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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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Politicians

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

Random Abraham Lincoln quote

351 quotes

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.

The House Divided speech (1858)

The little advance I now have upon this store of education, I have picked up from time to time under the pressure of necessity.

Autobiographical Sketch Written for Jesse W. Fell (1859)

Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world?

You think slavery is right and should be extended; while we think slavery is wrong and ought to be restricted. That I suppose is the rub. It certainly is the only substantial difference between us.

Letter to Alexander H. Stephens (1860)

No, leave it as a monument.

Tour of Richmond (1865)

The negative principle that no law is free law, is not much known except among lawyers.

Speech at Peoria, Illinois (1854)

Let us have faith that Right makes Might, and in that faith let us to the end dare to do our duty as we understand it.

The proposition that there is a struggle between the white man and the negro contains a falsehood. There is no struggle.

Speech at Hartford (1860)

An inspection of the Constitution will show that the right of property in a slave is not "distinctly and expressly affirmed" in it.

Cooper Union speech (1860)

If slavery is right, all words, acts, laws, and constitutions against it, are themselves wrong, and should be silenced, and swept away.

Cooper Union speech (1860)

Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.

Perhaps a man's character was like a tree, and his reputation like its shadow; the shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

The nation is worth fighting for.

I can see how it might be possible for a man to look down upon the earth and be an atheist, but I cannot conceive how he could look up into the heavens and say there is no God.

In your hands, my dissatisfied countrymen, and not in mine is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without yourselves being the aggressors.

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to the light I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right — stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong.

We can succeed only by concert. It is not "Can any of us imagine better?" but "Can we all do better?"

Christianity is not my religion and the Bible is not my book. I could never give assent to the long complicated statements of doctrine and dogma.

You can have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the Government; while I shall have the most solemn one to "preserve, protect, and defend" it.

Attribution

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