“In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it." I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearth-stone, 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.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Force is all conquering, but it's victories are short lived.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“To believe in the things you can see and touch is no belief at all - but to believe in the unseen is a triumph and a blessing.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“No man who is resolved to make the most of himself can spare time for personal contention.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. It is not the Constitution as I would like to have it, but as it is, that is to be defended. The Constitution will not be preserved & defended until it is enforced & obeyed in every part of every one of the United States. It must be so respected, obeyed, enforced and defended, and let the grass grow where it may.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Military glory--that attractive rainbow, that rises in showers of blood--that serpent's eye, that charms to destroy...”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Never do anything for anyone who can just as well do it themself”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“A woman is the only thing I am afraid of that I know will not hurt me.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“No matter how much the cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens. ”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“People who like this sort of thing will find this the sort of thing they like.
―
Abraham Lincoln
“It is not best to swap horses while crossing the river.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to 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, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
