Abraham Lincoln Quotes - 65 quotes

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) was the 16th President of the United States. He served from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln rose from humble beginnings to become a self-taught lawyer and politician. He is best known for leading the country during the American Civil War. He worked to end ... show more

 A compass I learned when I was surveying, it’ll, it’ll point you true north from where you’re standing. But it’s got no advice about the swamps, deserts, and chasms that you’ll encounter along the way. If in pursuit of your destination you plunge ahead headless of obstacles and achieve nothing more than to sink into a swamp? What’s the use in knowing true north?
- Abraham Lincoln
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 If the negro is a man, why then my ancient faith teaches me that `all men are created equal;' and that there can be no moral right in connection with one man's making a slave of another.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 ...let every man remember that to violate the law is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the charter of his own and his children's liberty.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Let reverence for the laws be breathed by every American mother to the lisping babe that prattles on her lap; let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in primers, spelling-books, and in almanacs; let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 When I so pressingly urge a strict observance of all the laws, let me not be understood as saying there are no bad laws, or that grievances may not arise for the redress of which no legal provisions have been made. I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say that although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still, while they continue in force, for the sake of example they should be religiously observed.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 There is no grievance that is a fit object of redress by mob law.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 We hope all danger may be overcome; but to conclude that no danger may ever arise would itself be extremely dangerous.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 That our government should have been maintained in its original form from its establishment until now, is not much to be wondered at. It had many props to support it through that period, which now are decayed, and crumbled away. Through that period, it was felt by all, to be an undecided experiment; now, it is understood to be a successful one.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 It is to deny, what the history of the world tells us is true, to suppose that men of ambition and talents will not continue to spring up amongst us. And, when they do, they will as naturally seek the gratification of their ruling passion, as others have so done before them.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 And thus, from the force of circumstances, the basest principles of our nature, were either made to lie dormant, or to become the active agents in the advancement of the noblest cause — that of establishing and maintaining civil and religious liberty.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 ...what invading foeman could never do, the silent artillery of time has done...

- Abraham Lincoln

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 They were pillars of the temple of liberty; and now that they have crumbled away that temple must fall unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars, hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 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.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart, which, say what you will, is the great high-road to his reason, and which when once gained, you will find but little trouble in convincing his judgment of the justice of your cause.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Better give your path to a dog than be bitten by him in contesting for the right. Even killing the dog would not cure the bite.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free...

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world...enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I want it said of me by those who knew me best that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.

- Abraham Lincoln

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

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Quarrel not at all. No man resolved to make the most of himself can spare time for personal contention. Still less can he afford to take all the consequences, including the vitiating of his temper and loss of self control.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 The hen is the wisest of all the animal creation because she never cackles until after the egg has been laid.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I do not mean to say, that the scenes of the revolution are now or ever will be entirely forgotten; but that like every thing else, they must fade upon the memory of the world, and grow more and more dim by the lapse of time.... At the close of the struggle, nearly every adult male had been a participator in some of its scenes. The consequence was, that of those scenes, in the form of a husband, a father, a son or a brother, a living history was to be found in every family.... But those histories are gone.  They can be read no more forever. They were a fortress of strength; but, what invading foemen could never do, the silent artillery of time has done; the leveling of its walls

- Abraham Lincoln

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 "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 other.”

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Let no feeling of discouragement prey upon you, and in the end you are sure to succeed.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men’s labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatable things, called by the same name—liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names—liberty and tyranny. The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as a liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty, especially as the sheep was a black one. Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of the word liberty;

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Prohibition will work great injury to the cause of temperance. It is a species of intemperance within itself, for it goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes. A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our nation was founded.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Whether or not the world would be vastly benefited by a total banishment from it of all intoxicating drinks seems now not an open question. Three-fourths of mankind confess the affirmative with their tongues, and I believe all the rest acknowledge it in their hearts.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition. Whether it be true or not, I can say, for one, that I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow-men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I have now come to the conclusion never again to think of marrying, and for this reason; I can never be satisfied with anyone who would be blockhead enough to have me.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 We, when mounting the stage of existence, found ourselves the legal inheritors of these fundamental blessings. We toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of them; they are a legacy bequeathed us by a once hardy, brave, and patriotic, but now lamented and departed, race of ancestors.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 At what point shall we expect the approach of danger? By what means shall we fortify against it? — Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant, to step the Ocean, and crush us at a blow? Never! — All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest; with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force, take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I hope I am over wary; but if I am not, there is, even now, something of ill-omen, amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country; the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions, in lieu of the sober judgment of Courts; and the worse than savage mobs, for the executive ministers of justice.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 When men take it in their heads to-day, to hang gamblers, or burn murderers, they should recollect, that, in the confusion usually attending such transactions, they will be as likely to hang or burn some one who is neither a gambler nor a murderer as one who is; and that, acting upon the example they set, the mob of to-morrow, may, and probably will, hang or burn some of them by the very same mistake.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Thus, then, by the operation of this mobocratic spirit which all must admit is now abroad in the land, the strongest bulwark of any government, and particularly of those constituted like ours, may effectually be broken down and destroyed...

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Whenever this effect shall be produced among us; whenever the vicious portion of population shall be permitted to gather in bands of hundreds and thousands, and burn churches, ravage and rob provision stores, throw printing-presses into rivers, shoot editors, and hang and burn obnoxious persons at pleasure and with impunity, depend upon it, this government cannot last. By such things the feelings of the best citizens will become more or less alienated from it, and thus it will be left without friends, or with too few, and those few too weak to make their friendship effectual.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I care not if God is on my side; my constant hope and prayer is that I may be found on the Lord's side.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 "It's not me who can't keep a secret. It's the people I tell that can't." ~Abraham Lincoln

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Common-looking people are the best in the world; that is the reason the Lord makes so many of them.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 I do not think much of a man who does not know more today than he did yesterday.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot establish security on borrowed money.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 The problem with internet quotes is that you cant always depend on their accuracy

- Abraham Lincoln

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 The problem with internet quotes is that you can't always depend on their accuracy.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Force is all-conquering, but its victories are short-lived.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Resolove to be honest in all events; and if in your own judgement you cannot be an honest lawyer, resolve to be honest without being a lawyer.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 A drop of honey will catch more flies than a gallon of gall. So with men. If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Writing, the art of communicating thoughts to the mind through the eye, is the great invention of the world...enabling us to converse with the dead, the absent, and the unborn, at all distances of time and space. — Abraham Lincoln

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter, and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.

- Abraham Lincoln

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  "It's not me who can't keep a secret. It's the people I tell that can't." ~Abraham Lincoln

- Abraham Lincoln

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 If the end brings me out all right, what's said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.

- Abraham Lincoln

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 You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.

- Abraham Lincoln

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