Abraham Lincoln quotes (65):
It is said an eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him with the words, 'And this, too, shall pass away.' How much it expresses How chastening in the hour of pride How consoling in the depths of affliction
You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.
You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.
All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother.
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearth-stone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Lets have faith that right makes might and in that faith let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.
...Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.
I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can excercise their constitutional right of amending it, or excercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.
As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.
If there is anything that a man can do well, I say let him do it. Give him a chance.
I remember my mother's prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.
People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.
If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem. You may fool all of the people some of the time you can even fool some of the people all the time but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.
If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business.
My father taught me to work he did not teach me to love it.
The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just.
I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end, when I come to lay down the reins of power, I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside me.
With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die.
I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom, and that of all about me seemed insufficient for the day.
It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words And this, too, shall pass away.
Whatever you are, be a good one.
I believe, if we take habitual drunkards as a class, their heads and their hearts will bear an advantageous comparison with those of any other class. There seems ever to have been a proneness in the brilliant and warm-blooded to fall into this vice.
Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any one thing.
Whenever I hear anyone arguing for slavery, I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.
'Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.
I believe it is an established maxim in morals that he who makes an assertion without knowing whether it is true or false is guilty of falsehood, and the accidental truth of the assertion does not justify or excuse him.
Find out what whiskey he drinks and send all of my generals a case, if it will get the same results. - in reply to comments about General Grant's drinking problems
No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.
Corporations have been enthroned .... An era of corruption in high places will follow and the money power will endeavor to prolong its reign by working on the prejudices of the people... until wealth is aggregated in a few hands ... and the Republic is destroyed.
Hypocrite The man who murdered his parents, and then pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan.
With the catching end the pleasures of the chase.
I don't know who my grandfather was I am much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.
He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal...We here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one
Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them
The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend.
The better part of one's life consists of his friendships.
If I had eight hours to chop down a tree, I'd spend six sharpening my axe.
All my life I have tried to pluck a thistle and plant a flower wherever the flower would grow in thought and mind.
And in the end it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.
It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.
I will study and get ready, and perhaps my chance will come.
If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend.
If this is coffee, please bring me some tea but if this is tea, please bring me some coffee.
I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crises. The great point is to bring them the real facts.
