“I would just as soon die now, but I haven't done anything yet to be remembered by”
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Abraham Lincoln
“A drop of honey gathers more flies than a gallon of gall.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“I am in favor of animal rights as well as human rights. That is the way of a whole human being.”
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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.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“Those who write clearly have readers, those who write obscurely have commentators.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“There has never been but one question in all civilization-how to keep a few men from saying to many men: You work and earn bread and we will eat it.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“I now leave, not knowing when or whether I may return, to a task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington. Without the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With that assistance, I cannot fail. Trusting in Him, who can go with me, and remain with you and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“Military glory--that attractive rainbow, that rises in showers of blood--that serpent's eye, that charms to destroy...”
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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.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“These [the armed forces] are not our reliance against a resumption of tyranny in our fair land. All of them may be turned against our liberties, without making us stronger or weaker for the struggle. Our reliance is in the love of liberty which God has planted in our bosoms. Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands, every where.... Familiarize yourselves with the chains of bondage, and you are preparing your own limbs to wear them. Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises.”
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Abraham Lincoln
“I have seen your dispatch expressing your unwillingness to break your hold where you are. Neither am I willing. Hold on with a bulldog grip, and chew and choke...”
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Abraham Lincoln
“The Bible is not my book nor Christianity my profession. I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian dogma.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
