“You can have anything you want if you want it badly enough. You can be anything you want to be, do anything you set out to accomplish if you hold to that desire with singleness of purpose.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“To remain as I am is impossible; I must die or be better, it appears to me.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us
from the support of a cause we believe to be just.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Abraham Lincoln was asked by an aide about the church service he had attended. Lincoln responded that the minister was inspired, interesting, well-prepared, eloquent and the topic relevant. The aide said, “Then it was a good service?”
Lincoln responded, “No.” The aide protested,
“But, Mr. President, you said that the minister was inspired, interesting, well-prepared, eloquent, and that the topic was relevant.”
“Yes,” replied Lincoln, “but he didn’t challenge us to do any great thing.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The greatest fine art of the future will be the making of a comfortable living from a small piece of land.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Folks are usually about as happy as they make their minds up to be.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“It will not do to investigate the subject of religion too closely, as it is apt to lead to infidelity.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“If this country is ever demoralized, it will come from trying to live without work.”
―
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
“With educated people, I suppose, punctuation is a matter of rule; with me it is a matter of feeling. But I must say I have a great respect for the semicolin; it's a useful little chap”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“The better part of one's life consists of his friendships.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
“Fourscore 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.”
―
Abraham Lincoln
