“It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, "You toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it." No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world...enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“In this age, in this country, public sentiment is everything. With it, nothing can fail; against it, nothing can succeed. Whoever molds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes, or pronounces judicial decisions.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The hen is the wisest of all the animal creation, because she never cackles until the egg is laid.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend it." I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. 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
“You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I shall adopt new Muse as fast as they appear to be true Muse.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Laughter can be used to sooth the mind and get rid of those awful thoughts.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“If my father's son can become President of these United States, then your father's son can become anything he wishes.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“I would just as soon die now, but I haven't done anything yet to be remembered by”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Believing everyone is dangerous, but believing nobody is more dangerous.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“We should be too big to take offense and too noble to give it.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
