1,780 Quotes by Abraham Lincoln

I do not doubt that our country will finally come through safe and undivided. But do not misunderstand me... I do not rely on the patriotism of our people... the bravery and devotion of the boys in blue... (or) the loyalty and skill of our generals... But the God of our fathers, Who raised up this country to be the refuge and asylum of the oppressed and downtrodden of all nations, will not let it perish now. I may not live to see it... I do not expect to see it, but God will bring us through safe.

The struggle of today is not altogether for today - it is for a vast future also.

Character is the tree, reputation is the shadow.

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

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 so nobly advanced.

We must free the slaves or be ourselves subdued.

I then thought him one of the most diffident and worst plagued men I ever saw.

Do not destroy that immortal emblem of humanity, the Declaration of Independence.

Slavery is founded on the selfishness of man's nature - opposition to it on his love of justice. These principles are in eternal antagonism; and when brought into collision so fiercely as slavery extension brings them, shocks and throes and convulsions must ceaselessly follow.