on the New York Cen- 
 tral, was thought by delegates on the train, by 
 Thurlow Weed, Mr. Everts, Mr. Osburn and other 
 
 '"'Orando E. Clark, Appleton, Wis. 
 
 104
 
 Eastern lights to be the certain outcome of the Con- 
 vention. It is now the 18th day of May, the third 
 of the Convention ; the third ballot has been taken ; 
 a vote or two is lacking for the nomination, Ohio 
 changes four ballots from Chase, Lincoln is the 
 nominee ! The Convention goes wild ! ! As soon aa 
 quiet is restored sufficiently, William M. Everts, 
 Chairman of the New York delegation, ascends the 
 platform and addresses the speaker, saying: "Mr. 
 Chairman, we come from a great State, with a 
 great candidate whom we hoped to see nominated. 
 In the name of that great State and by request of 
 that great, candidate, I move that the nomination of 
 Abraham Lincoln be made unanimous." Cheers 
 and deafening yells echoed and re-echoed through 
 that great building; the nomination was pro- 
 claimed from the house top and sounded forth 
 from the cannon's mouth on the street below, and 
 inj unnumbered telegraph offices the little brass 
 fingers clicked the news through all the land. In 
 the office in Springfield the message was handed to 
 Lincoln. He read it over, then read it aloud, and 
 without waiting farther said: "There is a little 
 woman at our home who will like to see it. I'll 
 go down and tell her."69 
 
 The Interim. 
 
 When Lincoln was elected President, Secession, 
 as we have come to know was in an advanced state 
 of preparation, and when he took his place war 
 was imminent ; with the Nation's navy scattered, 
 
 89 This and numerous other such like Incidents speak 
 forcibly as to the affectionate and confidential relations 
 between Lincoln and his wife. 
 
 105
 
 arsenals stripped, the treasury empty and the Na- 
 tion's credit at low ebb. 
 
 The four months between the election and the in- 
 auguration form a dark, weary, gruesome chapter 
 in the Nation's history. A weak and irresolute old 
 man was in the Executive chairjo questioning 
 the while his right to suppress insurrection and re- 
 strain insurgent States in acts of rebellion against 
 the government, and seeking to shift the responsi- 
 bility of his own administration upon that of his 
 successorJi High treason was crouching at the 
 
 70 The outgoing President was not a Statesman in the 
 higher sense, and of the first class. He was weak and 
 vacileating. He was wanting in executive ability, and 
 lacked self-assertion and the essential qualities of leader- 
 ship. He was always behind in important crises, but 
 managed to be at the front and ready to be counted in 
 the time of victory. He was a pro-slavery Democrat, and 
 his political proclivities were strongly Southern. He was 
 really loyal to the Government and did not want to see 
 the Union dismembered. His idea of the real character 
 of the Constitution, however, and of the Government 
 seem vague and incoherent. He seems to have been thor- 
 oughly tinctured with States' Rights ideas. 
 
 "General Duff Green went to Springfield in December, 
 1860, as an emissary of Pres. Buchanan to invite the 
 President-elect to Washington for a conference upon the 
 situation, with the hope that his presence there might 
 prevent Civil war, and General Green was bold enough to 
 tell him if he did not go, "Upon his conscience must rest 
 the blood that would be shed." Here Lincoln's political 
 shrewdness and diplomacy were demonstrated in as con- 
 spicuous a manner perhaps as at any other crisis in his 
 life. He detected at once the intention to unload upon 
 him the responsibility of a disunion and war and met it 
 with a counter proposition, which must have excited the 
 admiration of the conspirators who were trying to en- 
 trap him. He received General Green with great cour- 
 tesy, heard him with respectful attention and gave him 
 a letter in which he said he did not desire any amend- 
 ment to the Constitution, although he recognized the 
 right of the American people to adopt one ; that he be- 
 lieved in maintaining inviolate the right of each State 
 to control its own domestic institutions ; and that he 
 considered the lawless invasion by armed force of the 
 soil of any State or territory as the gravest of crimes. 
 While these were his sentiments, and while they indi- 
 
 106
 
 door, boldly scheming, and secretly planning to 
 make secession a settled fact before the Ides of 
 March. Traitors were in the Cabinet,72 plundering 
 and disarming the Government, strengthening their 
 allies in treason and plotting to render powerless 
 the incoming President. Conspirators, red-handed 
 and alert, were in Congress plotting treason and 
 planning the destruction of the Union. Treachery 
 stalked abroad, bold, and defiant, while patriots 
 looked on powerless to interfere, but praying God 
 to speed the coming of the chosen leader. Lincoln 
 was at home, watchful, anxious, reticent, hopeful, 
 firm and determined, trustful in the loyalty of the 
 masses and in the God of nations. 
 
 On the eleventh day of February, entrusted with 
 his great mission, with a dreadful ordeal, dangers 
 untold and difficulties unmeasured, before him, and 
 with a most pathetic parting with old friends and 
 neighbors,73 Lincoln, with his family, left his home 
 in Springfield, to which he was never to return. 
 After a noteworthy and historic journey, he reached 
 Washington on the morning of February 23d, hav- 
 ing safely escaped the assassination deliberately 
 planned at Baltimore, and discovered by the Pink- 
 erton detectives. 
 
 Buchanan turned over the Government to his suc- 
 cessor in a state of civil war. Until nearly the 
 
 cated the policy he should pursue as President he would 
 not consent to their publication unless the Senators from 
 Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana and 
 Texas would sign a pledge which he had written below 
 his signature to this letter, and upon the same piece of 
 paper. Curtis. 
 
 "John B. Floyd, Secretary of War; Isaac Toucey, Sec- 
 retary of the Navy ; Howell Cobb, Secretary of the Treas- 
 ury ; Jacob Thompson, Secretary of the Interior. 
 
 78 See Farewell Address, Appendix. 
 
 107
 
 close of his administration the majority of his 
 Cabinet were avowed disunionists, and were using 
 their various positions to advance the aims and 
 ends of secession, while their Chief doubted and 
 philosophized upon the Constitutional rights of 
 coertion ; "Imitating Nero," as some one has said, 
 "who fiddled while Rome was burning." 
 
 The Leader. 
 
 We tremble when we look back upon the scene 
 and see the dreadfulness of the conflict as no one 
 then could understand it. The shades of the 
 fathers who gave us the Nation seem to rise in pro- 
 test and ask for a leader upon whom might fall 
 their sacred mantle, and save what they had won. 
 
 In the restrospect of fifty years we can now anal- 
 yze the peculiarities of the Conflict as we could not 
 then, and judge of the combination of qualities, 
 gifts and abilities needed for that leadership as now 
 seen actually mirrored in the characteristics, activ- 
 ities and success of the leader himself. A man 
 self-poised, honest, gentle, tolerant of the opinions 
 of others, sympathetic but stern in pushing the 
 battle for the right ; wise, unselfish, tenderhearted, 
 broadminded and impartial ; hopeful, farsighted 
 and of a long suffering patience "that had in it 
 something of the divine;" a man of legally dis- 
 ciplined mind, of military strategic thought, and un- 
 dying courage; reticent, self-reliant but free from 
 arrogance of opinion ; a man of candor, and big 
 enough to see his own littleness and limitations, 
 and willing to learn from experience and from 
 others ; a statesman of the highest rank, one 
 
 108
 
 who would never compromise with principle, though 
 not refusing concession as to time and methods 
 when needful ; who would take God into account, 
 firm in unyielding faith that right makes might. 
 Such we have come to see were the qualities in part 
 needed for that leadership. 
 
 On the fourth of March, 1861, a large assembly 
 had gathered about the Eastern portico of the 
 Capitol at Washington. Upon a wooden platform 
 fronting that crowd of waiting people, was a cortege 
 of officers and distinguished guests. Under direc- 
 tion of General Winfield Scott, United States 
 soldiers had been duly stationed at various points. 
 On the platform was a table on which lay the Holy 
 Bible. With the utmost composure the speaker to 
 be took off his hat, Stephen A. Douglas reached out, 
 received and held it during the address. Senator 
 Edward Baker, an old-time friend, introduced the 
 man. Chief Justice Taney administered the oath 
 of office. The speaker is described as : "A tall, un- 
 gainly man, wearing a black suit, a black tie be- 
 neath a turned down collar, a black silk hat and 
 steel rimmed! spectacles ; His features were an- 
 gular, his skin dark and his hair almost black, 
 slightly sprinkled with gray ; his eyebrows very 
 heavy and prominent ; his eyes were deeply set, 
 gray and penetrating in their look ; his well formed 
 head was well poised on a neck neat and trim ; his 
 looks were sad and melancholy !" "His self posses- 
 sion," says Mr. Watterson, "was perfect. Dignity 
 itself could not have been more unexcited. His 
 voice was a little high pitched, but resonant, his 
 expression was serious to the point of gravity, not 
 
 109
 
 a scintilation of humor. It is only true to say that 
 he delivered that Inaugural address as though he 
 had been delivering Inaugural addresses all his 
 life." 
 
 That address 74 has now become classic, and he 
 who gave it was to be the Nation's leader through 
 the most critical and trying period of the Nation's 
 history. 
 
 Knotty and most intricate problems were to be 
 solved. Stupendous burdens were to be borne. "The 
 perplexing compound," as he termed it, "Union and 
 slavery," was in the seething caldron. There was a 
 maze of diverse and conflicting ideas even among 
 those who were for the Unionjs TO save the Na- 
 tion he must find his way through some adjustment 
 of these differing views as well as meet the open 
 foe. The way before him was one of blood and 
 tears and death. He was facing a war which 
 proved to be one of the greatest wars in history ; 
 a war whose responsibilities and heart-breaking ex- 
 periences were sufficient to wear out any ordinary 
 man. The people did not know the man then as we 
 know him now ; indeed he had not taken full meas- 
 ure of himself, and none but God could understand 
 the needs of the coming ordeal and take the 
 measure of the man He wanted. 
 
 It was thought by some that he was overmatched 
 by his principal rivals for the Presidency, and 
 would be overshadowed by the statesmen of the 
 
 74 See First Inaugural in part, Appendix. 
 
 76 He said: "There were those for the Union with, 
 but not without slavery ; those who were for it without, 
 but not with ; those for it with or without but who 
 preferred it with ; and those for It with or without but 
 who preferred it without." 
 
 110
 
 HOUSE WHERE PRESIDENT LINCOLN DIED.
 
 day. Failure was predicted, but fear was soon 
 dispelled. He summoned to his Cabinet, as coun- 
 selors, those men whom none but a great man 
 would have ventured to select, his principal rivals 
 in the contest for the Presidential nomination, the 
 leaders of the party, and the ablest statesmen of 
 the country. Nor did his greatness suffer in com- 
 parison by the contact. He towered above them all 
 as their leader. His discernment of character and 
 his masterly management of men so different from 
 himself and from each other as Seward and Stan- 
 ton and Chase, the power to hold them together and 
 to utilize their splendid and indispensible abilities 
 for the good of the Nation, proved the genius of a 
 leader seldom, if ever before, found in history. In 
 less than a year every one of these great leaders 
 recognized that he was in the presence of his chief 
 and superior. Seward was one of the first to recog- 
 nize this. Early in the administration he wrote to 
 his wife : "Executive skill and vigor are rare qual- 
 ities. The President is the best of us." 
 
 In '61 and '62 Lincoln's character and motives 
 were utterly misunderstood even by many in the 
 North ; and his efforts were often misconstrued. 
 For the first two years of his administration he was 
 often caricatured in the most ludicrous manner. 
 He was represented as a "Buffoon," "A blundering 
 ignoramus," "A selfish intriguer," "A heartless 
 clown," and such like. The present generation can 
 little understand the intensity of the antagonism 
 towards Lincoln, for a time, even in the North and 
 in his own party and among his nominal friends.76 
 
 78 Among these were Wendell Phillips, who at one time 
 called him the "slave-hound of Illinois" ; Horace Greely, 
 
 111
 
 Such, however, seems the characteristic weakness 
 of human judgment, when applied to men in public 
 life, and dealing with great and critical questions 
 in which men differ, and in which keen discernment 
 and judicious foresight are essential. Lincoln's real 
 self and work were veiled, at times, under a seem- 
 ingly rough and homely exterior. But when the 
 veil was lifted it disclosed a great heart, a noble 
 soul, a wise, farsighted and safe leader. 
 
 The Guiding Spirit of the War. 
 
 Lincoln in the Civil War is essentially the his- 
 tory of the War in miniature. He had his commit- 
 tee on conduct of the War, his Generals in the field, 
 and his Secretary of War, but he was Commander- 
 in-Chief, and upon him rested the ultimate responsi- 
 bility of military success or failure. Nor did he 
 attempt to shirk the responsibility. From first to 
 last he put in force his keen discernment, clear fore- 
 sight, instinctive military skill and intense applica- 
 tion in military as in other matters ; and as the War 
 progressed, encouraged and sustained by his great 
 War Secretary, he refused to loose his hold even 
 in the face of the bitterest criticism. Many leading 
 soldiers during the War gave him the credit of hav- 
 ing the essential qualities of a great General.?? 
 
 Dr. Cheever, delegates from the North ; Dr. Channing, 
 Conway and others. "During his brief term of power/' 
 says Joseph H. Choate, "he was probably the object of 
 more abuse, vilification and ridicule than any other man 
 in the world." 
 
 "Generals Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, Smith and 
 others. 
 
 Lincoln had his Secretary of War, his Generals in tne 
 field, and Committee on conduct of the War; but Lin- 
 coln himself was the final arbiter. 
 
 His memoranda of July 23d, and 27th of July was the 
 first definite and coherent plan for the prosecution of the 
 
 112
 
 His decisions touching the reinforcement of Fort 
 Sumpter, within twenty-four hours after his in- 
 auguration, and a like decision, a little later, as to 
 Fort Pickens, his outline of military plans sched- 
 uled in '61, various letters to his Generals; the 
 steam navy which so effectually blockaded the 
 Southern ports, and the opening of the Mississippi, 
 cutting in two the Confederacy, and which had their 
 
 War. It eminated from his own mind and not from that 
 of any of his Generals. * * * No professional soldier 
 or writer could state more precisely the military situa- 
 tion then existing or propose a sounder military plan. 
 Lincoln had that faculty of intense application and clear 
 insight, so rare that we call it genius ; and he applied It 
 as successfully to military affairs as to politics, notwith- 
 standing the fact that he was by instinct a man of peace, 
 and by training a lawyer, and that military problems 
 never engaged his attention until he was fifty-two years 
 old. His plans were interrupted and delayed first in one 
 way and then in another. 
 
 Ideas evolved and written out in his own hand, July 
 23, 1861 : (1) Let the plan for making the blockade 
 be pushed forward with all possible dispatch. (2) Let 
 the volunteer forces at Fort Monroe and vicinity, under 
 Gen. Butler, be constantly drilled, disciplined and in- 
 structed without more force for the present. (3) Let Balti- 
 more be held as now with a gentle but firm and certain 
 hand. (4) Let the force now under Patterson, or Banks, 
 be strengthened and made secure in its position. (5) Let 
 the forces in West Virginia act till further orders ac- 
 cording to instructions or orders from Gen. McClellan. 
 (6) Let Gen. Freemont push forward his organization 
 and operations in the West as rapidly as possible, giving 
 special attention to Missouri. (7) Let the forces late 
 before Manassas, except the three months men, be re- 
 organized as rapidly as possible in their camps here and 
 about Arlington. (8) Let the three months forces who 
 declined to enter the longer service be discharged as 
 rapidly as circumstances will permit. (9) Let the new 
 volunteer forces be brought forward as fast as possible; 
 and especially into the camps on the two sides of the 
 river here. (When the foregoing shall have been sub- 
 stantially attended to, July 27) : (1) Let Manassas 
 Junction (or some point one way or other of the rail- 
 roads near it) and Strasburg be seized, and permanently 
 held, with an open line from Washington to Manassas 
 and an open line from Harper's Ferry to Strasburg, the 
 Military men to find the way of doing this. (2) This 
 done, a joint movement from Cairo to Memphis, and from 
 Cincinnati to East Tennessee. (Scribner's, July, 1909.) 
 
 113
 
 origin in the mind of Lincoln, are in evidence of 
 his able military leadership. Though not a soldier 
 by profession, by education or by experience, he 
 showed himself possessed of the instincts of a 
 soldier, and had not a little of the soldier's strat- 
 egy. The military problems of the War, after a 
 few months, were more directly under the super- 
 vision of one of the ablest and most energetic men 
 of modern times, the great War Secretary, Edwin 
 M. Stanton. But the well-beaten path from the 
 White House to the War Department, and the 
 nightly presence of the President there at times of 
 military movements was in evidence that the war 
 measures were under his surveillance. With the 
 facts and movements of the War period brought 
 out and delineated through the careful study, in- 
 vestigation and criticism of nearly half a century, 
 the conclusion has been reached by those well qual- 
 ified to judge that Lincoln was a master of strat- 
 egy and a military leader of no mean capacity J8 
 
 Time and events soon developed the fact that the 
 war was to be a war of conquest on the part of the 
 
 "General Francis V. Greene is reputed to be one of the 
 foremost military critics in America. In 1901 he wrote: 
 "Lincoln stands out among the very few preeminently 
 great men in all time bringing to the study of purely 
 military questions his extraordinary common sense, and 
 often arriving at conclusions more correct than those of 
 some of his best Generals." Scribner's, 1901. 
 
 In 1909 he said : "Great statesman, astute politician, 
 clear thinker, classic writer, master of men, kindly, lov- 
 able man. These are his titles. To them must be added 
 military leader. Had he failed In that quality the 
 others would have been forgotten. Had peace been made 
 on any terms but those of surrender of the insurgent 
 forces and restoration of the Union, his career would 
 have been a colossal failure and the Emancipation Proc- 
 lamation a subject of ridicule. The prime essential was 
 military success. Lincoln gained it." See Scribner's, 
 1909. 
 
 114
 
 North, and Lincoln was not slow to recognize the 
 fact. "The skill which divined the proper strategy 
 of the war," says a recent writer, "was as marked 
 as the patience with which he tried General after 
 General, till he found at last the man who could do 
 the work" There were at first too many political 
 Generals on the roll of officers, and as a writer and 
 an officer has said, some "Trimmed their ships so 
 as to ride into the Presidential haven upon the high 
 wave of military fame and popularity." He en- 
 joined Hooker to be cautious, and upon others he 
 urged his ideas of movement and activity, as Pope 
 and Meade, and especially McClellan, and with re- 
 sults now known to history. 
 
 One leader after another, when found unequal 
 for the place, was displaced, and others named for 
 the Eastern army, until, at last Grant was called ; 
 and only as he took command would Lincoln relax 
 his hold. To him he gave the supreme command, 
 and the verdict of history shows his wisdom. 
 
 Diplomacy. 
 
 The sought for excuses on the part of England 
 and France, and other nations, to assist and rec- 
 ognize the Southern Confederacy, so-called, were 
 matters of no small moment, added to the Presi- 
 dent's already excessive burdens. But here as else- 
 where Lincoln rose to the needs of the occasion, and 
 displayed diplomatic qualities of the highest rank. 
 His quiet veto of Seward's plan to cure secession 
 by waging war with France or Spain, and then 
 with England, in the Trent affair, is in evidence. 
 This, supplemented by the later and marked states- 
 manship of Seward, the diplomacy of Charles Fran- 
 
 115
 
 ces Adams, then United States Minister to England, 
 the efforts of Henry Ward Beecher, and the splen- 
 did services of Arch-Bishop Hughes in France and 
 Italy, helped to avert the move and repel the inter- 
 ference. While Russia, always our friend, stood 
 ready to lend a helping hand, if needed. 
 
 The Chieftain's Slogan. 
 
 Lincoln's slogan was the "Salvation of the 
 Union." Union with the constitutional guarantees 
 accorded to the Slave system anywhere within the 
 Slave states, if possible; but no extension of the 
 system beyond such limits. He came to the Pres- 
 idency entrusted with these principles, and no 
 power, and no body of men were able to sway him 
 
 T9 "The world is indebted to this Society (a powerful 
 political society for reintroducing the Duma, abolished by 
 Peter the Great, and to liberate all slaves, especially 
 Christians, under the terrible Turkish sword), that the 
 Emperor, Alexander II., called the Liberator, by one 
 stroke of his pen abolished the slavery of twenty-two 
 millions of peasants in Russia and thoroughly reformed 
 all branches of administration. 
 
 To the same Society the United States are perhaps 
 indebted for their very existence, because when the Civil 
 War broke out, Lincoln's work was menaced by the at- 
 tack of England in conjunction with France. These two 
 strong countries, presuming that the failure of the North- 
 ern States meant to the United States ruin, seized the 
 opportunity to attempt by force the return of the North- 
 ern States to their former status of a British Colony and 
 to give back to France Louisiana and possibly some other 
 of the Southern States. Even all Texas was offered to 
 France in 1864 for recognition of the Confederacy. * * 
 But Lincoln, as Liberator, had already the admiration of 
 the Society, and the Society had the ear of the generous 
 Emperor Alexander II., who immediately ordered his 
 Atlantic fleet to sail into New York harbor and his Pacific 
 squadron to enter San Francisco, informing England and 
 France that their interference against Lincoln would 
 mean a declaration of war against Russia. England and 
 France heeded the timely warning." Count Spiridovitch. 
 (Lincoln Fellowship, 1908.) 
 
 (The above is amply confirmed by Hon. Samuel R. 
 Thayer, late U. S. Minister to the Netherlands.) 
 
 116
 
 in the least from this purpose. As Mr. Watterson 
 has said: "He became the incarnation of the 
 brains and the soul of the Union." He entertained 
 no question as to the Constitutional right of the 
 Government to coerce a State attempting to with- 
 draw from the Union.so when Fort Sumpter was 
 fired upon, and the evidence of determined war was 
 complete, Jackson like, though without his impetu- 
 osity, he acted. He called for troops and continued 
 to call, as the needs of the war required, until near- 
 ly three million (3,000,000) were numbered with 
 the Union army. The fall of Sumpter was the 
 trumpet sound for the resurrection of the spirit 
 of '76, and with deathless patriotism the Captain 
 nailed the Union pennant to the Ship of State All 
 else was secondary. 
 
 The Emancipation Proclamation. 
 
 It was the high privilege of Abraham Lincoln to 
 produce and sign the Emancipation Proclamation. 
 "It was special in language," says Frederick Doug- 
 las, "but general in principle." In the providence 
 of God it was calculated to be the death knell of 
 African slavery in our Nation. But it was issued 
 as a War measure and distinctly stated as such. It 
 proved a most welcome fulfillment too of a cher- 
 ished premonition of his early manhood. The two 
 great political aims of his life had been gained, the 
 perpetuity of the Union and the downfall of 
 slavery. 
 
 80 1 can no more be persuaded that the Government can 
 Constitutionally take no strong measure In time of re- 
 bellion because it can be shown that the same could not 
 be taken in time of peace, than I can be persuaded that 
 a particular drug is not good for a sick man because It 
 can be shown to be not good food for 1 a well. Reply to 
 Jfeio York Democrats. 
 
 117
 
 All sorts of people had been giving him the bene- 
 fit of their advice in the matter of liberating the 
 slaves.si He was in the midst of a war of conflict- 
 ing opinions ; and when emancipation was pro- 
 claimed, it was too late to suit some, too early to 
 suit others, and too limited to suit still others. Here 
 Lincoln was like the pilot carefully picking the way 
 for the Ship of State between the Scylla and Charyb- 
 dis of the Nation. After all, viewed from the light 
 of surrounding conditions, and internal data, as we 
 now see them, it was about as opportune a time as 
 the country could have tolerated. Old statesmen, 
 and other nations were looking on and questioning : 
 "Will the Old Backwoodsman really get the Ship 
 through?" But the hand of the leader was upon 
 the pulse of the Nation ; his head was above the 
 raging storm and the whirling clouds, while his 
 heart was in touch with the heart of God.82 Lin- 
 coln hated the institution of slavery. He had said 
 in his young manhood, witnessing men and women, 
 
 81 They seemed to think that the moment I was Presi- 
 dent I had the powoer to abolish slavery, forgetting that, 
 before I could have any power whatever, I had to take 
 the oath to support the Constitution of the United States 
 and execute the laws as I found them. When the Re- 
 bellion broke out my duty did not admit of a question. 
 Bee Six Months in the White House (On occasion of lec- 
 ture In House of Representatives by Mr. Geo. Thomas, 
 and his visit with Pierpont Morgan and others to White 
 House). 
 
 82 The Tycoon Is In fine whack. I have rarely seen 
 him more serene and busy. He is managing this war, the 
 draft, foreign relations, and planning a reconstruction 
 of the Union, all at once. I never knew with what ty- 
 rannous authority he rules the Cabinet till now. The more 
 Important things he decides and there is no cavil. I am 
 growing more and more firmly convinced that the good 
 of the country absolutely demands that ne should be 
 kept where he is till this thing is over. There is no man 
 In the country so wise, so gentle and so firm. John Hay 
 to J. G. Nicolay. 
 
 118
 
 .
 
 boys and girls in the auction shambles of New 
 Orleans, and especially a beautiful octoroon on the 
 auction block, handled, treated, examined as a 
 beast : "If I ever get a chance to strike that insti- 
 tution I'll hit it hard." The time and the man here 
 came together. But he was at the head of the Na- 
 tion to save the Union. "It was a fight for nation- 
 ality, and the Government was in self defence." This 
 act was a war measure, yet with its far-reaching 
 and inevitable results. Repellant on the one hand, 
 and sought for on the other, the thrilling word 
 "Emancipation" was at last spoken. It was the 
 bugle blast in the storm "All hands on deck to 
 save the ship" ! It went forth echoing its telling 
 message through the Nation and over the sea, and 
 greeted on its way the 20,000,000 Serfs whom the 
 Czar of Russia had spoken free. That Proclama- 
 tion has the seal of Heaven upon it, and Lincoln 
 will always be lauded as its honored agent. It has 
 called forth and will continue to call forth the grat- 
 itude of a race of Freedmen, and his name will be 
 crowned with eternal blessings. His reception at 
 Richmond the day after the evacuation was a 
 token of the feeling.83 
 
 The writer can never forget a scene he chanced 
 to witness at the city of Petersburg the morning 
 after the assassination. Several hundred colored 
 people contrabands whom the Government was 
 supplying with food had gathered in their morning 
 ranks. It was my duty as Quartermaster to issue 
 the rations. A tall negro, six feet and a half in 
 height, I should say, headed the ranks. Just then 
 
 83 See Admiral Porter's account ; also Col. Crook's and 
 others. 
 
 119
 
 a telegram was received and announced: "Lincoln 
 is dead; he has been assassinated" 1 1 All was at a 
 standstill. The very heavens seemed to be dar- 
 kened, a cloud of sorrow seemed to press down 
 upon the city. That tall negro in front trembled 
 like a leaf and cried like a child. And as I looked 
 over that dark cloud of humanity, weeping for their 
 benefactor, and in sobbing tones crying out: "Oh 
 Massa Lincum, Massa Lincum, Massa Lincum dead ! 
 Massa Lincum dead ! ! Massa Lincum dead ! ! ! 
 What shall we do"? and such like expressions, my 
 own eyes filled with tears and my heart quivered 
 with sadness. 
 
 The Drama Closing. 
 
 A drama, unparalleled in history, was coming to 
 its close. A drama, not a play, but most intensely 
 real, whose every act was crimsoned with the blood 
 of heroes. Scene follows scene upon the Nation's 
 tragic stage, until the assassin's bullet fells the 
 foremost actor, and drops the curtain in the gloom 
 of tragic midnight. 
 
 When our martyr leader died slavery had been 
 abolished in the District of Columbia, and prohib- 
 ited in the Territories. The Emancipation Procla- 
 mation had been honored in the Nation; and Con- 
 gress had already passed the act for a Constitu- 
 tional amendment abolishing slavery throughout 
 the Union. While several of the States had already 
 sanctioned the amendment; Illinois being the first 
 and Maryland the second. 
 
 Lincoln lived until the old flag of Sumpter, after 
 four dreadful years, was again unfurled on the 
 anniversary of its lowering to wave with added 
 
 120
 
 glory the triple message "Liberty and Union- 
 Now and forever One and inseparable." He lived 
 to see the War practically ended ; the Union saved ; 
 slavery abolished; the Declaration and the Consti- 
 tution honored; Free government no longer an ex- 
 periment, and its foundation fully established. He 
 saw the success and the magnanimity of his chosen 
 General, and died with the Nation bowed in sorrow, 
 and the nations of the world bringing glad tributes 
 to his memory, as one of the noblest characters, 
 and one of the ablest statesmen, and one of the 
 greatest men in all history. 
 
 The Chosen Man. True, and Equal to His 
 
 Calling. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was not an accident, nor was 
 he a prodigy. He was a man. A man equipped by 
 nature for an important mission. A man chosen of 
 God and selected by the people. He took good care 
 of his mental and moral equipments, put them to 
 their proper use, preserved them unsullied, and was 
 not disobedient to his calling. 
 
 His brilliant humor and kindly wit and marvel- 
 ous tact in story telling, especially in his later 
 years, servied him well, asi "fritfti on-saving oil," while 
 crushing burdens bore down upon him during those 
 fearful years of Civil War. Somehow, I seek not 
 here to diagnose the case, but somehow, nature, or 
 environments, or experience too sacred, perchance, 
 to uncover or disclose cast a lasting shade of 
 gloom upon his soul and left its impress upon the 
 mirthful, melancholy, changeful visage of that 
 "strange and lonely man." But through it all, and 
 overmastering all, we find a keen, clear, strong, vlg- 
 
 121
 
 orous intellect. His broad humanity, his marked 
 simplicity, his utter unassumption, dispassionate 
 self-possession, the various traits of his moral 
 greatness we do not undervalue, and from them 
 we would not detract one jot or tittle; but some- 
 times these qualities of the heart have been mag- 
 nified at the expense of his mental powers. 
 
 Lincoln was a many sided man. He was a man 
 of brains as well as heart. As a recent writer has 
 put it, "He was many men in one, and each is 
 worthy of a volume." His homely wit and thor- 
 ough grasp of human nature ; his incisive humor, 
 and marked common sense ; his intuition ; his silent 
 endurance of cruel calumny, and groundless cen- 
 sure; his tender sympathy and kindly tolerance; 
 his great forbearance and guileless mercy ; his re- 
 markable faith and faultless patience stood out 
 like the work of a master artist upon the clear and 
 symmetrical background of a most remarkable in- 
 tellect. 
 
 The time has now come when the keenest and 
 most severe of critics, looking back over the re- 
 ceding years, and sitting in calm reflection and 
 humble judgment upon his life and work, must 
 needs assert the superiority and greatness of his 
 intellect, and admire the marvelous breadth and 
 scope of his mental grasp. His intellect, however, 
 may not be regarded as superior to, or to transcend 
 the strength and beauty of his character his moral 
 and spiritual qualities, which stand out prominent- 
 ly in his life and work. His keen sense of justice, 
 his lofty disinterestedness, his frankness, caution, 
 candor and sincerity, his rigid honesty, modesty, 
 
 122
 
 fidelity, and moral courage, his rugged dignity, pa- 
 tience and magnanimity, his love for and faith in 
 God, and the common people these were rooted in 
 his soul, grew up in the byways of his private life, 
 budded in public office as servant of the people, and 
 blossomed in sacred memory and lasting fame as 
 he closed his eventful life. 
 
 He proved himself possessed of master powers 
 of mind* could grasp the situation, discern the 
 needs and dictate the ways and means of action, 
 when the Nation's grave had been dug and the 
 funeral ceremonies had been announced; when 
 statesmen of the highest rank hesitated, and pa- 
 triots trembled ; when diplomats looked on and 
 prophesied defeat; an intellect that could pene- 
 trate the intricacies of the impending crisis, up 
 towards which the ages had been moving the 
 complex problem how to save the Nation, and in the 
 wreck of war, when peaceful means had proved un- 
 availing, the corollary how to save a race from 
 bondage. Here as leader, and in living sympathy 
 with this great movement, so momentous in its 
 source and outcome, and in which a thousand bat- 
 tlefields attest the peerless valor of American 
 hearts, and the deathless glory of American arms; 
 here with statesmen of world-wide renown, war- 
 riors of historic fame, and patriots undaunted in 
 defeat, and those who died for victory ; here fore- 
 most in this glorious galaxy of the great and the 
 brave, with the searchlight of the world's best 
 critics thrown back upon those dreadful years, when 
 brother fought against brother for what each 
 thought was right; here we look upon the man 
 
 123
 
 whose hatred for slavery, and whose devotion to the 
 Union never wavered, but who could direct the 
 matchless fight of history without hatred or re- 
 sentment towards whom the death dealing thun- 
 derbolts of war were hurled with remorseless fury ; 
 whose courage was out of touch with passion; 
 whose great heart found no place for prejudice or 
 malice, which it has taken years to banish from 
 the hearts of the rank and file of the conquering 
 and the conquered, but whose endearing qualities, 
 like golden twilight shining forward, now touch 
 with kindred pride the hearts of those who wore 
 the blue and those who wore the gray ; the man in 
 whom was manifest the rare combination which 
 demonstrates "the greatness of real goodness, and 
 the goodness of real greatness." A man in whom 
 was joined together a great heart, full of simplic- 
 ity, gentleness, patience, forbearance, mercy, sym- 
 pathy, with an intellect profound and solid ;84 a 
 will like flint, and courage invincible as that of 
 the "Black Prince," whose strong arm and cold 
 determination added to England's history one of 
 her most splendid chapters. 
 
 We may not here attempt to unfold these traits, 
 or to picture them in their force and beauty as he 
 possessed them. Each is- worthy of a chapter. On 
 every hand they find expression in his life and 
 work. His life was not the play of head or heart 
 
 84 It has been claimed by some that Lincoln's Intellect 
 was slow in Its working. But any apparent slowness, I 
 am persuaded, may be accounted for in his effort to 
 reach absolute, or practical truth through reasoning. Mr. 
 Sweet, private Secretary of Robert T. Lincoln, once said 
 to the author: "He was not slow in his thinking, but 
 quick in his thinking ; he was careful, however, in reach- 
 ing correct conclusions." 
 
 124
 
 alone, or of some stray virtue grown to abnormal 
 strength ; but a character full and rounded out. The 
 wisdom of a sage seemed coupled to the simplicity 
 of a child. Those years of war when Lincoln stands* 
 transcendant when days were as the years and 
 years were as the ages were hero-making years, 
 and epoch-making years. Fame winged her flight 
 from vale and darkness to the mountain peaks of 
 history. Merit climbed the rugged steeps and left 
 her lasting placard on the heights above. Genius 
 burst her barriers and gave her golden treasures 
 to the world. In 1865 Lincoln was something 
 more than he was in 1826, in 1834, in 1842, in 1848, 
 in 1854, in 1856, in 1858, or in 1861. He grew like 
 others in those character-making years of war. But 
 as a man his measure has not yet been fully taken, 
 and cannot be until that great heart with its en- 
 dearing qualities, and that no less marvelous intel- 
 lect, shall be comprehended in their union, as they 
 really were, the one in two and the two in one, each 
 stimulating and illuminating the other, and both 
 guiding the man in his appointed work to form an 
 inseparable brotherhood of the American people, 
 who, under the added beauty of the Old Flag, on 
 land and sea, are now at the open door, in the far 
 off Orient, to guard and dictate peace to the na- 
 tions of the world. 
 
 Noted Ones of Eighteen Hundred Nine. 
 
 Noted men and women share with Lincoln the 
 birth-year of eighteen hundred and nine. Poets and 
 Musicians, Scientists and Statesmen. Alfred Ten- 
 nyson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Edgar Allen 
 Poe and Oliver Wendell Holmes, have gladdened 
 
 125
 
 with poetry the ears and hearts of the century gone. 
 Albert Pike, the traveler-poet-journalist-lawyer ; 
 soldier in the Mexican war, a commander in the 
 Confederate army ; a Mason world renowned, and 
 for nearly fifty years leader of the craft in the 
 Southern jurisdiction of the Scottish Rite. Men- 
 delssohn, the great composer of Oratorios, and 
 Frederick Chopin, the master pianist ; Charles Dar- 
 win, the man of brains, the master analyst who 
 has taught us seriously to think on evolution. Our 
 own Robert C. Winthrop, the silver tongued orator, 
 the Christian statesman, from the Old Bay state, 
 and Hannibal Hamlin, the man of granite princi- 
 ples, the sheet anchor of our Senate when the 
 storm of war was raging; and then Gladstone, 
 the scholar, the writer, the peerless statesman, the 
 "Grand Old Man of England." And yet the world, 
 today, turns to Lincoln, first of all, among the 
 noted ones of 1800. 
 
 Greatness Unveiled. 
 
 Here we look upon human greatness, unveiled, 
 and destined to stand the tests of time, because a 
 human soul, endowed with powers immortal, suited 
 for and called to a special work in the great world- 
 movement, cared for, cultivated, and exercised those 
 powers took in the principles of his mission, di- 
 gested them and made them a part of himself; 
 then, ambitious for the goal, dared to be honest; 
 dared to be unpopular when he knew he was right ; 
 dared to be unselfish ; dared to do the right ; dared 
 to be true ; dared to do his duty ; dared to trust in 
 God ; DARED TO BE A MAN ! ! 
 
 126
 
 CbartSs Darwin I Eiizakstb 8- Brawh'ing 
 
 NOTABLE CHARACTERS BORN IN 1809.
 
 The Nation's Product. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was the product of our free in- 
 stitutions. Born and reared in poverty, undaunted 
 by defeat and unsullied by prosperity, he rose 
 against fearful odds to the topmost point of human 
 power. He was endowed with the qualities of 
 greatness. He had the noblest qualities of a man, 
 the highest requisites of a leader, the keenest in- 
 stincts of a statesman, the heart and the soul of a 
 patriot. With cool head, and clear thinking, and 
 farsightedness, he moved steadily forward without 
 halt or hurry. Measured by what he accomplished, 
 he stands in the foremost rank among the greatest 
 characters of history. 
 
 In the dark hours of our greatest danger, un- 
 tried and little known, he took the Ship of State, 
 guided her through the storm of Civil War, and 
 brought her at last, through the crimson tempest, 
 into the harbor of peace and universal freedom. He 
 sought not fame, but victory for the right. Pos- 
 sessed of the martyr spirit, firm, unselfish, just and 
 tenderhearted, confident, wise, cautious, fearless, 
 but prayerful and kindly patient, he moved with 
 care and caution lest some interest of the Nation 
 should suffer, or some flower of humanity should 
 be crushed. 
 
 His work was great but it was simply done. We 
 did not understand him then; but when he left us 
 to receive a martyr's crown, we began to realize 
 that we had entertained a God-inspired man an 
 angel unawares. His rugged, quaint and gentle 
 characteristics blend in harmony, when reflected in 
 his spotless life, and the war-crimsoned years in 
 
 127
 
 which he rose as the standard bearer, the savior 
 of an imperiled Nation and the Emancipator of a 
 down trodden race. 
 
 The Bivouac and the Crown of Honor. 
 
 Enter with me, if you will, the Bivouac of our 
 dead. But speak gently, tread lightly, for four 
 hundred thousand of our martyr dead are sleeping 
 here, and other thousands, just as brave, and just 
 as noble, are sleeping by their side. First and fore- 
 most of this martyr band is the Lincoln of our 
 war-scarred years; dear to us because he died for 
 the Nation which he saved, and for the freedom of 
 a race; and doubly dear to the Nation and to the 
 world because of his tragic end, and the method of 
 his death. 
 
 No ruthless hand or impious tongue may dare to 
 desecrate that place or name, for North and South 
 the Soldier South vie with each other in their 
 guard, and the nations extend their watch of sym- 
 pathy and admiration. 
 
 Standing by his side on that sad and fatal morn- 
 ing, when the great leader had breathed his last, 
 Edward M. Stanton turned to those beside him, 
 saying : "Now he belongs to the ages." Truer and 
 more prophetic words were never spoken. Lincoln 
 belongs to us ; he belongs to our generation ; he be- 
 longs to our Country. We cannot give him up. But 
 the whole world today claims him for the race ; and 
 has placed him in his niche of fame alongside our 
 Washington, and among the greatest characters of 
 all history. And the years as they roll by, and the 
 centuries as they come and go, will add resplendant 
 
 128
 
 glory to the fame of him who was Master of him- 
 self; Master of the God-inspired truth; "All men 
 created free and equal" ; Master of those arrayed 
 against him ; Master of foreign diplomats who fig- 
 ured In the War ; Master of the great men and the 
 noble army who helped him to do his work ; Mas- 
 ter of the Heaven-born mission committed to his 
 trust ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 129
 
 APPENDIX.
 
 
 U^- c**^~>JL 
 
 V^ 
 
 / 
 
 
 4. 
 
 O 
 
 
 <S yo^
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 LINCOLN'S FAREWELL ADDRESS AT SPRINGFIELD. 
 
 My friends : No one, not in my position, can realize 
 the sadness I feel at this parting. To this people I 
 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. I go to assume a task more diffi- 
 cult than that which has developed 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 suc- 
 ceed without the same Divine blessing which sustained 
 him ; and on the same Almighty Being I place my reli- 
 ance for support. And I hope you, my friends, will all 
 pray that 1 may receive that Divine assistance, without 
 which I cannot succeed, but with which success is cer- 
 tain. Again, I bid you an affectionate farewell. 
 
 FIRST INAUGURAL. March 4, 1861. 
 
 In compliance 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 Con- 
 stitution of the United States, to be taken by the Pres- 
 ident "before he enters upon the execution of his office." 
 
 * * * 
 
 Apprehension seems to exist, among the people of 
 the Southern states, that by the accession of a Repub- 
 lican administration their property and their peace and 
 personal security are to be endangered. There has never 
 been any real cause for such apprehension. Indeed the 
 most ample evidence to the contrary has all the while 
 existed and been open to their inspection. * * * 
 
 I hold that in contemplation of universal law, and of 
 the Constitution, the union of the states is perpetual. 
 Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the funda- 
 mental law of all national governments. * * * 
 
 I therefore consider that, in view of the Constitution 
 and the laws, the Union is unbroken, and to the extent 
 of my ability I shall take care, as the Constitution itself 
 expressly enjoins upon me, that the laws of the Union 
 "be faithfully executed in all the states. * * * 
 
 In doing this there need be no bloodshed nor violence, 
 and there shall be none, unless it be forced upon the 
 national authority. The power confided to me will be 
 used to hold, and occupy, and possess the property and 
 
 133
 
 places belonging to the government, and to collect the 
 duties and imports ; but beyond what may be necessary 
 for these objects there will be no invasion, no using of 
 force against or among the people anywhere. * * * 
 
 This country, with its institutions, belongs to the 
 people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary 
 of the existing government, they can exercise the con- 
 stitutional right of amending, or their revolutionary 
 right to dismember or overthrow it. I cannot be ignorant 
 of the fact that many worthy and patriotic citizens are 
 desirous of having the national Constitution amended. 
 
 * * * 
 
 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 Con- 
 stitution unimpaired, and on the sensitive point, the 
 laws of your own framing under it. The new adminis- 
 tration 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, there is 
 no single good reason for precipitate action. Intelli- 
 gence, patriotism, Christianity, and a firm reliance upon 
 Him, who has never yet forsaken this favored land, are 
 still competent to adjust, in the best way, all our pres- 
 ent difficulties. * * * 
 
 In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and 
 not In mine, are the momentous issues 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 have the most solemn 
 one to "preserve, protect, and defend It." 
 
 I am loth 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 chord of memory, stretching from every 
 battlefield and patriot crave to every living heart and 
 hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the 
 chorus of the Union, when attain touched, as surely 
 they will be, by the better angels of our nature. 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 
 
 ADDRESS AT GETTYSBURG. Nov. 19, 1863. 
 
 Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought 
 forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty 
 and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created 
 equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, test- 
 ing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and 
 so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great 
 battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a 
 
 134
 
 portion of that field as a final resting place for those 
 who here gave their lives that that 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 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 which they who fought here have 
 thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be 
 here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, 
 that from these honored dead we take increased devo- 
 tion to that cause for which they gave the last full 
 measure of devotion ; that we here highly resolve that 
 these dead shall not have died in vain ; that this nation, 
 under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that 
 government of the people, by the people and for the 
 people shall not perish from the earth. 
 
 LINCOLN'S SECOND INAUGURAL. 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 be 
 pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expira- 
 tion 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 the energies of the nation, little that is 
 new can 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 satis- 
 factory 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 avert 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 
 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-eigTfth of the whole population were colored 
 slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but 
 localized 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, even by war ; while the government claimed no 
 
 135
 
 right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlarge- 
 ment of it. 
 
 Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or 
 the duration which it has already attained. Neither 
 anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease 
 with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. 
 Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less 
 fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible 
 and pray to the same God ; and each invokes His aid 
 against the other. It may seem strange that any men 
 should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing 
 their bread from the sweat of other men's faces ; but 
 let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of 
 both could not be answered that of neither has been 
 answered fully. 
 
 The Almighty has His own purposes. "Wo unto the 
 world because of offenses ! for it must needs be that 
 offenses come ; but wo to that man by whom the offense 
 cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery 
 is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, 
 must needs come, but which, having continued through 
 His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that 
 He gives to both North and South this terrible war, as 
 the wo due to those by whom the offense came, shall we 
 discern therein any departure from those divine at- 
 tributes 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 shall continue until 
 all the wealth piled up by the bondsman'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 with the sword, as was said three 
 thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judg- 
 ments 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 his orphan 
 to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and 
 lasting peace among ourselves, and with all nations. 
 
 LETTER TO ERASTUS CORNING. 
 
 In our judgment, one of the great masterpieces of 
 Lincoln has had but little notice, comparatively, in 
 books or from the press. I refer to the letter written 
 June 12th, 1863, to Erastus Corning of New York, in 
 answer to resolutions passed In a public meeting at 
 Albany, New York, touching the suspension of "habeas 
 corpus" in the case of the military arrest of C. L. 
 Vallandigham. In a few words Mr. Lincoln answers the 
 document sent by Mr. Corning, and then adds : "And 
 here I ought to close this paper, and would close It, if 
 there were no apprehension that more injurious conse- 
 
 13Q
 
 quences than any merely personal to myself might follow 
 the censures systematically cast upon me for doing what, 
 In my view of duty, I could not forbear." He proceeds 
 with one of the most masterly delineations of political 
 principles, and dissection of treasonable activities,, ever 
 unfolded in its line, perhaps, in our National history. 
 Kb attempt was made by Mr. Corning or any one else 
 to answer this letter. We must content ourselves here 
 with a mere extract of the letter. "He (Vallandigham) 
 was not arrested because he was damaging the political 
 prospects of the administration or the personal interests 
 of the commanding General (Burnside), but because he 
 was damaging the army, upon the existence and vigor 
 of which the life of the Nation depends. He was war- 
 ring upon the military, and this gave the military con- 
 stitutional jurisdiction to lay hands upon him. If 
 Vallandigham was not damaging the military power of 
 the country, then his arrest was made on mistake of fact, 
 which I would be glad to correct on reasonably satis- 
 factory evidence. 
 
 "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 maintained unless deser- 
 tion shall be punished by the severe penalty of death. 
 The case requires, and the law and the Constitution 
 sanction, this punishment. 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?" (Ad- 
 dresses & c. 11, 
 
 LINCOLN'S FAVORITE POEM.* 
 
 O why should the spirit of mortal be proud? 
 Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast flying cloud, 
 A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, 
 He passelh from life to his rest In the grave. 
 
 The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade, 
 
 Be scattered around, and together be laid ; 
 
 And the young and the old, and the low and the high, 
 
 Shall molder to dust, and together shall lie. 
 
 The infant a mother attended and loved ; 
 The mother that infant's affection who proved ; 
 The husband that mother and infant who blest 
 Each, all, are away to their dwellings of rest. 
 
 The maid on whose cheek, on whose brow, in whose eye, 
 Shone beauty and pleasure her triumphs are by ; 
 And the memory of those who loved her and praised, 
 Are alike from the minds of the living erased. 
 
 *Lincoln's favorite poem is here given because it re- 
 flects, as In a mirror, much of his reserve, thought, and 
 character. 
 
 137
 
 The hand of the king that the scepter hath borne ; 
 The brow of the priest that the miter hath worn ; 
 Te eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave, 
 Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave. 
 
 The peasant, whose lot was to sow and to reap ; 
 The herdsman, who climbed with his goats up the steep ; 
 The beggar, who wandered in search of his bread, 
 Have faded away, like the grass that we tread. 
 
 The saint, who enjoyed the communion of heaven ; 
 The sinner, who dared to remain unforgiven ; 
 The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just, 
 Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust. 
 
 So the multitude goes like the flower of the weed, 
 That withers away to let others succeed ; 
 So the multitude comes even those we behold, 
 To repeat every tale that has often been told. 
 
 For we are the same our fathers have been ; 
 We see the same sights our fathers have seen ; 
 We drink the same stream, we view the same sun, 
 And run the same course our fathers have run. 
 
 The thoughts we are thinking, our fathers would think ; 
 From the death we are shrinking our fathers would 
 
 shrink ; 
 
 To the life we are clinging, they also would cling ; 
 But It speeds from us all like a bird on the wing. 
 
 They loved but the story we can not unfold ; 
 They scorned but the heart of the haughty is cold ; 
 They grieved but no wail from their slumber will come ; 
 They joyed but the tongue of their gladness is dumb. 
 
 They died ay, they died we things that are now, 
 That walk on the turf that lies over their brow, 
 And make in their dwellings a transient abode, 
 Meet the things that they met on their pilgrimage road. 
 
 Yea ! hope and despondency, pleasure and pain, 
 Are mingled together in sunshine and rain ; 
 And the smile and the tear, the song and the dirge. 
 Still follow each other, like surge upon surge. 
 
 'Tis the wink 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 
 O why should the spirit of mortal be proud? 
 
 William Knox. 
 138
 
 TRIBUTES. 
 
 Authors and Statesmen. 
 
 As a child, in a dark night, on a rugged way, catches 
 hold of the hand of its father for guidance and support, 
 Lincoln clung fast to the hand of the people and moved 
 calmly through the gloom. * * * He finished a work 
 which all time cannot overthrow. George Bancroft. 
 
 That swarthy face, with its strong features, its deep 
 furrows, and its benignant melancholy eyes, is familiar 
 to every American. * * * Everybody in the civilized 
 world knows and loves him. * * * The sureness of 
 his outlook and the courageous firmness of his attitude 
 proves that he was not a mere follower of other men's 
 minds, but leader in the truest sense of the term. Carl 
 Schurz. 
 
 Lincoln's monument is not at Springfield by the Sanga- 
 mon, but everywhere in the hearts of the American 
 people ; in the hearts of the millions of Freed men, 
 among whom will always be cherished the name of Lin- 
 coln, the emancipator of the colored race in the United 
 States. Wm. H. Upham ex-Gov., Wis. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln became the leader of a great and power- 
 ful party. * * * He was called by the American 
 people to lead them out from the domination of an arro- 
 gant section. He was true to his mission, and died the 
 death of a martyr. General John M. Palmer. 
 
 Lincoln is certainly the most sagacious and far-seeing 
 statesman in the annals of American history. * * * 
 He was the greatest man of his time. History abundantly 
 proves his superiority as a leader, and establishes his 
 constant reliance upon a higher power for guidance and 
 support. The tendency of this age is to exaggeration, 
 but of him none have spoken more highly than those 
 who knew him best. * * * Lincoln is not far re- 
 moved from us ; not surrounded by the mists of an- 
 tiquity ; not by a halo of idolatry that is impenetrable. 
 * * * His name has leaped the bounds of party and 
 country and now belongs to mankind and to the ages, 
 prophet and master without a rival In the greatest crisis 
 of our history. * * * The martyr of liberty, the 
 emancipator of a race. His deeds will live in human 
 history forever. Pres. William McKinley. 
 
 Lincoln saw into the future with the prophetic imag- 
 ination usually vouchsafed only to the poet and the 
 seer. * * * He had the practical man's hard com- 
 mon sense. No more practical man ever lived than this 
 homely backwoods idealist. This nation will grow to 
 feel a peculiar sense of pride in the man whose blood 
 was shed for the Union and for the freedom of a race ; 
 the lover of his country and of all mankind; the might- 
 iest of the mighty men who mastered the mighty days. 
 Theodore Roosevelt. 
 
 139
 
 * * * Lincoln is one of the great men of this 
 country, a very able lawyer, a most skillful and eloquent 
 orator, a great statesman. Stephen A. Douglas. 
 
 He whom the nation loved and laments was called 
 to his high station at a most portentious crisis, at the 
 commencement of a war almost without a parallel in 
 human history. * * * His noble qualities inspired 
 general confidence and commanded general respect, and 
 his successful administration will be evidence, in all time 
 to come, of his own worth and the wisdom of hia 
 measures. Lewis Cass. 
 
 If that high eulogium (pronounced by Macaulay on 
 Washington, in his essay on Hampden) was fully earned, 
 we doubt if it has not been as well earned by the Illinois 
 peasant-proprietor and "village lawyer," whom, by some 
 Divine inspiration of Providence, the Republican caucas 
 of 1860 substituted for Mr. Seward as their nominee for 
 the President's chair. * * * Finding himself the ob- 
 ject of abuse so fierce and so foul * * * ; Mocked at 
 for his official awkwardness, and denounced for his stead- 
 fast policy * * * ; tried by years of failure before 
 that policy achieved a single great success. Further 
 tried by a series of successes so rapid and brilliant that 
 they would have puffed up a smaller mind and overset 
 its balance; beset by fanatica of principle on the one 
 hand * * * and by fanatics of caste on the other 
 * * * Mr. Lincoln has persevered through all without 
 ever giving away to anger, or despondency, or exultation, 
 or popular arrogance, or sectarian fanaticism, or caste 
 prejudice, visibly growing in force of character, in self- 
 possession and in magnanimity, till in his last message 
 to Congress, on the 4th of March, we can detect no 
 longer the rude and illiterate mold of a village lawyer's 
 thought, but find ft replaced by a grasp of principle, a 
 dignity of manner, and solemnity of purpose which would 
 have been unworthy neither of Hampden nor of Crom- 
 well, while his gentleness and generosity of feeling 
 towards his foes are almost greater than we should ex- 
 pect from either of them. * * * We doubt if any 
 politician has even shown less personal ambition and a 
 larger power of trust. Spectator, London. 
 
 He stands apart in striking solitude, an enigma to all 
 men. * * * Let us take him simply as Abraham 
 Lincoln, singular and solitary as we all see that he was : 
 let us be thankful if we can make a niche big enough 
 for him among the world's heroes, without worrying 
 ourselves about the proportion which It may bear to 
 other niches ; and there let him remain, forever, lonely, 
 as in his strange life-time, impressive, mysterious, un- 
 measured and unsolved. John T. Morse. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln was no ordinary man. I believe that the 
 hand of God may be traced in many of the events con- 
 nected with his history, and that he was specially singled 
 out to guide our government in these troublesome times. 
 
 140
 
 * * * His greatness, in mental characteristics, rested 
 on a quick and ready perception of facts ; on a memory 
 unusually retentive ; on a logical turn of mind, which 
 followed, sternly and unwaveringly, every link in the 
 chain of thought on every subject he was called to inves- 
 tigate. * * * His moral powers gave him pre-eminence, 
 His moral integrity gave him his hold on the people. 
 
 * * * The great act on which his fame shall rest long 
 after his frame shall moulder away, is that of giving 
 freedom to a race. * * * Abraham Lincoln was a 
 good man ; known as an honest, temperate, forgiving, 
 just man. He believed in Christ, the Savior of sinners, 
 and I believe was sincere in trying to bring his life in 
 harmony with revealed religion. As a ruler I doubt if 
 any President has ever shown such trust in God. Bishop 
 Simpson. 
 
 The American nation, the American truths, of which 
 our President was the anointed and supreme embodiment, 
 have been embodied in multitudes of heroes, who 
 marched unknown and fell unnoticed in our ranks. * * * 
 God brought him up as He brought David up from the 
 sheepfold to feed Jacob, his inheritance. The gentlest, 
 kindest, most indulgent man that ever ruled a State. He 
 lived as he did, and he died as he did, because he was 
 what he was. Phillips Brooks. 
 
 Down the ages this will be the legend of America : 
 Lincoln saved the Union. Archbishop Ireland. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln is the apotheosis of American man- 
 hood. Dr. Chas. Edicard Locke. 
 
 He was the gentlest President in American history, 
 because in a time of revolution he comprehended the 
 spirit of American institutions, grasped the purpose of 
 the American people, and embodied them in an act of 
 justice and humanity. Lyman Abbott. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln is the best man I ever knew. Rev. Dr. 
 H. W. Bellows. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln's greatness and work lay in his 
 simp'le manhood. Robert Collyer. 
 
 Few men in the world's history have been privileged 
 to do work involving so much benefit to mankind. 
 Neicman Hall. 
 
 There is no side but Abraham Lincoln's side. Winston 
 Churchill. 
 
 Measured by what he did, he towered from his girth 
 up above every other mere man for six thousand years. 
 Bishop Charles H. Fowler. 
 
 Had there been no Lincoln, the sun would have set for- 
 ever upon the work of Washington. Dr. James M. 
 Buckley. 
 
 By the side of Armstrong and Garrison, Lincoln lives 
 today. In the very highest sense he lives in the present 
 more potentially than fifty years ago. Booker T. Wash- 
 ington. 
 
 141
 
 Every element of Lincoln's public career is enriched 
 by the setting of his private life and personal work. 
 * * * * He was human in the highest and best sense 
 of the word. * * * His devotion to his wife and 
 children was as abiding and unbounded as his love of 
 country. Hon. George W. Julian. 
 
 President Lincoln was a large and many sided man, 
 and yet so simple that no one, not even a child, could 
 approach him without feeling that he had found in him 
 a sympathising friend. * * * He was, in my judg- 
 ment, the greatest man our country has produced. 
 Judge William D. Kelley. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln came very near being a perfect man ac- 
 cording to my ideal of manhood. * * * He is beyond 
 question the master mind of the Cabinet. Judge Edward 
 Bates (Atty. Gen. Lincoln Cabinet). 
 
 Homely, honest, ungainly Lincoln is the representa- 
 tive man of the country. * * * The typical Amer- 
 ican pure and simple. Prof. Asa Gray. 
 
 Lincoln surpassed all orators in eloquence ; all diplo- 
 mats in wisdom ; all statesmen in foresight ; all the 
 most ambitious in fame. Hon. John J. Ingaills. 
 
 I doubt whether man, woman or child, white or black, 
 bond or free, virtuoua or vicious, ever accosted, or 
 reached forth a hand to Abraham Lincoln and detected 
 in his countenance or manner any repugnance or shrink- 
 ing from the proffered contact, any assumption of supe- 
 riority or betrayal of disdain. * * * Other men were 
 helpful and nobly did their part ; yet looking back 
 through the lifting mists of those seven eventful, tragic, 
 trying, glorious years, I clearly discern the one Provi- 
 dential leader, the indispensable hero of the great drama, 
 Abraham Lincoln. Horace Greely. 
 
 The true representative of this continent ; an entirely 
 public man ; father of his country ; the pulse of 20,000,- 
 000 throbbing in his heart, the thought of their minds 
 articulated by their tongues. Oliver Wendell Holmes. 
 
 Perhaps none of our Presidents since Washington has 
 stood so firm in the confidence of the people as Lincoln, 
 after three years' stormy administration. * * * A 
 profound common sense is the best genius for statesman- 
 ship. Hitherto the wisdom of the President's measures 
 has been justified by the fact that they always resulted 
 In more firmly uniting public opinion. James Russell 
 Lowell (Atlantic, Dec. 1863). 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was born in obscurity, reared in 
 want and poverty and denied educational advantages, 
 and yet he stands today as the great colossal figure of 
 his age and time. * * * We knew him when we gave 
 him to mankind. The world knows him now. Dr. E. 
 Hursh (Chicago). 
 
 He left upon the age the mighty impress of his vir- 
 tues and his deeds. Judge Arthur H. Chetlain (Chicago). 
 
 142
 
 , * 
 
 '^ i! - 
 
 ROAD HKTWKK.X 
 
 . ' .C" '; "'- BERMUDA HUNDRfeD 
 
 XKNn'SFIHST MNK OK INTRKX< .1IMKXTS 
 
 OS THK XOHTH
 
 I knew him as a boy may know a President who was 
 never too busy to greet him kindly, to muss his hair, to 
 pull his ears, and to say gentle, tender words of the 
 father who had but lately passed away. Through all 
 these years the wondrous sweetness of that beautiful, 
 ugly face has never left my memory. Stephen A. Doug- 
 las, Jr. 
 
 It Is the province of a physician to probe deeply the 
 interior lives of men ; and I affirm that Mr. Lincoln is 
 the purest hearted man with whom I ever came in con- 
 tact. Dr. Robert K. Stone, Lincoln's family physician. 
 
 The mission of all great men, of all heroes, who are 
 looked upon almost as demigods, passes away. The 
 President of the Republic is suddenly struck down at the 
 moment of his triumph. * * * Lincoln, a martyr to 
 the principles which he represented, now belongs to his- 
 tory and to posterity, As the champion of freedom in 
 America, Lincoln drew, without hesitation, the sword of 
 the Republic, and with the point thereof erased from the 
 firm code that anti-social stigma, that blasphemy against 
 human nature, the sad, shameful, infamous codicil of 
 antiquated societies, the dark and repugnant abuse of 
 slavery * * * and as the stars of the Union waved 
 triumphant over the fallen ramparts of Petersburg and 
 Richmond the grave opens, and the strong and the pow- 
 erful fall to rise no more. Great man I purposely re- 
 peat great man the man who makes himself great by 
 his own acts and by his own genius is more to be envied 
 than he who was born among inherited escutcheons of 
 nobility. Lincoln belongs to that privileged race to that 
 aristocracy. As a legislator and in Congress, he pre- 
 pared to become one day the popular chief of many 
 millions, the defender of the holy principles which Wil- 
 berforce inaugurated. Trampling down the thorns in his 
 path, guiding his steps amid the tears and the blood of 
 so many holocausts, he still lives to see the promised 
 land. The great athlete stepped into the ring and fell 
 a martyr to the noble principles of which this noble 
 epoch has reason to be proud. * * * A good citizen 
 and a great Magistrate, who, himself, piloted his people 
 through terrible tempests, and succeeded in leading them 
 in triumph over the fallen ramparts of slavery's strong- 
 hold. L. A. Rebello da Silva (House of Peers, Lisbon). 
 
 In all the exigencies of civil war, this upright patriot 
 had but one purpose in view, to respect his oath of fidel- 
 ity to the Constitution, to prevent the dismemberment 
 of the great Republic, to efface the only stain upon its 
 flag slavery. This is what Abraham Lincoln has real- 
 ized ; he has accomplished this gigantic task, without 
 harm to the liberty of the people, with probity and en- 
 ergy in the choice of means, with moderation and gen- 
 erosity towards the vanquished. People of Geneva, 
 Switzerland, to people of U. 8. A. 
 
 143
 
 Abraham Lincoln, the mighty leader of these great 
 events, the manly model of civic virtue, of pure and 
 noble humanity, will be held holy in the memory of the 
 inhabitants of his native land, and be worshipped by the 
 world. Johanne Pflster, Buren-Berne, Suritzerland. 
 (Teacher.) 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, one of the greatest men who ever 
 lived upon this earth. Jo hn Kilchman, Lucerne. (In 
 the Bund.) 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, the man with the brow of iron 
 and the heart of gold. * * * When men in after 
 years shall commemorate Good Friday as the death-day 
 of their holy Redeemer, they will remember it as the 
 day of martyrdom for his truest disciple, the liberator 
 of millions of slaves, the noble paragon of virtue and 
 humanity Abraham Lincoln. The Manerchor, Berne, 
 Switz. 
 
 Lincoln had the most notable combination of sadness 
 and mirth that I ever met with in any of our public 
 men. I have never known any man who had greater 
 reverence for God than Abraham Lincoln. * * * I 
 am quite sure that no man could have filled Lincoln's 
 place during the Civil war with equal safety to the Re- 
 public His ablest political enemies ever paid the highest 
 tributes, not only to his personal attributes, but to his 
 masterly ability. I learned not only to respect, but, 
 indeed, to reverence the man. Col. Alexander K. McClure. 
 
 Lincoln had a spirit touched to fine issues. John M. 
 Scovel. 
 
 Next to the destruction of the Confederacy, the death 
 of Abraham Lincoln was the darkest day the South has 
 ever known. Jefferson Davis. (Said to A. KL. McClure, 
 10 years after Lincoln's death.) 
 
 There is no other name in America today so effective 
 and worthy of being used when we would conure the 
 noble, the open, and the tender in human nature. Rev. 
 Jenkin Lloyd Jones. 
 
 The greatest man in the world has Just died. Jane 
 Addams' father (As recalled by her). 
 
 The phenomenon of history. Burke Cockeran. 
 
 The President is, without exception, the tenderest 
 hearted man I ever saw. Judge Joseph Holt (Sec. of 
 War under Buchanan). 
 
 A man most worthy of memory in the history of our 
 country. 8. S. McClure. 
 
 Well, we might have done a more brilliant thing but 
 we could hardly have done a better thing. Judge Kelley 
 to Carl Schurz on leaving Lincoln's home after notifi- 
 cation. 
 
 144
 
 He overspread a continent with his pity. Arthur H. 
 Qleason. 
 
 He had an abiding faith in his own convictions, but 
 a world of charity for the views of others. John W. 
 Smith. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln is the only white man with whom I have 
 ever talked, or in whosa presence I have even been, who 
 did not consciously or unconsciously betray, to me, that 
 he recognized my color. * * * The simple approached 
 him with ease, and the learned approached him with 
 deference. Take him for all in all, Abraham Lincoln 
 was one of the noblest, wisest and best men I ever knew. 
 Frederick Douglas. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln was essentialy a thinker who had the 
 courage of his convictions. * * * Having been placed 
 by fortune in the proper sphere of action, he showed he 
 was a truly great man. Abraham Hewitt. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's life was one of true patriotism, and his 
 character one of honesty and of the highest type of 
 religious sentiment. Alexander Ramsey. 
 
 He was a noble, whole-souled, tender-hearted man. He 
 was a model President of this model Republic. P. T. 
 Barnum. 
 
 It is my humble judgment, that in all the positions 
 the great crisis forced him into he was a perfect fit. 
 J. M. Bailey. 
 
 BRITISH PRESS. 
 
 * * * He governed with an ability which even his 
 adversaries have not been the last to admit. * * * 
 His management of state affairs has illuminated a 
 brighter page in the history of his country than any 
 which has been emblazoned since the death of Washing- 
 ton. (Oateshead Observer, April 29, 1865.) 
 
 Poor Abraham Lincoln "honest Abe" the simple, the 
 noble, the true-hearted ; as blunt and unaffected, as 
 simple-hearted, kindly and playful in his high position as 
 President of the United States as ever he had been, in 
 earlier days, when he drove his team through the forests 
 of Illinois ! The people of this country had all come to 
 love him. (Glasgow Herald, May 1st, 1865.) 
 
 Mr. Lincoln slowly won for himself the respect and 
 confidence of all. Hia perfect honesty speedily became 
 apparent. * * * His utterances were apparently 
 careless, but his tongue was always under command. * 
 (London Times, April 27, ^865.) 
 
 * * * History will record the name of Abraham 
 Lincoln as that of a pure and disinterested patriot. 
 * * * She will speak also of the virtues which the 
 hard experience of early life had strengthened in him ; 
 of his large, humane, and tender sympathies ; of his self- 
 
 145
 
 control and good temper ; of truthfulness and sturdy 
 honesty. * * * She will represent him as possessed 
 with deep moral earnestness, and as endowed with vig- 
 orous common sense and faculty for dealing with af- 
 fairs. * * * Rising from the poorest of the people, 
 winning his slow way upward by sheer hard work, pre- 
 serving in every successive stage a character unspotted 
 and a name untainted, never pretending to more than 
 he was, nor being less than he professed himself, he 
 was at length placed in the chair of President, at the 
 turning point of his nation's history * * * Never 
 was any one, set in such high place and surrounded 
 with so many motives of furious detraction, so little im- 
 peached of aught blameworthy. * * * He had an in- 
 tellect as well as goodness. Cautiously conservative, 
 fearing to pass the limits of established systems, seeking 
 the needful amendments rather from growth than altera- 
 tion, he proved himself in the crisis the very man best 
 suited for his post. * * * The firmness with which 
 he refused to proceed faster than the progress of events 
 warranted was equaled by the tenacity with which he 
 refused to retire from the position he had at last thought 
 It right to take up. (London Daily News, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 It is given to; few men to triumph over the most 
 formidable obstacles as Mr. Lincoln triumphed, by the 
 mere force of honesty and sagacity. His simple integ- 
 rity of purpose, firmness of will, patience, humanity, 
 and the deep sense of accountability which marked every 
 important act, united to form a character which has 
 steadily and visibly gained upon the minds and hearts, 
 not of his own countrymen alone, but also of the world. 
 * * * In this country Mr. Lincoln's name is men- 
 tioned with regret by many who four years ago half 
 believed that he was the wretched imbecile he was de- 
 scribed to be by the Richmond press. (London Daily 
 News, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 His reputation is based upon tried goodness and 
 proven greatness. * * * He was raised up in a 
 season of danger to be a guide to the State in its diffi- 
 culties and perils. With steady and unfaltering purpose 
 he fulfilled his alloted task. * * * In the midst of 
 the raging storm of battle, when all the land was con- 
 vulsed ; * * * and at the no less dangerous crisis 
 when the tide of victory set in, * * * he was true 
 to his duty, and true to that high mission from which 
 his sense of duty derived its inspiration. Fearless in 
 danger, unshaken in adversity, hopeful when the bravest 
 all but despaired ; calm amidst the wild contagious ex- 
 citement of success ; as imperturable in the general ecsta- 
 cies produced by triumph as he was resolute in the gen- 
 eral despondency produced by misfortune, he displayed 
 from first to last the rare qualities of a good man and 
 a wise ruler. His simplicity of character was mistaken 
 for Ignorance ; his firmness of purpose was characterized 
 
 146
 
 UOAII 
 
 9 \ 
 
 : * \ f*f**si 
 
 : . Y 
 
 ' *^ 
 
 I *v " 
 
 > v^" 
 
 V~ # vtt 
 
 ^ > 
 
 1'OIX'l OK MOCKS 
 I'KTKRHBVrUi, 
 
 LINE (!' WOHKS 
 
 l< I'S. 
 
 /V 
 
 i-X?!?. 
 / ' '^ 
 
 } M 
 M 
 
 \ 
 
 iU 
 
 'ir 
 
 hWlV: 
 
 .>/ 
 
 .,,,.., 
 
 |rf ^ 
 
 * 
 
 '** J/^-r :. 'w- JEfrtei *
 
 as obstinacy ; his perseverance was regarded as infatu- 
 ation. * * * Lincoln had not fallen before the cause 
 to which he devoted his life had been rendered secure. 
 (Ulster Observer, Belfast, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 When President Lincoln penned the sentence which 
 liberated forever millions of his fellow creatures from 
 bondage, and gave the deathblow to slavery throughout 
 the world, he did an act which entitled him to everlasting 
 fame. (Ulster Observer, Belfast, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 The civilized world regarded with admiration the mag- 
 nanimity which rose spontaneously, with the haughtiness 
 of virtue, in the breast of the Northern people, and 
 turned the occasion of victory into an opportunity to 
 display, not merely mercy, but of brotherly sympathy 
 and love. (Ulster Observer, Belfast, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 We had a deep respect and love for this man. who, 
 quietly and unpretendingly, was doing a great work. If 
 he was not a man of brilliant qualities or showy accom- 
 plishments, yet he possessed great grasp and force of in- 
 tellect, honesty and singleness of purpose, unsullied in- 
 tegrity, unshaken perserverance, firmness in authority, 
 an ambition utterly unselfish, the qualities, in short, 
 which go to make the truest and noblest patriot. 
 (Bradford Review, April 29, 1865.) 
 
 AH lament the good and great statesman. We doubt 
 whether modern history contains a grander character 
 than the humble lawyer of Illinois. In genius and a 
 deep insight into the political future Abraham Lincoln 
 was far from deficient. In high moral qualities he was 
 unsurpassed by any public character of the age. His 
 hands were as free from corruption as his generous soul 
 waa indisposed to harshness. * * * His public virtues 
 shone out as brightly as his private worth, and both 
 made him the best beloved man in the United States. 
 (The Freeman's Journal, Dublin, April 28, 1865.) 
 
 In an age teaming with intellectual genius and refine- 
 ment, Abraham Lincoln, the humble woodman, was called 
 to play an arduous, noble, and conspicuous part in the 
 great drama of civilization and progress. (Dublin Re- 
 former, April 29, 1865.) 
 
 * * * Intense admiration we have ever had of the 
 calm, Christian, enlightened statesmanship of "honest 
 old Abe," his firm and inflexible determination to abide 
 by the Constitution of his country, and at the same time 
 to blot out, through that Constitution, the infamous 
 system and institution of slavery. (Caledonian Mercury. 
 Edinburgh, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 To us Abraham Lincoln has always seemed the finest 
 character produced by the American war, on either side 
 of the struggle. He was great not merely by the force 
 of genius and only the word genius will describe the 
 
 147
 
 power of intellect by which he guided himself and 
 his country through such a crisis but by the simple, 
 natural strength and grandeur of his character. * * * 
 He seemed to arrive by instinct by the instinct of a 
 noble, unselfish and manly nature at the very end which 
 the highest of political genius, the longest political ex- 
 perience, could have done no more than reach. He bore 
 himself fearlessly in danger, calmly in difficulty, modestly 
 in success. The world was beginning to know how good, 
 and, in the best sense, how great a man he was. (Lon- 
 don Morning Star, April 27, 1865.) 
 
 Raised from the ranks of the common people to take 
 upon himself the responsibilities of the most gigantic 
 struggle the world has ever witnessed between the forces 
 of freedom and slavery, he guided the destinies of his 
 country with unwavering hand through all the terrors 
 and dangers of the conflict, and placed her so high and 
 safe among the nations of the world that the dastards 
 of despotism dare no longer question the strength and 
 majesty of freedom. London Morning Star. 
 
 He boasted not of victory nor sought to arrogate to 
 himself the honors of the great deeds which have re- 
 sounded through the world ; but gentle and modest as he 
 was great and good, he took the chaplet from his own 
 brow to place it on the lowly graves of the soldiers. 
 (London Morning Star, Apr. 27.) 
 
 In truth a man like Abraham Lincoln is claimed by 
 humanity as her own. London Morning Star, April 27. 
 
 Only Washington among the Presidents of the United 
 States could compare with Lincoln. The Spectator, April 
 29, 1865. 
 
 If there ever was a leader in a civil conflict who 
 shunned acrimony and eschewed passion, it was he. In 
 a time of much cant and affectation, he was simple, un- 
 affected, true, transparent. In a season of many mis- 
 takes he was never known to be wrong. Liverpool Daily 
 Post, April 27, 1865. 
 
 The memory of his statesmanship, translucent in the 
 highest degree * * * will live in the hearts and minds 
 of the Anglo-Saxon race as one of the noblest examples 
 of that race's highest qualities. * * * Add to this that 
 Abraham Lincoln was the kindest and pleasantest of 
 men ; that he has raised himself from nothing, and that 
 to the last no grain of conceit or ostentation was found 
 in him, and there stands before the world a man whose 
 like we shall not soon look again. Liverpool Daily 
 Post, April 27, 1865. 
 
 148
 
 As a man of great good sense and cool judgment, he 
 was able to read the signs of the times with more clear- 
 ness than most of his contemporaries, and thus acquiring 
 the rare faculty of not only doing the right thing but 
 of doing the right thing at the right time. Leeds Mer- 
 cury, April 27, 1865. 
 
 DIPLOMATS. 
 
 His firm and consistant maintenance of the Nation's 
 cause, his clear understanding of the great questions at 
 issue, and his unwearied efforts, while enforcing the laws, 
 to deprive the conflict of all bitterness, were all so 
 happily blended with a reliance upon Divine Providence 
 as to elevate him to a high rank among successful states- 
 men. His name is, hereafter, identified with emancipa- 
 tion. 8. Wells Williams, (U. 8. Minister to China, 1865.) 
 
 If there is anything wanting, to complete the fame of 
 Lincoln, it may be found in the crown of martyrdom with 
 which an eventful career in a most eventful epoch has 
 been closed, honored for his virtues, and lamented for 
 his "taking off." James E. Harvey, (Ambassador to 
 Portugal), 1865. 
 
 * * * The great and good man, who died as he had 
 lived faithful to his trust and at the post of duty. * * * 
 In Europe, as in America, enlightened public opinion has 
 already inscribed among the most illustrious names on 
 the roll of fame our martyred President. Rufus King, 
 (V. 8. Legation at Rome, 1865.) 
 
 The death of this Chief Magistrate, elevated by the 
 force of great events to a place in history not less than 
 that of every other human name which the annals of the 
 race records, and filling that broad place worthily, has 
 sent a shock of horror through Europe. * * * Speak- 
 ing from Europe, I may say : Already that assassin blow 
 has done more to finish up the sympathies of men for the 
 defenders of slavery and oligarchy than all that has hap- 
 pened before or since. * * * The night of April 14th, 
 1865, has dispelled forever the mistaken sympathies 
 which the audacity of April 13, 1861, generated, and has 
 left the enemies of human progress naked before the 
 world. This in Europe * * * A citizen President trium- 
 phant over the slaveholding patrician element, but himself 
 obedient to law, is the result of our people's virtue and his 
 own God's instrument in a work which makes his name 
 Immortal. Horatio J. Perry, (U. 8. Minister to Spain.) 
 
 Widespread was the fame achieved by President Lin- 
 coln, and earnest was the admiration felt for the services 
 he had rendered to his race and to his country, even in 
 this remote corner of Europe. Fe had won the respect 
 and admiration of the world by the successful issue of the 
 
 149
 
 struggle he had directed against that foe, alike of hu- 
 manity and America Southern slavery * * * His 
 name and fame will be inseparably associated with the 
 great events in which he was so conspicuous an actor. 
 * * * He fell a victim to his devotion to the cause of 
 liberty and human rights, and he will take his place in 
 history among the martyrs whom universal humanity 
 honors as its benefactors. President Lincoln's course of 
 action had been so honorable to himself, and so useful 
 to his country, that he had won even the respect of the 
 enemies of the noble cause he championed. He lived 
 long enough to refute the calumnies of his foreign assail- 
 ants, and to confound the wicked schemes of domestic 
 traitors. * * * His steady perseverance in the cause 
 of right, his unshaken faith in ultimate success, and the 
 stern loyalty he exhibited to the Constitution, astonished 
 the European world and enforced its admiration of one 
 of the grandest exhibitions of moral courage and of con- 
 scientious discharge of duty to be found in ancient or 
 modern history. E. Joy Morris, (U. 8. Minister at Con- 
 stantinople.) 
 
 In the raging of political tornadoes, he bore himself 
 with the passionless calm of some abstraction and 
 divested of prejudice or favor devoted himself to the 
 large ends of human freedom and national life. I feel 
 that his death was the seal of the deeds of his life, and 
 he closed his eyes on great purposes achieved to open 
 tnem upon the immortal crown. James H. Campbell, 
 (Minister resident, Stockholm.) 
 
 The millions of America who loved Mr. Lincoln as a 
 father and revered him as the purest and greatest of 
 patriotic statesmen, could scarcely have mourned him 
 more profoundly than did the masses in Europe. Espe- 
 cially dear was he to the citizens of this little republic 
 of Switzerland. * * The events of his life, and the 
 moment and manner of his death will enshrine him in the 
 pantheon of history as the most illustrious character. 
 George Q. Fogg, (Resident Minister, Berne, Switzerland, 
 1865.) 
 
 The royal government is profoundly moved by the In- 
 telligence which reached us yesterday of the assassina- 
 tion of President Lincoln. In view of the so happily 
 existing relations between Prussia and the United States, 
 the undersigned cannot forbear to express to their govern- 
 ment the sincere sympathy of the royal government. 
 Otto von Bismarck, Berlin, April Wth, 1865. 
 
 The man who accomplished such great deeds from the 
 simple desire conscientiously to perform his duty, the 
 man who never wished to be more nor less than the most 
 faithful servant of the people, the man will find his 
 own glorious place in the pages of history. In the deep- 
 
 150
 
 ' Appoiulix ii<>) 
 
 I - 1 . A X 
 swvi.\< > 
 
 I'AHT OK THK 
 LINK OK THK r.S.F 
 
 <M .July 'Ji^'^'.lttii : 
 
 KMilXKKIl IIKI'T. 
 IIIS.<aW{(',WtTKHX.\l*.>f\ or THK 
 
 ttff<t*i, _ . _ tf fa 
 
 N 
 
 / - 
 
 <fx 
 
 *.
 
 est reverence I bow my head before this modest great- 
 ness, and I think it is especially agreeable to the spirit 
 of our nation, to pay the tribute of veneration to such 
 greatness, exalted as it is by simplicity and modesty. 
 Deputy Dr. William) Loe-we, Prussian House of Deputies. 
 
 Whatever may have been done in the United States, 
 Mr. Lincoln is being canonized in Europe. A like unanim- 
 ity of eulogy of sovereigns, parliaments, corporate bodies, 
 by the people, and by all public journals, was never be- 
 fore witnessed on this continent. The most truthful and 
 eloquent testimonials are now given by some of those 
 that belied him most while living. Berlin, May 4th. N. 
 B. Judd, U. S. Minister to Prussia, to Mr. Hunter, Wash. 
 
 The very high qualities which had adorned the illus- 
 trious dead, * * * had won for him throughout the 
 world, and particularly in this republic, the purest sym- 
 pathy and admiration. Juan Antonio Pevet, President 
 of Peru. Lima, Peru, May 28, 1865. 
 
 * * * All peoples in both hemispheres rise with one 
 voice to condemn the cowardly assassins who have black- 
 ened the brilliant pages of that wonderful war just when 
 the country already saw peace on the horizon, and when, 
 undoubtedly, that peace is owing to the efforts, the con- 
 stancy, and the skill with which the lamented Mr. Lin- 
 coln has directed those events. Count of Vistahermosa 
 in and, in behalf of the Spanish Senate. 
 
 Mr. Lincoln's firm and resolute character, his good 
 common sense, and his associations, acquired general 
 esteem for him in Europe. Count Manderstrom, Minister 
 Foreign Affairs, Stockholm, Sweden. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, the mighty leader of these great 
 events, the manly model of civic virtue, of pure and 
 noble humanity, will be held holy in the memory of the 
 inhabitants of his native land, and be worshipped by the 
 world. Buren, June 5th, 1865. Johann Pflster, in behalf 
 of Swiss People. 
 
 That which won for Mr. Lincoln most admiration in 
 Europe was his modesty in expression and firmness in 
 action. * * * Lincoln was the best friend I ever 
 had. He was the most conscientious man I ever knew, 
 and ranks with Washington in genius, public service and 
 patriotism. Cassius M. Clay, Ambassador, Russia. 
 
 The name of Abraham Lincoln will be cherished so long 
 as we have a history, as one of the wisest, purest, and 
 noblest magistrates, as one of the greatest benefactors to 
 the human race that have ever lived. I believed that the 
 foundation of his whole character was a devotion to 
 duty which enabled him to discharge the functions of his 
 
 151
 
 great office, in one of the most terrible periods of the 
 world's history, with such rare sagacity, patience, cheer- 
 fulness and courage. * * * I have followed his career with 
 an ever increasing veneration for a character and an intel- 
 lect which seemed to expand, and to grow more vigorous 
 the greater the demand that was made upon their 
 strength. ,7. Lothrop Motley, (U. S. Minister to Austria.) 
 
 I think it is generally conceded that the death of no 
 man has ever occurred that awakened such prompt and 
 universal sympathy, at once among our own people and 
 among foreign nations. Even here in foreign lands, 
 what American has not been surprised by the universal 
 demonstration elicited from all parties and from every 
 class, from the humblest and from the most exalted. * * * 
 Such a tribute was never paid to our country before ; 
 such homage was never paid to any other American. 
 
 * * * His death and the time and manner of it 
 seemed to have rendered his whole public career luminous, 
 and to make it clear that he had been fighting the fight 
 of humanity, of justice and of civilization. * * * His 
 public and private virtues have secretly but steadily 
 been graving themselves upon the hearts of mankind. 
 We, his compatriots, know best what a rare collection of 
 public and private virtues went down into the grave 
 with Abraham Lincoln. * * * That simple-hearted and 
 single-minded patriot has been transfigured, and has 
 taken his place in history as the impersonation of a 
 cause, which, hereafter, it will be blasphemy to assail. 
 John Bigelow, (U. S. Minister to France.) 
 
 The man who has fallen was immolated for no act of 
 his own. It may well be doubted whether during his 
 whole career he ever made a single personal enemy. In 
 this peculiarity he shone prominently among statesmen. 
 Abraham Lincoln was a faithful exponent of the senti- 
 ments of a whole people. The ball that penetrated his 
 brain was addressed to the heart of each and every one 
 of us. He has paid the penalty for executing our will. 
 
 * * * It is one of the peculiar merits of Mr. Lincoln that 
 he knew how to give shape, in action, to the popular 
 feelings as they developed themselves under his observa- 
 tion. He never sought to lead, but rather to follow, and 
 thus he succeeded in the difficult task of successfully 
 combining conservatism with progress. His labor was 
 always to improve. Hence it was that he conducted a 
 war of unexampled magnitude, always bearing in mind 
 the primary purpose for which it had been commenced, 
 at the same time associating with it broader ones as the 
 opportunity came. He had pledged himself at the outset 
 to accomplish certain objects, and he never forgot that 
 pledge. * * * The time had at last arrived when he 
 might honestly claim that it would be fulfilled. It was In 
 that moment he was taken away. On the very same day 
 of the year when the National flag, which Just four 
 
 152
 
 years before, had been lowered to triumphant enemies 
 at Fort Sumter, was once more lifted to its original posi- 
 tion by the hand of the same officer who had suffered the 
 indignity that commenced the war, Abraham Lincoln 
 fell. His work was done. He had fought the good fight ; 
 he had finished his course : and now we may well cry 
 out : "Go up, go up," with your gory temples twined 
 with the evergreen symbols of a -patriot's wreath, and 
 bearing the double glory of a martyr's crown. Go up, 
 while for us here remaining on earth, your memory shall 
 be garnered In the hearts of us and our latest posterity, 
 in common with the priceless treasure heaped up by the 
 great fathers of the Republic, and close by that of the 
 matchless Washington. * * * Let us draw together as 
 one man in the tribute of our admiration of one of the 
 purest, one of the most single-minded, and noble-hearted 
 patriots that ever ruled over the people of any land. 
 Charles Frances Adams. (At meeting of Americans, resi- 
 dent in London, St. James Hall, May 1st, 1865.) 
 
 LINCOLN APHORISMS. 
 
 The battle of freedom is to be fought out on principle. 
 There is both a power and a magic in popular opinion. 
 
 I have no policy. My hone is to save the Union. I 
 do the best I can to-day with the hope that when to- 
 morrow comes I am ready for its duties. (Said to Gen- 
 eral ,T. M. Palmer.) 
 
 If I know my heart my gratitude is free from any 
 taint of personal triumph. 
 
 I go for all sharing the privileges of the Government 
 who assist in bearing its burdens. Consequently I go for 
 admitting all whites to the right of suffrage who pay 
 taxes or bear arms, by no means excluding women. 
 
 It Is no pleasure for me to triumph over any one. 
 
 I am the peoples' attorney in this great affair. I am 
 trying to do the best I can for my client, the country. 
 
 Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. 
 Whether it be true or not I can say. for one, I have no 
 other so great as that of being truly esteemed by my 
 fellow men by rendering myself worthy of their esteem. 
 
 If he has no friend I will be his friend. 
 
 We should avoid planting too many thorns in the bosom 
 of society. 
 
 If any man ceases to attack me I never remember the 
 past, against him. 
 
 If there were more praying and less swearing it would 
 be better for our country. 
 
 I am satisfied that when the Almighty wants me to do 
 or not to do a particular thing He finds a way of letting 
 me know it. 
 
 153
 
 I shall go to God with my sorrows. 
 
 We shall sooner have a fowl by hatching the egg than 
 by smashing It. (Said In reference to the La. Con.) 
 
 The discipline and character of the National forces 
 should not suffer, nor the cause they defend be imperiled 
 by the profanation of the day, or the name of the Most 
 High. 
 
 War does not admit of holidays. 
 
 The honor is all yours, for I believe none of us went 
 further than to acquiesce. (To Sherman on capture of 
 Savannah. ) 
 
 No part of the honor for plan or execution is mine. 
 (After Appomattix.) 
 
 With malice towards none, with charity for all. 
 
 While I hold myself, without mock modesty, the 
 humblest of all individuals that have ever been elevated 
 to the Presidency, I have a more difficult task to per- 
 form than any one of them. 
 
 I don't believe it is wise to swap horses while crossing 
 a stream. 
 
 Now I am about to call upon the band for a tune that 
 our adversaries have endeavored to appropriate. But we 
 fairly captured it yesterday, and the Att'y General gave 
 me his legal opinion that it is now our property. So I 
 ask the band to play "Dixie." (Said at close of address 
 on Appomatox surrender. 
 
 A private soldier has as much right to justice as a 
 Major General. 
 
 Die when I may I want it said of me by those who 
 know me best, that I always plucked a thistle and 
 planted a flower when I thought a flower would grow. 
 
 God selects his own instruments and sometimes they 
 are queer ones. He chose me to steer the ship through 
 a great crisis. 
 
 I never shall live out the four years of my term. When 
 the Rebellion is crushed my work is done. 
 
 Reasonable men have long since agreed that intemper- 
 ance is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, of all 
 evils of mankind. 
 
 No man resolved to make the most of himself can 
 spare time for personal contention. 
 
 If slavery Is not wrong nothing is wrong. 
 
 I have not willingly planted a thorn in any man's 
 bosom. 
 
 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. 
 
 154
 
 I know that the Lord is always on the side of the 
 right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I 
 and this Nation shall be on the Lord's side. 
 
 I have always made it a rule if people will not turn 
 out for me, I will for them. If I didn't there would be 
 a collision. 
 
 Better give your path to a dog than be bitten by him 
 in contending for the right. Even killing the dog would 
 not cure the bite. 
 
 You can fool some of the people all the time ; you can 
 fool all the people some of the time ; but you can't fool 
 all the people all the time. 
 
 I protest against the counterfeit logic which- concludes 
 that because I do not want a black woman for a slave I 
 must necessarily want her for a wife. * * * I shall 
 never marry a negress, but I have no objection to any one 
 else doing so. If a white man wants to marry a negro 
 woman, let him do so, if the negro woman can stand it. 
 
 I shall do nothing in malice. What I deal with is too 
 vast for malicious dealing. 
 
 Even though much provoked let us do nothing through 
 passion and ill temper. 
 
 Gold is good in its place; but living, brave and 
 patriotic men are better than gold. 
 
 Whatever shall appear to be God's will I do. 
 
 I am a patient man, always ready to forgive on the 
 Christian terms of repentence, and also to give ample 
 time for repentence. 
 
 The severest Justice may not always be the best policy. 
 
 The world is in want of a good definition for the word 
 liberty. * * * The shepherd drives the wolf from the 
 sheep's throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd 
 as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the 
 same act, as the destroyer of liberty. 
 
 The present moment finds me at the White House, yet 
 there is as good a chance for your children as there was 
 for my father's. 
 
 Labor is superior to capital and deserves much the 
 higher consideration. 
 
 No men living are more worthy to be trusted than 
 those who toil up from poverty. 
 
 Moral cowardice is something which I think I never 
 had. 
 
 I authorize no bargains, and will be bound by none. 
 (Said In reference to nomination.) 
 
 I was losing interest in politics when the repeal of the 
 Missouri Compromise aroused me again. (To E. B. 
 Washburne.) 
 
 155
 
 If there is a man that can push our armies forward 
 one mile further or one hour faster, he Is the man that 
 ought to be in my place. (Thurlow Weed.) 
 
 Wealth is simply a superfluity of what we don't need. 
 
 I do not think much of a man who is not wiser to-day 
 than he was yesterday. I have always found that mercy 
 bears richer fruit than strict justice. 
 
 The plainest print cannot be tead through a gold eagle. 
 
 The contract awarded to me on the 6th of November, 
 1860, was a big job. 
 
 I do not seek applause, nor to amuse the people; I 
 want to convince them. 
 
 We shall not fail, if we stand firm, we shall not fail. 
 Wise counsels may accelerate, or mistakes delay, but 
 sooner or later, the victory is sure to come. (June, 
 1858, at Springfield.) 
 
 The great job is finished. I cannot but congratulate 
 all present, myself, the country, and the whole world, on 
 this great moral victory. (On passage of resolution for 
 Constitutional amendment abolishing slavery.) 
 
 It really hurts me very much to suppose that I have 
 wronged anybody on earth. 
 
 You may have a wen or a cancer upon your person, 
 and not be able to cut it out lest you bleed to death ; 
 but surely, it is no way to cure It, to ingraft and spread 
 it over your whole body, that is no proper way of treat 
 ing what you regard a wrong. 
 
 It matters not what becomes of me. If I go down, I 
 intend to go down like the Cumberland with my colors 
 flying. 
 
 One war at a time. 
 
 He who would be no slave must have no slave. 
 
 I am altogether unconscious of having attempted double 
 dealing anywhere. 
 
 I am always willing to forgive on the Christian terms 
 of repentence, still I must save this government if 
 possible. 
 
 If they decline what I suggest you scarcely need ask 
 what I will do. 
 
 It is good policy never to plead what you need not, lest 
 you oblige yourself to prove what you cannot. 
 
 By a course of reasoning, Euclid proves that the angles 
 of a triangle are equal to two right angles. Now if you 
 undertake to disprove that proposition, would you prove 
 it false by calling Euclid a liar? 
 
 Governor, I'll make the ground of this country too 
 hot for the foot of a slave, if he" (a free negro seized in 
 New Orleans), "be not returned to his home in Illinois." 
 
 156

 
 **> 
 
 
 ft
 
 >^s