“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”

“. . . 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. - President Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg address, November 19, 1863”

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

“The greatest fine art of the future will be the making of a comfortable living from a small piece of land.”

“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.”

“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.”

“Republicans are for both the man and the dollar, but in case of conflict the man before the dollar.”

“If there is anything that links the human to the divine, it is the courage to stand by a principle when everybody else rejects it.”

“Commitment is what transforms a promise into reality.”

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

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

“The best thing a man can do for his children is love their mother.”

“What is to be, will be, and no prayers of ours can arrest the decree.

“To remain as I am is impossible; I must die or be better, it appears to me.”

“The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.”