Category: Quote of the Day

A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half-slave and half-free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved – I do not expect the house to fall – but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the… Continue reading Quote of the Day 2jul

A fair examination of history has seemed to authorize a belief that the past action and influences of the United States were generally regarded as having been beneficent towards mankind.”– Letter to the Workingmen of Manchester, England, January 19, 1863

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 defence.”– Temperance Address, February 22, 1842

Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I hope it will come soon, and come to stay; and so come as to be worth the keeping in all future time.”– Letter to James Conkling, August 26, 1863

Property is the fruit of labor – property is desirable – is a positive good in the world.– Reply to New York Workingmen’s Democratic Republican Association, March 21, 1864

Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently he who molds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions.”– Lincoln-Douglas Debate at Ottawa, August 21, 1858

Resolve to be honest at all events; and if your own judgment you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer.”– Notes for a Law Lecture, circa July 1, 1850

Slavery is founded in the selfishness of man’s nature – opposition to it in his love of justice.”– Speech at Peoria, Illinois, October 16, 1854

Stand with anybody that stands RIGHT. Stand with him while he is right and PART with him when he goes wrong.”– Speech at Peoria, Illinois, October 16, 1854

Tell him, when he starts, to put it through – not to be writing or telegraphing back here, but put it through.”– Letter to Secretary of War Simon Cameron, June 20, 1861