“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“As a nation, we began by declaring that 'all men are created equal.' We now practically read it 'all men are created equal, except negroes.' When the Know-Nothings get control, it will read 'all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and Catholics.' When it comes to this I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty – to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Believing everyone is dangerous, but believing nobody is more dangerous.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“A capacity, and taste, for reading, gives access to whatever has already been discovered by others. It is the key, or one of the keys, to the already solved problems. And not only so. It gives a relish, and facility, for successfully pursuing the [yet] unsolved ones.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I would rather be a little nobody, then to be a evil somebody.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Those who look for the bad in people will surely find it.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Let me not be understood as saying that there are no bad laws, nor that grievances may not arise for the redress of which no legal provisions have been made. I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say that although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still, while they continue in force, for the sake of example they should be religiously observed.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I care not for a man's religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“You may deceive all the people part of the time, and part of the people all the time, but not all the people all the time.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Tact: the ability to describe others as they see themselves.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation is the philosophy of government in the next.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
