ABRAHAM LINCOLN QUOTES V
U.S. President (1809-1865)
If the Republicans, who think slavery is wrong, get possession of the general government, we may not root out the evil at once, but may at least prevent its extension. If I find a venomous snake lying on the open praire, I seize the first stick and kill him at once. But if that snake is in bed with my children, I must be more cautious. I shall, in striking the snake, also strike the children, or arouse the reptile to bite the children. Slavery is the venomous snake in bed with the children. But if the question is whether to kill it on the prairie or put it in bed with other children, I think we'd kill it!
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
"Speech at Hartford", Evening Press, March 5, 1860
If you intend to go to work, there is no better place than right where you are; if you do not intend to go to work, you cannot get along anywhere. Squirming and crawling about from place to place can do no good.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
letter to John D. Johnston, November 4, 1851
Military glory -- that attractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech in opposition to the Mexican-American War, January 12, 1848
The man does not live who is more devoted to peace than I am, none who would do more to preserve it, but it may be necessary to put the foot down firmly.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech, February 21, 1861
In law it is a good policy never to plead what you need not, lest you oblige yourself to prove what you cannot.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
letter to Usher F. Linder, February 20, 1848
It follows as a matter of course that a half-hour answer to a speech of an hour and a half can be but a very hurried one.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
debate with Stephen Douglas, September 18, 1858
On my return from Philadelphia, yesterday, where, in my anxiety I had been led to attend the whig convention, I found your last letter. I was so tired and sleepy, having ridden all night, that I could not answer it till today; and now I have to do so in the H. R. The leading matter in your letter, is your wish to return to the side of the mountains. Will you be a good girl in all things, if I consent? Then come along, and that as soon as possible. Having got the idea in my head, I shall be impatient till I see you.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
letter to his wife, June 12, 1848
The judge has alluded to the Declaration of Independence, and insisted that negroes are not included in that Declaration; and that it is a slander upon the framers of that instrument to suppose that negroes were meant therein; and he asks you: Is it possible to believe that Mr. Jefferson, who penned the immortal paper, could have supposed himself applying the language of that instrument to the negro race, and yet held a portion of that race in slavery? Would he not at once have freed them? I only have to remark upon this part of the judge's speech (and that, too, very briefly, for I shall not detain myself, or you, upon that point for any great length of time), that I believe the entire records of the world, from the date of the Declaration of Independence up to within three years ago, may be searched in vain for one single affirmation, from one single man, that the negro was not included in the Declaration of Independence; I think I may defy Judge Douglas to show that he ever said so, that Washington ever said so, that any President ever said so, that any member of Congress ever said so, or that any living man upon the whole earth ever said so, until the necessities of the present policy of the Democratic party in regard to slavery had to invent that affirmation. And I will remind Judge Douglas and this audience that while Mr. Jefferson was the owner of slaves, as undoubtedly he was, in speaking upon this very subject, he used the strong language that "he trembled for his country when he remembered that God was just."
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
debate with Stephen Douglas, October 7, 1858
These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech to Illinois legislature, Sangamo Journal, January 28, 1837
Without the assistance of that Divine Being ... I cannot succeed. With that assistance, I cannot fail.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech, February 11, 1861
I believe I shall never be old enough to speak without embarrassment when I have nothing to talk about.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
response to a serenade, December 6, 1864
Passion has helped us; but can do so no more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason, cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials for our future support and defense.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
address to the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois, January 27, 1838
You say men ought to be hung for the way they are executing the law; I say the way it is being executed is quite as good as any of its antecedents. It is being executed in the precise way which was intended from the first, else why does no Nebraska man express astonishment or condemnation? Poor Reeder is the only public man who has been silly enough to believe that anything like fairness was ever intended, and he has been bravely undeceived.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
letter to Joshua F. Speed, August 22, 1855
Many free countries have lost their liberty, and ours may lose hers; but, if she shall, be it my proudest plume, not that I was the last to desert, but that I never deserted her.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
speech to the Sub-Treasury, Sangamon Journal, March 6, 1840
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves -- in their separate, and individual capacities. In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
fragment of a speech from July 1, 1854, Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln
We cannot escape history.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
annual message, December 1, 1862
It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
attributed, The Wit & Wisdom of Abraham Lincoln
I do not believe it is a constitutional right to hold slaves in a Territory of the United States. I believe the decision was improperly made, and I go for reversing it.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
debate with Stephen Douglas, October 15, 1858
Free labor has the inspiration of hope; pure slavery has no hope. The power of hope upon human exertion, and happiness, is wonderful. The slave-master himself has a conception of it; and hence the system of tasks among slaves. The slave whom you can not drive with the lash to break seventy-five pounds of hemp in a day, if you will task him to break a hundred, and promise him pay for all he does over, he will break you a hundred and fifty. You have substituted hope, for the rod. And yet perhaps it does not occur to you, that to the extent of your gain in the case, you have given up the slave system, and adopted the free system of labor.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN
fragmentary manuscript of a speech on free labor, September 17, 1859?
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
First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861