“I do the very best I know how—the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me won’t amount to anything.
If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“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.”
―
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
“Get books, sit yourself down anywhere, and go to reading them yourself.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The written word may be man's greatest invention. It allows us to
converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Towering genius distains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“To remain as I am is impossible; I must die or be better, it appears to me.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“You cannot build character and courage by taking away people's initiative and independence”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I know of nothing so pleasant to the mind, as the discovery of anything which is at once new and valuable--nothing which so lightens and sweetens toil, as the hopeful pursuit of such discovery.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“If any man ceases to attack me, I never remember the past against him.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Executive Mansion,
Washington, Nov. 21, 1864.
Dear Madam,--
I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.
I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save.
I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Republicans are for both the man and the dollar, but in case of conflict the man before the dollar.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The inclination to share thoughts with one another is probably an original impulse of our nature.If in pain I wish to let you know it,and ask your sympathy and assistance;and my pleasurable emotions also,I wish to communicate to,and share with you.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
