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Abraham Lincoln Quotes

1809–1865 United States

Abraham Lincoln (12 February 1809 – 15 April 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Initially entering politics as a Whig, he became a member of the US congress from Illinois, and later the first Republican president, leading Union forces throughout the moral, constitutional, political and military crises of the American Civil War, during which he abolished slavery and strengthened the U.S. government.

United States
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Also known as: Abe Lincoln, Abraham lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln, Abraham, The Gettysburg Address

Random Abraham Lincoln quote

351 quotes

I intend no modification of my oft-expressed wish that all men everywhere could be free.

The way for a young man to rise, is to improve himself every way he can, never suspecting that any body wishes to hinder him.

In all that the people can individually do as well for themselves, government ought not to interfere.

If what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth.

I am for those means which will give the greatest good to the greatest number.

The Lord prefers common-looking people. That is why he made so many of them.

God made man and placed good and evil before him, allowing him to choose for himself, being responsible for the choice he should make.

Speech at Peoria, Illinois (1854)

Familiarize yourselves with the chains of bondage and you are preparing your own limbs to wear them.

Without slavery the rebellion could never have existed; without slavery it could not continue.

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

Included in Portrait-Life of Lincoln (1910)

What is to be, will be, and no prayers of ours can arrest the decree.

One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be extended, while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be extended. This is the only substantial dispute.

Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another; but let him labor diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built.

Allow all the governed an equal voice in the government, and that, and that only, is self-government.

It is the same spirit that says, "You toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it."

Lincoln–Douglas debates (1858)

When Southern people tell us they are no more responsible for the origin of slavery than we are, I acknowledge the fact.

Speech at Peoria, Illinois (1854)

Did Stanton say I was a damned fool? Then I dare say I must be one, for Stanton is generally right and he always says what he means.

Sir; You are directed to have a transport.. sent to the colored colony of San Domingo to bring back to this country such of the colonists there as desire to return.

But in a large sense we cannot dedicate, 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.

I leave you, hoping that the lamp of liberty will burn in your bosoms until there shall no longer be a doubt that all men are created free and equal.

Speech at Chicago (1858)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Abraham Lincoln (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.