“I am slow to learn and slow to forget that which I have learned. My mind is like a piece of steel, very hard to scratch any thing on it and almost impossible after you get it there to rub it out.”

“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.”

“A friend is one who has the same enemies as you have.”

“I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. --February 22, 1861”

“No man who is resolved to make the most of himself can spare time for personal contention.”

“I don't like that man. I must get to know him better.”

“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.” 

“I will prepare and some day my chance will come.”

“My concern is not whether God is on our side; my greatest concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.”

“Rules of living Don't worry, eat three square meals a day,say your prayers, be courteous to your creditors, keep your digestion good,steer clear of biliousness,exercise, go slow and go easy. May be there are other things that your special case requires to make you happy, but my friend, these, i reckon, will give you a good life.”

“Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.”

“Force is all conquering, but it's victories are short lived.”

“Nothing will divert me from my purpose.”

“I would just as soon die now, but I haven't done anything yet to be remembered by”

“My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.”