,libraries47 ,,abraham ,,lincoln',s ,,cardinal ,,traits ,a ,,study ,,in ,,ethics ,,with ,,an ,,epilogue ,,addressed ,,to ,,theologians ,,by ,c4 ,s4 ,,beardslee ,,boston3 ,,richard ,g4 ,,badger ,,the ,,gorham ,,press ,,the ,,copp ,,clark ,,co41 ,,limited ,,toronto ,copyright #aiad1 by ,c4 ,s4 ,beardslee ,all rights reserved ,the ,gorham ,press1 ,boston1 ,u4 ,s4 ,a4 ,to my sister ,alice-- ,a living blend ,of love and loyalty1 ,of modesty and immortal hope4 ,,preface ,abraham ,lincoln was a man among men4 ,he was earnest and keen4 ,he was honest and kind4 ,he was humble and inwardly refined4 ,he was a freeman in very deed4 ,his conscience was king4 ,these few words contain the total sum of the following book4 ,in unfolding what they severally mean1 and what their living unison implies1 the aim has been to bring to view the clear and simple beauty of a noble personality2 to show how such a human life contains the final test of any proper claim in all the bounds of ,ethical research2 and to stir in thoughtful minds the query whether such a character as ,lincoln's life displays1 instinct as it is with ,godliness1 may not yield forms of statement ample and exact enough for all the essential formulas of pure ,religion4 ,assuredly his aspirations were ideal4 ,quite as certainly his ways with men were practical4 ,the call and need today of just his qualities are past debate4 ,if only in our national senate chamber the ever-shifting group of senators could hear the voice of ,lincoln at every roll-call and in each debate6 ,if only in all our universities our studious youth could glean each day from ,lincoln1 as he speaks of politics and of logic1 of ethics and of history6 ,if only in every editorial room1 where current events are registered and reviewed1 ,lincoln's wit and wisdom might illumine and advise6 ,if only at every council1 conference1 or convention1 where leaders of our churches debate religious themes1 the reverence of ,lincoln might preside6 ,if only in the council chambers where directors meet to plan and govern our modern enterprises in industry and finance1 ,lincoln's broad humaneness might be felt6 ,if only every artist at his exalted and elusive task could every day obtain new views of ,lincoln's full nobility6 ,if only toilers in the shop and field could feel each day the friendly brotherhood in ,lincoln's rough1 hard hand6 ,then toil1 while losing naught of eagerness1 would become content4 ,art1 while losing naught of beauty1 would become unfailingly ennobling4 ,commerce1 while losing naught of enterprise1 would grow benign4 ,religion1 while retaining a becoming dignity1 would not fail to be sincere4 ,the public press would grow more savory and sane4 ,our schools would be nurseries of manliness4 ,and our conscience would be embodied in our law4 ,but ,lincoln's face is vanished4 ,lincoln's voice is hushed4 ,what remains is that ,lincoln's sentiments be republished every day in lives that reverence and reproduce his excellence4 ,to indicate this path1 to embolden and embody this aspiration is the service this volume undertakes4 ,throughout this study1 thought is fastened centrally upon ,lincoln's last inaugural address4 ,there ,lincoln stands complete4 ,and that completeness is vividly conscious in ,lincoln's own understanding4 ,eleven days after its delivery1 and one month before his death1 he wrote to ,thurlow ,weed1 saying that he expected that speech to wear as well as--perhaps better than--anything ,i have produced4 ,of almost incredible brevity1 containing as it left his hands1 but five short paragraphs1 the compass and burden of thought within that address are every way notable4 ,it is in fact ,lincoln's digest of the course and trend of our national life2 while on the side of character it is replete with telling intimations of ,lincoln's own moral effort1 purpose1 and point of view4 ,here are in visible action all the elements of essential manhood1 all the virtues of a balanced character4 ,here are insight1 judgment1 resolution4 ,here is momentum4 ,here is something that endures4 ,here are ends worth any cost4 ,here is wariest use of means4 ,and here are wrongs1 engendering anguish1 and mortal strife4 ,and here are ultimate alternatives4 ,and all is grasped and even merged in ,lincoln as he speaks4 ,here is wealth of ready matter and direct allusion quite enough for any volume to lay open and assess4 ,such a moral inventory and evaluation this study undertakes4 ,its method is to subject this short address to the strictest ethical analysis1 to identify the elements that are integral and cardinal in the moral being of ,god1 and man1 and government4 ,then1 to articulate and unify these elements into a vital ethical synthesis1 to demonstrate and manifest the living unison of character4 ,then1 to designate and undertake to clarify the major problems which such an analysis and such a synthesis of such a speech and such a man open to a student's mind4 ,in this procedure it is the aim to show how from first to last in ,lincoln's life his mental clarity and his moral honesty are held in model parity2 how in his daily walk law and liberty go hand in hand2 how his cardinal moral qualities are to be defined2 and how these elemental virtues may avail in their own authority and right to guide the eyes of men towards beauty1 to guard the souls of men against despair1 to find the stable base of government1 to overcome all guilt by grace1 to prove the perfect manliness of patience1 to ground the thought of men upon reality1 to pierce the gloom of woe1 to find the core of piety1 to perfect persuasive speech1 and to win a vision of the soul4 ,hereby and thus it may at last stand plain that in the soul of ,lincoln there is a moral universe2 and that within the verities and mysteries of this universe he alone is truly wise and fully free who knows and proves the worth of faith4 ,that so broad a study should be based upon so brief a speech1 or indeed upon ,lincoln's single personality1 may seem to some a fatal fault4 ,such a thought1 when facing such a method and such a theme1 is surely natural4 ,as to its validity there need be no debate4 ,the field is free4 ,let any number of other speeches1 or of other people be assembled and placed beside the material handled in this book1 for its re-examination4 ,in such a process1 the further it is pursued1 if only ,lincoln and the words of this inaugural are also held in thorough and continual review1 it may come the more fully clear that in a theme like ethics mere multitude is not the measure of immensity2 that the structure of this book is organic1 not mechanical2 that the single chapter on ,lincoln's ,moral ,unison comprehends all that the volume anywhere contains or intimates2 that all the problems handled in ,part ,,iv are only sample studies1 and handled only suggestively2 that the volume might be expanded indefinitely or much reduced1 and its significance remain in either case unchanged2 that correspondingly ,lincoln's last inaugural and ,lincoln's public life1 each and both1 outline in very deed a moral universe2 that to rightly understand this single character and this one address is to understand humanity1 and identify the ethical finalities2 that to scan the soul of ,lincoln in his religious attitudes is to gaze upon ,god's image1 and face the reality and the rationale of the true religious life2 and that1 in consequence1 any reader who hesitates to venture such vast conclusions upon so scant material may finally be induced to submit to a substantial remeasurement his present estimates of brevity and breadth4 ,,contents ,,part ,i4 ,,introduction ,lincoln's ,mental ,energy ,lincoln's ,moral ,earnestness ,,part ,,ii4 ,,analysis ,his ,reverence for ,law--,conscience ,his ,jealousy for ,liberty--,free-will ,his ,kindliness--,love ,his ,pureness--,life ,the ,cardinal ,virtues ,his ,constancy--,truth ,his ,humility--,worth ,,part ,,iii4 ,,synthesis ,lincoln's ,moral ,unison ,,part ,,iv4 ,,studies ,his ,symmetry--,the ,problem of ,beauty ,his ,composure--,the ,problem of ,pessimism ,his ,authority--,the ,problem of ,government ,his ,versatility--,the ,problem of ,mercy ,his ,patience--,the ,problem of ,meekness ,his ,rise from ,poverty--,the ,problem of ,industrialism ,his ,philosophy--,the ,problem of ,reality ,his ,theodicy--,the ,problem of ,evil ,his ,piety--,the ,problem of ,religion ,his ,logic--,the ,problem of ,persuasion ,his ,personality--,the ,problem of ,psychology ,,part ,v4 ,,conclusion ,lincoln's ,character ,lincoln's ,preference ,,an ,,epilogue--,addressed to ,theologians ,,last ,,inaugural ,,address ,,lincoln',s ,,cardinal ,,traits ,,part ,i4 ,,introduction ,,lincoln',s ,,mental ,,energy ,in ethics1 if anywhere1 a master needs to be mentally sane and strong4 ,truth cannot be trifled with here4 ,error here1 whether in judgment or as to fact1 is fatal4 ,insight to exactly discern1 and balance to considerately compare must be the mental instincts of a moralist4 ,how was this with ,lincoln8 ,what was his outfit and what his discipline mentally8 ,was he unfailingly shrewd8 ,was he sufficiently sage8 ,was he by instinct and by habit truly an explorer and a philosopher8 ,did he have in store1 and did he have in hand1 the needful wealth of pertinent facts8 ,had he the logical strength and breadth to set them all in order and to see them all as one8 ,such inquiries are severe--too severe to be pressed or faced by anyone in haste4 ,but in this study of ,lincoln such inquiries are not to be escaped4 ,to fairly answer them is worth to any man the toil of many days4 ,for just as surely as such research is resolutely pushed through all its course1 the eye will come to see where wisdom dwells1 and to learn what mental judgment and mental insight truly mean4 ,and it will grow clear as day that ,lincoln mentally1 as well as physically1 was no weakling2 that in intellect1 as in stature1 he stands among the first4 ,in many places this stands clear4 ,there is no better way to trace it out than to start from his last inaugural4 ,to fully explore one single paragraph of this address1 the paragraph with which it opens1 will make one's examination of ,lincoln's mental competence all but complete4 ,its opening sentence alludes to his first inaugural4 ,that one allusion will repay pursuit4 ,there ,lincoln assumed the presidency4 ,in that act and under that oath he stepped to the executive headship of the ,republic4 ,by that step he faced seven states in secession4 ,it was a civil crisis1 never one more grave1 or dark1 or ominous4 ,it threatened to subvert our national history and to undermine our national hope4 ,it was crowding on towards bloody war a debate that dealt with the very basis of manhood in men4 ,to see the meaning of that crisis and to govern its issue required an eye and a mind of ,godlike vision and poise4 ,here is an excellent place to examine the outfit and the action of ,lincoln's intellect4 ,his first inaugural is a masterpiece of intellectual equipoise and energy4 ,any mind that will fasten firmly upon the substance and the sequence of its thought may feel distinctly the struggle1 and the strength1 and the steadiness of ,lincoln's mind4 ,his arguments and his admonitions are impressive models of sanity and power4 ,which is the more notable1 his insight or his outlook1 it is hard to tell4 ,the marvel is that the soberness and the force of his appeal rest quite as firmly upon the prophetic as upon the historic base4 ,so clear is his grasp of the past1 so sure is his sense of the present1 and so deliberate is the poise of his judicial thought that his vision into the future has been found by time to be unerringly true4 ,let any student put this to test4 ,that address is an appeal4 ,from beginning to end it pleads4 ,set all its parts asunder4 ,then bind them all together as ,lincoln has done4 ,and so find out what are its elements2 whence they are gathered2 what is fact2 what is principle2 what is prophecy2 on what plan they are assembled2 by what art they are displayed2 to what they owe their force2 if in any spot of its argument there is a break2 and if the onset of the whole is irresistible4 ,distinct replies to these distinct inquiries will tell one all he needs to know about ,lincoln's mental strength4 ,without wandering any further one can find that ,lincoln's methods and conquests attest a student's patience1 and a scholar's power2 that his wisdom was ripe1 entirely adequate to devise safe counsel for a ,nation in civil strife4 ,a striking feature of the address is its philosophic finish4 ,though solidly set in concrete facts1 and fitted ideally to the day of its delivery1 it is replete with counsel good for every time1 so phrased as to become the very proverbs of civil politics4 ,total paragraphs are little more than clustered apothegms of consummate statesmanship4 ,to get the style and cast of ,lincoln's mind let any student comprehend the girth1 and ponder the weight of each following sentence1 all gathered from this one address3-- ,the intention of the lawgiver is the law4 ,i hold that in contemplation of universal law1 and of the ,constitution1 the ,union of these ,states is perpetual4 ,perpetuity is implied1 if not expressed1 in the fundamental law of all national governments4 ,it is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination4 ,continue to execute all the express provisions of our national ,constitution1 and the ,union will endure forever4 ,can a contract be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who made it8 ,that in legal contemplation the ,union is perpetual is confirmed by the history of the ,union itself4 ,no ,state upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the ,union4 ,think1 if you can1 of a single instance in which a plainly written provision has ever been denied4 ,all the vital rights of minorities and of individuals are so plainly assured to them by affirmations and negations1 guarantees and provisions in the ,constitution1 that controversies never arise concerning them4 ,if the minority will not acquiesce1 the majority must1 or the government must cease4 ,if a minority in such case will secede rather than acquiesce1 they make a precedent which in turn will divide and ruin them4 ,plainly the central idea of secession is the essence of anarchy4 ,a majority1 held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations1 and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments1 is the only true sovereign of a free people4 ,unanimity is impossible4 ,one section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be extended1 while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be extended4 ,this is the only substantial dispute4 ,physically speaking we cannot separate4 ,can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws8 ,can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws among friends8 ,suppose you go to war1 you cannot fight always4 ,this country1 with its institutions1 belongs to the people who inherit it4 ,the chief magistrate derives all his authority from the people4 ,why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people8 ,if the ,almighty ,ruler of nations1 with his eternal truth and justice1 be on your side of the ,north1 or on yours of the ,south1 that truth and that justice will surely prevail by the judgment of this great tribunal of the ,american people4 ,this people have wisely given their public servants but little power for mischief4 ,nothing valuable can be lost by taking time4 ,here are six and twenty sentences1 culled from this one address1 that are nothing less than the maxims of a political sage1 as lasting as they are apt4 ,as a glove fits a hand1 so did these counsels fit that day4 ,as the needle guides all ships that sail1 so their wisdom directs all politics still4 ,they embody sure witness of an eye that is keen to see--none more narrowly2 and of a mind that is trained to think--none more thoroughly4 ,their author was a man who knew4 ,he knew the past4 ,he knew things current4 ,he knew what their coming issues were sure to be4 ,he knew the grounds of government4 ,he knew the omens of anarchy4 ,he knew the awful possibilities in fraternal hate4 ,and he knew the need and the awful cost of patient forbearance4 ,here is a man well past childhood intellectually4 ,he has the eye and the mind of a man long schooled by discipline4 ,and he has a tongue expert in speech1 well freighted with tremendous sense1 but lucid too1 and graceful1 and void of all offense4 ,this one address displays a man1 though pathetically unfamiliar with childhood schools1 of consummate intellectual balance and force4 ,but1 for its cherished end this inaugural proved pathetically incompetent4 ,and when it became his duty to pronounce a second inaugural oath1 the ,nation had been four years in terrible war4 ,that war levied a terrible tax upon the president's intellectual strength4 ,the mental perplexities of those endless days and nights cannot be told4 ,much less can they be understood4 ,it may be doubted whether any other man could have brought a mind to uphold and command those years with any approach to ,lincoln's mental honesty4 ,it was1 under ,god1 within the steadfast1 tenacious grasp of ,lincoln's exhaustless and invincible mental loyalty that our national destiny lay secure4 ,to all the phases of all the problems of all those years1 and to his own judgment and endeavor concerning them all1 this same first paragraph of his second inaugural also alludes4 ,this allusion1 too1 if any one would compass the full measure of ,lincoln's mental strength1 demands review1 and will reward pursuit4 ,the records are well preserved4 ,and they bear abounding witness to ,lincoln's almost superhuman sanity and insight and energy and mental equilibrium4 ,if any one will follow through this honest and perfectly honorable hint1 he will come to feel that the mind of ,lincoln was the ,nation's crucible in which all the ,nation's problems were resolved4 ,,lincoln',s ,,moral ,,earnestness ,in the central paragraph of his last inaugural ,lincoln enshrined compelling demonstration of his moral soundness4 ,that single paragraph is nothing less than a solid section of a finished moral philosophy4 ,it reckons right and wrong incapable of any reconciliation1 ,god as ,almighty ,judge1 and all his judgments just4 ,but that opinion was no word in haste4 ,deliberate as he always was1 when voicing any estimate as ,president1 never was he more deliberate than when penning that moral explanation of the war4 ,in four stern years he had been revolving surveying and pondering that sternest of all debates3--,should the war go on or should it cease8 ,every argument on either side1 that heart or thought of man could feel or see1 had been driven by every sense into the faithful heed of his honest soul4 ,he bent his ear obediently to every plea1 binding his patient mind to register fairly every weighty word1 designing with absolute honesty that1 when at last he spoke the executive decree1 his decision should bind the ,nation for the single perfect reason that it was right4 ,and when finally and persistently he upheld the war and ordered its relentless prosecution to the end1 no one may truthfully charge that opinion and command to ignorance or malice1 to prejudice or haste4 ,moral grounds alone were the basis and motive of that conclusion and behest4 ,the war was caused by slavery4 ,with ,southern success slavery would spread and become perpetual4 ,if slavery was not wrong1 nothing was wrong4 ,that this great wrong should be restrained and in the end removed1 the war must be put through4 ,but that was not all his thought and argument in this last inaugural4 ,the war1 for the time1 parted the ,nation sectionally4 ,but the sin and guilt of slavery1 in ,lincoln's feeling1 rested upon the ,nation as a whole2 and upon the ,nation as a whole he adjudged the burden of its woe4 ,here the moral grandeur of ,lincoln comes fully into view4 ,his affirmation of that awful iniquity1 inwrought in two centuries and a half of slavery1 is no pharisaic indictment of the ,south4 ,it is a repentant confession of his own and all the ,nation's equal part in its infinite wrong4 ,among the guilty authors and abettors of that wrong he identifies himself4 ,he deems the war ,god's righteous judgment upon the national inhumanity1 and meekly bows his head1 among the humblest and most afflicted of those who suffer and sorrow beneath that scourge4 ,that kindly fellowship with all the ,nation in the sorrows of the war1 with its lowly confession of all the guilt1 and its patient endurance of all the atoning cost1 proclaims and demonstrates that ,lincoln's respect for righteousness was supreme4 ,it betokens a living sense of law1 a hearty assent to duty1 a careful reckoning of guilt1 an uncomplaining readiness to own and rectify all wrong1 a manly purpose to inaugurate a new rule of equity1 a reverent acknowledgment of ,god1 an ideal esteem for manhood everywhere1 freedom from the dominion of greed1 friendliness for the erring1 pity for the hurt and poor4 ,above all it shows the faith of a moral seer in its manifest confidence that human evil1 and all its awful sorrow1 are under the joint divine and human control and can be absolutely and joyfully overthrown and done away4 ,here is a type of manhood that1 under the discipline of ,god1 grew sterling to the core1 and by a signal favoring ,providence provided an ample basis for a national moral ideal4 ,here is an ideal where conscience and righteousness stand in close affiance1 where liberty springs from equity1 and where pity never fails4 ,here is a person and a name worthy and able demonstrably to inspire and lead to national triumph a new political league4 ,and here is an official whose spontaneous honesty has left upon all his state papers an indelible moral stamp1 creating thereby out of his official documents a national literature of finished beauty and excellence and power4 ,,part ,,ii4 ,,analysis ,,his ,,reverence ,,for ,,law--,,conscience ,deeply set within the heart of ,lincoln in this last inaugural was his binding sense of right4 ,this obligation was civic4 ,the speech can be described as a statement of what a loyal citizen under confederate law is bound to do1 when his civic loyalty is put to a final test4 ,it is an illustration of obedience facing rebellion4 ,it is an exposition of a confederate's duty1 when confederates secede4 ,it is a civilian's announcement of the law that is singly and surely sovereign1 when the sole alternative in the ,nation's life is dissolution or blood4 ,it is a revelation of the law that still prevails among and above a ,republic of freemen1 when all law is faced by the challenge and defiance of war4 ,here is a supreme exhibit of a solid co-efficient in ,lincoln's character4 ,it shows in a commanding way how moral duty held dominion in his life4 ,he had no predilection for war4 ,that he must face its menace1 or forswear his fealty to his freeman's covenant1 was a pathetic fate4 ,and when in that alternative he upheld his oath and endured the war1 it is past all denial that he was bowing under an inexorable constraint4 ,he was plainly ordering his speech and conduct in submission to an all-commanding1 all-reviewing moral regimen4 ,his will was listening to a moral behest4 ,his judgment was pondering a moral choice4 ,his eye was forecasting a moral award4 ,he was shaping sovereign issues with a sovereign responsibility4 ,this experience and this expression of ,lincoln's life unearths foundations in his character which demand precise examination4 ,what was the nature of the law which held and swayed the soul of ,lincoln with such an overmastering control8 ,whence came its authority8 ,wherein rested its validity8 ,is there record of its origin and authorship8 ,where is it recorded8 ,by whose hand was it transcribed8 ,precisely what are its so imperative terms8 ,in attempting an answer1 one's first impulse is to say that in this address ,lincoln was speaking as citizen and official1 as subject and chief executive of an openly organized civil government1 with written ,constitution and laws2 and that what he was saying in this inaugural address contained and involved no more and no less than those regulations expressed2 that he simply adopted and echoed what they defined and described2 that the sole and only authority he assumed to cite or urge was this well-known published law of the land2 and that in those open records one may find in fullness and precision the full definition of the nature and validity1 the authority and authorship and origin1 the very terms and abiding form of all the moral mandates he here obeyed4 ,in such a statement there is abounding truth4 ,lincoln explicitly shows explicit allegiance in all his political life to the dominion of our national law4 ,he revered our ,constitution4 ,and that the ,constitution should likewise be revered by all was all he gave his life to realize4 ,grounded as that ,constitution was upon our ,american ,bill of ,rights1 acknowledging as it did that all men were created equal1 owning as it openly did the sovereignty of the popular will1 and allowing no other lord1 he found within its reverent and reverend affirmations the dignity1 authority1 and power all-sufficient and supremely valid for him as a fellow-citizen among his fellowmen4 ,but in such a statement something is left unsaid4 ,as one listens through this address to ,lincoln's voice1 he instantly and continuously feels that he is hearing there no mere echo of quoted words4 ,there is in the vibrant tone a note that is original4 ,his voice is his own4 ,his words are of his own selection4 ,his phrases were fashioned by himself4 ,his paragraphs embody the shape and bear the stamp of his peculiar and painstaking invention and argument4 ,in his utterance are the inflection and accent1 the very passion of unforced and independent conviction4 ,he speaks as one who finds within himself1 in some true sense1 the authority for what he says4 ,but not merely are his words valid for himself1 as he shapes his ordered speech4 ,they are irrepressible4 ,his convictions throb with urgency4 ,the constraint to which he bows is enthroned and exercised within4 ,the law he obeys is just as truly a law he ordains4 ,but on either view it is a mandate which he humbly and grandly obeys4 ,it is an imperative to which he yields his life4 ,just here emerges another phase of his amenability to law4 ,it operates as an impulse to plead4 ,it drives him to the rostrum1 and makes of him one of the foremost masters of public address our civic life and history have produced4 ,as ,lincoln voices this address he is speaking not merely to himself1 nor for himself1 nor to ease and unburden his mind1 nor yet to open and indicate his view4 ,as he spoke those words his eye was fixed upon a mighty multitude of his fellowmen4 ,as he unfolded his thought before their attentive1 waiting minds1 it was as though a banner were being unfurled to symbolize and signify to a ,nation's multitudes the sovereign duty of all true patriots4 ,in that transaction he became undeniably prophet and lawgiver to the ,nation4 ,the obligations that supremely bind his life he urges and attests as binding with equal and evident urgency upon the millions upon millions of the members in the same free and solemn political league4 ,when his speech is done1 he would have all who hear conjoined indefeasibly with him in loyalty to his law4 ,every sentence of the address bears evidence of this design4 ,he is aiming to bring the ,nation's conscience and will to embody and obey the identical mandates that govern him4 ,but his appeal is vestured in ideal deference4 ,he deals with law4 ,but he does not command4 ,throughout his solemn exposition there is no note or hint of dictatorship of any sort4 ,not a breath in any accent suggests any undertaking to coerce4 ,he simply strives1 as a man with his friend1 to persuade4 ,and yet as he sets forth his speech1 within the comely apparel of its courteous words gleams the regal form of duty1 imperial offspring of inflexible law4 ,those words were no empty phrasings of indifferent platitudes1 disposed and pronounced to dignify a passing pageant in the formal rounds of our civic life4 ,they trembled with anxiety4 ,he spoke of nothing less than the ,nation's life and death1 the ,nation's duty1 and the ,nation's doom4 ,the honor of the ,republic was being sternly tried1 to see if it was sound or rotten in its very heart4 ,lincoln was dealing with things that all men owned to be above all price4 ,he was striving1 as for life1 to achieve agreement as to duties that should transcend all possible denial4 ,he was trying to fasten upon every ,american conscience constraints that no ,american conscience could possibly escape4 ,here is a cognizance of law and deference before its claims that is curiously composite1 if not complex1 or even innerly contraposed4 ,he acknowledges the written ,constitution to bind all citizens with supreme authority2 and gives his solemn oath to honor1 uphold1 and execute its plain behests4 ,he as plainly betrays the presence within his individual breast of a moral sovereign to which he bows with just as loyal reverence4 ,and before every man with whom he pleads he orders his behavior1 even while he pleads1 as before a throne whose moral majesty he has no right or power to nullify4 ,and yet within the terms embodying such a deference he expounds the genesis and justifies the conduct of a long-drawn civil conflict1 in which his own official decrees can be carried out only by the aid of the death and desolation entailed by war4 ,and when1 despite death-dealing guns and deferential pleas alike1 vast multitudes of men1 even all the captains and armies of the ,south1 despise his arguments and defy his arms1 he continues to urge his convictions and appeals1 and to reinforce his words with war4 ,can such a complex attitude be shown and seen to rest in moral harmony8 ,were his conscience1 and the ,constitution1 and his deference before other men1 and his summons of the land to arms equally and alike compelling morally1 all indeed morally akin8 ,beneath the unsparing gaze of his conscience-searching eye1 under all the awful testing of his loyalty to oath1 in all his patient and persistent pleadings for other men's agreement1 and through all the torture and distress of war1 what explanation and account can be given of any obligation adequate to bind and justify his course8 ,instinct himself with deference1 and averse to any form of tyranny1 how could he so rigidly refuse to yield8 ,prone toward conciliation in every fiber of his life1 how did he inwardly1 how could he openly vindicate his unbending determination to uphold his faith1 and carry through the war8 ,this forces a final and vital inquiry touching the nature of the law that was so regnant and compelling in ,lincoln's personal life2 and that he was struggling here in this address with such consuming desire1 and by the unabetted efficiency of oral appeal1 to implant in other breasts4 ,from ,lincoln's balanced words it stands apparent that the problems bound up in this inquiry beleaguered him on every side4 ,his throbbing syllables1 and the tactics by which his sentences are arranged1 attest impressively that while he was facing problems too profound for human thought to solve1 he was also facing laws that he could not escape1 and dared not disobey4 ,it was not for his kind heart to sanction and encompass such a war1 and stand so solidly against the solid ,south1 while yet behaving with so unfeigned respect for every other man1 except beneath compulsion of a law supremely gentle and invincibly severe4 ,he was plainly viewing some behest too plain to be denied1 too sacred to be disobeyed1 too insistent to be withheld1 and yet too reverend and benign to suffer any champion to be rude--a behest around whose throne hung sanctions1 true to fact1 waiting to adjudge1 certain to descend4 ,in the effort now to trace in the soul of ,lincoln the birth and growth and manly stature of this deep sense of law1 some things stand plain4 ,in this1 his consciousness of sovereign duty and supreme allegiance1 ,lincoln stands entire4 ,in this address will and thought and sentiments combine4 ,he is not swept against his will4 ,what he decides he eagerly desires4 ,and with his will and wish his best intelligence co-operates4 ,if any man essay to overthrow his argument1 he has the total ,lincoln to overturn4 ,determined1 impassioned1 and convinced1 he confronts all men1 whether they be adversaries or friends4 ,in his contention and defense his being is completely unified4 ,he is employing upon his master task his total strength4 ,distressful1 dark and difficult as is his environment and time1 he suffers and ponders and resolves1 with forces undivided1 none reserved4 ,with such convictions1 such desires1 and such determination1 the assurance in his onset was in itself triumphant4 ,upon what foundations now for such unyielding confidence and appeal did ,lincoln take his stand8 ,for ,lincoln's own deliberate reply1 let all men read again1 and then again1 and still again1 this second inaugural address4 ,those words are appareled with a beautiful charity4 ,but from deep within their kindliness resounds the clear1 firm voice of heaven-ordered1 all-prevailing law--a law that comprehends beneath its strong and high dominion the long career of ,american slavery1 defining its sin1 awarding its doom1 and dealing justly with the contending imprecations and the pleading intercessions that strangely voice the deep confusion of embattling hosts4 ,american slavery1 its sin and doom--in his exposition of that dark theme1 ,lincoln gave his exposition of all-compelling law4 ,all men were created equal4 ,the right of all men to liberty is likewise a primitive endowment4 ,upon this one broad base1 and upon no other1 did ,lincoln ever set up any claim to voice for himself1 or for his fellowman1 a civic obligation4 ,to that creative decree can be traced all the civic appeals that ,lincoln ever made4 ,in fixing there the ground of every plea1 he had indomitable assurance of faith that he was defining and declaring for every man an irreducible and ineffaceable moral law4 ,all men were created equal4 ,all men were divinely entitled to be free4 ,that fiat of ,god ,americans had tried and dared to invalidate4 ,its authority it was now the ,almighty's purpose1 by the obedient hand of ,lincoln1 to reinaugurate4 ,its simple terms1 that had forever been indelible1 were now to be made universally legible1 and everywhere visible1 by the obedient consent of all his fellowmen4 ,in all of this the chiefest thing to note is that this same all-commanding moral law is born within4 ,written precepts and published constitutions are but transcriptions4 ,they are not original4 ,they are only copies4 ,not at the tip of a moving pen1 but in our forefathers' reverent and independent hearts1 did our noble ,constitution come to birth4 ,and in the time of ,lincoln it was in ,lincoln's heart that this venerable law was born again4 ,in the heart of ,washington1 in the heart of ,lincoln1 in the heart of every man1 as fashioned and over-shadowed evermore by ,god1 all moral regimen has its stately origin4 ,to this grave oracle1 deep within ,lincoln's ,godlike soul1 did ,lincoln fashion utterance4 ,to this same reverend oracle1 deep-lodged within the ,godlike soul of every listener1 ,lincoln made appeal4 ,here is all the urgency of all his argument4 ,here is the secret of all his confidence4 ,herein alone shines all his moral majesty4 ,something such was ,lincoln's exposition to himself1 and to his time1 of the majesty and mandatory force of civic law4 ,its authority rests in ,god4 ,its validity rests as well in man4 ,it has been written down most nobly in our ,constitution and ,bill of ,rights4 ,its terms spell freedom and equality for all4 ,in the light of our common human sentiments1 kindling within us from heavenly fires1 its printed copies may be easily revised4 ,and while its concrete regulations are far too manifold for any general document to possibly contain1 its dictates are all as concrete and corresponsive to our human civic life as is the heaven-born and reverent human friendliness with which the life of ,lincoln was continually graced4 ,deferring then to future pages all specific analysis and appraisal of the pregnant interior wealth of ,lincoln's sense of moral obligation1 two momentous affirmations touching ,lincoln's reverence for law lie already right at hand4 ,the law he reverenced held high and wide dominion4 ,it shaped and swayed and judged at once and alike both his own and his ,nation's destiny4 ,and its terms were plain4 ,it was no timid1 dusky lamp1 held in trembling hand1 throwing uncertain rays1 and flickering towards extinction4 ,the law that shines in this inaugural is a glowing1 radiant orb1 bringing day when first it dawned1 and shedding still full light of day over all the earth4 ,,his ,,jealousy ,,for ,,liberty--,,free-,,will ,this second inaugural address had its birth in the breast of a man freeborn1 and resolute to remain forever free4 ,to find within this speech this living seed1 to trace and sketch its bursting growth1 and to gather up its fruit1 is well worth any toil or cost4 ,to begin with1 this speech is undeniably ,lincoln's own4 ,that in any sense it was born of any other man's dictation1 ,lincoln would never admit1 and no other man would ever affirm4 ,as its words gain voice1 every listener feels that ,lincoln was their only author1 and that even in their utterance1 though in the living presence of an un-numbered multitude1 this speaker was standing in a majestic solitude4 ,that exposition of the war1 of the ,union1 and of slavery was of and by and for himself4 ,what he was uttering was original4 ,the convictions he affirmed were his personal faith4 ,the decision his words so delicately veiled was his personal resolve4 ,the issue towards which they aimed was the outlook of his lone heart's hope4 ,the appeal he voiced was warmed and winged by his own desire4 ,the argument he so deftly inwrought was his invention and device4 ,the words he singled out were his selection4 ,the total aspect and onset and effect of the address1 as it looked and worked on the day of its delivery1 and as it looks and works today1 were of his unforced and free election and intent4 ,all the volume1 burden and design of those pregnant1 urgent1 far-seeing paragraphs are the first hand product of a freeborn man1 adapted and addressed to men freeborn4 ,here is for any student of ethics an imposing spectacle4 ,for here is a commanding demonstration that mortal man is in very deed a responsible author of moral deeds4 ,that this inaugural scene gives this stupendous truth an indeniable vindication1 no man may lightly undertake to disapprove4 ,but within that undeniable verity are involved all the mighty revolutions of a moral universe4 ,this import of this speech can never be made too plain4 ,to this end let any reader note the fact that in that stern day1 and in this plain speech1 ,lincoln faced1 and that under a pitiless compulsion1 an exigent alternative4 ,when he penned1 and when he spoke its freighted words1 he stood in the very brunt of war4 ,his thoughts were tracing battle lines4 ,his eye was fixed on bayonets4 ,before him stood far-ranging ranks of men in mutual defiance1 men at variance upon fundamental things1 men in conflict over claims irreconcilable by ,god or man4 ,by no device of argument or of compromise could those contending claims become identical1 or even mutually tolerant4 ,men's paths had parted4 ,armies had taken sides4 ,difference had deepened into intolerance2 intolerance had heightened into hate2 and hate had flared up into war4 ,secession had proclaimed that the ,union must dissolve1 that confederates were foes1 that one ,nation must be two4 ,and men based their reasons for rending the land and for rallying ranks in arms1 upon opposing views of ,god's decree1 and of the nature of men4 ,one side claimed that ,god ordained that black men should be slaves4 ,this claim the other side denied2 and avowed instead that ,god in his creation and endowment of the human race ordained that all men should be equal and free4 ,so appalling and so passing plain in our political life was the alternative which this inaugural had to confront4 ,equally plain upon the face of this inaugural is the fact that1 in the presence of that dread and stern alternative1 ,lincoln made a choice4 ,he picked his flag4 ,he chose the banner of the free4 ,the standard of the slaveholder he spurned4 ,responsibly1 deliberately1 he selected where to stand1 fully and consciously purposing that in such selection he was enlisting and employing all the voluntary powers of his life4 ,here was conscious choice4 ,he did select4 ,he did reject4 ,he could have taken another1 an oppugnant stand1 as many a familiar confederate did4 ,two paths were surely possible4 ,and they did undeniably diverge4 ,that divergence he soberly surveyed1 and traced down through all its devious ways to their final consequence4 ,in act and motive1 in judgment and intent1 he was self-poised1 self-determined1 self-moved4 ,when1 in this second inaugural scene1 removed from his former inaugural oath by four imperious years of sobering and awakening thought1 but facing still a frowning ,south1 he swore a second time to preserve1 protect and defend the ,constitution--that was a freeman's choice4 ,and it was ,lincoln's own4 ,between his soul and heaven1 as he registered that resolve1 no third authority intervened4 ,as he stood and published and defined that reiterated pledge1 his soul was sovereignly1 supremely free4 ,and within that sovereign freedom its even-balanced deliberation should not be overlooked4 ,those days that filed between those two inaugurals had been replete with studied meditation4 ,the mighty problems precipitated by the war he had taken and turned and poised and sought to estimate and solve in every possible way4 ,he pondered every ounce of their awful gravity4 ,he paced the total course of their development4 ,he knew our history1 with all its ideals and all its errors by heart4 ,he inspected with peculiar carefulness the drift and trend of our national career4 ,it is doubtful if any one ever studied so incessantly the current of our affairs1 or peered so anxiously and with such far-sighted calculation into the hidden and distant issues of the stupendous enterprise in which he was predestined to act so commanding a part4 ,so when his free decision was ushered forth and projected among the contending determinations of his day1 to play its part1 it was the ripe conclusion of a thoughtful mind1 like the well-poised verdict of a judge4 ,and his free choice was resolute4 ,his will was without wavering4 ,the side he made his own was forced to face the musketry and forts1 the arsenals and fleets1 of a would-be nation of angry1 determined men--men who would rather die than yield4 ,the choice he made involved the shedding of human blood4 ,this he sadly knew4 ,in four endless years he had been compelled to defend his resolution with arms4 ,and now as he volunteered his oath a second time1 his free decision involved again the frightful corollary of war4 ,this meant that within his voluntary oath was a conscious determination1 too vigorous and resolute for any threat to daunt1 for any form of terror to reverse4 ,his choice was no feeble leaning to one side4 ,into its formation and into its fulfillment poured all the energy of his life4 ,it was vastly1 radically more than impulse1 or propensity1 or easy1 unconsidered inclination4 ,it was a freeman's choice1 poised and edged and energized by a freeman's will4 ,it had firmness like the firmness of the hills4 ,this choice of ,lincoln was ponderous4 ,his exercise of freedom1 as shown in this inaugural1 was dealing1 not with things indifferent1 not with trifles void of moral moment1 nor with empty1 immaterial suppositions4 ,when ,lincoln shaped and welcomed to himself this preference1 he was handling nothing less than the affronts of human arrogance1 the greed of human avarice1 the cruelty of human slavery1 and a confederate's disloyalty4 ,that preference was his free election to enthrone within himself1 and within all other men1 the stability of a firm allegiance1 the grace of human friendliness1 the worthy valuation of human souls1 and the surpassing beauty of a true humility4 ,it was between such values that his election took its shape4 ,his decision dealt with things primary1 enduring1 and universal4 ,it was concerned with the elemental affections and convictions of men1 while all the time supremely respecting the decrees and judgments of ,almighty ,god4 ,upon such a level1 and amid such values1 did the will of ,lincoln trace out its path4 ,it was a ,godlike energy1 sovereign1 soberminded1 original1 free4 ,but though this freedom of ,lincoln1 as it reigns through this inaugural1 was individually his own1 and wrought out into precise experience in personal singleness and independency1 by no manner of means was he standing in this scene in moral isolation4 ,he was beset about and wrought upon from many sides by mighty moral energies4 ,for one thing1 a vast ,republic held him fast in the bonds of loyal citizenship4 ,it was a ,republic composed of freemen1 to be sure4 ,but those freemen were by no means a miscellany of mutually indifferent and disconnected units4 ,they had formed a ,union4 ,that ,union had a definite and inviolable integrity4 ,that corporate integrity laid an unrenounceable obligation upon all its membership4 ,it was the sacred respect for the sacred honor of that political bond that proved a man a patriot4 ,to assert the freeman's right to cast aside those bonds proved a man a traitor1 and gendered unto bondage4 ,here unfolds a veritable mesh of moral obligations--obligations of compelling potency4 ,it was precisely in defence and demonstration of those enveloping claims that ,lincoln advocated and prosecuted a defensive but relentless war4 ,the ,south resented all such claims4 ,they were resolute that national bonds should be defied1 that their authority should be annulled4 ,and this they urged explicitly in the very name of freedom4 ,this defiant protest ,lincoln's opposite preference had to face4 ,this involved his mind in the study of a problem that is never out of date--a study that will test any student's moral honesty to the quick4 ,lincoln's championship of moral liberty had to grapple1 in the counter championship of ,southern arms1 a type and sort of freedom that he forever disowned for himself1 and that he could never consent to in any other man4 ,this drove him into the study of the nature of a human soul and the nature of social bonds4 ,this inquiry uncovered two foundation rocks1 laid deep by our forefathers beneath the fabric of our republic1 supports to human honor and stability which no man nor any confederation of men can undermine and overthrow without turning upside down the fundamental supports of harmony and honor among civilians that are free4 ,these two foundation rocks are the divine design that all men should be equal and free2 and the certain corollary that governments among men derive their just powers from the consent of the governed4 ,the equality of freemen when they stand apart1 and their free consent1 when they join in a political league--these are the immovable pillars of character and order among intelligent men4 ,upon such foundations this government has been placed4 ,that sure basis the ,south assailed4 ,in the name of freedom that assault must be repulsed4 ,the national environment1 the national integrity1 the national honor1 the existence of the ,nation1 conceived as it was in liberty1 made all such liberty as the ,south preferred1 not a freeman's right1 but a sorry simulation1 a moral wrong4 ,government of the people1 by the people1 was freedom to the core1 the core of civic righteousness4 ,in such a government popular and everlasting allegiance was elemental uprightness4 ,among freemen1 the cornerstone of civics is a plighted troth to liberty4 ,thus ,lincoln argued4 ,and with him to argue thus was to obey4 ,as thus conceived1 obedience to his civic pledge went hand in hand with liberty4 ,enlistment under a government and laws framed by fellow-freemen was to him no limitation of his personal rights4 ,instead it involved and assured for every bondman a full emancipation1 and for every freeman full title forever to every unalienable right4 ,such a view was indeed ideal1 as ,lincoln soberly knew2 but for that ideal every power of his kingly manhood was ready to struggle and suffer and serve4 ,to bind his hand to such a league was his free choice4 ,to live in loyalty to such a bond was a living pride and joy4 ,such an agreement was to the end of his days unresented and unconstrained4 ,but it cost him dearly4 ,no indentured bonds-man ever wrought out sorer toil4 ,none ever suffered through longer1 heavier1 sadder days4 ,it wore away his life4 ,the war was to his tender soul1 as he termed it1 a dreadful scourge4 ,but as he interpreted its trend1 its certain winnings outvalued and outweighed its woe4 ,it was freely and willingly1 not by any irksome and alien coercion1 that he opened his soul to all its sorrows1 and poured out all his strength to direct and hasten its consummation4 ,he saw unerringly that it had to do with government by free consent1 with the tenure of a freeman's oath1 with the validity of a freeman's right4 ,and by a preference that in his freeman's breast was irrepressible1 he selected with an open1 far-ranging eye to take his place in that terrific conflict in the very brunt1 that the ,nation and all the world and coming ages might see and enjoy its happy issue in a ,union built and compacted indissolubly upon the inviolable oaths and rights of men who are free4 ,this was ,lincoln's law of liberty4 ,it secures to men their freedom2 but it binds those freemen in a league4 ,their civic life is not a solitude4 ,it is a covenant4 ,but when freemen form a league1 their solemn oath1 as this inaugural shows1 embodies awful sanctions4 ,from such a league and covenant1 seven confederate parts were affirming and defending their right to secede1 and that by force of arms4 ,this forced freedom to a final definition1 and a final test4 ,what follows when a ,republic fails8 ,what form of civic order lies beyond1 when a league of freemen is violently dissolved8 ,where will freedom find sure footing1 when the fundamental laws of freemen are defied8 ,on this stern question ,lincoln fixed his eye4 ,and as his vision cleared and deepened1 he grew to see that if freedom among men could ever survive1 a freeman's mutual covenant must be inviolate4 ,a freeman's compact must be kept1 else on all the earth freedom could find no resting place4 ,if this should ever be denied1 that denial must be sternly smitten to the ground4 ,thus for the very cause of freedom1 and as a freeman1 ,lincoln was driven into war4 ,he was put where he had no other choice4 ,he was forced to fight4 ,but in that war the havoc and disaster were mutual4 ,both sides suffered terribly4 ,the conflict dealt out torture that neither party could evade4 ,it was mighty ponderings on these conditions that wrung from ,lincoln's heart the heart of this inaugural1 wherein he traces with a humble1 deep-searching carefulness the cause of all the war to that prolonged infraction of the law of liberty in the lot of the ,american slave2 and the guilt of that enormous sin to ,north and ,south alike2 and the moral explanation of the sorrows of the war to the judgments of ,almighty ,god4 ,herein he learned that among freemen freedom is in no sense arbitrary and absolute4 ,laws lie in its very being4 ,their presence is spontaneous indeed1 as is every impulse of their promulgation and rule4 ,but they must be obeyed4 ,if their self-framed mandates are disobeyed1 then freemen are no longer free4 ,if freemen dare to bind and rob their fellows and aggrandize their own advantages1 then the yoke they bind on other men1 by a sanction no mortal can escape1 will be bound upon their own necks1 until their false advantages are all surrendered1 and the freedom that is claimed by anyone is given equally to every other man4 ,to the fulfillment and preservation of that law ,lincoln freely bowed his life4 ,this is the core of this address4 ,thus ,lincoln illustrates true liberty4 ,in the crucible of war was his vision of the worth of freedom finally refined4 ,it was through a costly sacrifice of peace4 ,but it was alone and all for freedom1 for freedom and for nothing else1 that his peace and ours was sacrificed4 ,this exposition of ,lincoln's pure ideal of independent1 virile manhood has embraced1 in passing1 a phase of the vast environment in which he felt his manhood framed1 that calls for separate remark--the relation of his human freedom to the rule of ,god4 ,the war is traced in this address to a threefold origin3 it was projected in the resolution of the ,south that slavery should be given leave to spread2 it was accepted in the decision of the ,north that the present bounds of slavery should not be passed2 the whole affair was overturned1 and the war was over-ruled in the purpose of ,almighty ,god1 that ,north and ,south1 as a single ,nation1 guilty in common for slavery as a national sin1 should make full requital for all its cruelty4 ,in this thought of ,lincoln1 the conflicting purposes of the ,north and the ,south1 and his own determination too1 were being made to bow beneath the mightier dominion of ,almighty ,god4 ,in the realm of human politics this is a rare and notable confession4 ,and that it was published beneath the open sky1 at noon1 before a peopled ,nation's open eye1 as a thoughtful explanation of his inaugural oath as president of a mighty government upon the earth1 must be conceded to mightily enhance its notability4 ,it lacks but little of rising to the rank of prophecy4 ,but equally notable with its publicity is its conscious1 free submissiveness4 ,clear to discern1 he is also prompt to own the over-mastering rule of ,god4 ,his attitude in this inaugural is an attitude of explicit subordination to a higher power4 ,but it is clear as day that this subordination is voluntary4 ,there is no sign of reluctance or unwillingness1 as though he were being forced1 not even though all expectations of his own were being over-ruled in the inscrutable plans of ,god4 ,this address reveals this man in a mood and tone of complete submission1 ready for rebuke1 surrendering all his ways to ,god4 ,this posture of acquiescence1 in ,god's revolution of his plans1 and reconstruction of his hopes1 is the factor to notice here1 as we examine the actual operation of ,lincoln's will4 ,above his private liberty1 above his high official authority1 above the great ,republic in which his own decisions merge1 reigns the hidden hand of ,god4 ,to the power and majesty of that unseen sway he summons every dignity and every desire of his own to render unreserved obedience4 ,in seeing and saying this1 however1 one must never omit to observe and add that ,lincoln's eye observed with solemn joy a precious moral meaning in the divine omnipotence4 ,heaven's unexpected guidance and consummation of the war were only adding clarity and emphasis to the principle of liberty4 ,it only drove the demonstration home1 and that with irresistible cogency1 that human bondage must be avenged4 ,and so in fact ,lincoln's solemn reverence for the divine control was a girdle confirming the strength of the fine jealousy that guarded for himself and for all mankind the sacredness and the majesty of the human will4 ,within the deeper deeps of his own free preference he coincided and co-operated with the will of ,god4 ,his obedience to ,god1 his allegiance to his civic covenant1 and his individual1 cherished preference coalesce ideally2 while each1 without any diversion or loss1 preserves its own integrity4 ,thus with life-exhausting1 sacrificial toil1 with genuine originality1 ever exemplifying in his chastened life all the burden of his thought1 by a decisive choice between divergent paths1 with the careful deliberateness of a full-grown man1 with unconquerable determination1 gravely sensible of every ponderous consequence1 in unbroken and intimate companionship with all his fellow-men1 with vision sharp to detect and uncover every simulation and counterfeit of his wish1 through solemn fellowship with redemptive sorrows1 bowing without repugnance to every sanction that free equality enjoins1 and in humble reverence for the all-commanding1 all-subduing will of ,god1 ,lincoln here unfolds the central and infolded implications in his all-consuming jealousy to be free4 ,,his ,,kindliness--,,love ,a genuine and generous goodwill to other men breathes warmly through this second inaugural1 as the glowing breath of life pervades the bodily frame of a living child4 ,this manifests itself1 as seen in his impassioned zeal for freedom1 in a vivid consciousness of companionship4 ,he felt his life and destiny interlaced inseparably with all ,americans1 nay with all the world of human kind4 ,with this widely expanded and ever expanding ,republic1 he felt himself in these inaugural scenes peculiarly identified4 ,in that great pageant he was deeply sensible of holding the central place4 ,his inaugural oath1 though his single1 individual act1 announced his conscious purpose to be the ,nation's head4 ,in that station his person became supremely representative4 ,it was for him to incorporate nobly1 mightily1 judicially1 the national dignity1 authority1 and design4 ,many phases of this profound coincidence of the life of ,lincoln with the ,nation's life come into sight whenever his life's career is carefully reviewed4 ,but among all the illustrations of his self-submergence deep within the overflowing fullness of our national history1 there is one that demonstrates his tender kindliness beyond all possibility of refutation4 ,this is his profound participation with the ,nation in her fate because of slavery4 ,around this awful issue circles all the thought of this1 as of the first address4 ,that this puissant co-efficient of our national history was somehow the cause of the existing war he said that all men felt4 ,he registered his own opinion that all the sorrows of the war were in requital for that sin4 ,into those sorrows no man entered more profoundly than did ,lincoln himself4 ,they sobered all his joy4 ,they solemnized him utterly4 ,it is true few heard his groans4 ,in his patience he was mainly silent4 ,none ever heard him make complaint4 ,all impulse to resentment was subdued4 ,but the nation's sorrows were on his heart4 ,through all those days he was our confessor1 self-sacrificed1 sorrow-laden1 faithful absolutely1 but uncomplaining4 ,upon his head an angry1 unanimous ,south1 and many thousands in the ,north dealt vengeful1 malicious blows1 denying him all joy1 crying out against him ruthlessly4 ,all this he bore1 as though he heard them not1 and continued day and night to seek the ,nation's peace4 ,with marvelous freedom from malice himself1 with fullness of charity for all1 he taught a ,nation how a ,nation's sorrows should be patiently borne4 ,and yet through all the days1 in all this land1 no man was more purely innocent of the ,nation's sin of slavery than this same man4 ,here is friendship4 ,here is neighborly compassion written large4 ,this is generosity1 untinctured with any selfish reservation4 ,amid all the sorrows and fortunes of our history no sight is half as pathetic as this deep1 free1 silent companionship of ,lincoln with his ,nation's griefs in the deepest period of her affliction4 ,and yet he almost seemed to cherish his fate4 ,he bore it all so quietly1 and with such a steady heart and eye1 that in his seeming calm we are unconscious of his pain4 ,he gives no hint of faltering and drawing back4 ,he even strove repeatedly to lure the ,nation to his side1 to enter into sacrificial fellowship with the hapless ,south4 ,but to nothing of this would the people hear4 ,this commanding fact1 the moral mutualness of the innocent ,lincoln's sorrows with the sorrows of a guilty land1 is a primary factor in this historic scene4 ,from such a moral complication momentous questions emerge4 ,how can such confusion of moral issues be ever justified8 ,why do guilty and innocent suffer and sorrow alike8 ,in such a glaring moral inequality how could ,lincoln himself ever bring his candid mind to honestly acquiesce8 ,why should a later generation suffer vengeance for their father's sins8 ,why the black man's fate8 ,how can moral judgments diverge so hopelessly upon such basic moral themes8 ,if ,god's judgment is just1 why are his judgments upon such inhumanity so long delayed8 ,how about those kindred sufferings of those earlier days that for total generations were unavenged8 ,questions such as these must have risen in ,lincoln's mind as he drained his bitter cup4 ,such questions are not to be evaded or suppressed4 ,it should rather be said that ,lincoln's undeniable gentleness in enduring1 as the ,nation's head1 and for his country's sake1 a ,nation's curse for a national sin forces just such questions into sharpest definition1 and focuses them insistently and unavoidably before every thoughtful eye4 ,they are shaped and fastened here solely to render aid in indicating1 as they undeniably do1 the supreme refinement of ,lincoln's friendliness4 ,he held by kindly fellowship with his fellowmen1 even when that fellowship involved his innocent life in the moral shame and pain of their reprobation and woe4 ,here is an interchange of guilt and innocence1 in ,lincoln's undeniable experience1 undeniably resolved and harmonized4 ,here is human kindliness1 triumphant1 transcending all debate4 ,around this exalted illustration of the strength and purity of ,lincoln's benevolence cluster many statements eager to be heard4 ,his kindness showed in many ways1 but they were all but varying1 accordant forms of pure neighborliness4 ,his mastery of all malice1 his unfailing charity1 the kindliness of his cherished hope1 his companionship with others' sorrow1 his longings for peace at home and among all men1 his pity for the bereft1 his tenderness before our human wounds1 his reluctance to go to war1 his championship of the oppressed1 his willingness to bear another's blame1 his silence before abuse1 his mighty predilections towards universal friendliness1 are all concordant and coincident types and forms of his prevailing1 spontaneous companionship with men4 ,each phase deserves elaborate description4 ,but it is in closer keeping with the treatment here to name some general qualities of his kindliness1 qualities that are common to all its forms4 ,his friendliness was immediate4 ,when human needs appealed for comfort and aid1 it was not his way to send a deputy4 ,he appeared himself4 ,here is something nothing less than marvelous4 ,an intimate friend of all1 he stood in conscious touch with all the ,nation's citizenship4 ,at first thought this may seem to be in consequence and by means of his eminence and office as the people's president4 ,as chief executive of the people's will1 and as foremost representative citizen1 he stood for every man in that man's place2 and his universal friendliness found open avenues to every individual citizen's consciousness4 ,here is truth4 ,but this truth only partially meets this case4 ,the operations of his benevolence were somehow independent of space and time4 ,his tours while president were short and few4 ,back and forth between the ,white ,house1 the war office1 and the soldier's home he wore a historic path4 ,it is almost overwhelmingly sad to realize how almost all his movements while president were within the sorrow-shadowed walls and the hidden solitudes of his official home4 ,as said before1 he seemed to exist apart from men1 in a pathetic isolation4 ,nevertheless1 it is plain to all that ,lincoln's uncalculating generosity reached1 like the shining of the sun1 to the limits of the land4 ,it is most surprising when one thinks4 ,but when one thinks1 it is most clear that there was in ,lincoln's kindliness a ,nation-wide capacity for intimacy4 ,in the open genial presence of his good-will all men feel they have an immediate and equal share4 ,and this holds true whether one is near enough to feel the warmth of his living breath1 or whether half a continent intervenes4 ,this fact forces into view and consciousness the pure excellence of his love4 ,it was in its nature deeply real4 ,he did in verity live close to every man4 ,he wore no distant air4 ,he practised no reserve4 ,he felt and proved himself to be the kin of all4 ,his pictured face and published speech were a perfect symbol1 a convincing pledge to every honest man of close and equal partnership4 ,his ways are often said to have been homely4 ,but their very homeliness was all human and all humane4 ,and in his presence1 or in the presence of any truthful impress or echo of his life1 no honest nature but feels itself instantly at ease and quite at home4 ,this habitude in him of overcoming distance1 and absence1 and all other obstacles to his far-ranging love1 and winning entrance everywhere into the affections of all kindly men1 is a notable stamp upon the total texture of his friendliness4 ,he stood with men in personal partnership1 immediate1 intimate1 real4 ,and in all his intimate and immediate fellowship with men his personal contribution was entire4 ,in his co-partnership he had no treasure too precious to invest4 ,he gave his all4 ,imposing1 almost impossible as is the meaning of these words1 all mankind do recognize1 and that with wondering reverence1 that when ,lincoln rose to take the presidential oath1 he held nothing back4 ,in his service of the ,union he invested his life1 his honor1 his hope1 even all he had4 ,it was little else he had to give4 ,his lineage was of the lowliest4 ,his education was of the meagerest1 and wholly a by-achievement4 ,in social graces he was quite unversed and unadorned4 ,he was no flatterer4 ,the fawner's dialect he never knew4 ,he would not boast4 ,to beg he was ashamed4 ,he was too honest for any knavery4 ,pure integrity was his only asset4 ,as he took his stand at the presidential post1 he stood without a single decoration1 unsupported1 all alone4 ,it was literal truth that when he took his official oath the only bond he had to furnish was his naked honor4 ,but that possession was no counterfeit4 ,its value did not fluctuate4 ,it was solid gold4 ,in his honest rating1 the plighted faith in the words of his official pledge was beyond all price4 ,as he discerned and understood the crisis of his day1 the ,nation's very being was at mortal stake4 ,and when in that momentous hour she summoned him to take the presidency1 she laid sovereign requisition upon his total being4 ,and when he obeyed the call1 he invested all4 ,no reserve of his possession was kept in hiding for his refuge and reimbursement1 in case the ,nation failed4 ,he ventured all he had1 even all his honor4 ,and this complete consignment by ,lincoln to the ,nation's use of all his moral wealth1 of all his pure and priceless personal worth1 was an act of unalloyed benignity4 ,it was for the ,nation's welfare that he devoted himself4 ,it was that the ,union might be preserved1 and that all men might be free1 that he plighted his integrity4 ,this investment of ,lincoln's friendliness for the well-being of all the land1 even of all the men therein1 was not alone immediate1 winning direct attachment to every man2 nor merely all-absorbing on ,lincoln's part1 impressing into kindly service every value and every capacity of his total life2 it also enshrined a deathless hope4 ,lincoln's patriotic devotedness was no venture of a day or of a decade4 ,lincoln's good-will looked far ahead4 ,he had a passion for immortality4 ,his total effort and aim in all his generous endeavors and hopes1 as he served in his public life1 can be defined as a sovereign aspiration that our government should be so guided and chastened in all its life that the ,union should never be dissolved4 ,to his kindly heart no possible event seemed more appalling than that this hope should fail4 ,so far as his words reveal1 this central1 sovereign passion of his glowing heart was all but exclusively patriotic4 ,he apparently forgot himself in his wistful anxious hope that the ,nation's peace might long endure4 ,his faith in the ,union's indestructibility may be said to spring out of his undying continual love for his fellowman4 ,indeed just here seems to be the birthplace of all his prophetic ponderings over the final issues of our civic life4 ,the very stature of the government which his ideal conceived and which he thankfully saw that our ,republic designed1 was deemed by him to be copied from nothing other than the divinely fashioned moral nature which he found alike in himself and in all his fellowmen4 ,deep within his friendly heart he cherished the vision of a ,republic of freemen leagued together indissolubly as mutual friends4 ,it was to realize and certify that hope that he dedicated his life4 ,and when he pledged and sealed that offering1 it was with no design that the seal should ever be broken1 or the pledge be ever recalled4 ,here is another primary quality of ,lincoln's friendliness4 ,it was inwrought with personal durability4 ,grounded as was his civic hope in the freedom and conscience of ,godlike men1 it was impossible for him to consent that such a hope should ever encounter defeat or decay4 ,deep and sure within its essential nature were the urgent promptings and the soaring promise of immortality4 ,these observations upon the immediate directness1 the integral whole-heartedness1 and the deathless eagerness of ,lincoln's friendliness1 if thoughtfully compared together1 reveal that these distinctive phases of his outpouring good-will are in nature identically the same1 and spring from an identical source4 ,this essential coincidence1 this mutual convergence deserves attention4 ,it intimates wherein the very essence and being of his neighborly kindness consists4 ,and in ,lincoln's life this indication of the precise whereabouts and substance of the essential and innermost quality and being of human kindliness is certain and clear1 as in hardly any other man4 ,his benignance in his dealings with men is of well-nigh unparalleled openness and freedom from all admixture and alloy4 ,lincoln's kindness embodies and conveys ,lincoln's self4 ,in every favor from him he is in the gift4 ,in the center of all the friendliness that is characteristic of ,lincoln1 ,lincoln himself stands erect and entire1 offering and commending in every case his full-sized1 undivided self4 ,this is the core and this the circumference1 this is the sum and this the substance of his good-will4 ,it is rich with all his personal wealth1 solid with all his personal worth4 ,in him an act of friendship was an inauguration of personal copartnership4 ,in his good-will was all the energy of his life4 ,in his benefactions he gave himself4 ,just so with his compassions4 ,with the sorrows of humanity it was his way to enter into personal fellowship4 ,this was the form and being of all his generosity4 ,his mastery over all malice when facing a foe1 his abounding charity when judging a wrong1 his hearty gladness in the presence of human joy1 his cordial ways in greeting friends1 his fatherly affection for his boy1 his love for his native land1 his pity in presence of the bereft1 his sadness at sight of wounds1 his readiness to share evenly with all his ,nation all that guilty ,nation's painful discipline--all this variety and plenitude of ample1 open-hearted tenderness towards other men was alike and always the complete and conscious contribution of himself4 ,in brief1 in full1 and finally1 ,lincoln's friendliness1 through all its beautiful versatility1 was a free and facile1 a full and total1 personal self-devotion4 ,this is the common content giving all its value to all the forms of his human kindliness4 ,,his ,,pureness--,,life ,in the exposition just foregoing1 the thought has been drawn into allusions to ,lincoln's premonitions or aspirations towards immortality1 for the ,union1 if not for himself4 ,this was in the course of an effort to find the spring-head of his kindliness4 ,and it culminated in the suggestion that deep within ,lincoln's being there was enshrined an assurance1 however unconfessed or even half unconscious1 of personal immortality4 ,and that from within this shrine of living hope1 common to him with every man1 he drew his inspiration and his very pattern of a national ,union and a national peace that would endure forever4 ,here is something that calls for examination1 for in this we touch a radical quality of ,lincoln's moral being4 ,this eager craving after permanence was in him an appetite that could never be fed or satisfied by any things that perish4 ,in itself and in its nutriment there is an irrepealable call for something indefeasable1 something utterly superior to all fear of death1 something never amenable to any form of dissolution or decay1 something spiritually pure1 and essentially kindred to the essential being of a deathless soul4 ,the matter may be approached to start with by saying some things negatively4 ,lincoln was centrally in no sense a materialist4 ,he was indeed firmly sensitive to the physical majesties of this continent1 though in his day they were hardly half disclosed4 ,he calculated with carefulness our material capacities for expansion in power and wealth4 ,he foresaw our certain outward growth into a puissant ,nation1 the coveted and ample resort and refuge and home of hordes of men from other lands4 ,in his own well-seasoned and resourceful physique he felt and knew the worth of physical virility4 ,he could thoughtfully compute the glittering values1 the goodly financial revenues1 the days and months and total seasons of physical idleness and delights that accrue to human owners from the unrequited toil of human slaves4 ,and in the current civil war he completely understood that no less a concern than the perpetuity of the ,american ,union was pending upon contests largely consisting of encounters of physical prowess1 of tests of muscular endurance and strength4 ,but not in calculations such as these did his thoughtful studies of human welfare take ultimate resort1 or find final rest4 ,his conception of the ideal state1 of the ideal citizen1 of the ideal life1 was not constructed or inspired from carnal elements4 ,he noted with life-long sadness the sordid baseness inseparably attending the fact of owning or being a slave4 ,he deeply saw that those battles in the ,wilderness were no mere conflicts of beasts4 ,and never could he imagine or allow that his personal weight1 and force1 and worth were ratable by gymnastic tests4 ,it was not upon things like these that ,lincoln's attention and hope were fixed1 when his hopes and plans for our prosperity took form4 ,to the whole world of his material environment he was marvelously indifferent4 ,on every perusal of his life one grieves at the story of his poverty1 and the sad infrequency and meagerness in his daily life of the pleasures and recreations which are for the comfort and happiness of men in material things4 ,but in this he seems as though unconscious of any disappointment4 ,for himself as for the ,nation1 and for the ,nation as for himself1 his satisfaction and confidence were not born and fed of things that perish in their use4 ,luxury in food or attire1 however toothsome or attractive to other natures1 stirred but the feeblest hankerings1 if any at all1 in him4 ,towards sensualism of any sort1 whether gluttony1 drunkenness or lust1 his sound and temperate manliness did not incline4 ,and in his estimate of personal character his eye and respect did not rest in outer attitudes1 on printed1 age-long codes of manner4 ,he was no slave of stately ceremonies1 or artificial etiquette4 ,nor in religion did he bind his tongue to creeds however hoary1 nor to rituals however august4 ,he swore not by the oaths of any sect1 however ancient and renowned4 ,neither in this mountain nor in that did he worship ,god4 ,but on the other hand1 and now to speak affirmatively1 ,lincoln lived no penury-stricken life4 ,the resources within his personality were well-nigh incalculable4 ,few men in all our national catalogue have been endowed by ,god with so sterling and abundant interior wealth4 ,and of all ,american patriotic benefactors few indeed have left in their single individual name and right such priceless legacies to their native land4 ,what is life8 ,what is human life8 ,wherein1 completely and precisely wherein1 is man distinguishable from the beast8 ,for answer1 study ,lincoln and see4 ,in the full development of such a study many massive verities will unfold4 ,but the feature in ,lincoln's manhood1 which this chapter is set apart to designate and clarify1 is the simple purity1 the elemental spirituality of all his elemental traits4 ,his dominant sentiments1 his primary convictions1 his main and all-mastering decisions were never born to die4 ,they were instinct with life1 with life indeed1 a life never failing1 ever more abundant and free4 ,this interior vitality1 this unalloyed and undecaying purity may be described one way as a real idealism4 ,but in ascribing idealism to ,lincoln1 it needs to be said at once that ,lincoln's idealism1 real and glorious as it must surely be confessed to be1 was transparently and unvaryingly practical4 ,in one way it may be defined as hope4 ,a waiting hope was a standard characteristic of ,lincoln's attitude4 ,his sorrowful eye held fast to things as yet unrealizable4 ,it is impressive to see how often and how fondly he mentioned the future1 the vast future1 as he termed it1 of our ,american career4 ,the secret of the beauty and of the power of some of his loftiest and most spontaneous rhetoric is due to just this solemn eagerness towards the coming days4 ,as one comes to study more intently into the outlay of his heroic strength1 his struggle and toil are seen to be leashed about his consuming wish that the ,nation in its undivided might could be unified about the speedy fulfillment of his prophetic aims4 ,he never forgot the mighty lesson1 nor lost the living inspiration of his own advancement from humblest station of ignorance and toiling poverty to the presidency4 ,that transformation he loved to humbly hold before the attention of his fellow ,americans1 as a pattern of what might anywhere occur again4 ,he loved to linger upon the possibilities of upward movement in the ranks of all laboring men4 ,large place and honorable position were given to this arousing theme in his first annual message to ,congress4 ,this general topic--the far-set1 soaring possibilities of human betterment--held constant and commanding eminence in the ranging measure of his eagle-searching thought4 ,for the ,nation1 and for its every inhabitant1 he was a true idealist4 ,but ,lincoln's idealism1 again be it said1 was no wild indulgence of a vagrant and untrained imagination4 ,it was utterly sober-minded4 ,it took its form and found its force in the center of his sanest thoughtfulness4 ,the terms in which its description has just been illustratively traced show it to be perfectly rational1 and even matter-of-fact4 ,lincoln's idealism was nothing else but a heedful interpretation of the proper destiny of man4 ,it was a reflection in terms of carefulest thought1 albeit also in the guise of ardent hope1 of the essential lineaments in the nature of man4 ,and no human portrait by any artist was ever truer to fact1 while yet tinged with fancy1 pure and free4 ,in all his picturing of things yet to be1 but not yet in hand1 his eye was fastened with an anatomist's intentness upon the actual human nature imperishably present in every man4 ,nothing that ,lincoln's idealism ever proposed ever diverged from the bounds of the original fiat creating all men equal and free4 ,that undeniable initial verity1 itself the keystone of our national ,constitution and ,bill of ,rights1 supplied to ,lincoln's hope its total and only inspiration4 ,in those ancient and elemental realities1 realities that deeply underlie and long outlast all the cults and customs and centuries which human thought is so prone to differentiate and divide1 ,lincoln detected solid foundations and ample warrant for age-long1 undissolving expectations4 ,in every human face there are outlines that are forever indelible4 ,these unfailing lineaments ,lincoln had the eye to see4 ,and what is vastly more1 he had the courage and the honesty to adopt them as the pattern of the platform1 and to voice them as the notes of the battle-peal of his statesmanship4 ,and this he did right wittingly1 knowing assuredly that therein his vision had caught the gleam of things eternal2 that therein he had made discovery that man1 even the humblest of his race1 could claim to be1 as he phrased it to a company of blacks1 kindred to the great ,god who made him4 ,this amounts to saying that ,lincoln's statesmanship may be completely and precisely defined as the studied and deliberate exploitation1 upon the field of politics1 of those forces1 central and common in all mankind1 that are ,godlike1 immortal1 spiritual4 ,here we reach a definition that outlines with close precision a trait of ,lincoln's full-formed character that held a primary place in winning for ,lincoln his immortal renown4 ,he attached himself to things themselves immortal4 ,his ideal hope had no admixture of clay1 nor even of gold4 ,he made no composition or compromise with anything that dies4 ,his supreme desire was of a nature never to decay4 ,it was pure with the deathless purity of the human soul4 ,to this pure principle1 eternal loyalty to the immortal dignity of man1 he signed and sealed his soul's allegiance with bonds that even death could never relax4 ,such statements describe a primary co-efficient in ,lincoln's ethical life4 ,abjuring the unnumbered allurements of the material world1 allurements whose fascinations unfailingly fade1 and reposing his confidence wholly in treasures that time and use only brighten and refine1 ,lincoln reveals in the realm of ethics the singular excellence of an ideal that can kindle in an immortal man an immortal hope4 ,purging every sort of baseness out of the central life1 and enthroning an all-refining pureness in the sovereign desires and visions and designs1 he has inaugurated in the field of civics an idealism that will honor every man1 fit actual life1 and endure forever4 ,personal pureness1 this pervades the life of ,lincoln as crystalline beauty pervades a block of marble4 ,this refining trait in ,lincoln1 this inner hunger for his living soul's true nutriment1 this thirst for the pure1 perennial springs1 finds signal illustration in the closing sentence of this last inaugural1 where he pleads with all his fellow-citizens to so conduct all civic interests as to secure among ourselves and with all ,nations a lasting peace4 ,that craving after permanence in civic harmony betokens an impulse towards immortality2 and rests down1 as the entire inaugural explains1 upon that only basis of enduring civic quietude1 an honest and universal recognition and respect for those indelible and universal lineaments of personal dignity which the ,creator of men has traced upon every human soul--lineaments from which the obscuring dross of centuries was being purged in the ,providential fires of an awful war4 ,just this was the meaning of the war1 as ,lincoln understood its work4 ,that earth-born sordidness which marked all slaves as common chattels1 was being burnt out of our national life1 as our basest national sin4 ,thenceforth1 forevermore1 it was ,lincoln's living hope that all mankind might peacefully agree to supremely cherish and mutually respect those human values that human unfriendliness1 and centuries of contempt1 however deeply they may obscure1 can never obliterate4 ,upon such enduring foundations1 and upon such foundations alone1 ,lincoln clearly saw1 could human peace endure4 ,and upon this same foundation rests his first inaugural as well4 ,in all those months of special study1 ensuing between his election in ,november of #ahfj and his inauguration in ,march in #ahfa1 and for an ample seven years before1 ,lincoln was feeling after civic perpetuity4 ,and when he stood before the ,nation to publish his first inaugural address1 his supreme concern was fixed upon the threatened and impending ruin of the ,republic4 ,he there faced a menacing ,south1 irreconcilable1 and resolute for dissolution or blood4 ,that outcrying situation brought final issues near4 ,must the ,union perish8 ,could the ,union endure8 ,civic dissolution or civic perpetuity--this was the immediate1 the unrelieved1 the ominous alternative4 ,in the fiery heat of civic hate1 flaming into civil war1 ,lincoln had to seek for civic principles that hate could not subvert1 nor the fires of war consume2 principles too strong to admit defeat1 too pure to be dissolved4 ,never did a statesman bend over a graver task1 nor with a more honest and patient heart1 nor with a mind more divinely fashioned and furnished to comprehend and penetrate the actual case in hand4 ,as in a chemist's alembic1 he fused and tried our ,constitution and all our history4 ,into that first inaugural he incorporated the issues of his thought4 ,and this was its simple1 sole result3--,slavery is the only substantial dispute4 ,with the people is ultimate justice4 ,with ,god is ultimate truth4 ,we are not enemies4 ,we are friends4 ,in this supreme dispute let us confer and legislate as friends1 and then as friends live together in an amity that shall be perpetual4 ,this is the uncompounded essence of his first inaugural1 as of all his political philosophy4 ,in universal freedom1 by mutual persuasion1 and in even friendliness1 let our ,union forever endure4 ,here again is a statesman's publication and heroic defense of a pure1 immortal hope1 voiced in an appeal and upheld by arguments as spiritual and pure as the inmost being and utmost destiny of the living souls of men4 ,no study of the transcendent momentum in ,lincoln's life of spiritual realities can fairly overlook his speech in ,peoria1 ,october #af1 #ahed4 ,it is1 as he said at the time1 substantially a repetition of an address at ,springfield1 twelve days before4 ,it made ,lincoln a power in national politics4 ,it was the commanding beginning of his commanding career4 ,that year1 #ahed1 began the convulsion which made him president1 involved the war1 and ended in his violent death4 ,as matters stood on ,new ,year of #ahed1 slavery was1 by act of ,congress in the ,missouri ,compromise of #ahbj1 thenceforth forbidden to spread anywhere in ,united ,states territory north of the southern boundary of ,missouri4 ,in the early half of #ahed ,senator ,douglas drove through ,congress a bill1 creating the territory of ,nebraska1 which declared the ,compromise prohibition of #ahbj inoperative and void4 ,thenceforth slavery might spread anywhere4 ,this is the repeal of the ,missouri ,compromise4 ,that repeal brought ,lincoln to his feet4 ,and from the day of that ,peoria speech ,lincoln was1 to seeing eyes1 a man of destiny4 ,for1 not for that day1 nor for that century1 nor for this continent alone did ,lincoln frame and join that speech4 ,let any logical mind attempt a logical synthesis of that address1 marking well what affirmations are supreme4 ,not out of conditions that vary with the latitudes1 nor out of opinions that change as knowledge improves1 and not from sentiments that bloom and fade as do the passing flowers1 was that address constructed4 ,it handles things eternal4 ,its central propositions outwear the centuries4 ,its conclusions are compounded from stuff that is indestructible4 ,and the piers upon which they rest are as steadfast as the everlasting hills4 ,freedom1 union1 perpetuity were its only positive themes4 ,let us save the ,union was its central call2 and so save it as to make and keep it forever worth the saving--so save it that the succeeding generations of free1 happy people1 the world over1 shall rise up and call us blessed to the latest generations4 ,the perpetual ,union of freemen--this was his one pure hope4 ,of this freedom slavery was a total violation4 ,such a ,union the principle of secession made forever impossible4 ,and in the continual presence of tyranny1 and under ever impending threats of disruption1 perpetuity in peace was an impossibility4 ,liberty1 equality1 loyalty--only upon these enduring verities could self-government ever be built1 or ever abide4 ,here is stability4 ,here is harmony4 ,here are truths self-evident4 ,against cruelty1 disloyalty1 and pride these eternal principles are in eternal antagonism4 ,and when the two collide1 shocks and throes and convulsions must continually follow4 ,against human slavery1 and all that human slavery entails1 humanity instinctively and universally revolts4 ,it is condemned by human righteousness and human sympathy alike4 ,repeal the ,missouri ,compromise1 repeal all compromises1 repeal the ,declaration of ,independence1 repeal all past history1 you still cannot repeal human nature4 ,thus ,lincoln bound together the arguments of this appeal4 ,the irrepealability of the human sympathies in the nature of all men1 the undeniable humanity of the black1 self-government built upon the creative fiat of freedom and equality for all--upon these enduring propositions a ,nation could be built whose resources either to eliminate all evils1 pacify all convulsions1 and resolve all debates1 or to achieve a lasting progress1 dignity and peace1 would be inexhaustible4 ,thus1 at the very start1 his eye pierced through the political turmoil of his time1 fixing in the central place before the ,nation's gaze those great and durable elements which no statesman can safely disregard4 ,plainly notable in all this is that powerful and habitual proclivity in ,lincoln to find out and publish abroad those civic propositions and principles that are inwrought with perpetuity4 ,he was straining and toiling towards a triumph that time could never reverse4 ,foundations that were sure to shift1 or disintegrate1 or sink away1 he was resolute to overturn1 and clear away4 ,he chose and strove to toil and speak for the immortal part in man1 for ages yet to come1 and for the immediate justice of ,almighty ,god4 ,and so he fashioned forth a programme that1 like the programme of the ,hebrew prophets1 circumvented death4 ,,his ,,constancy--,,truth ,this second inaugural contains a fine example of free and reasoned reliability4 ,it is in fact1 in its total stature1 a stately exhibit of deliberate steadfastness4 ,let this short document be read1 meanwhile remembering that other inaugural document1 and not forgetting all the unspeakable strain and struggles of those four intervening years4 ,the man who spoke in #ahfa1 and the man who speaks now again in #ahfe1 stands forth in the heart of those bewildering confusions of our political life1 a living embodiment of civic constancy4 ,in his person national firmness stands enshrined4 ,in those ripe convictions1 in those cool and poised determinations1 in those ardent1 prophetic desires--steadfast1 consistent1 and sure--are traceable the rock-like foundations of our confederate ,republic4 ,in those inaugurals stands a monument not liable soon to crumble away4 ,but within that monument insuring its durability1 rests as within and upon a steadfast throne1 ,lincoln's everlasting fidelity4 ,to win clear vision of this fine trait1 let one read again this second inaugural1 and locate truly the center of gravity of its second paragraph4 ,there ,lincoln is tracing in broad1 plain strokes the origin and on-coming of the war4 ,in the center of his steady thought the interest centrally at stake was the ,union4 ,on the one hand he recalls his own address at his first inauguration1 devoted1 as he says1 altogether to saving the ,union without war4 ,on the other hand1 he recalls insurgent agents seeking to destroy it without war4 ,war was deprecated and dreaded by both parties4 ,but one would make war rather than let the ,nation survive4 ,and the other would accept war rather than let the ,nation perish4 ,and the war came4 ,as a register of ,lincoln's capacity for free1 intelligent stability1 no passing glance can in any sense exhaust or apprehend the depth and sweep and energy of those last four words4 ,when loyalty to the ,union was the issue and interest at stake1 ,lincoln would accept war4 ,and the war came4 ,when ,lincoln voiced those four words1 his eye was looking back through four dreadful1 bloody years--years1 whether in prospect or in reminiscence1 fit to make any human heart recoil4 ,but as he surveys those scenes of hate and carnage and desolation1 retracing and reckoning again the sum of their awful sorrow and cost1 and rehearses again his resolution to accept the war1 it is without a shadow or a hint of wavering or remorse4 ,in fact he is recalling that fateful day of four years before with an eye to review and vindicate that fateful resolve4 ,at the end of those eventful and sorrow-laden years1 he is as steady as at their start4 ,not by the breadth of a hair have his footing and purpose1 his judgment and endeavor been made to swerve4 ,then as now1 now as then1 his loyalty is absolute4 ,and in that sturdy loyalty of that lone man a seeing eye discerns nothing less than the unbending majesty of a ,nation's self-respect4 ,it is the ,nation's sacred honor that he has in sacred charge4 ,in him the integrity of the ,nation at large finds a champion and a living voice4 ,in his firm-set decision the ,nation's destiny takes shape4 ,in those short pregnant words the proud consistency of our total national career1 and his superb reliability1 become1 instantly and for all time1 freely1 nobly1 and completely identified4 ,this is not to say that in the teeming history of those eventful years ,lincoln's mind and will and sentiments had stood in stolid immobility4 ,he freely concedes that the years have brought him lessons he had never foreseen4 ,and his central attitude in this second scene is a reverent inquiry into the ways of ,him whose purposes transcend all human wisdom1 and require full centuries to complete4 ,but strong and clear within his reverent and lowly acceptance of divine rebukes1 stands unbent and unchanged his steadfast1 invincible pledge to reveal1 on his own and on his ,nation's behalf1 the sovereign grandeur of civic reliability4 ,in his first message to ,congress this integral trait of his personal and official life finds majestic and most definite explication4 ,it is the passage explaining to ,congress1 in precise and minute recital1 just how the war began4 ,it deals with those ominous events in ,charleston harbor1 centering about heroic ,major ,anderson1 a federal officer1 and within ,fort ,sumter1 a federal fort4 ,that assault upon a national garrison by ,confederate guns was no haphazard event4 ,at just that moment1 and in just that spot the national crisis became acute4 ,upon that spot1 and upon those events ,lincoln's eye was fixed with a physician's anxiety4 ,there he knew he could feel the pulse of the resentment and resolution of the ,south4 ,day and night he held his finger upon its feverish beat4 ,and as the fever rose1 he marked with exactest attentiveness its registration of one condition of the ,southern heart3--,was that heart so hot with civic hate that1 when every lesser issue was set aside1 and the only issue under review was the right of the ,republic to stand by its officers and its flag1 then those ,southern leaders would fire upon those officials in a federal fort1 and pull down that flag upon federal soil8 ,if in a federal fort the major in command1 and his uniformed men1 while making no aggression nor voicing any threat1 but acting only as peaceful exponents of the ,nation's authority1 and being in exigent need of food1 were to be visited by a national transport bearing nought but bread1 upon such a ship1 upon such a mission1 would seceding soldiers open fire8 ,if they would1 and if that onslaught passed without rebuke1 then that ,nation's federal integrity was dissolved4 ,such was the unmixed issue1 and so sharply edged was its final and decisive definition under ,lincoln's hand4 ,and on his part there was here no accident4 ,with foresight1 and by careful design ,lincoln took pains to make the problem plain4 ,with impressive and ideal carefulness he guided the action of his own heart to its final resolution1 and predetermined the final verdict of the world4 ,in the last supreme alternative1 when government agents stand in need of food1 and citizens who repudiate all loyalty fire upon government transports freighted only with bread1 what shall a government do8 ,this was the naked question that ,lincoln faced1 when he decided to accept and prosecute the war4 ,upon this one plain question1 and upon his one convinced determination he massed and compacted his first ,congressional address4 ,right well he understood its point1 its gravity1 and its range4 ,and surpassing well was he fitted to be the man to frame and demonstrate the true reply4 ,in all the land no finer1 firmer exemplar of elemental constancy could ever have been found to guide and cheer the ,nation's course in this extremest test of elemental self-respect4 ,let those words be written and read again4 ,it was a test of national self-respect1 elemental and supreme4 ,it was a question that concerned1 as ,lincoln saw and said1 the whole family of man4 ,government of the people1 by the same people--can or cannot such a government maintain its own integrity against its own domestic foes8 ,can it maintain its own integrity8 ,can it master its own domestic foes8 ,can men who assume their self-control be trusted to maintain their self-respect8 ,here is a problem that is in verity elemental and supreme4 ,what1 in very deed and in solid fact1 what is civic reliability8 ,where1 among all the governments by men1 where can steadfastness1 civic steadfastness be found8 ,nowhere1 ,lincoln had the eyes to see2 nowhere1 but in the civic constancy of men at once governing and governed4 ,only thus and only there1 only so and only here1 in this heaven-favored land1 did ,lincoln see1 can any government of men by men find fundamental base and final form that shall be consistent1 stable1 and real4 ,this is government indeed4 ,here is elemental1 civic verity4 ,a community held in common self-control upon the basis of common self-respect--such a union alone has constancy4 ,this is the sublime and radical civic truth that ,lincoln forged out upon his steadfast heart1 as he bent with mighty ponderings over those scenes in ,charleston harbor1 and reviewed and expounded their pregnant implications in his initial message to ,congress in #ahfa4 ,in many ways this constancy of ,lincoln rewards attentive thought4 ,for one thing1 it was radiant with intelligence4 ,indeed in him the two became identified4 ,as thus conceived1 it shows as pure and clear consistency4 ,his fully tried reliability was the well-poised balance of a mind long-schooled in the art of steadiest deliberation4 ,when ,lincoln held immutably fast1 it was due to his invincible faith that the conviction to which he clung involved abiding truth4 ,this quality tempered all his firmness4 ,just here one finds the genesis and motive of all his skilled invention of reasoned1 pleading speech4 ,lincoln's prevailing power of urgent argument roots in the deep persistency of his convinced belief4 ,it was because of an impassioned confidence1 an assurance that was vibrant with a note of triumph1 that his grasp of any ruling purpose was so unwaveringly firm4 ,this was his mood and attitude in all the major contentions of his life4 ,to the central tenets that those contentions involved he held with all the firmness of the rooted hills4 ,touching those primary principles in his character and politics his mind and faith seem to have attained an absolute confirmation4 ,and from those settled positions he could never be moved4 ,constancy in him was nothing more nor less than the energetic affirmation of intellectual rectitude4 ,his steadfastness1 thus1 was a mental poise4 ,it can be defined as ripened judgment1 a conclusion of thought1 safeguarded on every side by a discernment not easily confused1 by a penetration not easy to escape4 ,this involved a wonderful flexibility4 ,while steadfast unto the grade of immutability1 where honor was involved1 no student of his ways could call him obstinate4 ,while firm and strong enough to hold the ,nation to her predestined course upon an even keel1 he held her helm with a gentle1 pliant grasp4 ,being in every mental trait inherently honest and deliberate1 he could at once be resolute and free4 ,this blend within his being of thoughtfulness and determination1 of openness and immutability1 this candid1 conscientious1 mental poise1 this ,godlike apprehension of the larger equilibrium1 qualified him peculiarly to interpret the major movements of his time1 to trace in the deep1 prevailing sentiments of the human soul the chart of our national destiny4 ,here is in ,lincoln something wonderful4 ,among the millions of his fellowmen he counts but one4 ,but in the range and grasp of his thought1 in the eager passion of his heart1 in the controlling power of his commanding will1 he comprehends them all4 ,stable and heedful at once1 he could challenge unanswerably every man's esteem4 ,his symbol is the firm1 benignant oak1 the sheltering1 abiding hills4 ,thus he stood to help and hold1 to serve and rule among his fellowmen4 ,thus he wrought coherence into our great career4 ,thus he linked together those mighty political events with a logic which succeeding times have proved powerless to refute1 but strong and glad to confirm4 ,he had marvelous capacity to divine4 ,with him to reason was to illuminate4 ,things bewilderingly obscure1 within his thought and speech grew plain4 ,he was our prime interpreter4 ,he explained the ,nation to itself4 ,but in every such elucidation the ,nation was made to co-operate4 ,his instinctive1 habitual attitude toward other men was that of a conferee4 ,he was sensitively open to complaints and appeals4 ,delegations and private supplicants always found him courteous4 ,this courtesy was never formal4 ,to a degree altogether noteworthy the words of other men found entrance into the counselings of his mind4 ,he was not merely accessible4 ,he was impressible1 sensitive1 quick to appreciate and honor the sentiments of another man4 ,with the earnest plea of balanced1 honest argument1 hailing from whatever source1 he was facile to correspond4 ,his judgments and decisions were amenable to estimates wholly novel to him4 ,indeed1 to an almost astonishing degree his major movements were commensurate with the progress and pace of the national events that environed his life4 ,in some of his mightiest accomplishments he seemed to do little more than register the conclusions of the national mind4 ,all this is to say that ,lincoln's constancy was poise1 not obstinacy2 a well-reflected equilibrium1 not a stiff rigidity4 ,all his steadiness was studied4 ,never can it be said of ,lincoln that his verdicts were snap judgments4 ,on the contrary1 with him deliberation and delay were so habitual and so excessively indulged1 while pondering some massive1 political perplexity1 that the patience of some of our greatest statesmen repeatedly broke down1 and he was charged repeatedly with criminal1 and all but wanton indifference1 inertia1 and neglect4 ,but never was sorer libel4 ,through it all he was only too intent4 ,through it all his eye refused to sleep1 while his steady and steadying mind pursued the vexing task1 until its permanent solution stood clear4 ,and then1 with his eye steadily single to the guiding hand of ,god1 to the ,nation's immortal weal1 and to his own unsurrendered integrity1 he would publish and fulfill his studied and sturdy resolve4 ,upon the basis of these internal mental conquests did all his firmness rest4 ,hence his life-long evenness and freedom from fluctuation4 ,but this challenges still further study4 ,given this notable blending in his mental habits of independent stalwartness and amenability to others' views1 what is the inmost secret and explanation of his undeniable consistency8 ,it lay in his human sincerity4 ,his affinity with his neighbor was a reality4 ,the ,nation's deepest concerns were as deeply his own4 ,hence his ultimate convictions1 though ripening in a single decade1 proved to be in deep and enduring agreement with the ultimate convictions of the ,nation at large1 though requiring a full century to mature4 ,the sentiments that were essentially his own were seen1 when openly published upon his lips1 to be the sentiments essential and common to his fellowmen4 ,his personal aspiration was a national goal4 ,his personal character was a national type4 ,truly representative1 he was at the same time as truly unique4 ,always facing towards other men1 he always stood erect4 ,this was ,lincoln's constancy4 ,it was not the stubbornness of an arbitrary will1 although his will had regal energy4 ,it was not a frigid intellectualism1 although in mental penetration he could not be surpassed4 ,it was not a tide of swelling enthusiasm1 although the supreme emotion of his heart was the passion of an ideal patriotism4 ,his commanding constancy1 potent to compose a ,nation's turbulence1 was but the outer stature of his typical interior integrity4 ,it was the open assertion and attestation of his personal self-respect4 ,thus ,lincoln's convictions and verdicts were unfailingly his own4 ,and thus those verdicts and convictions had continental breadth4 ,dealing with a ,nation's destiny1 he came to be clothed with a ,nation's majesty4 ,in his own great heart1 as in a ,nation's crucible1 he assembled and resolved the ,nation's complexities2 and in his own pure desire1 as in a ,nation's purified hopes1 he defined and described our national goal4 ,of all things narrow and peculiar1 of all things partisan and sectional1 he purged his eye1 until with malice toward none1 with charity for all1 with reverence towards ,god1 he could see the total vastness of the things with which he had to deal4 ,here is a loyalty worthy of the name--the plighted troth of one in whom the ,nation's noblest hopes stand forth already realized1 assured1 secure4 ,this defines and describes the force at play in this last inaugural4 ,in the volume of those words ,lincoln's message and ,lincoln's manhood were identical4 ,its utterance was the voice of his self-respect4 ,herein ,lincoln the patriot and ,lincoln the man are one4 ,here was ,lincoln's standard4 ,his search for verity was a study of himself--of himself as true kindred of ,god and of his fellowmen4 ,this is the core of ,lincoln's honesty4 ,this is the key to ,lincoln's constancy4 ,this is the secret of ,lincoln's authority4 ,this was the goal of ,lincoln's quest for verity4 ,this was for ,lincoln the one reality4 ,as child of the one great ,god1 as closest kin of every man1 he is our model champion and exemplar of the one abiding truth--personal self-respect4 ,that this should be held unperverted and preserved intact was in the thought of ,lincoln the primal equity1 the very substance of a man's integrity4 ,,his ,,humility--,,worth ,the name of ,lincoln is linked inseparably with the lot of the slave4 ,that the fortune of the lowly might be improved was the supreme enterprise of his life4 ,as conceived by him1 that enterprise concerned all men4 ,not for black men alone1 and not alone for men in literal and evident bonds1 was this1 his major interest1 engaged4 ,quite as keenly1 nay even more1 was his heart concerned for his closer kinsmen of ,saxon blood1 who never felt the slave driver's lash4 ,but even here his prevailing inclination was a kindly solicitude for people of meager comfort1 culture and liberty4 ,towards men whose fortune was adverse1 and from whom more favored ones were prone to turn their face1 his heart was prone to be compassionate4 ,his very instincts seemed inclined to make the poor his intimates4 ,and when he stood among the lowly1 he never showed a sign that he had entered the shadow of any shame4 ,richly dowered with nobility himself1 himself superior to every fortune1 incapable of subjugation by any fate1 a master owned among the mightiest1 the dominant function of his life was ministration4 ,this was his ambition4 ,and it was sovereign4 ,his towering aspiration was that the needy be relieved1 that poor men might have means1 that bondmen might be free4 ,this was a soaring1 imperial wish4 ,but it sent him where men were most down-trodden and overborne4 ,it forced his name and reputation to become identified with the gross and low condition of the rudest1 most untutored mortals of our land1 the humble ,afro-,american slave4 ,this lowly fellowship he never attempted to disguise nor consented to disclaim4 ,he rather seemed to welcome whatever burden or reproach it might seem to involve4 ,before and against the white man who held the whip1 beside and befriending the black who felt its lash1 he chose to take1 and persisted to keep1 his stand4 ,many a time was this co-partnership flung in ,lincoln's face with stinging words as a mongrel1 shameful thing--with most vigorous persistence by ,douglas in their famous debates4 ,but it was not in ,lincoln to desert and disown the poor1 nor yet to apologize1 nor to retort1 nor even to reply4 ,as champion and companion of the despised and embondaged victims of the white man's greed and contempt1 ,lincoln stands by the negro1 as full of resoluteness1 and as free from shame1 as though defending his own home4 ,here is genuine humility1 not an attitude assumed1 but a virtue inwrought4 ,that this rare and ,christian grace was planted deep in ,lincoln's heart1 and pervaded the total fullness of his life1 may be argued from the very texture of his last inaugural4 ,upon just this point that document deserves minute attention4 ,from the vantage ground of ,april #d1 #ahfe1 and from the point of view of slavery1 that address is a profound and most commanding interpretation of the philosophy and phenomena of our ,american life4 ,the war1 ,god's ,providence1 and slavery--they are its sovereign themes4 ,god's ,providence shaping into national discipline the tragedy of the war2 slavery somehow its deepest1 fateful cause3 there are thoughts for thoughtful men1 who may wish to understand the meaning of our national life4 ,the point to notice here is to observe how in ,lincoln's mind in #ahfe1 the course1 and curse1 and fate of slavery connect4 ,it is nothing less than a profound elucidation of outstanding ,american events4 ,it intimates impressively how ,lincoln's mind had brooded and pondered over the lot of the ,african slave4 ,he had reckoned all the value of their unrequited toil4 ,the marks of their bruises and wounds were seared upon his soul4 ,and of all the meaning of that sore humiliation1 in terms of our national destiny and of the ,divine dominion1 he became the supreme and sympathetic expositor4 ,in his unfolding of that meaning was infolded the master motive of his life4 ,under the hand of ,god he was having bitter but submissive share in setting forever right the cruel1 age-long wrongs of the ,african slave4 ,that such sentiments should take such shape at such a time is signal demonstration that they were the central sentiments of his heart4 ,he was highly designated to a humble task2 and he knew no higher honor than to keep close friendship with the poor1 until his high commission stood complete4 ,and to this close affiliation of lowliest lives with the loftiest aims and issues of his great career1 he devotes well-nigh the whole of his inaugural address as our ,nation's president to expound1 therein betraying no slightest sign that he sees in that alliance the slightest incongruity4 ,in that defense and championship of the rights that were elemental to men1 though the most despised1 he saw his highest dignity as president4 ,and to that lowly aim he shaped and pledged his policy1 his party1 his fortune1 and his fame4 ,in truth this affinity of ,lincoln with his neighbor in need was the very fruitage of the fortune of his life4 ,he was fitted and predestined for it by his birth4 ,his station was of the lowliest4 ,his setting-up was pathetically scant4 ,all his discipline was cruelly stern4 ,in ease and plenty he had no share4 ,of sweets and luxury he had no taste4 ,born of parents pitifully poor1 nurtured in painful penury1 poorly sheltered1 scantily clad1 accustomed to neglect1 intimate with want1 trained to disappointment1 toiling in untamed scenes against hard odds with rudest tools1 the kindred and daily familiar of unassuming men1 denied the commonest aids to personal refinement1 he was to the atmosphere and temperament of genuine1 undisguised humility native born1 and fully bred4 ,from such a hopeless start1 in such a hostile environment1 he made his way alone4 ,it can be said with almost literal truth that he never had any help4 ,his only friend was his modest1 resolute heart4 ,his winnings were all by wrestling--and the struggle never relaxed4 ,when every antagonist had been met and overthrown1 and his gaunt stature stood in the ,nation's arena alone and undefeated1 then upon that unbent but unpretending form his ,nation and his ,nation's ,god laid a burden1 such as no man in all our history had ever borne4 ,when beneath that great final task he meekly bowed1 its superhuman responsibility and weight were all-sufficient to crush forever all vain-glorious pride1 if in his tried heart any pride had ever entered1 and having entered had still remained4 ,before the majesty of his commission1 and amid the inscrutable perplexities of each unparalleled day1 he must always be fain1 even though never forced1 to walk humbly among his people1 and before his ,god4 ,from birth to death1 by fortune and by ,providence1 as though by overmastering fate1 he was fashioned for humility4 ,from all these grounds he was predisposed to modesty4 ,over against the vastness of his task1 facing daily all its formidable difficulties1 and sensible evermore of his infinite insufficiency1 the posture of his spirit and the tone of his daily speech unfailingly betokened a moderate estimate of his personal significance4 ,the overspreading majesty of the work to which he set his hand1 always towering vividly before his thought1 kept vividly active the consciousness that he was quite incompetent to accomplish aught1 except the ,god of ,nations tendered daily help4 ,as thus inclined and thus disposed in body and in mind1 he became a man of prayer4 ,that he should often fall upon his knees was but the consequence of his daily discovery that his burdens and his strength were widely incommensurate4 ,many times those supplications seemed as though unheard4 ,the heavens gave no sign4 ,then malice raged against him4 ,but then his unsurrendered faith in ,god1 his reverence for his task1 and his sobering estimate of himself would show as meekness4 ,it was not his way to retaliate or rail4 ,in darkness1 before delay1 and beneath abuse1 he bore and suffered long without complaint4 ,in this pathetic quietness his humility becomes heroic4 ,this bent towards lowliness1 tempered through and through1 as it was1 with his clear intelligence1 saved him from vaunting and all vanity4 ,there was habitually in his posture a grave solidity4 ,this often seemed like carefulness and caution4 ,but it was born of modesty4 ,if there was ever a time when ever a man might be suffered to boast1 the date of this second inaugural was the time1 and the author of that inaugural was the man4 ,the hour of that address marked the opening of ,lincoln's second presidential term4 ,it was the crowning vindication of his presidential policy4 ,after four years of war the national poll at the last electoral vote had shown the ,north stronger in men than when the war began4 ,the status of the ,south was desperate4 ,but five weeks lay between him and the surrender of ,lee4 ,lincoln was not lacking in foresight1 nor in careful calculation4 ,his skill therein was preeminent4 ,wary1 discerning1 resolute1 his assurance of ultimate victory no doubt firm and clear1 no breath of boasting was given vent4 ,instead1 with almost painful reserve1 he modestly said1 ,with high hope for the future1 no prediction in regard to it is ventured4 ,lincoln was one of those rarest of men1 invincible in resolution1 at the same time invincible in reserve4 ,this inner mood of modesty showed in all his outer furnishing4 ,it was not his way to publish his distinction4 ,for him to signalize his primacy by any decoration would be an incongruity4 ,in any group of men where precedence was emphasized he was ill at ease4 ,any attempt by him to designate his official elevation by some gilded ornament or plume would have been grotesque4 ,his eyes were not lofty nor his heart haughty4 ,his feet were for the furrow4 ,his hands were for the axe4 ,his lips were for friendly salutation of all the people on the street4 ,any outer token1 intended to mark him for separation or any superiority1 would have excited nothing but sorrow in him4 ,fabrics however costly and rare1 jewels however brilliant and pure1 designed and disposed for distinction and display1 awakening envy and unrest quite as much as admiration and delight1 were not for him4 ,plain man among the lowliest1 true nobleman among the noblest1 he wore all his honors in uttermost innocence of all parade4 ,nor were the features of ,lincoln ever intended to be employed as instruments of scorn4 ,into the hellish ministry of curling contempt those gracious lips could never be impressed4 ,his heart was far too kindly2 and that were safeguard enough4 ,but his unalloyed humility was far too potent to ever encourage or permit in him any indulgence of disdain4 ,truly lowly himself1 it was not in him to coldly despise any of his fellowmen4 ,just here his humility displayed its sterling honesty4 ,and just here his honor and his glory blend4 ,here is his sure title to nobility--a title that neither time nor eternity can ever tarnish or bedim4 ,by every right is this nobility his4 ,by his earthly fortune1 as by a hard1 relentless fate1 his lot was cast among the poor2 and by that same appointment the lot of all earth's poor has gained perennial dignity4 ,but he graced those ranks also as a volunteer4 ,by his own consent1 with sovereign free selection1 he elected to sustain and overcome all the impediments of the station of his birth1 and so to demonstrate the full capacity of the humblest human life for high endeavor and desire4 ,thus he was alike and at once filled with a deep compassion1 and free from high contempt4 ,here lies the firm foundation of his proud renown4 ,this is the true birthmark of his nobility4 ,he was above the baseness and the meanness of scorning any brother man4 ,and so he avoided arrogance4 ,it was not the way of ,lincoln to forever reiterate1 if even to allow1 his own importance4 ,he was acutely sensitive1 to the meaning and worth of an honorable renown4 ,especially was his cool1 gray eye awake to the future issues of the pregnant deeds of his teeming times4 ,but therein his eager concern was a patriot's anxiety--an anxiety in which he mingled his fortune and fame with the destiny of his native land4 ,therein the jealousy of his desire for the national welfare burned away1 as in sacrificial fires and upon a sacred altar1 all ambitions for himself4 ,at any cost to others1 or through any other man's neglect1 it was not in the heart of ,lincoln to demand and heap together honors or advantages for himself4 ,well might he be justified1 if ever such a course were fair1 in claiming for himself exceptional rewards4 ,chief executive of a great ,republic1 commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the ,north1 assured of the major momentum of military success1 in immediate reach of vast and ever increasing resources1 whether for war or peace1 chosen the second time to be the ,nation's head1 charged the second time to consummate the ,nation's perpetual unity--surely he had ample guaranty for imputing to his own sole hand1 in a supreme degree1 mighty prowess1 imposing achievements1 a vast and spreading authority and power4 ,at such a time and amid such surroundings1 a generous measure of self-aggrandizement would have seemed quite warranted and well sustained4 ,but never was a mighty commander freer from that uncomely fault4 ,the mention of victory makes him strangely unmindful of himself4 ,the thought of his vast authority makes him the lowliest in the land4 ,lincoln was not arrogant4 ,he made no effort after aggregated honors1 however deserved1 much less after honors unearned4 ,in particular he showed no inclination to appropriate another's fame4 ,for one thing1 he knew too well the awful cost of magistracy4 ,the right to be commander-in-chief of a ,nation's resources and arms1 so coveted a right in aspiring men1 became transmuted in the cup which ,lincoln drank into a terrible1 an almost impossible responsibility4 ,nor was it of his nature to subtract from other men for his own increase4 ,at the price of a brother's freedom1 or happiness1 or life1 the gaining of ease1 or wealth1 or joy of any sort for himself would be far too dear4 ,in the soul of ,lincoln extortion could find no soil4 ,his mien among men was that of indulgent ministry1 not of exacting mastery4 ,with the lower level and the lesser meed he could be well content4 ,morbid jealousy for his own acclaim1 hungry greed for another's reward1 satisfaction in plaudits that were undeserved1 or comfort from robbery or extortion of any sort were sentiments for which the refined and genuine modesty of ,lincoln had no appetite or taste4 ,the honors that surrounded and invested him were up-springing1 spontaneous and free2 in no least measure accumulated1 artificial or enforced4 ,the native purity of ,lincoln's lowliness shows best in his reverence for ,god4 ,he lived in a daily consciousness of ,providence4 ,as a statesman he was thoroughly a man of ,god1 full of a patriot's adoring and acquiescent thankfulness1 as he watched and studied the wonderful unfolding of ,god's just and kindly government of this most favored land4 ,this mood of humble reverence was deeply wrought4 ,it was of the texture of his character4 ,it was not a vesture or a posture1 a gesture or a phrase1 assumed here and discarded there1 and often counterfeit4 ,it was essential1 like his integrity1 pervading and indeed controlling all his responsible life4 ,and it was wholly undisguised4 ,in his most formal public documents--papers in which statesmen as a rule make scant allusion to ,deity--,lincoln's allusions to ,god are their most imposing feature4 ,beyond all contradiction1 ,lincoln enacted his public responsibilities in the fear of ,god4 ,this was the beginning of his wisdom4 ,just this is the secret of the sanity of this last inaugural4 ,and it is the secret of its immortal beauty4 ,and it is the girdle of its strength4 ,in framing its central argument1 and thereby steadying the ,nation's heart in the convulsions of war1 he was expounding the hidden ways of ,god4 ,there grew a mighty paragraph4 ,it reads smoothly now4 ,but when it passed through ,lincoln's lips1 it was the issue of a hard-pent agony4 ,when he voiced those words he stood before an altar1 and made confession1 like a very priest1 for both ,north and ,south4 ,all the land had behaved with unbecoming confidence4 ,all alike were under discipline4 ,god was in dominion4 ,even in their prayers both ,north and ,south had been contending against the ,lord4 ,the prayers of both could not be answered4 ,that of neither had been answered fully4 ,the ,almighty had his own purposes4 ,the expectations of all had gone astray4 ,the contending struggles of either side1 despite their contending prayers1 were being turned by the judgments of ,god against them both into a terrible national chastisement4 ,so ,lincoln discerned1 and so he humbly1 vicariously confessed4 ,but beneath this high dominion his heart too had been bowed down1 and overwhelmed1 and chastened sore4 ,repeatedly his counsels had been overturned1 and his expectations had been reversed2 and that too1 as he devoutly believed1 by the over-ruling purposes of ,god4 ,hence1 as in this inaugural scene he faced the future1 though he was head of a puissant people1 he behaved like a little child4 ,in a chastened sense of the mystery and authority of the overruling designs of ,almighty ,god1 he forebore to boast4 ,and then he said in rhythmic words of almost prophetic majesty1 and in the attire of all but sacrificial humility3 ,fondly do we hope--fervently do we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away4 ,yet1 if ,god wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk1 and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword1 as was said three thousand years ago1 so still it must be said1 ',the judgments of the ,lord are true and righteous altogether4' ,this is indeed in prophetic strain4 ,but he forbears to prophesy4 ,he longed with sacrificial eagerness for national prosperity1 in lasting freedom and unison and happiness4 ,as he renewed his official pledge to preserve1 protect1 and defend the world's greatest charter of equality and freedom for all mankind1 his heart and hope held high and firm4 ,but his total being was subdued4 ,god had crossed his path4 ,the long-drawn war was ,god's rebuke4 ,the ,nation had gone sadly astray4 ,the ,almighty had taken her waywardness in hand4 ,his purposes were in control4 ,and ,he was supreme4 ,and ,his ways were unrevealed4 ,lincoln stood to his task unflinchingly1 ready either for sorrow or relief1 ready either for death or life1 as the ,most ,high might appoint4 ,here is statesmanship indeed4 ,but it is altogether unique4 ,a mighty ,nation's executive head1 discerning1 devoted1 and devout1 holding in his steady hand the charge of a ,nation's destiny1 pledging in the ,nation's name to lay upon the altar1 if need be for the ,nation's honor1 the ,nation's life1 and there before the altar waiting humbly upon ,god4 ,many a theme of profoundest purport opens instantly into view4 ,just now our eye is fixed upon its illustration of humility4 ,on the one hand1 and in the first place1 its exhibition of the dignity of pure manhood is sublime4 ,in this inaugural scene1 beneath the awful stress of a ,nation in war1 upon the basis of the pledged covenant of the free1 invincible faith that a free ,republic can sustain and fulfill all its solemn responsibility1 and with unquenchable hope in the vast and unseen future of his land1 ,lincoln took his stand1 and held his ground1 and put on record before ,god and all the world his reverent and resolute oath4 ,here is manhood1 noble1 majestic1 decisive1 free--a manhood that embraces the worth1 voices the hope1 and confronts with open breast the destiny of the race4 ,but in this same scene these mighty energies pause4 ,lincoln consciously faces ,god4 ,for himself and for the ,nation he makes humble acknowledgment that the ,lord is ,almighty and ,most ,high4 ,and to ,god's full sovereignty he yields spontaneous consent4 ,with lowliest submission and confession he concedes and declares that all his rebukes and all his rule are in righteousness4 ,here is a place where any man may properly pause4 ,here the orbit of our proudest being strikes its verge4 ,here ,god and manhood meet4 ,here human power faints4 ,here human resolution halts4 ,here human foresight dims4 ,here human wisdom becomes a void4 ,here all our pride becomes perforce humility2 and all our counselings merge in faith4 ,here human grandeur touches its outer rim4 ,but here1 too1 human eyes awaken4 ,here human aspirations rise4 ,here human wisdom becomes newly informed4 ,here human forecasts brighten into hope4 ,here human strength revives4 ,here human purpose tightens4 ,here in reverence human wisdom begins4 ,here in human lowliness appears a ,godlike dignity4 ,here our human stature shows its noblest4 ,lincoln is at the utmost bound of his knowledge1 and his liberty2 and yet he is displaying just here a discernment and a decision of the most exalted type--a discernment1 however1 whose insight is a vision of faith1 and a decision whose resolve is an exercise of trust4 ,in this scene statesmanship is transmuted into religion1 undefiled and pure4 ,man in his loftiest hope and uttermost need1 and ,god in his transcendent royalty of equity and goodwill meet face to face1 and stand in open1 free and friendly covenant4 ,here is at once a portrait of true humility1 and the acme of high nobility4 ,here in childlike trust and childlike faith the wisdom and the freedom of man attain their goal4 ,here statesmanship and reverence1 wisdom and trust1 freedom and acquiescence1 dignity and lowliness harmonize and interblend4 ,and in the unison either one remains uncompounded and pure4 ,here many questions press to be resolved4 ,this signal scene in ,lincoln's career--what has it to say about the inner nature of man8 ,what about the nature of ,god8 ,what about the nature of our human insight into the essential qualities of things8 ,what about the relation of will to thought8 ,what about the sovereignty of character8 ,when human character touches the limit of human life1 is it facing night or day8 ,these are ultimate inquiries4 ,and they are immediate4 ,for answer to these inquiries1 let ,lincoln and ,hegel meet4 ,and let the ,nations listen to their replies2 and so discern what problems clear1 where dignity and lowliness convene4 ,for here is a shining scene1 where any man may see that in a lowly heart wisdom and nobility may sit together as on a throne4 ,modesty like ,lincoln's is a courtly grace4 ,reverence such as his beseems a prince4 ,such humility1 reflecting with heavenly beauty the immediate presence of ,god1 may clothe a mighty man1 and hold the center of a mighty scene1 without unseemliness1 and it wants not intelligence4 ,this at least this scene makes clear4 ,,part ,,iii4 ,,synthesis ,,lincoln',s ,,moral ,,unison ,the marvelous beauty of the ,athenian ,parthenon is displayed in four facades4 ,upon these four sides runs a frieze in a continuous band1 crowning all the columns1 and binding all the structure into a single shrine4 ,comprehended within the stately course of that all-encircling frieze is classic demonstration how an impressive manifoldness of sculptural form may present a perfect and impressive unison4 ,something such is ,lincoln's character1 as it stands in this second inaugural4 ,in this address four personal qualities stand forth1 as distinct and clear to the eye and thought as are the faces of the ,parthenon2 while1 like the ,parthenon1 the author of that address is indivisibly and undeniably one4 ,both are alike composite1 and both alike are one4 ,both embrace diversity1 but all in perfect harmony4 ,both have perfect unity1 but without monotony4 ,like the temple of ,athene1 greeting from its single altar every horizon of the ,grecian sky1 ,lincoln1 voicing his solemn oath as the ,nation's president1 gives utterance to every moral element in our ,american life4 ,here is something worth minute inspection4 ,here1 upreared upon our ,western1 modern ,american soil1 is a noble work of art1 as noble as any in the ancient ,east--finished1 balanced1 and enduring--the ripened moral character of a people's patriot4 ,first to notice narrowly is that ,lincoln's moral texture is fourfold4 ,four virtues stamp this speech4 ,four strands compose its web4 ,four hues commingle in its light4 ,four parts convey its harmony4 ,this four-foldness is discernible distinctly4 ,plain to see through all the features of this address1 as well-defined as the features of his friendly face1 is his kindliness4 ,of all things1 war was most deplorable4 ,of all things1 peace was most to be desired4 ,all malice was to be disowned4 ,all charity was to be indulged4 ,all wounds were to be bound up4 ,all sorrows were to be consoled4 ,there spoke the pleading voice of love4 ,all men were bidden to love their neighbors as they loved themselves4 ,here the quality of moral kindliness is unmistakably and indelibly distinct4 ,quite as plain is his ideal and illustration of integrity4 ,as manifest to all the world is his inflexible uprightness1 as is the outer stature of his erect physique4 ,for the equity in the bondman's protest against two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil he had an open ear and a profound respect4 ,in the confidence that the judgments of ,almighty ,god were altogether just he was not ashamed to make public announcement of his abiding faith4 ,eager that peace among ourselves and with all ,nations might always last1 he was also eager that it should be just4 ,firmly based1 for his ,nation and for himself1 upon such foundations of self-respect1 resting on ,god1 and resolute for the right1 he had no other thought but to strive with unremitting constancy1 until his work was done4 ,here is moral loyalty1 plainly visible1 and as plainly inviolate4 ,quite as clear is his humility4 ,the war1 as ,lincoln viewed it1 was a humbling visitation upon the ,nation of the ,nation's sins1 a mighty rebuke upon all human scorn and pride4 ,in all that sin and scorn and pride--the crime and guilt of slavery--,lincoln had no slightest1 conscious1 personal share4 ,but the shame and woe of that rebuke1 as it fell from the hand of ,god upon the ,nation as a whole1 he bore with quiet1 meek humility4 ,and to whatever further judgment the ,almighty might allot he humbly bowed his head1 confessing openly that1 in his own heart and thought1 ,god's ways had been proudly misunderstood4 ,here is reverent humility1 and here is humble reverence1 undeniable and undisguised4 ,and just as clear is his supreme esteem for values that are permanent and pure4 ,above all changing accidents ,lincoln honored the ,godlike human soul4 ,in harmony herewith his thoughts and arguments were prone to handle centuries4 ,and in rating worth his standard was a man's humanity4 ,thus he shaped the records and the prospects of our history into a philosophy4 ,thus he interpreted the war4 ,it was ,god's vindication of the immortal value of the humblest man4 ,carnal pleasures and worldly gains1 wrung from human lives at the cost of the degradation and debasement of the human soul1 and in defiance of ,god's eternal and indefeasible laws1 ,lincoln saw to be of all things the most foolhardy and crude4 ,so spiritual and pure was his conception of ,god and man1 and his active understanding of the meaning of historic efforts and events4 ,ideals1 endeavors1 and enjoyments1 even though normal and worthy1 if they dealt with values that were decaying and gross1 were cheaply rated by him2 while the ,nation's perpetuity1 each man's spiritual quality1 and ,god's eternal purity held eminence unfailingly in his affection and esteem4 ,here is spirituality1 pure within1 and by the inwardly pure plain to see4 ,as in the shapely quadrilateral of the ,parthenon1 this fourfoldness in the character of ,lincoln is cardinal4 ,each quality is an element1 each conforming with an elemental factor in the nature of every man4 ,this involves that in its essential substance each trait1 so far considered1 is incapable of analysis4 ,and each refuses to be resolved into something else4 ,each one is a simple and a constant co-efficient in ,lincoln's moral being4 ,each one exists within his life in a complete integrity1 indivisible1 self-contained4 ,his humility1 thus1 is integral and unmixed4 ,when ,lincoln bows1 as he does in this inaugural1 before his ,god1 and therein offers his life in a bending ministry to all his fellowmen1 that reverence and that ministry are1 as ministry and as reverence1 pure lowliness4 ,the phases of that lowliness may pass through continual transformation4 ,and those changing forms may have changing designations4 ,it may be submission before ,god's sovereignty1 reverence before his majesty1 awe before his mystery1 obedience before his authority1 trust beneath his ,providence1 confession under his rebukes2 but common1 essential1 and unchanged within them all is simple1 pure humility4 ,so with the fashion of his humble ways among his fellowmen4 ,it also wears a varying guise4 ,it may be modest reticence1 abhorrence of parade1 companionship with need1 submission to abuse1 co-partnership with a brother's shame1 preferring another's gain1 honoring other's worth1 seeking ways to serve4 ,but common1 essential and unchanged within all these as well1 is simple1 pure humility4 ,it is a solid moral trait1 substantial and irreducible4 ,as illustrated in ,lincoln's life1 it is entirely dignified and beautiful1 essential and inseparable4 ,as shown in his behavior1 it corresponds with a relationship1 as inherent and inwrought in his very being as his very breath4 ,as a trait of ,lincoln's character1 his humility has a root1 as firm and durable as is the transcendence of ,god1 and as are the opportunity and obligation of every man among his brothermen to bear1 forbear1 and serve4 ,it is just the same with his fidelity4 ,it too1 is an uncompounded and imperative moral trait4 ,it is a living1 facile grace1 easily capable of many kinds of affirmation4 ,it may identify itself with truth1 in reasoned or implicit faith2 with promise1 pledge1 or oath1 in loyalty2 with proof by testing fires1 as fidelity1 steadfastness1 or reliability2 with unvarying1 free adhesion to eternal principles1 as consistency2 with clear conviction of sure reality1 as verity2 with ethical straightforwardness1 as rectitude1 sincerity1 or honesty2 with even1 balanced justice1 as equity2 with the innermost and final norm of truth in any personal life1 as self-assertion1 or self-respect4 ,but common within them all1 unaltered and unalterable amid all those varied and varying forms1 is simple1 unmixed constancy4 ,in any analysis of ,lincoln's moral life this moral trait will forever demand distinct and distinctive recognition and name4 ,it is based and centered in his estimate and estimation of himself1 the eye of his very honor1 the core of his nobility1 the very sense within his living soul of the life of his integrity4 ,it is the inward attitude of his moral worth1 as invincible1 insistent1 and elemental as any purest action of his self-consciousness4 ,the same holds true of ,lincoln's kindliness4 ,in the balanced harmony of his character the note of human friendliness is a persistent and indispensable strain4 ,without that melody his moral consonance would be painfully and irretrievably impaired4 ,like every other fundamental trait1 this too may be voiced with every sort of easy1 fluent variation4 ,it may spring spontaneously from deep within the heart1 as benign and all-embracing benevolence4 ,it may overflow with benefits1 in active1 bounteous generosity4 ,it may bind together an ideal home in parental1 filial1 fraternal affection4 ,it may kindle at the altars of one's native land1 and influence the heart of the patriotic devotee4 ,it may break through all the accidents of birth and race into universal brotherhood4 ,it may befriend the hurt1 and needy1 and bereft1 as sympathy4 ,it may so prevail as to bear up beneath the cruel sin of alien hearts in the sorrow of vicarious love1 to the end that guilty men may be redeemed and reconciled4 ,in myriad ways this human kindliness may speak its gentle words of mercy1 grace1 and peace4 ,but every word is keyed to kindly fellowship4 ,through all those variations this note is prevalent4 ,and it is keyed to a relationship as universal and as unavoidable as are the bonds of human brotherhood4 ,this wanting in any moral character in fact or in idea1 that moral character is unbalanced and incomplete4 ,its mighty influence and its constant evidence in ,lincoln's active life supply an elemental requisite to that life's harmony4 ,it is his full-voiced answer to the world-wide plea for human friendliness4 ,and just such affirmations must be made concerning ,lincoln's pureness4 ,like each of the other three1 this quality1 too1 holds a place and eminence distinctly and uniquely its own4 ,no other trait can do its part or take its place4 ,its function and its office permit no substitute4 ,nor can its ministry be divided4 ,its claim is regal4 ,and in any rating and apportionment among the other three this trait must be granted equal primacy4 ,its presence and its purport in ,lincoln's total life are clear and fair and absolutely radical4 ,its aspect varies like the aspect of the sky4 ,but deep within those variations gleams the pure and shining blue4 ,it may win triumph over greed of appetite in temperance2 or over fleshly passion in continence4 ,it may fix supreme desire1 not on decaying things1 but on undying life2 not on things that change and disappoint1 but on values that abide and hold their own4 ,it may search far beyond things visible for things unseen2 and look within all symbols1 discerning what they mean4 ,it may detect within down-trodden1 untutored men souls kindred to their ,maker4 ,it may transcend all idol forms1 and make all worship spiritual4 ,it may see how ends outvalue means2 and how bottles should not outvalue wine4 ,in the midst of our universal lot of accident1 disease and death it may hold fast1 for all the pure in heart1 to the hope of a happy immortality4 ,but enduring and undying1 common and unchanged within them all is simple1 spiritual purity4 ,the soul asserts supremacy4 ,things that fluctuate and finally dissolve1 however befitting and beautiful while they thrive1 are admired and valued far beneath the immortal and unchanging worth of ,god and ,godlike souls of men4 ,this clear vision and high evaluation of spiritual things in the thought and life of ,lincoln can never be omitted nor excluded in any final analysis of his moral life4 ,it ranks among the elements of his character1 as each or any one of its facades holds rank about the ,parthenon4 ,thus in the composition of ,lincoln's moral being there are four solid1 permanent1 radical integers--his kindliness1 his loyalty1 his pureness1 and his humility4 ,and these four elements of his character face the four cardinal points in the compass of his life--his brother man1 his conscious self1 his flesh-bound soul1 and his sovereign ,lord4 ,so inherent in his very structure1 so inwrought in his conscious character1 so deeply based1 so cardinal1 and so enduring and irreducible is this fourfoldness in ,lincoln's inward life4 ,and now1 as with the ,parthenon1 this finished circuit of these four constituents makes the outline of ,lincoln's character not only clear and cardinal1 but inclusive and complete4 ,combining in their significance and sweep all fleshly and material things2 all things superior and supreme2 all the realm and range of human brotherhood2 and all the truth and worth within his own identity--every factor and relation of his conscious life has been embraced4 ,his neighbor and himself as conscious peers1 each in loyalty and love demanding and awarding equal mutual heed2 his spirit and his flesh1 the two and only two constituents of his personal life2 his finite nature1 facing1 with the daily meed and due of humble reverence1 his infinite ,creator1 the ,lord of grace and truth--these exhaust the primal co-efficients of his life2 these enjoin and specify his primal obligations2 these inspire and consummate every moral excellence4 ,when these four virtues are discovered and admired1 when each and all are elected and achieved2 when any man stands true and firm in self-respecting constancy2 benign and kind in self-devoting love2 spiritually refined and pure amid a world of corroding change2 bending before the ,most ,high ,god with the adoration and awe that are forever so beautiful and meet1 his moral stature stands fully finished1 balanced1 and mature4 ,so plain to see1 so integral1 and so comprehensive are these four qualities of ,lincoln's character4 ,and now a mighty statement is waiting to be made4 ,these four constituents of ,lincoln's virtue are not four fractions of his character1 each possessing and commanding in solitude and exclusively some separate segment of his morality4 ,not alone is each one integral1 but ,lincoln is integrally in each4 ,his kindliness is not the action of a section of his character2 it enlists and occupies his being as a whole and indivisibly4 ,in ,lincoln's faithfulness ,lincoln's stature stands complete4 ,pureness is by no means an occasional or intermittent exercise of his judgment or choice4 ,nor in the geography of his life is ,lincoln's lowliness local or sectional4 ,the total ,lincoln is kindly1 faithful1 pure1 and lowly equally1 fully and continually4 ,when in this address he calls the ,nation to firmness in the right as ,god reveals the right1 his manhood stands full-sized in its exercise and pledge of patriotic loyalty to duty and oath4 ,when again with pitying heart he makes reference to the slave driver's lash1 to those centuries of unpaid toil1 to the terrible cruelty of the war with its sorrowful entail of widows and orphans and wounds and graves1 and1 disowning all malice1 voices his great-souled plea for universal charity and everlasting peace1 the full flood of his full strength is pouring through his speech4 ,when he reminds his fellowmen how far the worth of man transcends all other wealth1 he is professing and commending a faith to which all his hopes stand pledged4 ,and when in humble fellowship with humble men he abjures all hollow boasts and pride1 and1 bending beneath ,god's just rebukes1 voices for all the land our national guilt1 from that humiliation and lowliness no portion of his being is exempt4 ,each cardinal virtue engrosses and engages all his soul4 ,and now ensues with a sequence that is irresistible1 an affirmation that in all this study of ,lincoln's character must stand supreme4 ,integral as is each several one of these four virtues in ,lincoln's life1 and integral as is ,lincoln's life in each single several trait1 these two integrities can be clearly seen to deeply interblend and truly coincide4 ,there is among the four qualities within his life no dissonance4 ,here emerges ,lincoln's moral unison4 ,as in the ,parthenon all the elements harmonize and the edifice is one1 so in ,lincoln moral manifoldness unifies4 ,there is throughout coincidence4 ,the heart that bows towards ,god1 in that very act of meekest acquiescence swells with pity for all who mourn and bleed1 with indignant jealousy for equity1 and with a supreme esteem for immortal souls4 ,these four virtues do not exist and operate asunder4 ,they do not come into view in this inaugural in sequence1 each one in turn displacing and eclipsing the one that went and shone before4 ,they coexist1 each one continuing undiminished and unobscured1 each one fully active and plain to see1 their confluent tides pouring through the same identical phrase1 the total strength of ,lincoln surging alike in each4 ,through the whole address thrills ,lincoln's whole conviction1 all his passion1 and the total vigor of his will respecting truth and falsity1 hate and charity1 greed and purity1 pride and humility4 ,here is moral unison4 ,to find the secret to this moral synthesis demands and deserves the sharpest scrutiny4 ,that this may be understood it requires to be seen that these four virtues1 so clearly distinguishable and so perfectly combined1 are as clearly and perfectly akin4 ,lincoln's equity and charity1 as voiced in this address1 are not alien energies4 ,they vitally correspond4 ,they bear mutual resemblance4 ,each springs from deep within himself1 from his elemental manhood1 a manhood that finds in his brother's life and liberty as deep rejoicing as in his own4 ,and herein he is also kindred with ,god1 as ,god's purposes and ways are defined in this address4 ,god1 too1 is deeply just and kind4 ,here roots ,lincoln's meekness under ,god's rebuke1 and ,lincoln's firmness in his understanding of what is right4 ,between his heart's chief wish and ,god's high will the moral correspondence becomes identity4 ,so deep is the coincidence and agreement of ,lincoln's reverence and equity and charity within himself and with his ,god4 ,the same inwrought agreement shines in the profound affinity of ,lincoln's kindliness and faithfulness and lowliness with his pure idealism4 ,in him they are all as fully unified as is his manliness4 ,so deeply intimate is the vital synthesis of ,lincoln's moral unison4 ,this position is pivotal4 ,if either of these four virtues1 here defined and designated as elementally distinct and cardinal1 can be ever merged into any one1 or any two1 or all the other three2 or if any one can be dissolved1 or analyzed into something else still more elemental and pure1 that possibility should be made passing sure and clear at just this point4 ,for from the affirmations1 thus far laid down1 as to the cardinal validity and vital harmony of these four moral traits1 and of the four foundations in which these virtues rest1 follow other affirmations in the chapters that now ensue1 which no artificial postulate can ever uphold4 ,but here1 in passing1 two standard affirmations are required4 ,it is not to be asserted or assumed that ,lincoln's personal life attained perfection1 and transcended sin4 ,in the chapter on humility1 and in chapters yet to come his own deep sense of deep unworthiness stands evident4 ,but in his clear and firm ideal and desire1 aglow throughout with ,godlike grief for all delinquency1 appear the qualities above defined4 ,and then these qualities1 which his unique career displays1 are1 as moral qualities1 in no respect unique or beyond the measure of any man4 ,they beseem quite normally the plainest of us all4 ,this truth deserves full heed and unreserved respect4 ,lincoln was beautifully like a little child4 ,he was indeed a hero and performed heroic deeds4 ,but with all his heroism1 as regards his moral qualities1 the humblest mortal may be his peer4 ,here is the hidden secret of the universal and ungrudging admiration which his heroic character commands4 ,he is the world's model and guarantee of a world democracy4 ,,part ,,iv4 ,,studies ,,his ,,symmetry--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,beauty ,in ,lincoln's character is a beautiful illustration of moral balance4 ,he stands before the eye unchangeably1 like the ,capitol dome at ,washington1 a signal exhibition of firmness1 harmony1 and repose4 ,as he fills his place as president1 he seems to face the whole horizon at once4 ,a study of his life leaves the impression that he is resting upon a solid1 ample base2 that his weight is well distributed2 that his energies are united evenly2 that all his parts agree together2 that throughout his structure he is at ease2 while yet there swell and rise within his breast proud1 far-seeing hopes that only a ,nation's grandest magnitude could give complete embodiment4 ,this massive poise1 and breadth1 and balanced evenness are the seemly vesture of his character4 ,they well become his inner attitude4 ,they are the open intimation of the shapeliness and majesty of the unseen soul within4 ,and quite as worthy of study and admiration as our national dome1 is this well-poised nobility of ,lincoln's personality4 ,with this intent one may well review this last inaugural1 for it enshrines superior beauty4 ,not unfittingly did it find first utterance beneath the presence of that imposing masterpiece at our national ,capitol4 ,as in that circling colonnade1 so in the measured cadences of this address1 there is exalted harmony4 ,its phrases1 rhythmic and pleasurable1 rank almost as music4 ,read however many times1 its sentences never tire4 ,minds the most refined are glad to point to this address as to a noble monument1 assured that its perusal will awaken in any ,american high national pride1 and in the minds of all men a pure delight4 ,this commanding1 gracious dignity is not alone a matter of even rhythms and pleasing cadences4 ,it is to its author's moral poise and full harmony that this speech owes its symmetry4 ,indeed this is all its substance4 ,of rhetorical decoration it is absolutely bare4 ,its only title to its universal admiration is the patent fact that its author has traced and set therein1 as with an engraver's nicest art1 the princely fashion of his high-born soul4 ,its finished ethical symmetry is all the art that gives this speech its everlasting charm4 ,what now is the inmost nature of the attractiveness that holds possession of this last inaugural8 ,in this inquiry is extended a winsome invitation to any beauty-loving mind4 ,as such a mind fixes its inspection intently upon the vital structure of this address1 he sees within its shapely borders four princely virtues1 standing together in a courtly league4 ,each virtue stands mature in unrestrained virility1 no one of them overbearing the other three1 nor being overborne4 ,with easy1 manly grace each virtue does its part1 while all harmoniously combine1 to support with ,godlike sagacity and strength the problems of a ,nation's destiny in days and tasks that mock the sagest counsel and baffle the proudest might of man4 ,like stately columns beneath a stately dome1 these virtues deserve regard4 ,each one is integral in ,lincoln's personal majesty1 and in the finely finished power of this address4 ,the exhibition of personal self-respect1 the very eye of moral verity1 as displayed in ,lincoln's own reliability1 and idealized within his steadfast plan for national consistency1 is fashioned forth within the well-set features of this address with all the well-poised grandeur of the ,olympian ,zeus4 ,the tones of kindliest friendliness towards detractors and defenders alike1 repelling all malignity1 unfailingly benign1 cannot in any cadence be misunderstood4 ,they fall like healing music1 reminding listeners of home1 and hearthstone1 and a father's heart4 ,the lowly attitude of penitent submissiveness towards ,god1 with its wonderful mingling of solemn awe1 adoring worship1 and conscious fellowship1 undeniably without hypocrisy1 as without restraint1 institutes in this address nothing less than the model and inspiration of a reverent1 religious liturgy1 fit to lead and voice a ,nation's humble penitence and praise4 ,the kindled and enkindling zeal for the transcendent worth of men above all other wealth1 the burning hearth from whose free flame springs up every passion glowing through this speech1 is like the fervent ardor of a prophet's heart1 watching with a patient1 eager wistfulness towards the dawning of a day that shall never pass away4 ,these are signal qualities in this address1 each one erect and free1 its signal beauty and virility undiminished and complete4 ,but to be noticed here is1 not their individual comeliness1 but the beauty of their companionship4 ,they consort together perfectly4 ,and in that unison is a peculiar1 an individual attractiveness4 ,here is a symmetry that pleads for appreciation4 ,it is the beauty of this unison throughout this speech that constitutes its eloquence4 ,see how ,lincoln's very confession of error puts him in line with ,god4 ,feel how his righteousness affiliates with tenderness4 ,mark how his heed for earthly things provides a body for his idealism4 ,within the unyielding rigor of his resolute will see how bending and genial is his attitude4 ,here is marvelous symphony--sin and error and war1 light and truth and peace1 so comprised and combined1 so resolved and reconciled in this speaker and in this address1 as to show a ,nation how in the discord of arms heaven's own harmonies may be heard4 ,to this fine blending of tones that are distinct1 to this pure consonance of notes that are diverse1 it were well for all our ears to become accustomed4 ,this would mean a true and real refinement4 ,to this refinement ,lincoln did achieve4 ,with this deep consonance his ear became familiar4 ,hence the deep-toned fulness and carrying power in the moral resonance of this address4 ,it faces a manifold emergency with sentiments likewise manifold1 but so composed together as to lead all discordant voices into lasting peace4 ,this moral equilibrium carried within it generous breadth4 ,this is a striking aspect of this inaugural4 ,it comprehends and resolves together1 with an ease that seems an instinct1 the total orbit of our national life4 ,within its little compass is the easy movement of the full momentum of our past4 ,it holds in easy grasp the full circumference of concurrent events4 ,it evinces1 though with amazing brevity1 that the ponderous issues of the coming day are a familiar topic in his brooding thought4 ,and all of this consists together within his thought with even1 equal recognition4 ,events are made to balance4 ,causes and effects are so held face to face as to declare by demonstration their true comparison4 ,great issues and mighty forces are given their needed amplitude in his observation and review4 ,the weight of centuries is in his ponderings4 ,this was the style and attitude of his mental deliberations4 ,he was predisposed to cast and arrange his thoughts in national dimensions4 ,union1 liberty1 manhood1 ,providence1 were the themes to which his soul was drawn1 as though by gravity4 ,thus ,lincoln's influence attained solidity4 ,the place of this inaugural1 and of its author's honor1 in our ,american life1 and in the larger world of worthy civics is well-secured4 ,the qualities embodied in this address1 each one so elemental1 and all so eternally allied1 are more enduring1 as they stand poised within those balanced paragraphs1 than any qualities resident in marble or bronze4 ,the proposition that the hostile interests of a mighty ,nation be reconciled into eternal friendliness and constancy under the awful discipline of ,god through sacrificial baptisms of blood1 contains within its balanced and majestic terms an interior cohesion and stability that nothing can ever disintegrate or move4 ,it is without a bias anywhere4 ,through all its massiveness the weight is even absolutely4 ,and its moral proportions are in perfect truth4 ,it is a monument of finished majesty1 solidity1 and grace4 ,it is a masterpiece of moral symmetry4 ,this massive grandeur in ,lincoln's moral character finds an exalted illustration in the closing half of his message to ,congress in ,december of #ahfb4 ,it forms in itself a document that may well be held before the eye as a companion piece to his last inaugural4 ,he is making an elaborate argument for compensated emancipation4 ,he is laboring to make clear that the issues pending in the center of the war are no concern of mere geography1 but rather a problem hanging upon the free decisions of living citizens2 and that in the interest of universal liberty a full agreement by ,congress and the chief executive to tax the ,nation peaceably1 to remunerate all loss entailed by freeing every slave1 would surely win the requisite electoral support1 stay the war at once1 establish lasting peace1 and give demonstration of a civic character and courage fit to brighten and enhearten all the world4 ,he closes his appeal with these following words3-- ,fellow-citizens1 we cannot escape history4 ,we of this ,congress and this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves4 ,no personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us4 ,the fiery trial through which we pass will light us down1 in honor or in dishonor1 to the latest generation4 ,we say we are for the ,union4 ,the world will not forget that we say this4 ,we know how to save the ,union4 ,the world knows we do know how to save it4 ,we--even we here--hold the power and bear the responsibility4 ,in giving freedom to the slave1 we assure freedom to the free--honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve4 ,we shall nobly save or meanly lose the last1 best hope of earth4 ,other means may succeed2 this could not fail4 ,the way is plain1 peaceful1 generous1 just--a way which1 if followed1 the world will forever applaud1 and ,god must forever bless4 ,there is in that message a document that has the scope and the grandeur of the ,alps4 ,it offers an imposing illustration how politics1 so prone to become and to remain ignoble1 may come to have surpassing beauty2 how statesmanship1 vested in a worthy character1 may wear transcendent dignity4 ,this appeal1 as shaped by ,lincoln1 is a monument fashioned by a master hand4 ,note its basis in equity1 all the ,nation in common accepting their money cost of a common complicity in wrong4 ,note its inscription to human goodwill1 curtailing the period1 and staying the bloodshed of the war4 ,note its enduring substance and composition1 built up of human hearts1 cemented in the action of freedom in the human soul1 a towering protest against all gains and consequences where human liberty is denied4 ,note the humble reverence in the soaring appeal to the benediction of ,god1 with which the whole address concludes4 ,note the conscience-stirring reference to inevitable and over-ruling law1 in the ominous intimation that the light of history would luminously adjudge each several man4 ,and note1 with all the imperial urgency of the appeal1 its vesture of infinite respect for the right of every congressman to make a free decision of and by and for himself alone4 ,here is something at once most imposing and most engaging4 ,here is handicraft of the highest grade4 ,the man that conceived and drafted that political appeal was1 in the realm of politics1 no mean architect4 ,he is1 in these arguments1 measuring the forces elemental in a great ,republic1 as ,michael ,angelo measured gravitation4 ,he is dealing with decades1 and with centuries1 with freedom and with slaves1 with a transient ,congress and the course of history1 as builders deal with granite blocks4 ,embracing things dispersed and widely variant1 as also things mutually inclined towards fellowship1 he defines and demonstrates1 as a master artisan1 how they may all be grasped and overcome and harmonized in a commanding unison4 ,with a skilled designer's easy grace he drafts a sketch of our transformed career1 as plain and open to the observing eye as are the massive1 graceful movements of deploying clouds across the sky4 ,here is majesty1 lofty1 balanced1 and secure4 ,and all its excellence is ethical4 ,and it pleads to be made supreme in earthly politics4 ,in such a message is ideal courtliness4 ,its bearer must be a comely prince4 ,the man and author upon whose polished tongue those sentiments found birth must be of royal lineage4 ,thus ,lincoln has given to civics ideal comeliness and dignity4 ,in his hand1 and under his design1 politics wears heavenly majesty4 ,in his conception of a ,state1 though devised and traced in times when cruelty and sordidness and unfairness and negligence of ,god were sadly prevalent through the ,nation's life1 there rose to view1 in his pure patriotism1 a civic standard in which1 through holy fear of ,god1 all men were rated at their immortal worth1 and treated with the love and fairness that were the mutual due of freemen who were peers4 ,here is a portrait of a patriot upon which no artist can easily improve--a portrait which attests in ,lincoln's soul a pure and a free idea of what true art must ever be4 ,and it is not without profound significance for art that ,lincoln's statesmanship has become one of the finest objects in our modern world for artists to idealize4 ,the very features of his face1 that were wont to be esteemed most plain1 have come to show a symmetry that is beautiful4 ,and his whole outward frame1 that men so many times have called ungainly1 has come to bear and body forth a dignity such as summons finest bronze and marble to their most exalted ministry4 ,whence came to that plain face and plainer frame such symmetry and dignity8 ,let artists contemplate and reply4 ,for in ,lincoln's manhood stature1 where utmost rudeness has become transmuted to refinement1 all men are taught that true beauty and true art are ethical4 ,in moral harmony is found ideal symmetry4 ,,his ,,composure--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,pessimism ,in the foregoing pages reference has been made repeatedly to ,lincoln's poise4 ,in the chapter just concluded this poise has been studied for its beauty4 ,this attitude will repay still further scrutiny4 ,for looked at again1 and from another point of view1 it reveals itself as a reservoir of energy4 ,seen thus1 ,lincoln's notable poise becomes a mighty store of potential1 and indeed of active force4 ,it may be described as a mingling of energy and repose1 of resourcefulness and rest1 showing and playing through all his influence among other men1 and largely explaining its potency4 ,of just this personal habitude1 through all the years of ,lincoln's participation in our national affairs1 there was strenuous need and requisition4 ,his public course ran through an era in our national career of unprecedented internal turbulence4 ,the house was divided against itself4 ,the cause of the dissension was a diametrical opposition and an irreconcilable contention of views touching a matter so radical as the basis of our ,declaration of ,independence1 and the purport of our fundamental national document1 the ,constitution4 ,to the men on either side of this contention it seemed as though their antagonists were bent upon uprooting and removing the very hills4 ,this obstinate and inveterate disagreement revolved about the single1 simple1 fateful question of the right and wrong of holding men in bonds4 ,for a full generation before ,lincoln entered the lists the conflict had been bitterly intense1 refusing to be composed or assuaged4 ,near the beginning of the last decade of ,lincoln's life he put on his armor and chose his side4 ,in #aheh1 while competing with ,douglas for a seat in the ,u4 ,s4 ,senate1 ,lincoln made a declaration that1 for its bearing upon his own career and its influence in national affairs1 has become historic2 while for its testimony to the topic of this chapter it has the very first significance4 ,the core of that declaration was a quotation from words of ,christ1 when refuting the charge that he was in league with ,beelzebub3--,a house divided against itself cannot stand4 ,this quotation was cited by ,lincoln to edge his affirmation that the national agitation concerning slavery1 then in full course1 and continually augmenting1 would not cease until a crisis should be reached and passed4 ,this was his firm assurance4 ,a national crisis was at hand4 ,but to this assurance1 that the government could not endure permanently half slave and half free1 he attested another confidence equally assured3--,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 divided4 ,it will become all one thing or all the other4 ,either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it1 and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that is in the course of ultimate extinction2 or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become alike lawful in all the ,states1 old as well as new1 ,north as well as ,south4 ,that was said with resolute and imposing deliberation in ,july of #aheh4 ,in that utterance ,lincoln's attitude deserves analysis1 and for many reasons2 but in particular for its revelation of his composure4 ,he knew full well what tremendous issues for himself and for the ,nation were involved in what he said4 ,he knew that his appeal for the senatorship at ,washington was thereby gravely imperiled4 ,he knew that it foreboded national convulsions and throes4 ,he knew that for himself and for the government a mighty crisis was ahead4 ,and he knew that in that crisis the alternatives were for all humanity supreme4 ,the issues were nothing less than human freedom and equality1 or human tyranny and bonds4 ,in the stress and strain of an age-long strife like this1 many a man has swerved to moral pessimism4 ,from the date of that speech ,lincoln stood in the face of that vicissitude4 ,indeed for his few remaining years he was1 in all that deepening commotion1 an energetic and influential central force4 ,and he never yielded to despair4 ,in this same month he issued to ,senator ,douglas his doughty challenge to a series of debates4 ,during those debates ,lincoln forged his way into a preeminence that amounted almost to solitude1 as champion of a people and a cause that1 for weary generations1 had been under all but hopeless oppression and reproach4 ,through all those debates ,lincoln's single heart was nothing less than a national theater of a solicitude nothing less than national4 ,upon his lone shoulders lay the gravest burdens of his day4 ,the ideals of a ,nation lay upon his anvil2 the national temper was being forged beneath his hand4 ,highest chivalry waged against him1 bearing tempered steel1 and jealous of an old and proud prestige4 ,in the immediate outcome of those debates ,lincoln met defeat4 ,but farther on he only found himself involved more deeply still in the anguish of the crisis he had foretold4 ,the national disagreement was verging towards the ,nation's dissolution1 heightening at length into secession and actual1 long-drawn civil war4 ,so tremendous was the crisis ,lincoln foresaw4 ,and this was precipitated directly by his election to the presidency4 ,so vitally were his own fortune and fate bound up in the crisis he foretold4 ,so pitiless and fundamental was the challenge to his hope4 ,his total administration was spent in the tumult of arms4 ,by no possibility in any ,nation's conscious life could civil confusion be worse confounded than during the period of his presidential terms4 ,beginning with seven states in open secession1 and brought to an end by assassination1 the measure of his supreme official life was full to either brim with perils and sorrows and fears1 such as any single human heart could hardly contain4 ,but the undiminished1 overwhelming volume of those fears and sorrows and cares was encompassed every day within his anxious1 ample1 patriot heart4 ,when facing in ,august of #ahfd the national election1 upon which this last inaugural oath was based1 he said3--,i cannot fly from my thoughts--my solicitude for this great country follows me wherever ,i go4 ,i do not think it is personal vanity or ambition1 though ,i am not free from these infirmities2 but ,i cannot but feel that the weal or woe of this great ,nation will be decided in ,november4 ,so momentous and grave seemed to him the meaning and weight of the contention that drove the ,nation into war4 ,in this estimate1 as said before1 he stood almost in solitude4 ,our best and greatest men1 he said in ,new ,haven in #ahfj1 have greatly underestimated the size of this question4 ,they have constantly brought forward small cures for great sores--plasters too small to cover the wound4 ,to ,lincoln's credit it must forever be said that he had a true prevision of the agony through which the ,nation must strive1 as she reached and passed the crisis which he saw in #aheh to be her predestined and impending fate4 ,and so it came to pass that in #ahfa1 when ,fort ,sumter was assailed1 and the sharp imperious alternative of immediate dissolution or blood faced the ,nation's eye1 he was not surprised or unprepared2 as likewise1 when in #ahfe at his second inaugural scene1 after four full years of awful war1 he is still found waiting in sacrificial patience to hail the culmination of his assured interpretation and hope4 ,here in #ahfe as there in #aheh1 there in #aheh as here in #ahfe1 he is cherishing the patriot-prophet's confidence that the crisis would be passed1 that the ,nation would not be dissolved1 that the house would stand4 ,and to ,lincoln's singular honor it must always be allowed that through all the terrible hours while that crisis was being passed1 it was pre-eminently due to ,lincoln's mighty moral optimism that our ,union was preserved4 ,amid all the turbulence of armies and arms1 his assurance of our national perpetuity was so deeply1 firmly based1 as to be itself invested and informed with perpetuity4 ,so commanding was his posture of heroic1 triumphant confidence1 that it mightily availed to guide and steady the ,nation through the crisis into an era of internal and international peace4 ,but not merely did ,lincoln's composure prevail to secure that this ,nation should not dissolve4 ,it also wrought prevailingly to perpetuate our liberty4 ,throughout the crisis the issue held in stake was whether the ,nation should be wholly slave or wholly free4 ,those were the alternatives between which ,lincoln's care and fear1 and the ,nation's fortune and fate were hung4 ,throughout the crisis ,lincoln's hope was that the ,nation should be forever wholly free4 ,his fear was that the ,nation might be wholly slave4 ,but above that fear1 that hope steadfastly prevailed4 ,one who studies ,lincoln through those days comes to feel unerringly that deep beneath an anxiety that seemed at times almost to overwhelm his life1 there lay a supreme assurance that1 when the crisis should have passed1 it should stand clear beyond debate1 and sure beyond all doubt1 that here in this favored land the chance of all the sons of men should be forever equal1 fair1 and free4 ,astutely heedful of the power of selfish1 sordid greed2 deeply conscious of the blind defiance of scorn and pride2 painfully aware of the awful capacity of a human heart for cruelty and hate2 and sharp to see how reason yields to prejudice1 when chivalry becomes a counterfeit2 he still found grounds to hold his anchored hope for universal liberty and brotherhood4 ,this deep-based confidence deserves to be well understood4 ,it is a primary phenomenon in ,lincoln's life4 ,how in the deepest welter of violence and strife could ,lincoln's mood retain such level evenness8 ,how in all that continental turbulence could he keep so unperturbed8 ,how1 through all that confusion was he never confused8 ,in truth his days were mostly dark and sad4 ,sorrows did overwhelm him4 ,how did his anchorage hold unchanged8 ,when the very hills gave way1 his foundations seemed to stay4 ,the assurance to which his soul was attached seemed all but omnipotent4 ,what was the secret1 what the ground of such phenomenal steadiness8 ,to answer these inquiries is but to rehearse again what has already been repeatedly made plain4 ,this massive sturdiness of ,lincoln's statesmanship1 this unalterable political reliability lay inwrought in the hardy fiber of his moral character4 ,one factor here may be termed intellectual4 ,lincoln's study made him steady4 ,his untiring thoughtfulness secured to ,lincoln's soul a fine deposit of pure assurance4 ,it was with him a jealous and guarded custom to make examinations exhaustive4 ,he was always seeking certainty4 ,few men ever dealt more sparingly in conjecture4 ,always eager towards the future1 and often making statements touching things to come1 he was nevertheless a model of mental caution4 ,it was this passion to make his footing fully secure that kindled in him such zest for history4 ,it was this same passion that glowed in his eye1 as he inspected in common men their common humanity4 ,and likewise it was this that led him into the fear of ,god1 and made him a student of the ,bible1 and a man of prayer4 ,the full capacity of his mind was taxed unceasingly1 in order to secure to his ripening judgments their majestic equipoise4 ,but with saying this not enough is said to describe the grounds of his composure4 ,it was not merely that his mind1 through thoughtful inquiry and comparison1 grew far-sighted1 and balanced1 and clear4 ,what gained for ,lincoln his solid anchorage was his deep1 strong hold upon all that was inmost and permanent in the heart and nature of men4 ,every inch a man himself1 the one ambition of his mental research was to make every responsible thought and deed conduce to guide every brother man to the destiny which his nature decreed4 ,this was the research that made his eye so clear4 ,this was the study that made his hope so sure4 ,outcome of unsparing intellectual toil1 this was the assurance that won for ,lincoln his unique and most honorable diploma and degree4 ,this was ,lincoln's standing and this its warrant among all thoughtful men1 alike the learned and the unlettered4 ,this was the secret of that marvelous calmness1 that was so potent to compose the fears of other men4 ,he studied man1 until he attained a magisterial power to understand and explain result and cause1 issue and origin1 amid historic1 surrounding1 and impending events4 ,in the field where ,lincoln stood and toiled he was an adept4 ,he was a worthy master of the humanities4 ,he took a liberal course in the liberal arts4 ,and out of this broad course he constructed politics4 ,he came to see unerringly1 and to believe unwaveringly1 and to contend unwearyingly that man1 that all men should hold1 in a universal equilibrium1 their regard for ,god1 their self-respect1 their brother love1 and a true1 comparative esteem for things that perish and souls that survive4 ,this reasoned1 hopeful faith1 adopted with all his heart as the comely pattern and well-set keystone of all his politics and statesmanship1 is what secured to ,lincoln through all those tumultuous days his far-commanding political equanimity4 ,that all men were designed and entitled by their ,creator to be free1 and that in this liberty1 as in the elemental right to life and self-earned happiness1 all are likewise created equal1 ,lincoln did devoutly1 profoundly1 and invincibly believe4 ,confirmed by all his ranging observation and incessant1 pondering thought1 this faith was also rooted beyond repeal in his own deep reverence for ,god1 in his own instinctive respect for himself1 in irrepressible friendliness1 and in his unabashed idealism4 ,such a man could never be a pessimist4 ,such a faith in such a soul could not be plucked away4 ,nor could its protestations be variable4 ,that each1 as alike the handiwork of ,god1 should alike be always fair1 and that all should always and alike be free1 was the base of his political philosophy1 and the bond of his consistency4 ,this was the teaching of the past4 ,this was the harbinger of the day to come4 ,and in this long-pondered wisdom and belief lay the explanation of his underlying peacefulness through the war1 and of his singular ability to prevail above the fears of other men1 when in other hearts every hope gave way4 ,he deeply saw that underneath all battlefields1 and within all antagonisms1 these simple principles1 so surely sovereign and so certainly immortal1 encompassed a breadth and strength sufficient to circumvent and overcome all hate and doubt and fear1 doing to no freeman any vital harm1 shielding from essential evil every toil-bowed slave4 ,this is the source and secret of ,lincoln's unexampled composure amid scenes of unexampled anxiety and unrest4 ,and this composure1 being so inwrought with hope1 was unfailingly active and alert4 ,it was never mere endurance1 stolid and inert4 ,it enshrined a powerful momentum4 ,it was alive with purpose1 conscious1 vigorous1 resolute4 ,one of its fairest features was a seeing eye--an eye transfixed upon a goal4 ,things as yet invisible1 and still unrealized1 his earnest1 unwearying eye prevailed to see4 ,hence his optimism was astir with enterprise4 ,anticipation1 quite as truly as peacefulness1 marked the constant attitude of his life4 ,his composure could be closely defined as confidence respecting things to come4 ,always environed by difficulties1 and all but blinded by their strife1 his faith struck through their turmoil1 and his hope rose free and strong into a jubilant salutation of man's undoubted destiny1 and into a victorious companionship with ,god's clear1 certain will4 ,and so there throbbed in this habitual posture of ,lincoln's heart a mighty potency4 ,his composure was prevailing4 ,his deep and calm security dissipated other men's dismay4 ,repeatedly beneath the presence of his stately quietness the ,nation felt its turbulence subside4 ,this efficiency can be felt at work in this last inaugural address2 and its action well deserves to be identified4 ,in his exposition of its theme1 and in his registration of his presidential pledge1 he seems by one hand to have fast hold of things immutable1 while with the other hand he is helping to steady things that tremble and change4 ,here is kingly mastery4 ,things mightily disturbed are being mightily put to rest1 as though from an immutable throne4 ,the open figure of that throne may well be scanned by all the ,nation and by all the world4 ,it is built and stands foursquare4 ,its measure conforms in every part with the measure of a man4 ,it is shaped and set to stand and abide where men consort1 to unify their minds1 and tranquillize their strifes4 ,with sobered and sobering insight into the human soul1 with resolute and expectant will before our human goal1 this address inscribes and upholds1 as at once an outcome and an ideal of human events1 a universal amity compacted of loyal1 friendly men who walk in reverence before ,god1 and cherish treasures that can never fail4 ,purity1 humility1 charity1 loyalty--these are the constituents in the structure1 and the explanation of the power of ,lincoln's composure4 ,fully illumined1 firmly convinced1 evenly at rest upon principles that stand foursquare upon the balanced manhood of ,godlike men1 his civic hopefulness stood in the midst of his practical statesmanship1 like an invincible1 immovable throne4 ,,his ,,authority--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,government ,the study in the preceding chapter of ,lincoln's even-paced serenity1 culminating in the symbol of a throne1 conducts directly to an examination of his influence and mastery over other men4 ,during those troubled days in ,washington1 despite all the malice1 defiance1 and active abuse which he daily bore1 his power to persuade1 conciliate1 and govern other men was1 in all the land1 without a parallel4 ,in fact1 as well as in name1 he was throughout those presidential days the ,nation's chief magistrate4 ,and since his death that dominion has increased1 until it stands today above comparison4 ,here is an opportunity1 not easily matched1 to explore a theme whose importance in the field of ethics no other topic can surpass--the seat and nature of moral authority4 ,and here in this second inaugural is a transparent illustration of the firm security in which that authority rests1 and of the method by which it prevails4 ,as in his own inner reverence for law1 so in his sway of other men1 his posture towards the national ,constitution demands attention first4 ,the supreme law of the land--thus the ,constitution of the ,united ,states1 in its sixth article1 defines itself4 ,in its fifth article1 the same fundamental document provides that ,amendments1 properly made1 shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of this ,constitution4 ,this primary authority for the rule of the land is further affirmed to have been ordained and established by the people of the ,united ,states4 ,here are three noteworthy features of this law of the land3--it is supreme2 it is amendable2 it arises from the people4 ,this written standard of our national life1 its amendability1 and its primal origin in the people's will1 were matters much in ,lincoln's eye4 ,each separate one of these three features of our national civic life had reverent respect in ,lincoln's mind1 in all his conception and exercise of authority over other men4 ,it was this supreme law that he swore in both inaugurations to preserve1 protect1 and defend4 ,an amendment to the ,constitution1 that was pending at the time of his first inaugural oath1 he took unusual pains in that address to mention and approve4 ,and it was to the people1 on both occasions of his inauguration as president1 and at all other times of public and responsible address1 that he paid supreme respect1 in his most finished and earnest eloquence and appeal4 ,here was a threefold ultimate standard to which ,lincoln always made final appeal--the original ,constitution2 its amenability to due revision2 and the people's free and deliberate decree4 ,this triangular base-line was for ,lincoln's politics and jurisprudence and statesmanship the supreme and finished standard of last appeal4 ,he deferred to it submissively1 habitually1 and with reverence4 ,all this can be truly said4 ,and yet all this does not say all the truth4 ,respectful as ,lincoln was for all that he found thus fundamentally prescribed1 and heedful as he was to indulge in no executive liberty inconsonant with those express decrees1 he found his fortune as chief executive forcing him to move where all explicit regulations failed to specify the path4 ,the ,constitution does not include all details4 ,it does not vouchsafe specific counsel for specific needs4 ,its guidance is as to principles4 ,no foresight can anticipate1 nor any document of reasonable length contain1 express provisions for all possible questions4 ,this he declared in his first inaugural4 ,then he mentions three such unprescribed details3--the method of returning fugitive slaves2 the power of ,congress to prohibit2 and the duty of ,congress to protect slavery in the ,territories4 ,touching those three civic interests1 civic duties and civic standards were undirected and undefined4 ,but even while he spoke1 those three unsettled problems in the ,nation's life were kindling the national pulse to an uncontrollable heat4 ,nothing less than civil war was certainly impending1 over controversies touching which the sovereign standards of the civic life did not expressly speak4 ,upon these momentous1 undecided questions ,lincoln1 in his high authority as president1 had to bring his judgment1 his action1 and his influence into settled shape4 ,deep in the heart of these unsettled regions he set his camp1 and toiled away his life4 ,this heroic and patriotic act may be called a detail of constitutional interpretation4 ,but it was for ,lincoln a labor of ,hercules4 ,it opened a gigantic controversy4 ,the land was convulsed with contending explications4 ,views1 held essential to the vital honor of separate sections of the land1 were in essential hostility4 ,as the dissension deepened1 two questions rose1 outstanding above the rest3--the ,constitutional integrity of the several ,states 7might ,states secede872 and the ,constitutional rights of slavery 7should slavery spread874 ,both these problems were mortally acute in #ahfa4 ,both were still in hand in #ahfe4 ,under the ,constitution could the ,union be legitimately dissolved8 ,under the ,constitution should slavery be permanently approved8 ,to both these questions ,southern leaders answered1 ,yes4 ,to both these questions ,lincoln answered1 ,no4 ,of these two questions and asseverations1 it is plain to see that the second is the more profound4 ,so this second inaugural affirms3 ,somehow slavery was the cause of the secession and the war4 ,this all knew4 ,upon this pivot1 all the chances and contentions of the great debate were compelled to turn4 ,here lay all the meaning of the war4 ,all those awful battles were trembling1 struggling arguments2 thrilling1 impassioned affirmations striving to finally and forever decide whether human slavery was justified to spread4 ,here was a supreme divergence of conviction1 and a supreme debate4 ,in all the realm of social morals1 no divergence and no debate could be more radical4 ,into this supreme contention ,lincoln was compelled to enter4 ,to some conclusion that should be supreme he was1 by his official station and responsibility1 compelled to lead4 ,to find his way through such a controversy1 and to guide the land through all that strife to some sovereign reconciliation1 involved this common citizen in the presidential chair in an assumption and exercise of authority nothing less than sovereign4 ,face to face with this impending and decisive agony1 ,lincoln took his stand in his first inaugural1 not flinching even from war1 if war must come4 ,a mighty wrestler in the awful throes of mortal civic strife1 he held his determined stand in the act of his second inaugural oath1 after war had raged for four full years4 ,the great debate is unsettled still4 ,still ,lincoln has to bear the awful burden of responsible advice4 ,he is still the ,nation's chief magistrate4 ,an authority pregnant to predetermine continental issues for unnumbered years to come1 however dread its weight1 and however frail and faint his mortal strength1 he may not demit4 ,within the darkness and amid the din1 he must think and speak1 he must judge and act1 he must rise and lead1 while a ,nation and a future both too vast for human eye to scan and estimate1 stand waiting on his word and deed4 ,it was a time for omens4 ,but never did ,lincoln's ways show fuller sanity4 ,in such a day1 and for such a responsibility this1 his second inaugural address1 is ,lincoln's perfect vindication4 ,here the true civilian's true democracy stands vested with an authority both sovereign and beautiful4 ,here political expertness becomes consummate4 ,here the very throne of civil authority is unveiled4 ,here leadership and fellowship combine4 ,here a master1 though none more modest in all the land1 demonstrates his mastery in the mighty field of national politics4 ,here it may be fully seen how in a true democracy a true dominion operates4 ,here emerges1 in the ripened1 rugged1 mellowed1 moral character of ,lincoln1 and in the finished1 immortal formulation of his uttermost contention and appeal1 a marvelous illumination of an inquiry1 that is always alike the last and the first1 the first and the last in ethical research--the inquiry about ethical authority4 ,where did ,lincoln finally rest his final appeal8 ,he is assuming to venture a preponderant claim4 ,he is speaking as a ,nation's president4 ,and in a conflict of radical views that for four dread years has been a conflict of relentless arms1 he argues still1 and without a quaver1 for the thorough prosecution of the war4 ,divergence of judgment on moral grounds could never be brought to a sharper edge4 ,contention over issues in the moral realm could never be harder pressed4 ,on what authority could ,lincoln push a moral argument unto blood8 ,is there moral warrant for such a deed8 ,if ever there be1 then where is its base1 and whence its awful sanctity8 ,to shape reply to this is but to shape more sharply still the naked substance of the debate--the crying issue of the war4 ,the core of that insistent strife concerned the essential nature of man4 ,was slavery legitimate8 ,might a white man enslave a black8 ,could a strong man enslave the weak8 ,dare some men forswear toil8 ,may any men who toil be pillaged of the food their hands have earned8 ,are some men entitled to a luxury and ease they never earned1 while to other men the luxury and ease they have fairly won may be denied8 ,are some men so inferior that they can have no right to life1 and liberty1 and happiness1 however much they strive and long for such a simple1 common boon8 ,are other men so super-excellent that life1 and liberty1 and happiness are theirs by right1 though never earned or even struggled for at all8 ,this was the central issue of that war2 and this the central theme of this inaugural4 ,are common people to be forever kept beneath1 and traded on1 and eyed with scorn2 while favored men are to be forever set on high1 and filled with wealth1 and fed with flattery8 ,this was the quivering question that was brought on ,lincoln's lips to its sharpest edge4 ,well he knew its momentousness and its antiquity4 ,in its very formulation1 as ,lincoln gave it shape1 there loomed the formulation of its reply1 perhaps still to be bitterly defied1 perhaps to be still long deferred2 but inevitable at last1 and sure finally to find agreement everywhere4 ,this final answer ,lincoln's vision saw4 ,in that clear vision he discerned the certain meaning of the battles of the war4 ,in the great debate they were the solemn1 measured arguments4 ,amid those awful arguments this inaugural took its place1 the oracle of a moral prophet1 explaining how the war arose1 by whose high hand the war was being led1 and in what high issue the war must attain its end4 ,as the arguments of this address advance1 one grows to feel that ,lincoln's thought is forging a reply1 in which emerges a moral law whose authority no man may ever dare rebuke4 ,but as that authority comes to view in ,lincoln's speech1 its form is shorn of every shred of arrogance4 ,never was mortal man more modest than in the tone and substance of this address4 ,this modesty is indeed throughout devoid of wavering4 ,his tones ring with confidence and decisiveness4 ,but in that confidence1 though girt for war1 there are folded signs of deference and gentleness and solemn awe1 as though confessing error and confronting rebuke4 ,even of slavery1 that most palpable and abhorrent evil1 as he forever avers2 and of slaveholders1 who wring their bread from the sweat of other men's faces1 and then dare to pray for heaven's favor on their arms1 he says in this address3--let us not judge that we be not judged2 as though the germ of that dark error might then be swelling in his and all men's hearts4 ,and as to the war itself1 for which he bade the ,nation stand with sword full-drawn1 the central passage in this speech more than intimates1 what in an earlier part he fully concedes1 that he and all the people had availed but poorly to understand the ,almighty's plans4 ,in all of this ,lincoln seems to say that he found himself1 in common with all the land1 but imperfectly in harmony with ,god1 as to his judgment concerning the sin inwrought in holding slaves1 and as to the primacy of the ,union among the interests pending in the war4 ,he seems in this address1 so far from affirming his right to judge and govern arbitrarily1 instead confessing that love of ease1 greed for gain1 the mood of scorn1 and proneness to be cruel--those inhuman roots that rear up slavery--were apt to find hidden nutriment in his and all men's hearts1 yielding everywhere the baleful harvest of inhumanity2 confessing further that this deep-rooted tendency in human hearts to undo ,god's primal decree of freedom and equality was far more needful to eradicate than any proneness to secede within any confederacy of ,states2 and confessing in consequence and finally that it was for all ,americans to accept the war as ,god's rebuke of their common propensity to be unkind1 and as ,god's correction of their false rating of their national concerns4 ,this then seems to be ,lincoln's posture in this address--no lofty arrogance of authority to decree and execute the right2 but a humble confession of error and guilt2 an acquiescent submission to ,god's correction and reproof4 ,this modest hue must tincture this address through all its web4 ,and yet the dominant note of this inaugural is clear decisiveness1 an unwavering firmness in his own opinion1 a classic illustration of persuasion and appeal1 as though from the vantage ground of convictions perfectly assured4 ,where now1 in full view of all that has been said1 is the basis of ,lincoln's argument and authority to be placed8 ,in an argument where conviction seems to be transmuted into penitence1 and where confession seems transfigured into confidence1 how can the logic be resolved2 and where at last can the authority repose8 ,the full reply to this inquiry can be found only when we find where ,lincoln's conviction and confession coalesce4 ,touching this1 one thing is clear4 ,both bear upon the same concern4 ,deep within them both slavery is the common theme4 ,assured that slavery is wrong1 he confesses that its roots run everywhere4 ,honest to the core1 he bows beneath the scourge of war1 convinced that it is heaven's penalty upon all the land4 ,throughout he is pleading and suffering consistently that all men may be free4 ,this is the sum of the address4 ,in this it all coheres4 ,thus he divines and understands the ways of ,god4 ,and so he stands1 as poised in this address1 in ideal fellowship1 at once with men who have held slaves1 with slaves in their distress1 with the ,creator in his primal decree1 and with the ,providential meaning of the war4 ,to all this problem1 vexing so many generations1 the clear and witting touch of ,lincoln's sacrificial penitence is the master key4 ,in this all contradictions1 all hostilities1 all sufferings1 all transgressions1 and all pure longings are harmonized4 ,in assurance and repentance he has found how truth and grace1 blending together in humble heed for ,god and for undying souls1 hold complete dominion in the moral realm4 ,these pure principles1 congenial alike to ,god and men1 he welcomes to himself1 and commends to all his fellowmen in sacrificial partnership4 ,here is ,lincoln's prevailing faith4 ,this is the secret of his strength4 ,herein vests his commanding and enduring power4 ,this is ,lincoln's self--his very manhood4 ,this is the man in this address whom the world beheld1 and still beholds--the man he was1 the man he aimed and strove to be1 the man he recommended all the ,nation to combine to reproduce1 the man in whom the fear of ,god1 the love of men1 the zeal for life1 and true reliability1 mingle evenly1 at whatever cost4 ,this is the man1 and this the mighty influence over other men1 enthroned imperishably in this address4 ,here is the throne1 the scepter1 and the key to ,lincoln's vast authority4 ,it is patterned and informed from the cardinal constituents of a balanced moral character4 ,it is inwrought within a life that heeds harmoniously1 and with heroic earnestness1 his own integrity1 his ,god1 his fellowman1 and things immortal4 ,holding souls above goods1 holding his fellow as himself1 holding himself in true respect1 and holding ,god above all1 he stands and pleads1 with a cogency that is unanswerable1 for verities as self-evident to any man as any man's self-consciousness4 ,all his claims in the heart of this address are self-apparent4 ,they are original convictions4 ,they prove and approve themselves4 ,they make no call for substantiation4 ,they confront every man within himself1 the light in his eye1 the life in his heart1 the spring in his hope4 ,they confront every man again within his neighbor4 ,they confront both men again1 when together they look up to ,god4 ,and far within all forms that change1 they confront all men forevermore in things that immortally abide4 ,this is the truth to which ,lincoln pledged his troth1 and in which he besought all other men to plight their faith1 in this address4 ,the vivid1 ever-living dignity in man1 discoverable by every man within himself1 to be greeted by every one in his brother-man1 at once the image and the handiwork of ,god--this defined all his faith1 fired all his zeal1 woke all his eloquence1 shaped all his argument1 winged all his hope4 ,that such a being should be a slave1 that such a being should have a slave1 was in his central conviction1 of all wrong deeds1 the least defensible4 ,it was the primal moral falsity1 cruelty1 insult1 and debasement4 ,that such a sin should be atoned1 at whatever cost1 was the primal task of purity1 reverence1 tenderness1 and truth4 ,holding such convictions1 handling such concerns1 for him to make the statement was to give it demonstration4 ,against such convictions1 and in scorn of such concerns1 no man could seriously contend without assailing and1 in the end1 undoing himself4 ,this was the citadel and the weaponry of ,lincoln's authority4 ,and ,lincoln found within these views the pledge of permanence4 ,he saw them bulwarked and corroborated by all the lessons and revelations of history4 ,all devices of human society1 contending against these rudimentary verities1 had been proved pernicious and self-defeating a thousand times4 ,only such behavior of man with man as harmonized with the creative design1 and sprang from endowments that were common to all1 could ever hope to last4 ,here is the sovereign lesson from all the centuries past1 and a sovereign challenge for all the centuries to come4 ,as ,lincoln viewed it1 he was handling a matter beyond debate1 when he talked of two centuries and a half of unrequited toil4 ,if that was not wrong1 then nothing was wrong4 ,there is the whole of ,lincoln's argument1 and the whole of his authority4 ,it stood true two hundred and fifty years ago4 ,it will hold fast two hundred and fifty years hence4 ,to deny this is to dethrone all law1 turn every freeman's highest boast to shame1 and finally banish moral order from human government and from human thought4 ,that this could never be suffered or confessed was the substance of ,lincoln's argument1 and the sum of his authority4 ,this and this alone was the sovereign lesson that the sacrificial sorrows of the war were searing so legibly1 that all the world could read1 upon the sinful ,nation's breast4 ,and in saying this1 ,lincoln's voice was pleading as the voice of ,god4 ,,his ,,versatility--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,mercy ,the study of ,lincoln's authority1 as it wields dominion in the last inaugural1 has brought to prominence his humble readiness to share repentantly with all the ,nation1 in the bitter sorrows of the war1 the divine rebuke for sin4 ,that sin was the wrong of holding slaves4 ,but in all the land1 if any man was innocent of that iniquity1 it was ,lincoln4 ,and yet the honest ,lincoln was never more sincere1 more nobly true and honest with himself1 than in this deep-wrought co-partnership with guilt4 ,surely here is call for thought4 ,lincoln's character was fertile4 ,the principles that governed his development were living and prolific4 ,in his ethics1 as in his bodily tissues1 he was alive4 ,as the days and years went on1 he grew4 ,like vines and trees1 he added to his stature constantly4 ,new twigs and tendrils were continually putting out1 searching towards the sunshine and the springs1 and embracing all the field4 ,and in all this increase he was supremely pliable4 ,while always firm and strong1 he had a wonderful capacity to bend4 ,the primary1 towering impulse working in ,lincoln's life was ethical4 ,amid the continual medley and confusion of things1 he was continually reaching and searching to find and plainly designate the right and the wrong4 ,this stands evident everywhere4 ,nowhere does this stand plainer than in the period1 when1 at his second inaugural1 he faced a second presidential term4 ,still straining in the toil and turmoil1 in the intense and blinding passion of the war1 he halts upon the threshold of a second quadrennium of supreme responsibility1 to see if he can surely trace ,god's indication of what is right4 ,the eternally right was what he sought4 ,he was after no mere expediency1 no ephemeral shift for ephemeral needs4 ,the judgments of the ,almighty ,ruler of ,nations1 true and righteous altogether and evermore1 were what he prayed to find and know4 ,then1 if ever1 ,lincoln's earnestness was moral4 ,and for this search at just this time his eye was peculiarly sobered and grave4 ,portentous problems were emerging1 as the finish of the war drew near4 ,and these problems were new4 ,what should the ,nation1 when it laid aside its arms1 decide to do with the seceded ,states1 and with those millions of untutored slaves8 ,for that no precedent was at hand1 no direction in the laws4 ,the conclusion must be original4 ,and it must be supreme4 ,and its issues must hold wide sway for generations of imperial1 expanding growth4 ,there loomed an impending peril1 and a test of statesmanship1 demanding the wisdom1 and integrity1 and deep foresight of a moral prince--a peril and a moral test but poorly met by the men whom his untimely death thrust into ,lincoln's place4 ,for bringing to perfection his ripening judgment upon that task1 and so for displaying another historic demonstration of ,lincoln's moral adaptability1 the few short requisite years were mysteriously to be denied4 ,but upon other problems and in other days1 there was ample revelation of ,lincoln's agile moral strength4 ,his entire career in national prominence provides outstanding demonstration of the continual full mobility and plastic freedom of his moral powers4 ,the civil war1 which he was conducting with such determination to its predestined end1 as he stood the central figure in this second inaugural scene1 was but the central vortex of a moral agitation in which all our national principles and precedents were challenged and defied2 and in which statesmen of supremely facile1 virile1 moral sense were in exigent demand4 ,problems were propounded constantly upon which our ,constitution shed no certain light1 and the ,constitution itself was in a way to be overturned4 ,throughout this period of national discord and moral instability1 ,lincoln was a leading1 creative mind4 ,the circuit of that career was brief indeed1 scarcely more than one decade4 ,but in those dark1 swift years shine and cluster many illustrations of the rich and ready fertility of his ethical postulates in the political realm4 ,man of the people though he was1 and acutely sensitive of his responsibility to the people for every responsible act1 he was in every judgment and resolve every inch a king1 openminded1 original1 free4 ,again1 and again1 and again1 he was the man for the hour4 ,one demonstration of this is shown in his surprising readiness4 ,with whatever situation1 he behaved as though familiar4 ,undisciplined in diplomacy1 he proved himself almost instantly a finished diplomat4 ,totally untutored in all the acts and practices of war1 but compelled by his office to take sovereign command of the ,nation's arms1 and that so suddenly that even the arms themselves could not be found1 he became one of the foremost critics and counselors of perilous and intricate military campaigns4 ,unaccustomed to authority1 but advanced at a leap to the ,nation's head1 beleaguered by deadly animosities among cliques and sections and ,states1 encompassed by shameless cabinet intrigues1 he developed1 as in one day1 into manager1 adviser1 administrator of political affairs1 the most astute in all the land4 ,a most impressive example of this adjustability is seen in his manifold capacity for moral patience4 ,it reveals how he could keep his full integrity1 while binding up his life and fortune inseparably with men whose moral standards swayed far from his4 ,lincoln's first inaugural gave luminous definition of his designs and hopes4 ,the principles there propounded were the ripe and firm convictions of a thoughtful1 honest life4 ,they had been pronounced repeatedly before4 ,to their defense and consummation his heart and honor were pledged irrevocably4 ,those propositions were the irreducible rudiments of his faith1 the permanent constituents of his hope4 ,surrender those convictions and desires he never did1 he never could4 ,within the ample compass and easy play of those glowing sentiments there was no room for secession1 nor for war1 nor for any bitterness1 but only for loyalty1 fellowship1 peace4 ,but as he turned from that inauguration and its declaration of his policy toward the execution of his trust1 he had to face and handle secession1 war1 and malicious defamation4 ,he had to see the ,nation's holiest dignity desecrated1 all his brotherly offices disdained1 the souls of men still held as rightful objects of common trade1 and the plainest decrees of ,god defied4 ,this as shown in the spirit and uprising of the impatient1 imperious ,south4 ,and within the ,north1 in the very armies assembled for the ,union's defence1 he had to find the very leaders and plotters of his campaigns absorbed and overcome by petty jealousies1 too despicable and unpatriotic to be believed1 and yet so real and vicious as to defeat their battles before they were fought4 ,and back among the ,union multitudes around his base1 were men of might and standing1 and men in multitudes1 who maligned his motives1 and entangled his plans1 until antagonism the most malignant and resolved to all his views and undertakings seemed to environ him on every side4 ,to such conditions it was ,lincoln's bitter obligation to conform4 ,many men were ready with many fond prescriptions for the case2 but they all were marked by weak futility4 ,they either brought the ,nation no complete relief1 or else surrendered the ,nation's very life4 ,within the strain and pull from every side ,lincoln felt the obligation of his oath4 ,the mood and method he employed 7and let not the phrase be misunderstood7 was moral relaxation4 ,this did not mean that he altered aught of his pronounced belief1 or varied by a single hair from his announced design4 ,he remembered his inaugural oath4 ,he retained his faith and hope1 and held to his prime resolve unchanged4 ,but he gave the opposition time4 ,he suffered malignants to malign1 seceders to rebel1 detractors to impugn2 and bore their taunts and blows and wounds patiently1 still abiding by his word4 ,his very war was simply for defense4 ,the honor of the ,union he would not yield up4 ,his brotherly friendliness he would not forego4 ,his rating of freemen he would not discount4 ,the mandates of ,god he would not disobey4 ,but while on every hand these might be assailed and abjured1 he repressed all violence and vehemence of heart1 and endured1 and indulged1 and was still4 ,herein1 however1 his convictions and hopes wore a modified guise4 ,their rigor softened2 their lustre mellowed2 their angles broadened2 their rudeness ripened2 and his aspect passed through change2 the while his honor brightened and became more clear4 ,this adjustment of such a nature to such a fate is a massive illustration of moral versatility4 ,it is like keeping the steed to the course1 while yet laying the rein upon his neck4 ,through experience such as this it must have been that ,lincoln traversed his profoundest sorrow4 ,just here his critics and traducers had their firmest hold4 ,to the world at large his tactics did seem slack1 his method dilatory1 his mood indifferent4 ,men wearied past endurance at his delay1 and charged repeatedly that he had betrayed his trust4 ,such accusations must have been to his pure loyalty like gall4 ,and yet he must perforce be mute4 ,it was not he1 it was the awful situation in which his noble life was manacled1 that was so incorrigible4 ,with ,god and man he pleaded day and night that bloodshed might be stayed1 and peace possess the land4 ,but an enemy was in the land1 determined not to leave his guns until the ,union was dissolved1 and slavery vindicated as right4 ,rather than forsake the ,union1 and own that men were as the brutes1 he would die a thousand times4 ,and with a patience that no malice and no misfortune could wear away1 he held his post and kept his word1 through torments too severe for unheroic men to bear1 producing thus upon his silent1 sorrowful face a humble replica of the divine long-suffering of the meek and lowly ,christ4 ,and so he taught the world how in patience the righteousness that abhors all wrong may turn its face toward sin with humble meekness1 through years that seem like centuries1 and cause thereby that pure and ,godlike truth and love shall only be more glorious4 ,but even with this the description of this case stands incomplete4 ,to understand it rightly further statements are required4 ,after all his patience1 the ,south was obdurate4 ,even while in this last inaugural ,lincoln was pleading for universal charity1 and seeking to banish malice everywhere1 the leaders of the armies in the ,south were rallying their unrecruited ranks in a very desperation of hatred for his principles1 and of scorn for his forbearance4 ,while he was interpreting the desolations and sorrows of the war as ,god's all-powerful punishment of slavery1 our common national sin1 they resented with impassioned vehemence such an explanation1 disclaimed all guilt1 and denied that slavery was wrong4 ,here emerged in ,lincoln's thought ,lincoln's supreme perplexity4 ,he was dealing with right and wrong1 both only the more intensely real1 because so really concrete4 ,liberty and loyalty1 loyalty to liberty1 the dignity of man1 and the good pleasure of ,god--these were the eternal principles1 and the personal interests at stake4 ,antagonisms were deadly virulent2 and they were unrelenting4 ,compulsion was not availing4 ,patience likewise failed4 ,here was a desperate call for moral mastership4 ,the man to meet the crisis1 to join the cleft1 to reduce to moral harmony this discord of right and wrong1 the man who could resolve and morally unify this moral disagreement must have a soul and an understanding whose insight and moral comprehension were complete4 ,here ,lincoln's moral grandeur gains its full dimension4 ,and in this consummation it comes clear to see how in very deed right and wrong1 evil and good1 can be encompassed in a moral unison such that evil remains the all-abhorrent thing1 and good is proved to be alone desired4 ,this marvelous explication is found within the words and tone of this last inaugural4 ,it stands contained in perfect poise within the mutual balancings of his princely pledge to abjure all malice1 show universal charity1 and still pursue the awful guidance of ,almighty ,god in the prosecution of the war4 ,herein moral rigor1 forbearance1 and gentleness do majestically coalesce4 ,the breath and voice of this same moral mystery are felt and heard again within this same inaugural in that bold prophetic exposition of the ,providential purport of the war4 ,in the burning furnace of those last four years1 ,lincoln's eyes had been purged to see how the ways of ,god transcend the ways and thoughts of men4 ,both ,north and ,south1 in battle and in prayer1 had failed to comprehend the thoughts of ,god4 ,all the movements of all their armies were being mightily over-ruled4 ,the purposes of the ,almighty were his own4 ,both ,north and ,south had gone astray4 ,neither side was wholly right4 ,the land was under discipline4 ,the ,nation had committed sin4 ,that sin was destined for requital4 ,that requital was to be complete4 ,the ways of ,god were true and righteous altogether4 ,all this the ,nation must acquiescently confess4 ,for all the wrong of slavery requital must be made1 submissively1 ungrudgingly1 repentantly4 ,beneath that judgment every heart must bow4 ,the sin must be abjured4 ,its wrong must be abhorred4 ,goodwill to all alike must be restored4 ,and through it all the ,almighty must be adored4 ,like a solemn litany within a great cathedral1 these solemn sentiments of ,lincoln resounded through the land1 as1 in want of any other priest1 ,lincoln himself led the ,nation to the altar of the ,lord4 ,he truly led4 ,and to an altar4 ,in this inaugural1 ,lincoln1 for all ,americans1 bows and veils his own brave heart in sacrificial sorrow and confession1 to bear and suffer all that1 as the ,nation's due1 and for the ,nation's rescue1 it is the will of holy heaven to inflict4 ,in this profound1 spontaneous assumption of full co-partnership with all the ,nation in a ,nation's undivided ill-desert2 in this uncomplaining acquiescence1 while ,god inflicted upon the land1 as an awful scourge1 all the shame and cost and sorrow that the woful wrong of slavery had entailed2 in this deep discernment that deep in every heart ran and flourished all the baleful roots of greed and pride1 of injustice and cruelty1 out from which all man's enbondagement of brother man springs up2 in this estimation of human slavery as a primary sin1 while receiving without repining its ultimate doom--,lincoln unveils in his single heart1 an abhorrence and an endurance of our national sin1 that makes him enduringly and indivisibly the friend and brother of us all1 accomplishing1 in a single moral experience1 the pattern of the confession1 and of the resolution of our common wrong4 ,unto this1 ,lincoln's moral versatility attained4 ,beyond this1 moral versatility could never go4 ,the same moral dextrousness1 this facile power and fluent readiness to fully comprehend and fitly meet the moral mastery of a problem1 in itself all but absolutely obstinate and impossible1 this wondrous deftness in compounding together guilt and grace in mutual compassion and repentance1 is shown in ,lincoln's patiently repeated1 but always futile efforts to persuade the ,north and the ,south to come together1 and so bring slavery and all dissension to an end1 by giving and receiving fiscal reimbursement for the emancipation of the slaves4 ,to this magnanimous and unexampled proposition1 offered in the midst of war1 and urged in words and tones of classic winsomeness1 the ,north and ,south could never be brought unitedly to consent4 ,therein this moral hero stood like a king against the wrong1 argued like a prophet for the right1 and led towards mutual penitence and sacrifice like a priest4 ,it is in human history one of the supremest illustrations of moral versatility4 ,never were ,lincoln's character and aim more stable than in that plea4 ,but never was mortal man more mobile4 ,beyond all his contemporaries he observed and regarded the signs of the times4 ,he saw that the ancient order was certainly to change4 ,he felt that an almighty1 a just1 and a benignant ,providence had assumed control4 ,he discerned that the new order was freighted with vast store of good4 ,to make its entrance gentle1 so that nothing should be rent or wrecked1 was the sum of all his thought and toil4 ,he took for pattern the coming of the dew4 ,for his method he adopted his own well-mastered and transcendent art of brotherly persuasion4 ,as to manner1 he was vestured in humility1 desiring to eject and ban the pharisee from his own and all other hearts4 ,for prevailing motive he designated the passing hour as a time of unexampled opportunity4 ,so much good1 he said1 has not been done by one effort in all past time1 as in the ,providence of ,god it is now your high privilege to do4 ,and for admonition he pointed to the vastness of the future1 and a possible lament over a pitiful neglect4 ,but it was all for naught4 ,for such a moral transmutation and free triumph the embattled ,nation was unprepared4 ,but over against that unrelenting rigor1 his moral readiness to meet his brother1 friend or foe1 in free and mutual sacrifice1 glows beautifully4 ,deep in the heart of his design was struggling heroically1 and in balanced moral unison1 the ,godlike spirit of eternal justice1 mercy1 and conciliation4 ,in his strong breast all pride was crucified1 malice was melted down to tenderness1 hypocrisy and sordidness were purged away4 ,his moral outlook was now unobstructed1 open every way4 ,then his soul stood fleet and free for any path within the moral universe4 ,with every man in this broad land he stood ready to journey or sojourn1 meek to suffer1 resolute to prevail4 ,sharing with the wrongdoer and the wronged alike their shame and suffering and sin1 while urging with immortal eagerness towards fairness and happiness and peace1 he resolved and overcame the problem of the slaveholder and the slave1 and made this land forever the universal refuge of the free4 ,in such a transmutation1 first within himself1 and then throughout the land1 moral as it is in every fiber1 and from circumference to core1 is perfect moral concord4 ,thus1 in moral discord1 moral freedom finds the way to peace1 while full responsibility remains unchangeably supreme4 ,here is the final1 perfect triumph of moral ingenuity4 ,thus by means of mercy1 freely offered and freely received1 through mutual fellowship in moral suffering1 wrong may be comprehended1 and fully overcome1 in the unchanged dominion of the right4 ,so moral freedom and moral consistency combine4 ,men's lives become vicarious4 ,thus moral versatility culminates1 and overcomes1 and wins the sovereign moral crown4 ,,his ,,patience--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,meekness ,in the chapter just preceding1 ,lincoln's patience came into allusion and review4 ,that quality deserves a somewhat closer1 separate examination4 ,when ,lincoln took his last inaugural oath1 he based its meaning upon a statement in his inaugural address1 that all the havoc of the war was1 under ,god1 a penalty and atonement for a wrong that had been inflicted and endured for centuries4 ,in this interpretation he subtly interwove a pleading intimation that all the land1 in reverent acquiescence with the righteous rule of ,god1 should meekly bow together to bear the awful sacrifice4 ,and1 deep within this open exposition of his prophetic thought1 there gleamed the hidden pledge1 inherent in his undiluted honesty1 that he himself would not decline1 but would rather stand the first1 to bear all the sorrow consequent upon such wrong4 ,here is an attitude1 and here a proposition which men and ,nations are forever prone to scorn2 but which all ,nations and all men will be compelled or constrained at last to heed4 ,therein are published and enacted verities1 than which none known to men are more profound1 or vast1 or vested with a higher dignity4 ,they demand attention here4 ,the statement made by ,lincoln pivots on offenses4 ,strong men1 in pride and arrogance of strength1 had wronged the weak4 ,weak men1 in the lowliness and impotence of their poverty1 had borne the wrong4 ,in such conditions of painful moral strain the centuries had multiplied4 ,those long-drawn years of violence had heightened insolence into a defiance all but absolute4 ,those selfsame years of suffering had deepened ignominy into all but absolute despair4 ,through banishment of equity and charity1 of purity and humility1 while all the heavenly oracles seemed mute1 fear and hope alike seemed paralyzed4 ,the oppressor seemed to have forgotten his eternal obligation to be kind and fair4 ,the oppressed seemed to have surrendered finally his ,god-like dignity4 ,the times seemed irreversible4 ,here is a problem that1 while ever mocking human wisdom1 refuses to be mocked4 ,it enfolds a wrong1 undoubted moral wrong2 else naught is right4 ,it overwhelms4 ,within its awful deeps multitudes have been submerged4 ,and it is unrelieved4 ,it outwears the protests and appeals of total generations of unhelped1 indignant hearts4 ,this problem ,lincoln undertook to understand4 ,in his conclusion was proclaimed the vindication of the meek4 ,beneath that age-long wrong1 beneath the silence and delay of ,god1 and beneath the final recompense1 he prevailed upon his heart1 and pleaded with other hearts to stand in suffering1 hopeful acquiescence4 ,among these sorrows1 so wickedly inflicted1 without relief1 and without rebuke1 let patience be perfected4 ,here let meekness grow mature4 ,let confidence in our equal and unconquered manhood1 and let faith in ,god not fail to overcome all ,godlessness and inhumanity4 ,let time be trusted absolutely to prove all wrong iniquitous4 ,let the worth inherent in undying souls be shown to be indeed immortal4 ,here is ,lincoln's resolution of this profound enigma1 a resolution unfolding all its mystery1 and involving all his character4 ,here ,lincoln won his crown4 ,this is all his meaning in abjuring malice1 and invoking charity4 ,too kindly to indulge resentment1 whatever the provocation1 and too sensible of his own integrity to ever court despair1 he appealed to ,god's eternal justice and compassion1 and clung to a hope that no anguish or delay could overcome4 ,this is ,lincoln's patience4 ,this is the inmost secret of his moral strength4 ,this is his piercing and triumphant demonstration that in this troubled world1 where sin so much abounds1 it is the meek who shall finally prevail4 ,this moral patience deserves to be explored4 ,it comprehends ingredients1 quite as worthy to be kept distinct1 as to be seen in unison4 ,for one thing it identified him with slaves4 ,therein he bore a grave reproach4 ,its weight only he himself could rightly compute4 ,beneath the rude and among the hurt he took deliberate stand4 ,among the lowly1 before the scorner1 he held his place4 ,he braved the master's taunts4 ,he penetrated to its heart the cause that kept the black man mute4 ,he measured out1 but without indifference1 as without complaint1 the divine delay4 ,he courted in his thought on slavery a perfect consciousness of its sin4 ,he examined with nicest carefulness the sufferers' impulse towards revenge4 ,he knew the awful misery in human shame4 ,he shared with honest men their proudest aspirations4 ,and all of this1 he shared with blacks1 not by compulsion1 but as a volunteer4 ,herein1 and in the second place1 he held fast the fundamental claims that every slave retained an ineffaceable affinity with ,god2 that this divine inheritance1 however deep the negro's poverty1 could never be annulled or forfeited2 that friendliness with fellowmen1 however hard or sad their lot1 was no reproach2 that in human sorrows it well becometh human hearts1 as it becometh ,god1 to remember to be pitiful2 that all invasion or neglect of those inherent human rights and dignities was bound to be avenged2 that in ,god's good time all patient souls would be crowned with song2 and that thus his open championship of the cause of slaves was in perfect keeping with his own unaltered and unalterable self-respect4 ,a third ingredient in ,lincoln's patience was its conspicuous and inseparable impeachment of oppression4 ,lincoln's patience under moral wrong made him no neutral morally4 ,without fear and without reserve1 he held before oppressors1 however hard or strong1 the enormity of their wrong4 ,before the cruel their cruelty was displayed4 ,before the arrogant their arrogance was reflected back4 ,before the base and foul their sordidness was brought to light4 ,before disloyal men the perfidy of covenant disloyalty was nakedly unveiled4 ,all the wrongs inwrought and undergone in slavery were recited with insistent accuracy and unreserve4 ,of all those centuries of unpaid toil each month and year were reckoned up4 ,of all those sins against pure womanhood and helpless infancy each tell-tale face was told numerically4 ,the moral wrong in slavery was set before its advocates and beneficiaries unsparingly4 ,patience1 whether ,god's or man's1 and whether for one day or for a thousand years1 can never be interpreted or understood to diminish sin's iniquity4 ,its prolonged persistence only aggravates its guilt4 ,in the fourth place1 there was in ,lincoln's patience a waiting deference before ,god's silence and delay4 ,his total confidence was in ,god4 ,that ,god was negligent1 or indifferent1 he would not concede4 ,his whole abhorrence of oppression was based on ,god's decree4 ,here rested also all his hope of recompense4 ,vengeance belongs to ,god4 ,he will rebuke the mighty1 and redeem the meek4 ,in both1 his righteousness will be complete4 ,and when his judgments fall1 all men must own adoringly his perfect equity4 ,finally1 in ,lincoln's patience there is explicit recognition and confession of his own complicity with all the land1 in the wrong to slaves1 and of his own and all the land's delinquency before the ,lord1 in failure to discern and approbate the divine designs4 ,it had been left with ,god's far greater patience and far higher moral jealousy to overcome and overwhelm and overrule the devious plans and ways of erring men4 ,in lowly acquiescence it was for him and the land to acquaint themselves with ,god's designs1 confess their wanderings1 accept his will alike in redemption and rebuke1 and unite henceforth to represent and praise on earth his perfect equity and grace4 ,here are the elements in ,lincoln's patience1 and here their sum4 ,forming with the lowly and oppressed a free and intimate partnership2 avowing jealously for all mankind a coequal dignity among themselves and an imperishable affinity with ,god2 declaring unflinchingly to all who tyrannize the full enormity of their primal sin2 restraining malice and all avenging deeds2 confessing his own misjudgments and misdeeds among his fellowmen and before the ,lord2 he endures submissively the divine delays1 and shares repentantly with all who sin the judgments of a perfect righteousness4 ,genuinely pitiful for suffering men1 sharply jealous for human worth1 direct as light to designate the shame in pride1 docile as a child before the righteous and eternal rule of ,god1 he illustrates and demonstrates how a perfect patience makes requisition in a noble man of all his noblest manliness4 ,but worthy as are all its qualities1 its exercise entails stern discipline in suffering4 ,it costs a man his life4 ,that this was ,lincoln's understanding1 as he traversed the responsibility of that last inauguration day1 is witnessed unmistakably by his letter to ,thurlow ,weed respecting his inaugural address4 ,these are his words1 well worthy to be reproduced a second time3-- ,i believe it 7the address7 is not immediately popular4 ,men are not flattered by being shown that there has been a difference of purpose between the ,almighty and them4 ,to deny it1 however1 in this case1 is to deny that there is a ,god governing the world4 ,it is a truth which ,i thought needed to be told1 and1 as whatever of humiliation there is in it falls most directly on myself1 ,i thought others might afford for me to tell it4 ,most directly on myself4 ,there ,lincoln bares his heart to ,god and man1 in order that upon himself might fall the first1 the deepest1 and the most direct humiliation4 ,at one with slaves1 despised by pride1 astray from ,god prepared for sacrifice--but attesting still that slaves were men1 that robbery was wrong1 that ,god was just--so he stands4 ,but1 be it said again and yet again1 in such a posture looms nobility4 ,in meekness such as this is nothing craven4 ,it beseems true royalty4 ,bowing before his ,god to receive rebuke1 bowing to make confession before his fellowmen1 he stands as on a hilltop1 announcing and declaring to all the world how arrogance proves men base1 how lowliness may be beautiful1 how reverend are ,god's mysteries1 how just and pitiful his ways4 ,here is a kingliness that no crown can rightly symbolize4 ,here is a victory that is not won with swords4 ,in the very attitude is final triumph4 ,it bravely claims1 and truly overcomes the world4 ,in such a patience there is present instantly1 and in full possession1 the vigor of undying hope1 and the title of a firstborn son to the heritage of the earth4 ,this capacity in ,lincoln's patience for the close allegiance of self-devotion and self-respect1 of sympathy and jealousy1 is shown dramatically in his tournament with ,douglas in #aheh4 ,throughout those speeches1 replies1 and rejoinders ,lincoln held fast his full fraternity with the slaves1 while repressing with his fullest vigor every onslaught against his personal integrity4 ,the date of those debates marked over four full years1 since ,douglas had championed through ,congress into finished legislation a bill that abrogated all federal limitation of slavery1 and opened an unrestricted possibility of its further spread forever1 wherever any local interest might so desire4 ,that bill obtained the presidential signature in ,may of #ahed4 ,during the succeeding years ,douglas had been shaping public sentiment by his almost royal influence in public speech towards a stereotyped acceptance of the principles and implications of that law4 ,under his aggressive leadership his party had been well solidified upon three political postulates1 which he declared essential not alone to party fealty1 but to any permanent national peace4 ,these three postulates were the following3-- ,slavery is in no sense wrong4 ,slavery is to be treated as a local interest only4 ,these principles have been sanctioned perfectly by history4 ,from these fundamental postulates flowed numerous corollaries3-- ,black men are an inferior race4 ,this inferiority has been stamped upon this race indelibly by ,god4 ,the ,declaration of ,independence did not and does not include the blacks in its affirmations about equality4 ,this country contains vast sections precisely fitted to be occupied by slavery4 ,local interests being essentially diverse1 as for example between ,alabama and ,maine1 decisions as to local affairs will also be diverse4 ,this entails divergent treatment of black men1 just as of herds and crops4 ,to the rights of stronger races to enslave the blacks1 the fathers who framed our government1 our national history since1 and the age-long fate of ,africa unitedly bear witness4 ,counter to these three major postulates of ,douglas1 ,lincoln set the following three3-- ,the enslavement of men is wrong4 ,the treatment of slavery is a federal concern4 ,our history has contained1 and still contains a compromise4 ,our fathers deemed slavery a wrong4 ,but finding it present when they framed our government1 and finding its removal impossible at the time1 they arranged for its territorial limitation1 for its gradual diminishment1 and for its ultimate termination4 ,from these three fundamental postulates in ,lincoln's arguments flowed also various corollaries3-- ,the sinfulness of slavery roots in the elemental manhood of the slave4 ,this manhood warrants his elemental claim to the employment and enjoyment of his life in liberty4 ,in our form of government1 things local and things federal being held within their respective realms respectively supreme1 things locally divergent lead to federal compromise4 ,certain sections of the country in particular1 and the ,nation in general being committed1 either from policy or from choice1 to foster slavery2 men who hate the thing as wrong must in patient meekness endure its presence1 until in ,god's own time its presence and its sin and guilt shall be removed4 ,as will be seen at once1 for the purposes of a popular debate1 the postulates of ,douglas were easier to defend4 ,of the two sets of premises1 his seemed the more simple1 more explicit1 more direct1 more telling with a crowd2 while those of ,lincoln1 by reason of that moral and historical compromise1 seemed more confused1 more evasive1 and not so apt to take the multitude4 ,in the nature of the debate ,lincoln had to shape his propositions and replies to face two ways3--towards the practical emergencies of our history and form of government1 on the one hand2 and on the other hand1 towards an ideal nowhere yet attained1 and seemingly unattainable4 ,whereas ,douglas1 quite unconcerned about any ideal motives in the past1 as of any vision of an ideal day to come1 but dealing solely with the political situation that day occurrent1 could make every affirmation and every thrust against his adversary seem straight1 and clear1 and impossible to refute4 ,this very practical and substantial disadvantage ,lincoln had to bear4 ,questions that ,douglas would answer decisively1 and instantly1 and with absolute distinctness1 ,lincoln would be compelled to labor with1 in careful deference both to our ,constitutional protection of slavery1 and to its moral wrong4 ,this situation in those debates deserves a close attention4 ,the difference in the two positions was most profound4 ,that this deep difference was laid fully bare was the supreme resultant of the debate4 ,it was indeed a difference in principles4 ,but stated yet more narrowly1 it was a difference in nothing less than estimates of men1 and attitudes towards wrong4 ,it was not a difference in abstract theorems4 ,it was vastly more4 ,it was a difference in the personal qualities of the two protagonists4 ,to test this affirmation let any one imagine ,douglas producing from his heart the sentiments1 and arranging in his thought the arguments of ,lincoln's last inaugural4 ,douglas sadly erred in his opinion of his time4 ,in ,lincoln1 in those debates1 our government1 our history1 our ideal as a great ,republic stood incorporate4 ,like our noble history1 he patiently endured and bore what he instinctively and inveterately abhorred4 ,this pathetic situation1 this invincible anomaly in our national career1 is pathetically re-enacted in the fate of ,lincoln in these debates4 ,this at bottom1 and this at last is what those flashing falchions and ringing shields declare4 ,this explains the genesis and the actual course of those painful personalities4 ,and it is to study this that these debates have been introduced4 ,in the personal thrusts of those debates two qualities in ,lincoln become pre-eminent4 ,he would not forsake his humble championship of slaves4 ,he would accept no thrust against his personal integrity4 ,let those debates be read1 and re-perused until those cardinal elements in ,lincoln's attitude come clear4 ,and let it be observed that in no single personality was ,lincoln's thrust initial4 ,douglas opened the debate4 ,in his opening speech he made direct assertions and indirect intimations too gross to be termed subtle1 and too staring to be called disguised2 imputing and suggesting that ,lincoln was in character a coward and a cheat1 in his politics a revolutionary1 and in his social proclivities contemptible4 ,these same charges were made with unrelenting persistency and reiteration by ,douglas throughout the series of the debates4 ,to every imputation ,lincoln made definite and reiterated reply1 denouncing them roundly as unwarranted and inexcusable impeachment of his honor1 his veracity1 and his candor4 ,and then1 with measured and exact equivalence1 he dealt out to ,douglas's face a list of counter personalities of sharply parallel and actual transactions in ,douglas's life1 meriting precisely his own reproach4 ,and he pressed the battle home so hard that ,douglas1 in an impassioned height of protest1 demanded if ,lincoln meant to carry his tactics up to personal difficulty4 ,all this is painful confessedly to review4 ,one wishes earnestly1 just as with the later civil war1 it might never have occurred4 ,but it should be remembered that every retort of ,lincoln was1 as in the war itself1 in personal defense4 ,lincoln was not the assailant4 ,but once his honor was assailed1 it was not the nature of that honor to stand so mute that his own character seemed rightly smirched1 while justice rested with his adversary4 ,and so1 in self-defense1 as in his speech at ,quincy1 he carefully details1 he vigorously returned each thrust4 ,and this1 be it constantly recalled1 not in any selfishness1 not for wounded pride1 not for unction to a hurt1 not in any vengeful heat2 but just as in the following war1 in absolute unselfishness1 void of malice1 in the ministry of charity1 that the honor of all men might be saved1 and that the ,union with its boon of universal freedom and equality might not perish from the earth4 ,such was ,lincoln's patience1 in those earlier debates1 and in this last inaugural1 the same4 ,while bearing voluntarily in his single life all the opprobrium borne by slaves2 through all that fellowship and sympathy1 and on its sole behalf1 he guarded his own honor with an infinite jealousy4 ,but it was honor saved for suffering4 ,his life was sacrificial4 ,he learned to know full well1 but willingly1 what meekness costs4 ,not alone from a political antagonist and an embattled ,south1 but from a multitude of active dissentients besides throughout the ,north1 from ,congress1 and from the close circle of his cabinet he had to bear with blind misunderstandings1 and malignant misrepresentations of the deeds and qualities and motives of his perplexed and overburdened life4 ,but whatever his shortcomings or mistakes1 whatever his follies or sins1 two affirmations about his life will hold forever true4 ,he bore his load4 ,and he kept his path4 ,through all that stern campaign for liberty and union he turned neither to the right nor to the left4 ,sorrows and contentions surrounded him continually4 ,but he descried a better time4 ,to speed that day he welcomed sacrifice4 ,he lived and died for nothing else4 ,to show the priceless worth of freemen in a mighty multitude1 in a civic league of lasting unison and peace was his supreme commission and consuming wish4 ,to bring that vision near he aspired and submitted to be its pattern and its devotee4 ,,his ,,rise ,,from ,,poverty--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,industrialism ,in his first public speech1 seeking election to the ,state ,legislature of ,illinois in #ahcb1 ,lincoln said3 ,i was born1 and have ever remained1 in the most humble walks of life4 ,he adds3 ,if the good people in their wisdom shall see fit to keep me in the background1 ,i have been too familiar with disappointments to be very much chagrined4 ,in the same speech he said3 ,i have no other 7ambition7 so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow-men1 by rendering myself worthy of their esteem4 ,here are three phrases that epitomize ,lincoln's ideals and ,lincoln's career3--the most humble walks of life2 too familiar with disappointments2 and rendering myself worthy of their esteem4 ,there at the age of twenty-three we are apprised of ,lincoln's poverty1 of his ambition1 and of his adversity4 ,in the same address he says3 ,i have no wealthy or popular relatives or friends to recommend me4 ,at that time he had been but two years in the ,state4 ,in pondering this brief and frank appeal one wonders at the blending of the youthful and the mature1 the daring and the wary1 the ardent and the chastened1 the eager and the sedate1 the wistful and the resigned4 ,what had been the inner and the outer history and fortune of him1 who at the age of twenty-three could talk of being familiar with disappointments--so familiar with experiences of reverse that he could bear the public refusal of his one greatest ambition1 that public's true esteem1 without being much chagrined4 ,plainly in ,lincoln's early life there was a great heart1 cherishing a high hope1 but environed with poverty1 familiar with reversals1 unchampioned1 unknown4 ,already he was being refined by manifold discipline4 ,already in that refining fire he had fixed his eye and set his face to win his neighbor's true esteem4 ,therein one comprehends his whole career4 ,out of oblivion and solitude and direst poverty he passed by sheer self-mastery to the highest national authority and renown4 ,of all the distance and of all the way between those humblest walks and that commanding eminence1 and of all the pregnant meaning to him and to all ,americans1 and indeed to every son of ,adam1 of that achievement1 ,lincoln had a marvelous discerning sense4 ,he knew full well its vast significance and he never let its vivid recollection lapse4 ,it was always in his living consciousness4 ,one impressive proof and token that the meaning of his advancement had permanent place in his remembrance1 and that he deemed his fortune an ideal and a type of our ,american government and life has been preserved in the tone and substance of his address in ,independence ,hall1 when on his way to his first great inauguration4 ,standing there at the age of forty-one1 the ,nation's president-elect1 and filled with deep emotion1 he said3 ,i have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the ,declaration of ,independence4 ,and to give that statement explanation he said1 ,i have often inquired of myself what great principle or idea it was that kept this ,confederacy so long together4 ,and for answer to that inquiry he points to that sentiment in the ,declaration which gave liberty not alone to the people of this country1 but hope to all the world for all future time4 ,it was that which gave promise that in due time the weights would be lifted from the shoulders of all men1 and that all should have an equal chance4 ,liberty1 hope1 promise1 weights lifted1 an equal chance1 to all1 for all1 of all1 all1 in due time--these are the terms that answered the question over which he often pondered and often inquired4 ,this was the great principle1 the idea which held the ,confederacy together4 ,this was the basis on which1 if he could save the country1 he would be one of the happiest men in the world1 if he could help to save it4 ,this was the principle concerning which he exclaimed3 ,if this country cannot be saved without giving up that principle1 ,i was about to say that ,i would rather be assassinated upon this spot than surrender it--words whose purport is seen to be nothing less than tragic1 when we recall the peril of death1 which he was consciously facing in that very hour from a deep laid conspiracy against his life4 ,thus spoke ,lincoln within ten days of his inauguration1 in a speech which he says was wholly unprepared4 ,but the day before1 in a speech at ,trenton1 he characterized that same idea as that something more than common which away back in childhood1 the earliest days of his being able to read1 he recollected thinking1 boy though ,i was1 was the treasure for which those men struggled4 ,that something he then defines as even more than national independence2 and as holding out a great promise to all the people of the world to all time to come4 ,this lifting of weights from the shoulders of men1 this equal chance for all2 this was the liberty for which the fathers fought1 this was the hope which their ,declaration enshrined1 this it was whose preservation ,lincoln longed to secure above any other happiness1 this it was for which he was all but ready to die4 ,there ,lincoln spoke his heart4 ,there he voiced his highest hopes4 ,there he traced his patriotism to its roots4 ,and there too he touched the quick nerve of his own disappointments1 of his own often futile endeavors and desires4 ,and there as well his living sympathy with other men1 encumbered with disadvantage and defeat1 found mighty utterance4 ,lifting weights from the shoulders of all men--that in due time this should be achieved he judged and felt to be the single sovereign meaning of our national destiny4 ,of just this national destiny ,lincoln's personal life was a strangely full epitome4 ,his shoulders knew full well the pressure of those weights4 ,his soul knew all the awful volume of sorrow as of joy1 that poured about the denial or the enjoyment of an equal chance4 ,from the humblest walks to the foremost seat he had been permitted to thread his way4 ,that liberty he chiefly sought in struggling youth4 ,that liberty he chiefly prized as president4 ,and this1 not alone for himself1 not alone for all ,americans1 but for all the world4 ,thus spoke ,lincoln1 all unprepared in ,february of #ahfa4 ,but these spontaneous words were no passing breath of transient sentiments4 ,in ,july of that same year he sent to ,congress his first ,message4 ,that paper was ,lincoln's studied and formal argument1 a president's deliberate ,state ,paper1 addressing to ,congress his responsible demonstration that the war was a necessity4 ,in that argument and demonstration his fundamental postulate was a definition of our government4 ,in that definition he affirms its leading object to be to elevate the condition of men--to lift artificial weights from all shoulders2 to clear the paths of laudable pursuit for all1 to afford all an unfettered start1 and a fair chance in the race of life4 ,and so he calls the war a people's contest4 ,and he speaks of its deeper purport as something that the plain people understand4 ,and he speaks of the loyalty of all the common soldiers--not one of whom was known to have deserted his flag--as the patriotic instinct of the plain people4 ,those words of ,lincoln in ,trenton and ,philadelphia1 defining the leading object in the minds of the founders of our government in the hours of its birth-travail1 define his own idea and ideal as he approached the hour of his presidential oath4 ,that a national government1 thus beneficently designed for the equal weal of all1 should be preserved inviolate and preserved from dissolution was his supreme desire and his supreme resolve4 ,its majesty and its integrity must be held most sacred and most jealously preserved4 ,this was the apple of his eye4 ,by the light of this ideal and in the pursuit of this alluring1 wistful hope he studied and judged all the movements of his time4 ,and in this1 his initial message1 he registers his official verdict upon those surrounding evolutions and events4 ,a vast and ever-expanding ,confederacy of intelligent and resolute men1 leagued together in a ,union of ,confederate ,states1 and pledged to secure to all men within its bounds a clear path1 an unfettered start1 and a fair chance in every laudable pursuit1 was judged by him a civic undertaking too preciously freighted with promise and hope for the welfare of the world to be ever disrupted and destroyed by the disloyalty and the withdrawal of any one or any cluster of its constituent parts4 ,it was a ,union as sacred and holy as all the worth and all the hopes of men4 ,to separate from such a league was a capital disloyalty4 ,to disintegrate such a unison was the ultimate inhumanity4 ,to stand fast forever by such a federation was a crowning fidelity4 ,to preserve1 protect and defend such a ,union1 at whatever cost of life or wealth1 and therein to adventure however sacred honor was a primary and a final obligation4 ,by its perpetual preservation unimpaired was secured to all mankind the vision and the priceless promise of liberty and hope4 ,by secession1 defiance1 and violent assault1 that precious human treasure was being endangered and defiled4 ,hence his anxious all-consuming eagerness as he approached his ominous task4 ,hence his firm acceptance of awful1 inevitable war4 ,such were the marshalings of ,lincoln's thoughts and sentiments as he approached and undertook his mighty work--fit prelude in ,independence ,hall1 and befitting explanation and defense in the ,halls of ,congress of the mighty rallying of those regiments of men for the awful combats of a people's war4 ,this was ,lincoln's argument4 ,that the rights of life and liberty and happiness were designed and decreed by the ,maker of all to be equal for all was for him1 as an ,american1 and for him as a fellow and a friend of all1 under ,god1 an axiom4 ,and to that firm truth the war was but a corollary4 ,because the ,union was a league of freemen1 kindred to ,god1 and peers among themselves1 bound together in mutual goodwill and for mutual weal1 it must at all hazards and through all perils and sorrows be made perpetual4 ,not that slavery should be immediately removed1 though its existence in such a league was an elemental unworthiness and affront2 but that the ,union should be forever secured was his immediate aspiration and resolve4 ,this once achieved and forever assured1 and slavery with every other kindred inequality would in due time be done away4 ,this is the key and the core of his ringing and irresistible retort to ,greeley4 ,this was the inspiration of that immortal appeal at ,gettysburg1 the very pledge and secret of its excellence and immortality--the plea that government of the people1 by the people1 for the people should not perish from the earth4 ,and it was definitively this axiomatic verity that provided to his deeply thoughtful mind that deeply philosophic interpretation of the divine intention in the war1 which he so carefully enshrined within his last inaugural4 ,the sin of slavery had transgressed a primary law of ,god4 ,human shoulders had been heavily laden with artificial weights4 ,brother men had been denied by fellow-men an equal start4 ,the paths of laudable pursuit were not kept equally clear to all4 ,multitudes of men1 by the inhuman tyranny of the strong upon the weak1 and that from birth to death1 had been accorded no fair chance4 ,men had toiled for centuries1 and that beneath the lash1 without requital4 ,hence the awful doom and woe of war--,god's visitation upon ourselves of our own offense1 the wasting of our unholy wealth and the leveling of our inhuman pride4 ,and all of this was being guided through to its predestined and most holy end with the divine design that through the awful baptism of blood our national life should begin anew in humble reverence for him whose just and fiery jealousy demands that all his little ones shall share with all the mightiest in equal rights4 ,thus ,lincoln viewed the war as ,god's avenging vindication of the just and gracious principles that all men everywhere are entitled to share together equally in liberty and hope4 ,but ,lincoln felt all of this to be1 not alone the law of ,god1 but quite as truly the common and compelling affirmation of the human heart4 ,this way and style of phrasing it found eloquent annunciation in that earliest and unanswerable address respecting slavery at ,peoria in ,october of #ahed1 where were deeply laid and may still be seen the foundations of all his power and fame4 ,in that address he said1 ,my faith in the proposition1 that each man should do precisely as he pleases with all which is exclusively his own1 lies at the foundation of the sense of justice there is in me4 ,and upon that foundation he laid this cornerstone of social and civic order3 ,no man is good enough to govern another man without that other man's consent4 ,to so invade the liberty of another man is despotism4 ,such invasion is founded in the selfishness of man's nature4 ,opposition to it is founded in his sense of justice4 ,these principles are in eternal antagonism4 ,when they collide1 shocks and throes and convulsions must ceaselessly follow4 ,these sentiments of liberty are above repeal4 ,though you repeal all past history1 you cannot repeal human nature4 ,out of the abundance of man's heart his mouth will continue to speak4 ,and to demonstrate that this sentiment of liberty1 this consciousness that human worth is sovereign1 is a verity of human nature which even holders of slaves corroborate1 he points to the over #djj1jjj free negroes then in the land4 ,their presence is proof that deep in all human hearts is a sense of human justice and sympathy continually attesting that the poor negro has some natural right to himself1 and that those who deny it and make merchandise of him deserve kickings1 contempt and death4 ,this irrepealable law of the human heart was a mighty rock of confidence in ,lincoln's social and political faith4 ,all men were made to be free1 and entitled equally to a happy life2 and of this divine endowment all men everywhere were well aware4 ,human nature is by its nature the birthplace and the home of liberty and hope4 ,especially serviceable for the purposes of this study upon ,industrialism is the section in ,lincoln's ,message to ,congress of ,december1 #ahfa1 dealing with what he calls our popular institutions4 ,with his eagle eye he discerns in the ,southern insurrection an approach of returning despotism4 ,the assault upon the ,union was proving itself1 under his gaze1 an attack upon the first principles of popular government--the rights of the people4 ,and against that assault he raised a warning voice4 ,in this warning he treats specifically the relation of labor and capital4 ,in this discussion his motive is single and clear4 ,he detects a danger that so-called labor may be assumed to be so inseparably bound up and indentured with capital as to be subject to capital in a sort of bondage2 and that1 once labor1 whether slave or hired1 is brought under that assumed subjection1 that condition is fixed for life4 ,both of these assumptions he assails4 ,labor is not a subject state2 nor is capital in any sense its master4 ,there is no such thing as a free man's being fixed for life in the condition of a hired laborer4 ,so he affirms4 ,and then he argues that labor is prior to and independent of capital4 ,capital is only the fruit of labor4 ,labor is the superior of capital1 and deserves much the higher consideration4 ,hired labor1 and capital that hires and labors not--these do both exist2 and both have rights4 ,but a large majority belong to neither class--neither work for others1 nor have others working for them4 ,this is measurably true even in the ,southern ,states4 ,while in the ,northern ,states a large majority are neither hirers nor hired4 ,and even where free labor is employed for hire1 that condition is not fixed for life4 ,many independent men everywhere in these ,northern ,states1 a few years back in their lives1 were hired laborers4 ,the penniless1 if prudent1 labors for wages awhile2 saves a surplus2 then labors on his own account2 and at length hires another new beginner to help him4 ,this is the just and generous and prosperous system which opens the way to all1 gives hope to all4 ,here is a form of political power2 here is a popular principle that underlies present national prosperity and strength1 and infolds a pledge of its certain future abounding expansion4 ,thus ,lincoln argued in his ,annual ,message of #ahfa4 ,in his ,annual ,message of #ahfb1 he pursued in a similar strain1 a vital and kindred aspect of the same industrial theme4 ,he was arguing with ,congress in favor of compensated emancipation4 ,in the course of that argument1 speaking of the relation of freed negroes to white labor and white laborers1 he said3 ,if there ever could be a proper time for mere catch arguments1 that time surely is not now4 ,in time like the present1 men should utter nothing for which they would not willingly be responsible through time and in eternity4 ,and then1 after appealing with utmost patience and consideration and with ideal persuasiveness to every better sentiment and to every proper interest1 he drew towards the close of his plea with these arresting1 prophetic1 almost forboding words1 words richly worth citation for a second time3--,the occasion is piled high with difficulty1 and we must rise with the occasion4 ,we must disenthrall ourselves1 and then we shall save our country4 ,we cannot escape history4 ,the fiery trial through which we pass will light us down1 in honor or dishonor1 to the latest generation4 ,we know how to save the ,union4 ,we--even we here--hold the power and bear the responsibility4 ,in giving freedom to the slave1 we assure freedom to the free--honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve4 ,we shall nobly save or meanly lose the last1 best hope of earth4 ,the way is plain1 peaceful1 generous1 just--a way which1 if followed1 the world will forever applaud1 and ,god must forever bless4 ,thus ,lincoln voiced1 and in terms that human-kind will not lightly suffer to be forgotten1 his seasoned and convinced belief about the principles that should hold dominion in the industrial realm4 ,they reveal that in his chastened and chastening faith ,civics and ,economics are merged forever in ,ethics1 and that therein they are forever at one4 ,individuals1 however lowly or however strong2 parties or combinations of men or wealth1 however massive or however firm2 governments or nations1 however puissant1 ambitious or proud1 are alike endowed and alike enjoined with sovereign duties and with sovereign rights4 ,the negro1 however poor1 may not be robbed or exploited or bound by any master1 however grand4 ,the soil of a neighboring government1 however alluring its promise of expansion or wealth1 may never be invaded or annexed by force of any ,nation's arms1 however exalted and humane that ,nation's professions and aims4 ,if any man1 or any ,nation of men be but meagerly endowed1 that humble heritage is inviolably theirs forever to enjoy4 ,the person of ,dred ,scott and the soil of ,mexico are holy ground--heaven-appointed sanctuaries that no oppressor or invader may ever venture to profane4 ,if to any nation1 or to any man ,god gave but little1 that little let him enjoy4 ,slavery and tyranny are iniquitous economy4 ,take from him that is needy is the rule of the slaveholder and the tyrant4 ,give to him that is needy is the rule of ,christian charity4 ,as between the strong and the weak1 the rich and the poor1 the timid and the bold1 this good earth is plenty broad enough for both4 ,here is indeed an eternal struggle4 ,but underneath is an eternal principle4 ,and among the many ,nations of the earth this ,american people are bringing to this principle in the face of all the world a world-commanding demonstration of its benign validity4 ,by the sweat of his face shall man eat bread4 ,and the fruit of his toil shall man enjoy4 ,so would ,lincoln guard1 in the industrial world1 against all exaggeration and all infringement of human liberties and rights1 and this quite as much for the sake of the strong as in defense of the weak4 ,tyranny1 in despoiling the weak1 despoils the tyrant too4 ,liberty does harm to none1 but brings rich boon to all4 ,thus ,lincoln cherished freedom4 ,but deep within this treasured liberty ,lincoln saw the shining jewel of human hope4 ,and hope with him was ever neighborly4 ,and this generous sentiment1 expanding forever in his heart1 he cherished1 not merely as common civilian1 but as president4 ,it was while at ,cincinnati1 on his way to his inauguration1 that he said1 ,i hold that while man exists it is his duty not only to improve his own condition1 but also to assist in ameliorating mankind4 ,it is not my nature1 when ,i see people borne down by the weight of their shackles 444 to make their life more bitter by heaping upon them greater burdens2 but rather would ,i do all in my power to raise the yoke4 ,but true as was ,lincoln's view of our national mission1 and clear and just and generous as was his own desire1 he saw in the ,nation's path before his face a mighty obstacle4 ,he knew the fascination of property4 ,and he knew that this fascination held its malevolent sway1 even though that property was vested in human life4 ,here was the brunt of all his battle4 ,the slaves of his day had a cash value at a moderate estimate of #b1jjj1jjj1jjj4 ,he saw that this property value had a vast influence on the minds of its owners4 ,and he knew that this was so very naturally that the same amount of property would have an equal influence 444 if owned in the ,north2 that human nature is the same2 that public opinion is founded to great extent on a property basis2 that what lessens the value of property is opposed2 that what enhances its value is favored4 ,with this prevailing tendency1 native and universal in all men alike1 he had to deal4 ,indeed he had no other problem4 ,all his presidential difficulties reduced to this3--the universal greed of men for gain2 and deep within this inborn greed1 man's inborn selfishness4 ,and all his all-absorbing toil and thought as statesman and as president were to exalt in human estimation the values in men above all other gain4 ,this desire lay deep in his heart at the beginning of his struggle in #ahed4 ,at the end of his conflict in those closing days of his life in #ahfe this longing came forth as pure and shining gold thrice refined4 ,from the time of his second election his thoughts moved with an almost unwonted constancy upon these upper heights4 ,with immeasurable satisfaction he brooded and pondered over the emerging issues of the stupendous strife4 ,with an almost mother's love he considered and counted over and reckoned up those outcomes of the sacrifice that should worthily endure4 ,with a vision purged of every form of vanity and every form of selfishness1 not as a miser1 but in very deed with a mother's pride and inner joy1 he recited over the precious inventory of the chastened ,nation's wealth4 ,touching evidence of this is in his habitual tone of speech when addressing soldiers returning from the field to their homes4 ,over and over again he would remind the men of the vital principle at stake1 alike in war and in peace4 ,that you may all have equal privileges in the race of life2 that there may be an open field and a fair chance for your industry1 enterprise1 and intelligence--this is 'our birthright1' our 'inestimable pearl4' ,nowhere in the world is presented a government of so much liberty and equality4 ,to the humblest and the poorest among us are held out the highest privileges and positions4 ,it is hard to say1 when he was voicing his satisfaction and his gratitude to these returning regiments1 to which his words were most directly addressed1 to the soldier in the uniform1 or to the citizen4 ,all those veteran soldiers were to his discerning eyes the precious sterling units of the ,nation's lasting wealth4 ,in their service as defenders of the ,union they had saved the most precious human heritage that human history ever knew or human hope conceived4 ,and of that heritage and hope they were themselves the exponent4 ,their service under arms and their civilian life in coming days of peace were one4 ,and with a deep and fond solicitude he would charge them to shield and guard1 to champion and defend with ballot as with sword their dear-bought liberty and right4 ,these peaceable precious fruits of the deadly terrible war he well foresaw and greeted eagerly4 ,the verdict of the ballots in his re-election in #ahfd proclaimed afar a word the world had never heard before4 ,it demonstrated that a people's government can sustain a national election in the midst of a great civil war4 ,that verdict declared authoritatively that government by the people was sound and strong4 ,and it also showed by actual count that after four terrible years of war the government had more supporting men than when the war began4 ,this abounding victory filled and satisfied his heart4 ,and in the presence of that unexampled proof that equal liberty for all was safe within the guardianship of common men1 he exclaimed with a prophet's vision of the living unison of civic and economic weal3--,gold is good in its place1 but living1 brave1 patriotic men are better than gold4 ,such were ,lincoln's principles as he defined a ,nation's true prosperity and wealth4 ,a ,nation's strength1 a ,nation's honor1 a ,nation's truest treasure is in her men4 ,men of freedom and men of hope1 men intolerant of tyranny1 men resolved to be worthy of themselves and conscious of kinship with their ,maker1 men jealous equally of their own and their brother's liberty1 men who welcome all the bonds involved in a friendly league of equal duties and equal rights1 men in whom the amelioration of all is a ruling desire1 these are the chief and best achievement in the proudest ,nation's wealth4 ,to undervalue men1 preferring any other good1 is to cherish in a ,nation's heart the source of its undoing4 ,more to be prized than finest gold is every citizen4 ,however weak and humble any man may be1 his honor is sacredly above offense4 ,to leave the burden of the feeble unrelieved1 or to clog the progress of the slow is in any ,nation's history a primal sin1 and is sure to be abundantly revenged4 ,for such a sin no store of wealth has power to atone4 ,a sin like that a sinner himself must bear4 ,this is the central thought of the last inaugural4 ,these were the human sentiments lying underneath all ,lincoln's economic faith4 ,to these firm verities he held devotedly1 whether counseling the ,nation as its president1 projecting negro colonies as the negro's friend1 or offering to an idling1 impecunious brother a dollar gratis for every dollar earned4 ,men are equal2 men are free4 ,men are royal2 men are kin4 ,men are hopeful2 men aspire4 ,men are feeble2 men have need4 ,men may prosper2 men may rise4 ,melioration is for all4 ,men have duties2 men have rights4 ,rights are mutual2 duties bind4 ,every man resents offense4 ,only despots can offend4 ,human tyranny is doomed4 ,vengeance waits on every wrong4 ,god is sovereign1 kind and just4 ,these are ,lincoln's sentiments4 ,these he nobly illustrates4 ,these are laws which he defends4 ,these are truths he vindicates4 ,these few fundamental principles1 applied anywhere in the industrial field1 would soon and certainly put in force wholesome1 everlasting1 all-embracing laws4 ,if1 like ,lincoln himself1 men start in penury with never a favor and never a friend1 then1 like him1 they must hire themselves to other men for the going wage4 ,but every such a contract must be forever subject to a fair and orderly recall4 ,the humblest earner of a daily wage must be forever free1 free to continue or to withdraw4 ,to his freedom and improvement1 to his enheartenment and hope all industrial regulations must conduce4 ,this is basic4 ,this alone is generous and fair4 ,and only here can any government win permanence and peace4 ,here are ,lincoln's primal postulates in social economics4 ,moral imperatives are over every man4 ,moral freedom is in every breast4 ,within the nethermost foundations of any mortal's share in any social fellowship must rest his own self-wrought integrity and self-respect4 ,to make that social fellowship in any form perpetually secure each man must seek with all his heart and with continual willing sacrifice the lasting welfare of every party and of every part4 ,that this be safely guaranteed each man must learn to estimate his brother-man1 not by epaulets and coins1 but by immortal standards1 such as only living persons can achieve4 ,to make this social league invincible within1 each member in the fellowship must show a true humility1 abjuring all temptation or desire to be a despot or a grandee4 ,and through it all this social compact must be cherished and revered as ordained by a ,god of pure and sovereign truth and love4 ,thus by friendly ministry1 in unpretending honesty1 in brother-kindliness1 as sharing in a common immortality1 under the favor and in the fear of ,god1 may fellowmen in multitudes be fellow citizens in a civic order that may hope for perpetual prosperity4 ,this is the resounding message that ,lincoln's life transmuted into speech through his pathetic and inspiring rise from poverty4 ,,his ,,philosophy--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,reality ,the study of ,lincoln's moral versatility1 examined in a former chapter1 ranging as it does through all the measure of the moral realm1 verges all along its border on the domain of philosophy4 ,lincoln has scant familiarity1 it is true1 with the rubrics and the problems1 the theories and the methods of the schools4 ,his boyhood was in the wilderness2 locusts and wild honey were his food4 ,such education as he achieved was in pathetic isolation4 ,it was a naked earth1 unfurnished with any aids or guides1 from which his homely hard-earned wisdom was laboriously wrung4 ,but his ,maker dowered him with a mind attempered to defiance of every difficulty4 ,and1 however stern the face of his life's fortune might become1 his sterner will and diligence found in her solitudes her choicest treasures4 ,to minds that nimbly traverse many books1 thinking to have gained the substance of great truths1 when they have only gained vain forms1 this may seem to be impossible4 ,but ,lincoln's mind had traversed severest discipline4 ,he found rare substance of intellectual wealth4 ,and he knew its solid worth4 ,of this1 as has been shown1 his first inaugural yields shining proof4 ,almost every sentence is as the oracle of a sage4 ,but his second inaugural1 too1 is a gem of wisdom1 clear and pure1 fit ornament for any man to wear in any place where wisest men convene4 ,let keenest eyes examine narrowly the aspiration with which this second inaugural concludes4 ,there shines a wish as bright as any human hope that ever shone in human breast--a wish that all the earth might gain to just and lasting peace4 ,that yearning plea was voiced upon the very breath that spoke of the battles and wounds1 the dead and the bereft1 of a mighty ,nation in fratricidal war4 ,the peace he sought for within all the land1 and through all the earth1 was to be the national consummation of a conflict in which multitudes of men and millions of treasure had been offered up under ,god in the name of charity and right4 ,such was the wording and the setting of this wish4 ,comprehend its girth4 ,it encircled all the earth4 ,this cannot be said to be nothing but the ill-considered aspiration of an inexperienced underling4 ,it is the prayer of one who for four terrific years had held the chief position in conducting the executive affairs of one of the major empires of the world4 ,during all that time1 among the bewildering and imperious problems of an era of unexampled civil convulsion1 hardly any complications had been more obstinate or more disturbing than those bound up in the relation of the ,united ,states to the other major ,nations of the world4 ,within those international complications were infolded problems and principles as profoundly fundamental as any within any ,nation's single life1 or within all the reach of international law4 ,in such a situation and out of such a career ,lincoln culminates the declaration of his policy for a second presidential term with an invocation of just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all ,nations4 ,again let it be said1 and be it not forgotten1 that it is from the lips of ,lincoln that this appeal ascends4 ,he is not a novice4 ,he is a seasoned veteran4 ,coming from that heart1 and spoken in that hour1 those words cannot be lightly flung aside4 ,they are the longing of a man who1 through almost unparalleled discipline1 has attained an almost peerless sobriety1 sincerity1 and clear-sightedness4 ,too honest to utter hollow words1 too deliberate to accept an ill-judged phrase1 too discerning to recommend a futile and unlikely proposition1 and sobered far beyond any power or inclination to play the hypocrite1 we must concede that ,lincoln meant and measured what he said4 ,in simple fairness1 and in all sobriety1 we must allow that ,lincoln understood that the principles which guided him as national chief magistrate1 and the goal towards which he was driving everything in his conduct of the war1 contained all needed light and power for winning all the world to perpetual harmony4 ,this is nothing less than to allow in ,lincoln's deeds and words the sweep and insight of a philosopher4 ,and it is but simple justice1 though of vast significance1 to append just here that it was in the office and person of ,john ,hay1 ,lincoln's private secretary1 when later he was our ,secretary of ,state1 that there dawned and brightened the new era in international diplomacy1 now in our day so widely inaugurated1 and so well advanced4 ,it can be truly added that in this vast arena1 where mighty ,nations are the actors1 and in very fact all the world is the stage1 those cardinal moral traits of ,lincoln1 and his transparent and commanding personality1 so steadfast and vivid and gentle and meek1 have no need to borrow from other and ancient theories and illustrations of world-wide statesmanship either light or power4 ,that each individual retain unsmirched and undiminished his pristine self-respect as the cornerstone of all reliability1 his neighborly kindness as the prime condition of all true comity1 his child-like deference towards ,god as the basis of all genuine dignity1 and his rating of human souls above all perishable goods as the absolute and essential foundation of any perpetuity1 forms a programme as elemental and imperial among mightiest ,nations1 as among humblest neighborhoods of men4 ,lincoln's obedient recognition of the ,almighty's purposes in over-ruling national affairs1 his king-like resolution to hold loyally by his innate sense of equity1 his eagerness for the elevation of all the oppressed1 his instinctive aspiration in his civic life for foundations that cannot fail1 and his uncomplaining fellowship with the penal sorrows of his erring fellow citizens1--all apprehended and defended and adhered to with such a lucid mind and steadfast will and prophetic hope upon the open platform of our ,american ,republic--propose both in active practice and in reasoned theory a pattern of statesmanship1 capable of comprehending the political conditions1 and directing the diplomacy of all the governments of the world4 ,here are the primal conditions and constituents of international amity4 ,agreements constructed and defended thereupon among the ,nations could not fail to be fair4 ,they would surely endure4 ,and as the centuries passed1 the faith of ,lincoln in a ,ruler of ,nations1 just1 benign1 eternal1 supreme1 would aboundingly increase4 ,but once again it must be said that these are not the themes1 nor this the flight of an untrained imagination4 ,the peace among all ,nations towards which ,lincoln's hope appealed1 was being patterned upon a just and lasting achievement among ourselves4 ,and among ourselves the government was being tried in the burning1 fiery furnace of a civil war4 ,it was being proved in flames what factors in a national civic order were permanent1 and fair1 and approved of ,god4 ,it was out of deep affliction and unsparing discipline1 rebuking all our sins1 humbling all our vanity1 purging all our hopes1 and cementing among ourselves a just and lasting brotherhood1 that ,lincoln found the heart to hope for perpetual fraternity through all the world4 ,within his wish deep-wrought1 hard-earned1 clear-eyed wisdom was crystallized4 ,it was an imperial proposition1 momentous1 comprehensive1 profound4 ,it embodied nothing less than a political philosophy4 ,but these assertions demand a closer scrutiny4 ,does ,lincoln's thought1 in scope and mode1 deserve in any sense to be entitled a philosophy8 ,in soberness1 is any such pretension justified8 ,are ,lincoln's principles so radical1 so comprehensive1 so well-ordered1 as to deserve a title so supreme8 ,all turns on truly understanding ,lincoln's apprehension of reality4 ,lincoln's world was a society of persons4 ,god1 himself1 his fellowman engrossed his thought and interest4 ,among all persons1 as seen and known by him1 there was a full affinity4 ,all men were equal1 and all were kindred to the great ,god4 ,this was the starting point1 this the circuit1 and this the goal of all his conscious thought and toil4 ,this was his world4 ,to penetrate its nature was to handle elements4 ,to grasp those elements was to be inclusive4 ,and to comprehend their native correlation was to master fundamental wisdom4 ,here ,lincoln shows his mental strength4 ,among all these elements he traced a fundamental similarity4 ,a common pattern embraced them all4 ,the highest and the lowest were essentially alike4 ,all were dowered with kindred capacities for nobility4 ,he never suffered himself or any of his fellowmen to forget his own elevation from lowliest ignorance and poverty to the presidency4 ,however humble1 all could rise4 ,however ignorant1 all could learn4 ,however unbefriended1 all deserved regard4 ,life and liberty and happiness were a common boon1 an even1 universal right4 ,for fellowship with ,god1 even when buffeted beneath divine rebukes1 all might hope4 ,the ultimate1 open possibility of such divine companionship is shown in this last inaugural1 where ,lincoln's keen discernment avails to comprehend1 that even sinning men may1 through penitent acceptance of heaven's rebukes1 win heaven's favor and walk with ,god4 ,thus ,lincoln learned and knew that among all men1 and between all men and ,god there was a fundamental ground of imperishable affiance4 ,here lies the foundation of his philosophy4 ,and this affiance was in its being moral4 ,with him the real was ethical4 ,pure equity was the primal verity4 ,by character were all things judged4 ,politics and ethics were identical4 ,in the thought of ,lincoln the qualities constituting our ,american ,union1 the qualities that defined and contained its very being1 the qualities that made it a civic entity1 securing to it its coherence and perpetuity1 the qualities guaranteeing that it should not dissolve and disappear in the fate and wreck of all decaying things1 the qualities that made it worth the faithful care of ,god and the loving loyalty of men1 were identical with the qualities constituting himself a free1 responsible soul4 ,the same humble reverence1 the same mutual goodwill1 the same regard for durability1 the same jealousy for integrity as informed his personal conscience and inspired his personal will1 should form the law and determine the deeds of the ,nation as well1 if the ,nation was ever to have in its civic being a dignity worthy to survive4 ,here is a standard conformable at once with the measure of things in heaven1 the measure of a ,nation1 and the measure of every man4 ,such is the scope of this inaugural4 ,in penning that grave paragraph touching unrequited toil1 ,lincoln had his eye alike upon the individual slave1 upon the ,nation as a whole1 upon long centuries1 and upon the ways of ,god4 ,it may be said with equal truth that he was pondering the sin and hurt of a single act of fraud1 the vital structure of organic civic life1 the continual tenure of right and guilt through lives and times that seem diverse1 and the unison of moral estimates that hold with ,god and men alike forever4 ,this may not be denied4 ,the sin inflicted in a single wrong1 like that of slavery1 may implicate a ,nation in a guilt that1 under the impartial and upright rule of ,god1 the centuries cannot obliterate4 ,inhuman scorn1 short-sighted greed1 disloyalty and cruelty1 however disguised1 or however upheld1 entail a doom too certain and too sovereign for the centuries to unduly defer1 or for any nation to ever annul4 ,here are principles undeniably4 ,and as undeniably these principles are supreme4 ,a just ,god is over all4 ,to his high purposes all things1 even the most perverse1 must eventually conform4 ,to his right rule even unrighteous men must bend4 ,into intelligent harmony with his will all upright men may come1 finding in lowly acknowledgment of his great majesty their true dignity1 in loyalty to his pure righteousness their own complete integrity1 in imitation of his universal benignity their perfect mutual friendliness1 and in a vision of his eternal purity their assurance of personal and civic perpetuity4 ,thus in the midst of all being1 and in the conscious presence of ,him in whom all being finds its source1 our personal1 human being finds its transcendent dignity and crown4 ,living thus1 and living thus together1 men find life indeed4 ,thus all1 endowed alike with the common sanctity of life1 enjoying equally the common right to liberty1 share equally a common boon of happiness4 ,thus each man alone and thus the civic order as a whole may survive and flourish under ,god in just and lasting peace4 ,this1 in ,lincoln's thought1 was final1 comprehensive truth4 ,taken in all its foursquare amplitude and unison1 there was nothing human it did not avail to fitly arrange and fully circumscribe4 ,whether for man alone or for men in leagues1 whether for ,states supreme or for ,states confederate1 it provided every needful guide and bond4 ,as for the international arena1 so for every lesser realm of social life1 the principles enshrined in this inaugural are civic wisdom crystallized4 ,they proffer to our human social life nothing less than a philosophy4 ,this is the wisdom literally inscribed upon the tablet of this last inaugural4 ,to unveil its face before an ever heedful and ever more attentive world is being found a sovereign function of succeeding time4 ,men are ever learning1 but have ever yet to learn what ,lincoln was4 ,despite his fame1 his proper glory has been veiled4 ,his features have been shadowed1 almost smirched4 ,his reputation has been overlaid with rumours and reports of excessive pleasure in ribald1 rollicking hours in wayside inns4 ,but in his very laughter there were deep hints of measured soberness4 ,seasoned wisdom flavored all his wit4 ,his very folly was profound4 ,but when his mood of frolic passed1 when1 and almost without any inner change1 his outer mien grew serious1 and sadness brooded on his face1 then his speech was fed from nether springs4 ,then his lips were freighted from afar1 and his speech was rich with precious lore4 ,in his inmost instinct ,lincoln was a philosopher4 ,out of life's complexities he was always searching for its clue4 ,his speeches deal at bottom with nothing but details4 ,but out of the mesh of those details he was always weaving principles4 ,it is this that gives his words their weight4 ,he is by his own right a true philosopher4 ,it was true wisdom with which he dealt4 ,with true wisdom he was in love4 ,in his own character he has garnered all his gains4 ,by self-refinement he has become a ,nation's pattern4 ,in himself are treasured all the honors1 dignities1 and rewards that appertain to a worthy devotee of wisdom4 ,assuredly1 and beyond all fair dispute1 the author of this last inaugural1 when fairly measured and esteemed for what he was1 and what he did1 and what he overcame in civic realms by sheer original research1 far more than any ,dr4 ,faust1 deserves his doctorate and degree4 ,in sober verity the author of this inaugural is a true ,doctor of ,philosophy4 ,,his ,,theodicy--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,evil ,the last preceding chapter closed with an allusion to ,dr4 ,faust4 ,that reference may now be profitably resumed4 ,goethe's ,faust is introduced as in deep uneasiness before the unsolved mysteries of life4 ,he is described as having mastered all that all the ,faculties can give1 but all to no sure end1 and as being then beguiled into other paths and scenes1 there to prosecute afresh his quest for present satisfaction4 ,in this new quest he accepts the guidance of a scorner into realms of magic1 sorcery1 and witchcraft2 into scenes of ribaldry1 debauchery1 and basest sordidness2 into lust1 murder1 and treacherous unfaithfulness2 into a devilish trade for present carnal happiness1 at cost of freedom1 reason1 and any heed for future destiny4 ,one notable feature in all this quest is its submergence in the sea of things that surge up around the passing life1 only to pass away themselves and disappear4 ,his riddles and his quests1 his ideals and delights are largely physical4 ,his guide does not conduct him into the steadfast presence and observation of things permanent and spiritual4 ,he is prone to make him roam in realms of magic1 where forms and deeds are too thin and vague to be even shadows1 and too false to be even artificial1 but where yet each scene excites the imagination to perishing desires for joys of sense4 ,carnal potions1 charms1 and lust2 physical tumults and delights so largely occupy the central place in all the scenes1 that the riddles ,faust would fain resolve are1 to a large degree1 the mysteries of the universe of sense4 ,now let any man compare the major problems in the mind of ,goethe's ,faust with the problems that ,lincoln felt to be supreme4 ,one discovers instantly a vast divergence4 ,themes and questions1 that to the very end of ,goethe's life perplexed and vexed his thought1 were in ,lincoln's writings not so much as named4 ,but far beyond all this4 ,the vast1 unwieldly world of solid sense1 so baffling1 but so sure1 now so terrible1 and now so kind1 now serving1 and now crushing boastful1 trembling man1 now begetting1 and now absorbing endless1 countless generations and multitudes1 seems not to constitute a vexing or perplexing theme in ,lincoln's most insistent thought4 ,this can never be explained as due to a painless1 care-free1 earthly lot2 nor to a pampering environment2 nor to physical stolidity2 nor to incapacity for aesthetic joys4 ,the lines that seamed his face1 the muscles that leashed his frame1 the structure of his hands1 the meaning message upon his lips1 his shadowed1 sobered1 brooding eyes attest a different tale4 ,lincoln was sufficiently aware of the plain and common sorrows incident to our earthly environment4 ,he knew what havoc cold and heat1 hunger and pain1 toil and want1 plague and death could visit upon our human life4 ,but none of these things seemed to trouble him4 ,so engrossed was he with questions he called durable1 that all physical discomforts and distresses1 with their connected pleasures and desires and hopes and fears1 were but passing1 minor incidents4 ,this undoubted fact in ,lincoln's mental habitude is a signal and significant factor1 to be held in careful estimation in a final judgment of ,lincoln's character4 ,ethics1 pure ethics1 themes that dealt with realms where man is truly responsible and truly free1 were his supreme concern from first to last4 ,and so it comes to pass that the problem1 which for him is truly fundamental and ultimate1 passes wholly by at once all that burden of so-called evil1 in the fear and hurt and mystery of things inflexible1 and clings fast hold of things alone that are responsible and free4 ,touching the theme of this chapter1 and touching also this last inaugural1 the following letter1 written ,march #ae1 #ahfe1 to ,thurlow ,weed1 already cited and considered once1 deserves a bit of heed again3-- ,every one likes a compliment4 ,thank you for yours on my little notification speech and on the recent inaugural address4 ,i expect the latter to wear as well as--perhaps better than--anything ,i have produced2 but ,i believe it is not immediately popular4 ,men are not flattered by being shown that there is a difference of purpose between the ,almighty and them4 ,to deny it however1 in this case1 is to deny that there is a ,god governing the world4 ,it is a truth which ,i thought needed to be told1 and1 as whatever of humiliation there is in it falls most directly on myself1 ,i thought others might afford for me to tell it4 ,truly yours1 ,a4 ,,lincoln4 ,this letter shows what ,lincoln judged to be the secret of this inaugural's permanent hold on human approbation4 ,it was its humble testimony to the fact that1 amidst and above the errors and sins1 the struggles and failures of men and ,nations1 there is a world-governing ,god4 ,here opens a theme that is truly sovereign and ultimate4 ,the last inaugural reveals that ,lincoln was closely pondering two incongruous themes3 the bitter career of slavery2 and the just rule of ,god4 ,touching the first--the fact of human slavery--whatever other men might think1 in ,lincoln's view it was always abhorrent1 a primary immorality4 ,he was naturally anti-slavery4 ,even in this address1 guarded against all malice1 and suffused with charity1 he could not forbear from saying3--,it may seem strange that any men should dare to seek a just ,god's assistance in wringing their bread from other men's faces4 ,man's right to live was in his thought primal4 ,that right carried with it the right to enjoy the bread that his own hands had earned4 ,such a privilege was the central element in human happiness4 ,such felicity was elemental4 ,such freedom and such joy were the simplest common boon in our common1 earthly lot4 ,the institution of slavery blasted that joy1 denied that liberty1 robbed that right to life4 ,this annihilated hope4 ,it ranked men with brutes4 ,such a ravaging of human desires and human rights ,lincoln judged1 from the side of the slave-holder1 a paramount crime2 and from the side of the slave1 an insufferable curse4 ,the terrible enormity of both crime and curse was measured in ,lincoln's estimation by the enormity of the war4 ,viewed any way1 that war was the indication and register of the wrong done1 and the wrong borne1 by men in the centuries of slavery4 ,arrogance and insolence1 ruthlessness and cruelty1 dishonesty and faithlessness1 luxury and lust1 trailed all along its path4 ,that1 in a ,republic dedicated to liberty1 men would go to war and fight to the death with their fellow-citizens in defense and perpetuation of tyranny and bonds1 gave evidence to the strange and obdurate perverseness involved and nurtured in the mood and attitude of men that were bent on holding fellow men as slaves4 ,the existence of such an institution in any land ,lincoln deemed a national calamity2 in a free ,republic he felt it to be a heaven-braving anomaly and affront4 ,it was a flagrant evil1 bound to bring down woe4 ,but in the deep entanglements of history this baleful institution had to be condoned1 even in this land made sacred to the free4 ,inbred within the ,nation in the ,nation's very birth1 that it be sheltered within the ,nation's life became a national responsibility4 ,from this firm bond ,lincoln himself could not escape4 ,in the ,constitution that ,lincoln swore to uphold1 when first he took the presidency1 slavery was sheltered1 if not entrenched4 ,as chief magistrate of the whole ,republic1 however obnoxious slavery might be1 he had the obnoxious thing to protect4 ,this he freely admitted1 and explicitly declared in his first inaugural4 ,here was the beginning of his final1 moral debate4 ,how should he morally justify himself in defending what he morally abhorred8 ,that this dual attitude should be assumed he seemed fully to concede4 ,this shows most clearly1 and in its sharpest moral contradiction1 when1 in his first inaugural1 he volunteered to permit an amendment to the ,constitution1 enacting1 as the supreme law of the land1 that slavery should remain thereafter undisturbed forever4 ,how he brought his mind to take that stand has never been made clear4 ,he said in that connection that such an amendment was in effect already ,constitutional law4 ,but previous to that date he had always pledged and urged forbearance with slavery1 on the understanding that such forbearance was only for a time2 that1 as foreseen and designed by the men who framed the ,constitution1 slave holding was always to be so handled1 as to be always on the way to disappear4 ,it is not easy to see how a man1 to whom the practice of holding slaves was so morally repellent1 could participate in making it perpetual4 ,one could wish that just this problem had been frankly handled under ,lincoln's pen4 ,it must have been plainly before his thought4 ,and the words of few men would be more worthy of careful record and review than deliberate words from ,lincoln upon this world-perplexing query3--how adjust one's thoughts and acts to a moral evil1 that inveterately endures1 and is never atoned8 ,but in fact that amendment was never carried through4 ,one of the fruits of slavery was its rash unwisdom at just this juncture4 ,still1 though the amendment lapsed1 slavery held on4 ,and slaveholders tightened their resolution to retain their rights in slaves1 or rend the ,union4 ,this precipitated war4 ,this may seem to have doubled ,lincoln's problem1 slavery and national dissolution4 ,standing at the apex of national responsibility1 he had to bear the hottest brunt of the physical anguish1 the mental perplexity1 and the moral sorrows of a war waged by a slave-holding ,south in militant secession4 ,but in reality1 in his thought1 the two were one4 ,all turned on slavery4 ,this was the burning blemish in the ,constitution4 ,this was the intent of the war4 ,this was the burden on his heart4 ,here was a load too grievous for any man to bear4 ,it bore preponderantly on him4 ,and yet1 as regards any personal and conscious desire or deed1 he was through and in it all conscious within himself of innocence4 ,his trial and sorrow were without cause4 ,how now1 in his soberest thought1 was all this moral confusion explained8 ,hating slavery with all his heart1 innocent all his life of any inclination to rob another man of liberty1 but pledged and sworn to shelter slavery under the arm of his supreme and free authority1 how could he prove himself consistent morally8 ,here emerge the profoundest thoughts of ,lincoln on the ways of ,god4 ,and herein appears his contribution to a theodicy--a vindication of ,god's moral honor1 where his moral government seems slack4 ,how can thoughtful men conceive and hold that ,god is just1 when such injustice and disaster are allowed at all1 much less for centuries2 in any corner of the earth1 much less where heaven's favor seems to dwell8 ,upon this subduing theme this last inaugural gives us ,lincoln's most explicit words4 ,of ,god's personal being1 and of his personal care1 this address shows ,lincoln to be perfectly assured4 ,this was his standing attitude and confidence4 ,throughout his years in the presidency this trust had seemed unwavering4 ,indeed1 by repeated1 almost unconscious attestations1 it was his stablest trust4 ,some of his utterances are tender and touching testimonials to his belief that ,god rules in his own personal career4 ,but mainly his confessions of belief in the ,providence of ,god are connected with national concerns4 ,he did joyfully1 almost jubilantly believe that this ,republic was under ,god's special watch and care4 ,his own hope for our national future well-being and honor rested mainly1 we must judge1 upon the tokens he thought he could trace in our thrilling and inspiring history of the divine controlling care4 ,at bottom it was this faith that underlay all his patriotism4 ,that the fundamental affirmations of our ,constitution were rescripts and digests from the will and word of ,god was the lively ground and unfailing confirmation of his pure devotion to his ,nation's honor and weal4 ,more than aught in all the world beside1 it was this religious faith that steadied and girded his will through all those strenuous days4 ,it is just here that this study of a theodicy sets in4 ,above all his former thoughts about himself1 about his land1 about the clash of right and wrong2 above all thoughts of other men1 and other times2 even above his own and his opponents' former prayers and faith1 he lifts new thoughts in new reverence and new docility towards ,god4 ,still naught but slavery in his theme--its undeniable iniquity2 its strange1 prolonged permission2 his own1 and all other men's responsibility2 its unavoidable entail in penalty2 and the divine1 enduring terms of new liberty and peace4 ,here are themes and fixed realities that seem eternally to disagree4 ,can they ever all be morally harmonized8 ,could even ,god enlighten that dark past8 ,could his own historic acts be morally unified8 ,nothing he had ever done with slavery1 not even its utter elimination in his act of freedom1 had ever been done1 he explicitly affirmed1 on moral grounds4 ,yet slavery1 and by his own hand1 was indeed undone4 ,but even so the spirit of the ,south was still invincible1 and war was holding on4 ,what indeed could be the thoughts and plans of ,god8 ,to begin with1 he confesses both ,north and ,south and all the land gone wrong4 ,this is the first component in his theodicy4 ,neither ,north nor ,south1 not even in the act of prayer1 had walked with ,god1 nor found the truth1 nor gained its wish4 ,all thoughts of men1 in the righteous rule of ,god1 were being overturned4 ,this confession verges near to worship1 acclaiming1 as it does1 the ,almighty's designs2 and venturing as it does1 to trace and reproduce the ,almighty's thoughts4 ,here is seen how genuine is the moral earnestness in ,lincoln's earnest thoughtfulness4 ,as though by a very instinct1 his form of words betrays his reverence4 ,he refrains from dogmatism4 ,he refrains even from affirmation4 ,he knows he is venturing upon a daring flight4 ,he is assuming to conjoin together into a moral unison that bitter sample of the age-long cruelty of man against his brother1 and the transcendent sovereignty1 the eternal justice1 and the age-long silence of ,god4 ,his formula is a modest supposition4 ,but within its modesty is an eye that searches far4 ,he takes resort in one of the most trenchant declarations of ,christ1 that momentous saying in his colloquy about the majesty and modesty of a little child3--,woe unto the world because of offenses6 for it must needs be that offenses come2 but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh4 ,in this colloquy ,jesus seems to be moved by a tender impulse of affectionate jealousy for the model beauty and grace of children4 ,but that tenderness is roused into one of the most terrific outbursts that ever passed his lips4 ,little children are ,christlike1 ,godlike1 models of the citizenship in the heavenly ,kingdom4 ,god is their jealous guardian and defender4 ,but ,godlike1 and of heavenly dignity though they be1 they are shy and frail4 ,and men1 as they grow gross and impudent1 abuse and offend their defenselessness4 ,so things have to be4 ,but woe to such offenders4 ,they were better tied to that mammoth stone that the mule turns in the mill1 and submerged in the abyss of the deep of the great sea4 ,here are four noteworthy elements3--a blended heavenly modesty and majesty and innocence2 an insufferable insolence2 a trebly-terrible penalty2 and a strange and ominous necessity4 ,over these four factors ,lincoln's mind must have pondered long4 ,else how explain their place in this inaugural8 ,they form the foundation of its central paragraph1 and constitute its paramount argument2 forming alike a sobering admonition1 and a humble ground of hope to all the ,nation1 while at the same time holding aloft before the ,nation's thought the outline and substance of a stately vindication of the ways of ,god4 ,evidently here is shapely fashioning in lucid speech of ,lincoln's ripest1 surest thought4 ,as one faces all its range1 it seems like the open sky1 clear but fathomless4 ,but its wisdom is doubly sealed1 and it bears a double claim to our respect4 ,it shows the way of ,lincoln's mind1 and the way of the mind of ,christ4 ,not quickly will any other thinker1 however disciplined1 traverse all its course4 ,but travel where he will in the mighty orbit of this inquiry1 the modern thinker1 whatever his attainment1 may find in this inaugural shining indications that ,lincoln's thought has gone before4 ,in this modest1 far-searching supposition1 transferred to ,american history from the lips of ,christ1 ,lincoln firmly grasps two solid facts1 elemental and universal in human life3--the beautiful modesty of the meek2 and the ugly arrogance in the strong4 ,strength and weakness needs must be4 ,these invite to rudeness and retreat4 ,then the powerful overbear4 ,the gentle are overborne4 ,offenses multiply4 ,the arrogant prevail4 ,so must it be4 ,but when the meek go down beneath the wicked rudeness of the strong1 then the ,most ,high ,god1 within whose firm dominion both strong and weak share equally in all the privileges and rights of liberty and law1 sets over the offended one his shield1 and against the proud offender his sword1 until pity and equity are enthroned upon the earth again4 ,thus must it be4 ,the meek must suffer4 ,offenders must arise4 ,but meekness is a heavenly1 ,godlike quality4 ,and as with ,god1 so with his gentle little ones1 patient gentleness will be duly vindicated2 rude arrogance will meet exact and fit rebuke2 and it will stand clear that strength and weakness may dwell together in equity and liberty and peace4 ,this was the age-long moral process which ,lincoln's eye discerned1 and the final issue which his expectation hailed4 ,then and therein his eye discerned that all voices would be constrained to proclaim that in all the moral world pity and equity were prevalent2 that the least had ,godlike majesty2 that humility gave to all the great their courtliness2 and that there was within all men a fadeless worth1 far outranking all other wealth4 ,but it is essential to note1 not alone that ,lincoln offers this in the modest form of supposition2 but that1 as it leaves his lips1 it assumes the formula of a confession4 ,even the meek receive rebuke4 ,the gentlest have wandered also away from ,god4 ,the problem has surpassed us all4 ,all have somewhat to learn from ,god4 ,that arrogance may meet its due1 meekness must be yet more meek4 ,it must needs be that offenses come4 ,greater than all our wrong1 and all our patience1 is the patient truth of ,god4 ,this must be fully learned4 ,it is under wrong that wrong is made right4 ,it is by meekness under arrogance that arrogance is put to shame4 ,it is by gentleness under rudeness that rudeness is subdued4 ,offenses must needs be4 ,only in sacrificial submission to its woe is the problem of evil ever resolved4 ,only thus is the iniquity of the sin measured back upon the evil doer in a symmetrical and equivalent rebuke4 ,but this is never to exculpate the offender or condone the offense4 ,blood with the sword1 drop for drop1 must be meted out to the slaveholder1 as he meted out to the slave blood with the lash4 ,all the wealth that the bonds-man's lord has snatched from the toiling slave must be yielded up4 ,over human scorn and greed and injustice and cruelty hang unfailingly judgments that are true and righteous altogether4 ,neither may they who are offended rail1 nor they who offend exult1 over the divine delay4 ,nor when ,god's judgments fall may they who are rebuked complain1 nor they who are redeemed turn exultation into arrogance4 ,god's ways1 and his alone are even1 and altogether true4 ,in thoughts like these ,lincoln's final explanation of the ways of ,god took form4 ,in patient1 repentant1 adoring acquiescence his heart found rest4 ,his sorrows were profound1 the sorrows of a patriot1 kinsman to all the sorrowful in the land4 ,but he learned1 however deep the stroke1 to forbear complaint4 ,he received the sorrows of the war into his own breast as heaven's righteous woe upon a haughty land1 and as heaven's discipline1 teaching offenders the woe of their offense4 ,so his ways became coincident with the greater ways of ,god4 ,but in this moral explication of the war1 and of all that the war involves1 two vastly different types of character persist4 ,lincoln's solution of the enigma was in diametrical contrast with the views of the leading spirits of the ,south4 ,not like him did they rate slavery1 nor conceive the war1 nor understand the ways of ,god4 ,how1 now1 could ,lincoln's view assimilate this obduracy in the ,south8 ,this question was clearly within the scope of ,lincoln's thought1 and its answer is embraced in what has already been explained4 ,given an even penalty for any sin1 drop for drop with the avenging sword for blood with the lash1 and it is morally indifferent whether men rail1 or whether they acquiesce4 ,the wrong is made right4 ,the meek are redeemed4 ,god's delay is vindicated4 ,rudeness is reversed4 ,the law is fully revealed4 ,man's liberty is honored equally4 ,cruelty and unfairness are rebuked4 ,the gains of greed are scattered4 ,humblest men are crowned with eternal dignity4 ,to such1 whether from the ,north or from the ,south1 as with melting sorrow and repentance welcomed to their bosoms this bitter vindication of those primal rights1 the sorrows of the war opened into perennial peace4 ,to such as repelled that proffered vindication1 there was in the sorrows of the war no alleviation4 ,but for both1 nevertheless1 and for both identically1 the sorrows of the war completed the moral vindication of a pure and ,christlike equity and friendliness4 ,thus all the ways of ,god1 with the repentant and the rebellious alike1 are just and righteous altogether4 ,this it is the highest wisdom of men to acquiescently confess4 ,to this even those who rebelliously complain and rail must finally utterly submit4 ,and now one final matter remains--the idea and definition of happiness4 ,when men discuss the problem of evil in the universe1 and in its awful presence try to substantiate their confidence in the just and friendly care of a transcendent ,deity1 one subtle touchstone governs all they say3--,what is their conception of human weal1 and of human woe8 ,what in actual fact is deepest misery2 and what is true felicity8 ,what do they assume man's highest good to be8 ,just here is wide and multiform diversity4 ,for illustration1 let thought recur to the contrast with which the topic of this chapter was introduced4 ,the idea of happiness that ,goethe plants in ,dr4 ,faust1 and the idea of happiness that ruled in ,lincoln1 are as separate as the poles4 ,and again1 to keep within the setting of this inaugural1 the happiness towards which ,lincoln strove1 and in which his thought found satisfaction1 contrasted mightily with the happiness that informed the aspirations of the leaders of the ,south4 ,in their ideal1 disdain of all inferiors1 delight in easy luxury1 unequal acknowledgment of rights1 and a cruel stifling of the very rudiments of love1 were mixed and working mightily4 ,desiring and enjoying that ,elysium1 their estimate of evil1 their definition of the highest good1 and their programme for a final consummation under ,god could have no fellowship with any final plan of thought approved by ,lincoln4 ,what was ,lincoln's highest happiness8 ,this merits pondering anywhere2 but compellingly1 where one tries to trace his views upon this problem of theodicy2 and yet still more when one conceives in this inquiry how in ,lincoln's life his ethics1 his civics1 and his religion became coincident4 ,as this mighty problem resolves itself in ,lincoln's mind1 it comprehends1 along with his own welfare and worth and true contentment1 the equal dignity and happiness of every other man1 and a harmonious consonance with the being and decree of ,god4 ,he sees that scorn of any other man involves in time the scorner's shame4 ,he sees that robbery1 however veiled1 entails a debt whose perfect reimbursement the slowest centuries will in their time exact4 ,he sees that any form of malice or unfriendliness1 housed and fed in any heart1 will forfeit all the joy of gratitude1 and fill that heart at last with vindictive hate and bitterest loneliness4 ,he sees that fleshly joys1 however lush and full1 are marked and destined for a swift and sure decay and weariness and vanity4 ,and so1 to realize the perfect welfare1 he commends to himself1 and urges persuasively on all other men1 the sovereign good of an even justice1 upheld within himself1 and so measured out to other men by the perfect standard of ,god's self-respecting loyalty2 of universal charity1 eager everywhere to minister universal benefit and peace2 of supreme enthusiasm for enduring life2 and of a genuine humility1 that shares all hope with all the lowly1 and trusts and honors ,god4 ,in this fourfold1 composite unison of conscious1 deathless life ,lincoln sees the fairest goal1 the choicest boon1 the highest good of man4 ,in the presence of such a standard1 and before the outlook of such a hope ,lincoln fashions his theodicy4 ,here then is the sum of ,lincoln's thought upon this bewildering theme3-- ,the evil that makes this earthly lot so dark and hard is man's wrong to man2 the awful sorrows of the meek2 the offenses wrought upon the helpless by the arrogant4 ,before this mystery all other mysteries1 however deep and terrible1 such as hurricanes and famine1 plagues and death1 may not be named4 ,this most sovereign evil is most clearly understood by those who are oppressed4 ,their eyes pierce all its deeps4 ,the rude are1 by their rudeness1 blind4 ,the names of all who suffer and are still are registered on high for full solace and redemption4 ,the register of the rudeness of the strong is also full1 and destined for full requital4 ,this redemption and requital shall be wrought by ,god4 ,in this redemption the ruthless may relent and share with all the meek the full measure of all their sorrows1 and so become partakers of all their joy4 ,if ruthlessness persist1 full requitals shall still descend1 and in the presence of ,god's even righteousness every mouth shall be stopped4 ,and so shall all evil be fully rectified4 ,,his ,,piety--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,religion ,of all the words of ,lincoln1 evincing what he thought of ,god1 none outweigh the witness of this last inaugural4 ,his reply to ,thurlow ,weed regarding this address1 referred to in another place1 concerned precisely just this point--the movements and the postulates of his religious faith4 ,as his ripened mind prepared and pondered and reviewed this speech1 there accrued within his consciousness a solemn confidence that it was destined to become his most enduring monument2 and that as coming generations became aware of its outstanding eminence1 their eyes and hearts would fasten on those words about the age-long1 just1 and overturning purposes of ,god4 ,there was a confession1 so ,lincoln felt assured1 embracing and conjoining ,north and ,south and ,east and ,west in an equal lowliness and shame2 and declaring and extolling ,god's divine supremacy over all the erring waywardness and awful sufferings of men4 ,in this outpouring of his burdened heart before his ,god1 and in the presence of his fellowmen1 there is evidence respecting ,lincoln's piety that courts reflection4 ,in the first place it indicates where ,lincoln's sense of moral rectitude found out its final bearings4 ,those purposes of ,god1 as ,lincoln watched their operation1 were working out the moral issues in the awful wrong of age-long1 unrequited toil in perfect equity4 ,strong men had been wronging weaklings and inferiors4 ,helpless men had been suffering untold sorrows4 ,indignant men had been crying out in hot and hasty protest for full and speedy vengeance4 ,thoughtful men had been tortured over weary1 futile wonderings as to how the baffling problem could be solved4 ,convulsions and confusion1 which no arm or thought of man could start or stay1 were shaking and bewildering all the land4 ,but through and over all1 as ,lincoln came reverently to believe1 a sovereign ,god held righteous government2 and out of all the baffling turmoil he was1 by simple righteousness1 bringing perfect unison and peace4 ,the dark mystery of unrequited wrong was being illuminated by the righteous majesty of complete requital4 ,but in its full perfection1 it was a righteousness such as no mind of man devised4 ,it was the righteousness of ,god4 ,here ,lincoln's moral sense was purified4 ,he was being taught of ,god4 ,and this he clearly1 humbly recognized4 ,and he took full pains in this address to give ,god all the praise4 ,and so his reverence towards ,deity1 and his affirmation touching righteousness became identical4 ,his sense of equity stood clothed in piety4 ,in the second place1 deep within the heart of these divine instructions were such unveilings of ,god's high majesty1 in his steadfast reign above the passing centuries1 as awoke on ,lincoln's lips such lowly adoration as attuned these words of ,godly statesmanship unto a psalm of praise4 ,here ,lincoln's lowliness attains consummate beauty4 ,it is indeed an utterance of profound abasement4 ,it sinks beneath a strong rebuke4 ,it acknowledges sad wanderings4 ,it accepts correction1 and meekly takes ,god's guiding hand4 ,it also sees ,god's excellence1 his high thoughts and ways1 his irresistible dominion1 his moral spotlessness4 ,and before that revelation he humbly walks among his fellow-citizens1 the lowliest of them all1 confessing that the reproach involved in what he said fell heaviest upon himself2 and therein1 as a priest1 leading the ,nation in an act of worshipping submissiveness before the ,lord4 ,herein his comely1 moral modesty becomes an act and attitude of simple reverence towards ,god4 ,and thus his humility1 just like his sense of righteousness1 becomes apparelled all about with ,godly piety4 ,in the third place1 this new discernment of the ways of ,god unfolds profound discoveries of the divine evaluation of the diverse1 contending interests in our commingled life4 ,it makes clear which values fade1 and which shine on eternally4 ,the problem upon which ,lincoln had transfixed his eye was that two and one-half centuries of hard and sad embondagement4 ,by that gross sin men's deathless souls were bought and sold for transient gain4 ,past all denial1 therein was moral wrong2 else moral wrong had no existence4 ,its presence1 every time he faced it1 tortured ,lincoln1 and made him miserable4 ,and it affronted heaven1 overturning ,god's creative fiat of equality in all mankind4 ,it set and ranked brief creature comforts and desires above the worth of heaven's image in a brother man4 ,every day it challenged heaven's curse4 ,but heaven's judgment was delayed4 ,long centuries seemed to show that heaven was indifferent whether human souls or carnal pleasures held superior rank4 ,but now1 within the awful tumult of the war there boomed an undertone1 conveying unto all who had quick ears to hear1 how ,god adjudged that wrong4 ,upon dark battle clouds shone heavenly light1 making newly plain ,god's estimate of slaveholder and of slave2 of joys and gains that perish with their use1 or await recall2 and of souls that never die4 ,those awful tidings told how ill-gotten1 carnal wealth is mortgaged under woe1 and to the uttermost farthing must be released2 how offending men affront the ,lord2 and how all offenses must be avenged4 ,they made full clear how he who grasps at earthly gain by wrecking human dignity commits a primal sin--a sin that time1 though it run into centuries1 cannot obscure1 or mitigate1 or exempt from strict review4 ,they reveal infallibly that ,god's pure eye is on ,god's image in every son of man2 that supreme1 far-seeing ends are lodged in all the good but unenduring gifts wherewith ,god's wise and kindly bounties crown man's toil2 that a perfect moral government holds dominion everywhere and forevermore2 and that beneath this rule1 in ,god's own time1 it shall come supremely clear that feasts and luxury and fine attire1 that wealth and lust and pampered flesh have lesser worth and pass away1 while souls of men may thrive1 and gain1 and win new worth eternally4 ,as ,lincoln's eye reviewed these centuries of reveling wealth1 and impoverished hearts2 and beheld1 in the issues of the resultant war1 that wealth laid waste1 and those pure hearts fed and filled with hope and liberty2 his wisdom to compare all earth-born1 mortal things with things unperishing and heavenly passed through new birth1 new growth to new completeness in depth and clarity and confidence4 ,and all this gain to ,lincoln1 while wholly ethical1 dealing as it did with the wrong and right in human slavery and liberty1 owed all its increase to truer understanding of the ,lord4 ,here again his ethics was purified by faith4 ,his faith was deeply ethical4 ,as with his lowliness1 and his rectitude1 so with his moral valuation of the human soul4 ,it was vestured all about with ,godly piety4 ,in the fourth place1 within the awful wreckage of the war1 with which this last inaugural is so absorbed1 there were mighty attestations that ,god was pitiful4 ,that war could be defined as ,god's vengeance on man's cruelty4 ,precisely this was what ,lincoln grew to see4 ,to all who toiled in slavery the war had brought deliverance4 ,thereby the stinging lash was snatched from human hands2 the human heel was thrust from human necks2 the shameless havoc of the homes of lowly men was stayed2 countless sufferings were assuaged2 and true blessedness was restored to souls hard-wonted to unrelenting grief4 ,and this achievement was alone the ,lord's4 ,of all down-trodden men high heaven became the champion4 ,in all its awful judgments he who ruled that conflict remembered mercy4 ,high above all the bloody carnage of those swords there swayed the scepter of the ,all-pitiful4 ,in the very doom upon the strong ,god wrought redemption for the poor4 ,and so1 as that dreadful wreckage brought to nothing all the pride in the extorted gain of centuries1 it published most impressively that he who reigned above all centuries was ,all-compassionate4 ,to this great thought of ,god1 ,lincoln keyed this last inaugural4 ,the majesty of ,god's sovereign law of purity and righteousness was robed in kindliness4 ,into this high truth ascended ,lincoln's patriot hope4 ,let men henceforth forswear all cruelty1 and follow ,god in showing all who suffer their costliest sympathy4 ,this was a mighty longing in his great heart1 as he prepared this speech4 ,before ,god's vindication of the meek1 let the merciless grow merciful4 ,yea1 let all the land1 for all the land had taken part in human cruelty1 confess its wrong1 accept ,god's scourge without complaint1 thus opening every heart to ,god's free1 healing grace1 and binding all the land in leagues of friendliness4 ,let men1 like ,god1 be pitiful4 ,like ,god1 let men be merciful4 ,in mutual sympathy let all make clear how men of every sort may yet resemble ,god1 the ,all-compassionate4 ,this was the trend and strength of ,lincoln's gentleness1 as it stood and wrought in full maturity beneath ,god's discipline1 within this last inaugural4 ,it was nothing but an echo and reflection of the gentleness of ,god4 ,and so1 in his benignity1 as in his rectitude and lowliness and purity1 he stood in this address attired in ,godly piety4 ,so ,lincoln's ethics can be described1 in his ripened harvest-tide of life4 ,so it stands in this inaugural4 ,it is alike a living code for daily life1 and a religious faith4 ,it is born and taught of ,god4 ,it is ,godliness without disguise1 upon the open field of civic statesmanship4 ,it is a prophet's voice1 in a civilian's speech4 ,it is the seasoned wisdom of a man familiar equally with the field of politics1 and the place of prayer4 ,it shows how ,god may walk with men1 how civic interests deal with things divine4 ,it proves that a civilian in a foremost seat may without apology profess himself a man of ,god1 and gain thereby in solid dignity4 ,it shows how heaven and earth may harmonize4 ,but this manly recognition in ,lincoln's mind of the inner unison of ethics and religion was in no respect ephemeral1 no careless utterance of a single speech1 no flitting sentiment of a day4 ,it was the fruitage of an ample season's growth4 ,it was royally deliberate1 the issue of prolonged reflection1 the goal of mental equipoise and rest to which his searching1 balanced thought had long conduced4 ,it was in keeping with an habitual inclination in his life4 ,this proclivity of his inwrought moral honesty to find its norm and origin1 its warrant and secure foundation in his and his ,nation's ,god must have taken shape controllingly within those silent days that intervened between his first election in #ahfj1 and the date of his inaugural oath in #ahfa4 ,else1 in those brief addresses on his way to ,washington1 that marvelous efflorescence upon his honest lips of an ideal heavenward expectancy is unaccountable4 ,in those dispersed and fugitive responses1 from ,springfield to ,independence ,hall and ,harrisburg1 there breathed such patriotic sentiments of aspiration and anxiety as owed their ardor1 their excellence1 and their very loyalty to his eager trust and hope1 that all his deeds as president should execute the will of ,god4 ,throughout his presidential term this wish to make his full official eminence a facile instrument of ,god1 attains in his clear purpose and intelligence a solid massiveness1 all too unfamiliar in the craft of politics4 ,the witness to this1 in a letter to ,a4 ,g4 ,hodges of ,april1 #ahfd1 is most explicit and unimpeachable4 ,this letter is a transcript of a verbal conversation1 is written by request1 and is designed distinctly to make the testimony of his mortal lips everywhere accessible and permanent4 ,its major portion aims to give his former spoken words a simple repetition4 ,then he says3--,i add a word which was not in the verbal conversation4 ,and upon this he appends a paragraph1 as of something he could not restrain1 the while he was conscious perfectly that what he was about to write was certain to be published and preserved among all men4 ,in this letter1 so doubly1 so explicitly deliberate1 he is defending his decree for unshackling the slave1 by the plea1 that only so could the ,union be preserved4 ,in the appended paragraph1 he disclaims all compliment to his own sagacity1 and accredits all direction and deliverance of the ,nation's life1 in that dark mortal crisis1 to the hidden1 reverend government of a kind and righteous ,god4 ,if any man desires to probe and understand the thoughtfulness of ,lincoln's piety1 let him place this doubly-pondered document and the last inaugural side by side1 remembering discerningly the date of each1 detecting how each conveys ,lincoln's well-digested judgment of unparalleled events1 and not forgetting that ,lincoln foresaw how both those documents would be reviewed in generations to come4 ,here are signs assuredly that ,lincoln's lowliness and reverence1 his prayerfulness and trust1 his steadfastness and gratitude towards ,god had been balanced and illumined beneath the livelong cogitations of an even1 piercing eye4 ,pursuing and comparing every way the tangled1 complex facts of history2 the endless strifes of men2 the broken lights in minds most sage2 and the awful evidence1 as the centuries evolve1 that greed and scorn and hate and falsity lead to woe2 his patient mind grows poised and clear in faith that a good and righteous ,god is sovereign eternally4 ,the truth he grasped transcended centuries4 ,his grasping faith transcends change4 ,but ,lincoln's piety was not alone deep-rooted and deliberate1 the ripened growth of mixed and manifold experience4 ,it was heroic4 ,it was the mainspring and the inspiration of a splendid bravery4 ,this is finely shown in the early autumn of #ahfd4 ,on ,september #d of that year he wrote a letter to ,mrs4 ,gurney1 a ,quakeress4 ,this letter bears a most curious and intimate resemblance to the central substance of the last inaugural4 ,it witnesses to his earnest research after the hidden ways of ,god4 ,within this search he sees some settled certainties4 ,he sees that he and all men are prone to fail1 when they strive to perceive what ,god intends4 ,into such an error touching the period of the war all had fallen4 ,god's rule had overborne men's hopes4 ,god's wisdom and men's error therein would yet be acknowledged by all4 ,men1 though prone to err1 if they but earnestly work and humbly trust in deference to ,god1 will therein still conduce to ,god's great ends4 ,so with the war4 ,it was a commotion transcending any power of men to make or stay4 ,but in ,god's design it contained some noble boon4 ,and then he closes1 as he began1 with a tender intimation of his reverent trust in prayer4 ,the whole is comprehended within this single central sentence1 a sentence which involves and comprehends as well the total measure of the last inaugural3--,the purposes of the ,almighty are perfect1 and must prevail1 though we erring mortals may fail to accurately perceive them in advance4 ,here is a confession notable in itself4 ,it would be notable in any man1 and at any time4 ,but when one marks its date1 its notability is enhanced impressively4 ,for ,lincoln was traversing just there some of the darkest hours of his overshadowed life4 ,it was the period following his second nomination for the presidency in ,may of #ahfd1 and before the crisis of election in ,november of the same year4 ,central in that season of wearisome and ominous uncertainty fell the failure of the battle in the ,wilderness under ,grant2 the miscarriage of his plans for ,richmond2 and the awful carnage by ,petersburg4 ,here fell also the date of ,early's raid1 with its terrible disclosure of the helplessness in ,washington4 ,thereupon ensued1 in unexampled earnestness1 a recrudescence of the great and widespread weariness with the war2 and of an open clamor for some immediate conference and compromise for peace4 ,foremost leaders and defenders of the ,union cause throughout the ,north sank down despairingly1 convinced that at the coming national vote ,lincoln was certain to meet defeat4 ,at the same time the army sorely needed new recruits2 but another draft seemed desperate4 ,then ,lincoln's closest counselors approached his ears with heavy words of hopelessness about the outlook in the ,northern ,states confessedly most pivotal4 ,in the midst of those experiences1 on ,august #bc1 #ahfd1 ,lincoln penned and folded away with singular care from all other eyes1 these following words3-- ,this morning1 as for some days past1 it seems exceedingly probable that this administration will not be reelected4 ,then it will be my duty to so co-operate with the president-elect as to save the ,union between the election and the inauguration1 as he will have secured his election on such ground that he cannot possibly save it afterward4 ,those words were written eleven days before he penned the sentiments cited above from the letter to the ,quakeress4 ,between those two dates the ,democratic ,convention of ,chicago had convened and nominated ,general ,mc,clellan4 ,amid such scenes1 in the presence of such events1 and among such prognostications1 ,lincoln chiseled out those phrases about the perfect1 hidden1 but all-prevailing purposes of ,god4 ,here is ,godly piety in the sternest stress of politics4 ,here faith is militant1 and unsubdued4 ,its face is like a burnished shield4 ,its patience no campaign outwears4 ,in its constancy suggestions of surrender can find no place4 ,it was forged upon a well-worn anvil1 under mighty strokes1 and at a fervent heat4 ,fires only proved its purity4 ,it was fighting battles quite as sore as any fought with steel4 ,it was the deathless1 truceless courage of a moral hero4 ,it was pure and perfect fortitude4 ,its struggle1 its testing1 and its victory had not been wrought on earthly battle-fields4 ,its strife had been with ,god4 ,more than with the ,south1 ,lincoln's controversy had been with the ,most ,high4 ,he wrestled with the heavenly angel through the night1 like the ancient patriarch4 ,like the ancient saint1 he bore the marks of grievous conflict4 ,and like him of old1 he gained his boon4 ,he achieved to see that ,god and perfect righteousness were in eternal covenant4 ,such was ,lincoln's piety4 ,his view of ,god gave ,god an absolute pre-eminence4 ,in ,lincoln's day1 as in the day when ,satan tempted ,christ1 vast areas of human life seemed to give all faith in ,god's control the lie2 and men in multitudes abjured such futile confidence4 ,but ,lincoln kept his faith in ,god1 and truth1 and love1 and immortality4 ,and in that faith he judged his trust1 and hope1 and prayer to be preserved on high inviolate4 ,there above1 he firmly held1 were lodged eternally the perfect pattern and assurance of full rectitude and charity4 ,and in that understanding he held on earth unyieldingly to the perfect image of that heavenly norm1 in a pure and acquiescent loyalty and love4 ,thus discerningly1 submissively1 triumphantly did ,lincoln's heart aspire to unify an honest earthly walk with a living faith in ,god4 ,one word remains4 ,as ,lincoln makes confession of his faith in this inaugural1 extolling ,god supremely1 and therein announcing to his fellowmen the groundwork of his morality1 it comes to view that the qualities held fast in ,lincoln's heart1 and the attributes of ,god have marvelous affinity4 ,the equity he adores in ,god he cherishes within himself1 and recommends to all4 ,god's estimate of the incomparable value of a human soul1 when set beside the variable treasures men exchange1 ,lincoln's judgment reverently approves1 and as reverently adopts1 establishing thereby a standard quality in his conscious life4 ,god's tender pity for the poor1 hidden deep in his divine rebuke of slavery1 and hidden deeper still within his mercy for all who help to bear its awful sacrifice1 melts and molds the heart of ,lincoln to the same compassion4 ,and to the very outlines of ,god's majesty1 as his sovereign purposes are all unrolled and all fulfilled throughout the earth1 ,lincoln's soul conforms ideally1 in its humble vision and expression of devout1 discerning praise4 ,here is something passing wonderful4 ,between a fragile1 mortal man and the eternal ,god1 when each is limned in terms of ethics1 appears a deep and high agreement4 ,there is enthroned in each a common righteousness4 ,in each1 the laws of mercy are the same4 ,in each are constituted principles inwrought with immortality4 ,and within the eternal interplay of reverence and majesty between mankind and ,god1 there is a fellowship in dignity that proves the holy ,maker and his moral creature to be immediately akin4 ,and so the mind and will of ,lincoln1 in this their moral plenitude1 may interpret and recommend1 may apprehend and execute the eternal purposes of ,god4 ,this high commission ,lincoln humbly1 firmly undertook4 ,and in his commanding life there is a mighty hint1 not easy to silence or erase1 that ,godliness and ethics1 which have been set so often far apart1 were eternally designed for unison4 ,,his ,,logic--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,persuasion ,in the study of ,lincoln's ethics it is not enough to describe it as an ideal scheme of thought1 however notable its range and poise and insight may be seen to be4 ,as ,lincoln's character stands forth in national eminence among our national heroes1 he figures as a man of deeds1 a man of powerful influence over the actions of other men1 a man of masterly exploits4 ,however truly it may be affirmed that multitudes of adjutants reinforced his undertakings at every turn and on every side1 it still holds also true1 and that a truth almost without a parallel1 that his sheer personal force was the single1 undeniable1 over-mastering energy that shaped this ,nation's evolution through an outstanding epoch in its career4 ,it was primarily out of those prolific and exhaustless energies1 stored and mobilized within himself1 that he rose1 as though by nature1 to be national chief executive4 ,it was straight along the line of his far-seeing vision and advice that ,congress and the ,nation were guided to accept and undertake that terrible enterprise of war4 ,in that great struggle he came to be in firm reality1 far more than any other man1 the competent1 effective commander-in-chief4 ,he was chief councilor in a cabinet whose supreme function dealt singly with matters wholly executive4 ,it was by the almost marvelous unison of wisdom and decision resident in him that ,congress and the ,nation were day by day induced to hold with an almost preternatural inflexibility to the single1 sovereign issue of the strife4 ,when1 after four years of unexampled bitterness1 multitudes were wearying of all patience in further hostilities1 it was his personal momentum and weight1 more than any other influence1 that held the prevailing majority of the national electorate to predetermine by their free ballots that1 at whatever cost of further war1 the principles of liberty1 equality1 and national integrity should be placed above all possible challenge or assault forever4 ,and in the period before the war and before his elevation to the presidency this same executive efficiency1 this singular capacity to mold the views and stir the motives of other men1 was likewise in continual demonstration4 ,discerning how supreme a factor in our ,american affairs was the power of public sentiment1 and observing how that power was being utilized to undermine the national tranquillity1 he challenged and overthrew single handed the leading master of the day in the field of political management and debate4 ,trusting in the same confidence1 and pursuing the same device1 he appealed to the civic consciences of men in the open field of free debate1 by the single instrument of reasoned speech1 until1 by his persuading arguments1 he consolidated into effective harmony and led to national victory a party of independent voters1 with watchword1 platform1 and experience all untried4 ,in all the process by which that new-formed party gained access to national pre-eminence it was ,lincoln's governing influence that went ahead and gave the movement steadiness4 ,and through it all he vitally inspired a ,nation1 now undivided and indivisible1 with a prevailing1 corporate desire1 that all succeeding days and all beholding ,nations are now deeming1 for any stable civic life1 the true enduring ideal4 ,and all of this was compassed and set afoot within scarcely more than one decade4 ,in ,october of #ahed at ,peoria1 he consciously took up his strenuous enterprise4 ,in ,april of #ahfe1 he laid it down and ceased to strive4 ,single handed he undertook the task4 ,through all its progress the weight of that one hand was undeniably preponderant4 ,and when that hand relaxed1 the task that its release left trembling was one that stirred a mighty ,nation's full solicitude4 ,here is something marvelous4 ,these affirmations1 as thus far made1 seem certainly overdrawn1 and totally incredible4 ,an agency and an efficiency of national dimensions1 introducing and completing an epoch in our national history2 but an agent and an outfit almost defying inventory1 his personality seeming in every phase so simple and without prestige1 and all his ways and means seeming so unpromising and plain2 the while through all his course he was confronting a resistance and a hostility whose impulse was rooted in centuries of firm and proud dominion1 and whose onset made a ,nation tremble4 ,how can such stupendous affirmations be clothed with credibility8 ,was it indeed the hand of ,lincoln that turned the ,nation from its mistaken path8 ,was it ,lincoln's will that reinaugurated our predestined course8 ,was it ,lincoln's overcoming confidence that established in the land again a good assurance that its integrity was indestructible8 ,if questions such as these were addressed to ,lincoln himself for his reply1 we may be sure his answer1 like all his ways1 would contain a beautiful mingling of modesty and confidence4 ,heeding well the mortal crisis1 and hearing the ,nation's call for help1 he would not refuse1 when bidden and appointed1 to take his stand alone at the very apex of the strain1 knowing well that the burdens to be borne would be greater than tasked the strength of even ,washington2 and affirming as he advanced warily to his post1 that in his appointment many abler men had been passed by4 ,but then he would re-affirm and urge again all the arguments of his great addresses and messages and debates1 beginning with that initial trumpet peal in ,peoria in #ahed1 and not concluding until1 after all had been rehearsed and reavouched1 he recited again with prophetic earnestness this last inaugural4 ,and throughout all his devout re-affirmation of all the spoken and written appeals to which his patriotic mind gave studied form and utterance in that intense decade1 a discerning ear could distinguish in every paragraph profound and penetrating attestations1 such as these3--,this is a mighty ,nation4 ,its future is far more vast4 ,its present perplexities are intricate4 ,it has been misled4 ,it needs most sane direction4 ,i am stationed at her head4 ,difficulties environ me4 ,my burdens outweigh ,washington's4 ,but this land was conceived in liberty4 ,it was dedicated to be free4 ,here all are peers4 ,god's hand has been on our history4 ,our destiny enfolds the highest human weal4 ,god is with us still4 ,human hearts are with us4 ,here is overcoming power4 ,despite my frailty and poor descent1 ,i will never leave my place4 ,i see how other men prevail with multitudes by personal appeal4 ,this shall be my confidence4 ,though ,i have no name1 though there is perhaps no reason why ,i should ever have a name1 ,i can plead4 ,i can plead with men4 ,it is a ,godlike art4 ,grave as is my problem1 this is its grand solution4 ,i will study to persuade4 ,i will take refuge in the mighty power of argument4 ,i will confer1 and conciliate1 and convince4 ,i will employ my reason to the full4 ,i will address1 and assail1 and enlist the reason of other men4 ,i will put all my trust in speech1 in ordered1 reasoned speech4 ,i will arrange all my convictions and hopes and plans in arguments4 ,i will approach men's wills with momentous propositions4 ,i will open a path to human hearts through open ears by my living voice4 ,i will make righteousness vibrate vocally4 ,to men's very faces will ,i rebuke their wrong4 ,argument1 pure argument shall be my only weapon1 my only agency1 my only way4 ,by naked argument1 honest and unadorned1 ,i will undertake to turn this ,nation back to rectitude4 ,i will rest all my confidence in truth1 truth unalloyed1 abjuring every counterfeit and all hypocrisy4 ,it is truth's primal and mightiest function to persuade4 ,through persuasion alone can freemen be induced by freemen to yield a free obedience4 ,the heavenly art of persuading speech shall be for me the first and the last resort4 ,by this most comely instrument shall my most eager and ambitious wish gain access to all this peopled land1 and win vindication through all coming time4 ,something such as this1 as one must judge from ,lincoln's practice1 was ,lincoln's science and evaluation of the art of logical appeal4 ,by every token ,lincoln was a master of assemblies4 ,upon a public platform he was in his native element4 ,there he won his place and name4 ,whatever any one may say about ,lincoln's reputation or ,lincoln's power1 that power and that reputation were mined and minted in the very act and exercise of reasoning appeal4 ,as iron sharpeneth iron1 so he1 in the immediate presence of audiences of freeborn men1 assembled from his very neighborhood1 shaped and edged and tempered his total influence4 ,it was when upon the hustings1 and while engaged in pleading speech1 that he commanded the ,nation's eye and gained the ,nation's ear4 ,and once advanced to national pre-eminence1 it was still by logical persuasion that the ,nation's deference was retained4 ,what now was the inner nature of ,lincoln's arguments8 ,what was the fiber1 what the texture in the composition of his thought that made its arguments so convincing8 ,what was the structure1 and what the carrying power in his appeals that made their logic so prevailing1 so compelling1 so enduring8 ,to find an answer to this inquiry let men review yet once again this last inaugural4 ,here is a product of ,lincoln's mind whose single motive is persuasion1 whose momentum does not diminish1 and which seems destined to be adjudged by history a master's masterpiece4 ,what does this short speech contain that gave it in #ahfe1 and gives it yet1 an influence almost magical8 ,there can be but one possible reply4 ,the factor in that address that makes its influence so imperial is the moral majesty of the argument in its major paragraph4 ,that paragraph enshrines an argument4 ,though fashioned in the mode and aspect of a reverent supposition1 the steady pace and import of its ordered thought is such as every ordered mind admits to be compelling4 ,but in substance and in structure that argument is purely ethical4 ,all turns upon that cited1 undoubted fact of age-long1 unrequited toil4 ,upon that stern actuality hinges all the arrangement of the thought4 ,its phrases move with rhythmic fluency2 but they bind together inseparably a ,nation's duty1 sin1 and doom2 not omitting to enfold1 with a marvel of moral insight1 an almost hidden intimation of a healing cure4 ,here are weighty thoughts1 thoughts that press and urge1 thoughts that carry and communicate the gravity of centuries4 ,they contain an interpretation4 ,they clarify and illuminate4 ,and they all co-ordinate4 ,they combine and operate together to enforce agreement4 ,they demonstrate that tyranny breeds a baleful progeny of guilt and woe2 that robbery binds the robber under debt to the full measure of his rapine2 that such guilt can never be forgotten2 that such a woe is pitiless2 that the centuries1 though slow and mute1 are attentive and impartial witnesses2 and that ,god's even judgments are over all1 and are altogether just4 ,this is all the content and all the purport of this paragraph1 and of all this speech3 an exposition of ,american slavery and of its resultant civil war1 in moral terms1 before the moral bar of every hearer's conscience1 and beneath the thought of ,god's eternal righteousness2 all turning upon the self-evident verity that unpaid toil is wrong4 ,in this prolific affirmation is the fertile germ of all that ,lincoln ever thought or undertook in that supreme decade4 ,here are enfolded all his axioms and postulates and propositions4 ,by interlocking its multiform1 infolded1 self-evident certitudes he framed all his arguments4 ,its overflowing1 resistless demonstrations in active human affairs formed all his corollaries4 ,toil unrequited is a moral wrong4 ,it cries to heaven1 and shall be avenged4 ,in this avenging1 if we but see our day1 there is an open door to join with heaven1 and transmute its vengeance into recompense and reconciliation4 ,this was ,lincoln's logic4 ,it was purely ethical4 ,this was the master-key to his transcendent statesmanship4 ,here was the secret of his political efficiency4 ,thus1 and in no other way1 he swayed the ,nation4 ,himself a ,godlike man1 and discerning in every other man the same ,godlikeness2 trusting his own soul's honesty1 and appealing to honest manhood in all other men2 he took his stand beside all the oppressed1 and against all extortion2 and voiced and urged and trusted the sovereign moral plea for perfect charity1 and perfect equity for all4 ,but ,lincoln's logic was interlaced with history4 ,all through his debates and addresses are woven the facts and sequences of our national career4 ,and to these connected events he clung in all his arguments1 as a man clings to the honor of his home4 ,there was in those events an argument4 ,to tamper with that history1 discrediting its sure occurrences1 or distorting their right connection1 was in his conception a downright immorality4 ,but mere historical exactitude was not the motive of ,lincoln's appeal to past events4 ,the momentum of our past was for ,lincoln's use entirely moral4 ,here upon this continent1 as he conceived our great experiment1 was being tried1 in the presence and on behalf of all mankind1 a government in which the governed were the governors4 ,here men are inquiring and being taught what true manhood can create1 uphold1 and consummate upon a continental scale1 in mutual equality4 ,here men are schooled for independence4 ,here men may dare to fashion their own law4 ,here men are nurtured towards full fraternity4 ,here men are forced to heed the civic necessity of being fair4 ,here a boundless impending future has to be kept steadily in view4 ,here the ,god of ,nations is teaching a ,nation that he should be revered4 ,here1 in brief and in sum1 men are being disciplined to know and cherish the rudiments of civic character4 ,thus ,lincoln interpreted the meaning of our national history4 ,in his rating1 its total purport was ethical4 ,any logical exposition of our national career1 if its statements are historically exact1 will carry moral consequences4 ,if the logical sequence of any statement of our historical course is morally perverse1 then that statement of our history is historically untrue4 ,thus ,lincoln's jealous zest for truthful history1 for truthful argument1 and for true morality became coincident4 ,but ,lincoln's logic was his own4 ,his zeal for history was a freeman's zest4 ,his arguments were not the cold reflection of a borrowed light4 ,they were the fervid affirmations of his own convictions1 compacted into reasoned unison1 out of the indivisible constituents of his very manhood's honor4 ,when in his appeal his soul most glowed1 when the ordered sequence and pressure of his thought waxed irresistible1 he was simply opening to his auditors the balanced burden of his honest heart4 ,then genuine manhood became articulate4 ,then pure honor found a voice4 ,then eloquence became naught but plain sincerity4 ,then arguments became transparent1 and affirmations convinced like axioms4 ,then demonstrations moved4 ,assertions did persuade4 ,then the very being of the orator took possession of the auditor in an intelligent fraternity4 ,true1 indeed1 a solid ,south1 and multitudes besides1 derided his postulates1 contemned his arguments1 and scorned derisively his tenderest appeals4 ,but better than they themselves he understood their hearts2 and holding fast forever his deeper faith and confidence1 he maintained his reasoning and his plea1 knowing surely that in some future day their chastened hearts would vindicate his words4 ,but in all of this exposition of ,lincoln's logical force and skill there has been no mention of a syllogism4 ,did ,lincoln then neglect that famous formula of argumentative address8 ,to this natural inquiry it must be replied that ,lincoln understood right well the fine utility of this strict norm of formal thought4 ,indeed1 he had taken special pains to perfect his skill in just that form of argument4 ,to the logical click in a well-formed syllogism his inner ear was well attuned4 ,repeatedly he summoned in its aid4 ,an excellent illustration may be seen in his rejoinder to ,douglas at ,galesburg in ,september of #aheh4 ,but ,lincoln's confidence was not in syllogistic forms1 however trim4 ,his trust was in his moral axioms4 ,unaided1 naked truth2 truth whose total urgency is self-contained1 whose perfect verity is self-displayed1 and whose proudest triumphs are self-achieved2 pure truth1 shaped forth in speech of absolute simplicity2 truth that works directly in the human mind1 like sunshine in the eye1 was ,lincoln's handiest and most common instrument in an argument4 ,thus he sought to so use reason as to awaken conscience and arouse the will4 ,and thus his arguments prevailed4 ,this was ,lincoln's logic4 ,it was the orderly exposition of his honest manhood1 pleading with the honest intelligence of every other man for his free assent4 ,himself a freeman whom ,god made free1 and greeting in every other man an equal dignity2 with loyalty to himself and with charity for all2 with ,godly deference and unfailing hope2 he urged and argued from his own true manhood1 and from no other grounds1 with a logic that no true freeman can ever refute3 that in this heaven favored land1 and for the welfare of all the world1 these ethical foundations of all true civic welfare be kept unmoved forever4 ,in such a moral character1 and in such a moral argument is this expanding ,nation's only pride and sure defense4 ,at any modern ,round ,table of civic knights ,lincoln is true ,king ,arthur1 and his persuading speech the true ,excalibur4 ,,his ,,personality--,,the ,,problem ,,of ,,psychology ,when ,plato took his pen to write his dialogues2 when ,michael ,angelo took his chisel to fashion his ,moses2 when ,raphael took his brush to paint his ,madonna2 they were designing to make their several ideals of personality pre-eminently beautiful and distinct4 ,and each artist in his way won a signal1 a supreme success4 ,moses1 ,socrates1 the ,madonna1 are shining revelations of human personality4 ,success herein is the height of highest art4 ,but what is personality8 ,it seems an eternal secret1 despite all human search and art4 ,yet its secret is everywhere felt instinctively to be of all quests the most supreme4 ,by every avenue men are trying to reach and reveal its hiding place4 ,our goal is nothing less than the human soul4 ,and upon this inquest the eyes and instruments of our inspection are being sharpened with a determination and zeal hitherto unparalleled4 ,suppose this quest be turned to ,lincoln4 ,surely here is a human person4 ,he stands enough apart in his preeminence to be pre-eminently distinguishable and distinct2 while yet his face beams near enough to be as familiar and accessible as our most accessible and familiar friend4 ,for surely1 despite all his proneness towards a musing solitude1 ,lincoln1 of all ,americans1 displays through all his published statements1 and in all his public life1 an instructive and unstudied openness and unreserve4 ,just here his marvelous power and influence lie4 ,he practiced no concealment4 ,he held communion with all his fellowmen4 ,herein consists his honesty4 ,now may not an honest scholarship1 honestly conceiving that of all investigations our pursuit for the ways and dwelling place of personality is easily supreme1 as honestly believe that in the open1 waiting heart of ,lincoln that supreme inquiry may find its supreme reward8 ,surely here is promise of a labor that will pay4 ,in ,lincoln's personality is a vein1 a mine whose worth and sure utility no mineral wealth can parallel4 ,what in very truth1 what in solid fact1 what in absolute reality is ,lincoln's personality8 ,for undeniably in facing and regarding him1 we confront and apprehend a human life1 compact and self-controlled1 the native home and throne of all the conscious and self-directed energies that are ever resident within and representative of any man4 ,if human personality ever took evident and conscious shape and form1 then ,lincoln is an open and easily approachable illustration of its embodiment4 ,upon no object may a student of psychology more easily or more wisely fix his eye than upon the soul of ,lincoln1 when it thrills in resolute1 intense endeavor1 as in this last inaugural4 ,for one thing1 that ,lincoln should be the specimen of psychology commanding any student's choice is suggested by ,lincoln's notability4 ,here is an exhibit in no way ordinary4 ,he has secured the attention of us all4 ,and the attention of us all is athrill with mighty interest4 ,however it has come about1 in some way1 as a human personality1 he illustrates a type1 he presents a sample so powerful and positive as to stand before all eyes almost alone1 while also so attractive as to be by everyone beloved4 ,this fact may fairly beget assurance from the start that in any heedful search for the very substance of human personality1 an interior and intimate fellowship with ,lincoln may show us closely and clearly where it dwells1 and what it is4 ,for from the start it stands plain that ,lincoln's hold upon our hearts is in its controlling co-efficients purely personal4 ,that hold clings fast and spreads afar1 indifferent to space1 or time1 or even death4 ,his influence over us1 so gladly welcomed and so clearly felt1 is no wise physical or temporal4 ,it cannot be handled or weighed4 ,it is personal4 ,herein is high encouragement4 ,and that in this sense of our response to his enduring sway should be enfolded on our part1 a kindred1 pure1 enduring delight attests convincingly that within ,lincoln's personality and our own there is something mutual4 ,within the thing we search and us who seek there is profound affinity4 ,in this our encouragement may heighten1 and that with solid soberness1 unto hope4 ,and then the scene of this his last inaugural is all aglow with promise4 ,for here if anywhere ,lincoln's personality may be seen engaged in the ripeness of his finished discipline1 and the fullness of his manhood's strength4 ,the scene itself swells full of meaning2 and ,lincoln's part and contribution fix and fill the center of its significance4 ,surely if anything within that scene is plain to see and localize1 it is ,lincoln's own identity4 ,the living ,lincoln is surely there1 wholly unreserved and unconcealed4 ,there ,lincoln's personality is in fullest play1 an evident and mighty revelation1 plainly felt and seen4 ,but it is only in the action that the actor comes to view2 only in his words does the thinker stand revealed4 ,here and thus1 and nowhere else or otherwise1 is ,lincoln's personality unveiled4 ,and yet herein1 within the compass of this speech1 ,lincoln unlades a burden of such grave concern1 and unrolls a problem of such profound complexity as could nowhere come to birth and utterance but in a mighty human heart4 ,in the vastness of that problem and anxiety can be gauged the vastness of the measure of that heart4 ,here open into immediate view at once an object and a method of research1 fitted at once to challenge and appall the bravest student's heart4 ,but once its summons is distinguished1 it is irresistible4 ,one thing that meets the student1 as he seeks the speaker in this speech1 is its witness to his titanic and pathetic toil4 ,the words he utters are the message of a laborer far forespent1 voiced with mingled weariness and hope1 well towards the sunset of a weary day4 ,the sun had been fiercely hot4 ,the field had been full of thorns4 ,and through the arid hours he had tasted little food1 or rest1 or joy4 ,no husbandman ever chose his seed or tilled his ground at greater cost of patient care4 ,none ever had to bend his frame to ruder weather1 or battle against more malicious and persistent pests4 ,and all the agony of that toil had been wrought through within the anguish of his mind4 ,in exactest and exacting thought he had engrossed and consumed the full measure of his full strength4 ,on all he had to bear and do he pondered mightily4 ,no mortal ever pondered more intently on all that mortals ever have to meet4 ,in this inaugural scene the soul of ,lincoln is straining at its full strength4 ,no portion of his personal life is idling4 ,if a student's hand is truly deft1 he can feel1 as he fingers the throbbing life of this address1 the pulse beats of a full heart4 ,and within the grasp and compass of that heart are revolving vast and strenuous themes4 ,the soul of ,lincoln is dealing with a ,nation's destiny4 ,his speech is borne upon his single voice2 but with that single voice he pleads for millions2 and its vibrations carry through a continent1 as a national oracle4 ,expounder and defender of the ,nation's vital honor1 beleaguered all about with war1 distressed by all oppression1 eager with a sacrificial passion that all men everywhere may have liberty and an equal share in equity1 searching for a just and stable basis for the world's tranquillity1 as he stands and strives throughout that speech the structure of his soul grows luminous4 ,as he studied ,providence and scanned the grounds of government2 as he peered far into the deeps of freedom1 the majesty of duty1 and the sanctions of inviolable law2 as he pondered the nature of eternal right1 and the deadly mischief of moral wrong2 as he watched the ways of hate and pride and falsity and sensual delights1 he was not alone compacting the substance and order of this immortal address2 but in the shapely body of his argument he has embodied and uncovered his honest1 guileless heart4 ,in the very scars and seams upon his sorrow-shadowed face1 as he overcomes his task and fills out his duty in this address1 discerning eyes can see through the furnace of how deep refinement his humble and majestic soul has been forever beautified4 ,transforming themes possessed his mind4 ,by the ministry and inner influence of these themes he grew to be transformed2 and in the process and issue of that change the outline and texture of his inner being becomes traceable4 ,and of this inner revelation the most notable mark is its simplicity4 ,as in this speech his inner life is introduced1 its texture is not perplexing and intricate4 ,it is perfectly apprehensible4 ,the total speech can be quickly scanned4 ,its sentiments barely get your full attention before they are at an end4 ,its entire compass can be comprehended in a single glance4 ,its whole sum can be reviewed in a single breath4 ,and still its themes and propositions are imperial4 ,within its fine simplicity its stateliness stands uneclipsed4 ,hence its marvelous power to command4 ,upon all who look and listen1 its action and appeal are like the dawning of a day4 ,its major propositions are assented to unconsciously4 ,it works like light4 ,it is genial1 winsome1 clear4 ,and it is irresistible4 ,it moves4 ,it rules4 ,it is an argument1 the ordered appeal of a candid1 earnest mind to the reasoned thought of honest men4 ,gentle and modest throughout1 it contains and conveys compelling energy4 ,it has the sturdiness of a hardy oak4 ,and yet its first appearing was like a new unfolding of our flag4 ,it is a kingly word1 alike in lasting beauty and enduring strength4 ,in this there is surely some sure reflection of that hidden man within1 ,lincoln's real1 undying self4 ,and this still further may be said4 ,amid these sovereign interests and affirmations their agent is thus employed of his own free choice4 ,he is no automaton4 ,the ,lincoln whom we seek1 the ,lincoln whom this address is helping us to see can never be defined by physical terms4 ,through the realm of physics things move as they are moved4 ,lincoln in this address moves and guides and governs himself4 ,and he is here self-judged4 ,this inaugural teems with moral verdicts1 verdicts that define eternal issues irrevocably4 ,no higher function than this can be imagined in any sphere of being1 or in any form4 ,these verdicts ,lincoln fastens upon himself4 ,and before the same complete authority he summons the whole ,nation to bow4 ,deep within those verdicts there throbs omnipotently a sense of moral duty1 moral right1 man's highest good and goal4 ,this ideal of what should be stands evident in this inaugural in ,lincoln's own humble conformity with ,god1 in his own unimpeachable integrity1 in his unreserved benevolence1 and in his pure esteem for souls4 ,in each one of these constituents of human duty ,lincoln sees unchallengeable authority4 ,for the honor of each one he deems himself responsible4 ,their mingled rays create the light in which he writes this speech1 by which this speech is read1 and under whose clear radiance he records his oath4 ,surely here are more than hints for any one1 who seeks to see just where this speech originates1 and most precisely how its author may be defined4 ,within this last preceding paragraph one feels again the presence and the movement of all that all the chapters of this volume have contained4 ,herein we seem to face a sort of final synthesis of all our study4 ,if this be true1 or only true approximately1 then its face and contents should be scrutinized until they are cleared of every shadow or alloy4 ,for this research is surely approaching its goal1 and some of its boundaries may surely be defined4 ,one line that shows indelibly is his intelligence2 an intelligence comprehending total centuries1 and assembling within its scope extreme diversities2 an intelligence that has a piercing eye1 acute to distinguish and divide2 an intelligence that has power to estimate1 compare1 and summarize2 an intelligence intolerant of error1 and eager after truth2 an intelligence that can frame an argument designed to clarify1 convince1 and win all other minds2 an intelligence that assumes to deal with ,god1 receiving and reflecting within its own interior and proper vision a revelation of the divine intent4 ,here is an energy1 at once receptive and original1 fitted marvelously for a reflection that can embrace and authorize eternal truth4 ,this intelligence is within control4 ,it is not a vagrant or unguided force4 ,it is under conduct1 all its action to observe1 inspect1 and estimate being ordered reasonably4 ,and all this influence operating to understand and counsel1 all this wisdom1 while gathering light and substance from everywhere1 is informed within1 and wonderfully self-contained4 ,as ,lincoln reasons in this inaugural1 as he resolves and purifies his argument1 its power to convince is most intimate and deep within himself4 ,as he guides and shapes his thoughts for the thought of other men1 the convictions within the speaker1 and their power to persuade1 so inwrought in the speech1 become identical4 ,in his own consent choice and judgment are combined4 ,here is freedom indeed1 a freedom to discern as truly as to choose1 to distinguish as truly as to decide1 to estimate as truly as to select1 the freedom of the intelligence1 an intelligence that is truly free4 ,this freedom fashions character4 ,it is a moral architect4 ,it is original1 able to create4 ,the author of this speech is self-produced4 ,the personality that comes to view among those words is self-determined and self-made4 ,its plan was sketched by his own hand4 ,his position and his posture1 his sentiments and his sympathies1 his bent and inclination1 his moral postulates and axioms1 his moral stamp and trend and tone1 his stability and moral sturdiness are all his own invention1 originally1 essentially1 inseparably his own4 ,lincoln's character is ,lincoln's handicraft4 ,its title vests in him4 ,it never was1 nor could it ever become the property of another man4 ,this all men recognize4 ,but this universal recognition is pregnant with significance to any seeker amid the phenomena of ,lincoln's life for the substance of his personality4 ,somewhere within those statements just now made1 somewhere within ,lincoln's conscious authorship and invention of his moral worth is precious intimation of the whereabouts and constitution of his personality4 ,this blend in ,lincoln of freedom and intelligence1 of liberty and sanity is notable for its evenness4 ,lincoln's liberty is not chimerical or riotous4 ,it is regulated1 orderly1 real4 ,within himself and over his full destiny1 an unimpeachable sovereign though he is1 he is not prone towards wilfulness1 but towards composure and sobriety4 ,he moves as one fast-held beneath the law that for all his movements he will be accountable4 ,he always wears the mien of one who carries high responsibilities4 ,far from being arbitrary1 he behaves as facing within himself a court of arbitration1 truly self-invested1 and just as truly sovereign4 ,of all his words and deeds and attitudes he is himself self-constituted1 reverend judge4 ,whether seeking to resolve a doubt1 or waiting to receive a verdict1 his appeal is finally to himself4 ,this is his mood and posture in this inaugural4 ,he is giving an opinion4 ,this scene is a literal crisis in a review in which a ,nation's history and delinquency have met incisive1 balanced examination1 to the end that his own view of duty as president might come clear to his own judicial eye1 and all gain the approbation of all mankind4 ,in his loftiest originality1 where his conscious power and right to elect the path he takes is most self-evident1 the way he takes is also owned to be an unimpeachable obligation4 ,here is another signal hint for the seeker after the living and abiding source of ,lincoln's words and deeds4 ,somewhere within this sense of duty1 so sane and free and serious1 lives the very ,lincoln whom we seek4 ,this judicial evenness within the free and reasoned movements of ,lincoln's action and argument is due to a balanced store of moral ballast4 ,his stalwart mind and sturdy will and steadfast consciousness that duty binds his life stand leagued together in a partnership employing infinite wealth4 ,with these resources he daily ventures vast investments4 ,this speech is such a venture1 laden with most goodly merchandise4 ,indeed he ventures here1 as everywhere1 his all4 ,his fear of ,god1 his self-respect1 his neighbor love1 his thirst for things that last--these are the priceless treasure he examines with a searching insight1 estimates with judicial carefulness1 enjoys with soul-filling admiration1 and then responsibly invests4 ,on these and these alone he chooses and resolves to seek returns4 ,these are the only seas where sail his ships4 ,here is all his merchandise4 ,here is the only exchange where ,lincoln ever resorts4 ,here and here alone can one make computation of his wealth4 ,if he has wisdom1 it is here4 ,here is all his liberty4 ,here is a full register of his life's accounts1 and of his full accountability4 ,here are all his goodly pearls4 ,these are the jewels that delight his heart4 ,and if only students have the eye to see1 within this joy deep secrets are revealed4 ,just here this study has to pause4 ,for while it seems to be facing straight for that in ,lincoln which is innermost--his essential and immortal self1 transcending all the mere phenomena of life--and standing where nothing intervenes between our eager search and his steadfast soul1 the outlook1 as it is scanned by different eyes1 reflects in different minds world-wide diversity4 ,lincoln sees this difference1 and deals with it in this speech4 ,he knows his chosen estimates of ,god and man and government1 of prayer and equity and happiness1 of right and wrong and penalty1 awake resentful protest4 ,just here his manhood shows its breed4 ,without resentment1 but without surrender1 he takes and keeps his oath1 expecting that ,god1 humanity1 and time will vindicate his insight and his choice4 ,this valiant expectation stands today fulfilled1 a commanding testimony that ,lincoln's personality1 though so simply childlike in its every trait1 has majestic permanence and comprehension4 ,its inmost attributes1 as purified in him1 reflect and clarify to other souls1 however opposite and hostile they may seem1 their own essential and enduring rank4 ,this gives pointed intimation that in ,lincoln's conscious life1 deep underneath his daily words and deeds1 there is a conscious unity1 the very seat of freedom and law1 a shrine of reverence1 an altar of love1 a throne of truth1 a fountain-head of purity--a unity that no antagonist can overcome1 that neither time nor death can decompose4 ,but an objection still persists4 ,some man will say that the search for ,lincoln's personality1 as thus far carried on1 has only dealt with ethics1 whereas research in personality is at bottom a problem of pure psychology2 and that in pure psychology the position holds impregnable that naught beneath men's words and deeds can ever be discerned2 that naught indeed is real for this investigation but sensible phenomena2 that a human soul is something it is impossible to place4 ,this matter plainly claims respect4 ,as an objection it is inveterate2 and whenever urged1 it gains wide heed4 ,in treating with it some things rise up for hearing4 ,to begin with1 the intimation cited in the former paragraph will honor pondering4 ,though that paragraph is intent on ethics in its every word1 no paragraph in all the volume more strictly so1 still its statements clear more ground than a single hasty glance is liable accurately to survey4 ,it is concerned with ethics truly--again be that conceded4 ,but in no concern of morals whatsoever did ,lincoln vacate intelligence4 ,never was pure intelligence more intellectually engaged than when ,lincoln's mind was scanning moral problems4 ,in such engagements ,lincoln's total being was occupied4 ,and if amid the clustering multitudes of moral judgments and decisions that attend his moral inquiries and activities1 there is witness to the presence of a freeborn judge whose identity remains continuously and consciously single and the same1 that fact sheds searching light upon the problem with which this paragraph deals4 ,let one listen again to this address--listen with a due intentness as it speaks of ,union and destruction and defense2 of bondage and lash and unpaid toil2 of offenders1 offenses and woe2 of malice and charity and right2 of ,god and ,bible and prayer2 of widows and orphans and wounds2 of war and sorrow and peace2 of ,nations and centuries and ,providence4 ,here are trilogies and tragedies and millenniums1 in ethics and religion and philosophy--but borne from perishing lips to perishing ears upon the perishing vehicle of a passing breath4 ,this human breath is frail1 these human words are faint1 this scene bursts forth and vanishes4 ,but those trilogies6 ,they are more than flitting words1 and shifting scenes1 and dying breath4 ,the actor outlasts the scene2 the speaker outlives his word2 the mortal breath is not the measure of the man4 ,he by whom these massive trilogies were marshaled and deployed before a national audience1 upon a ,nation's stage1 to form a national spectacle1 and expound a ,nation's history1 does not perish with his breath1 nor vanish with this scene4 ,before1 within and afterwards he lives1 pre-arranging1 fulfilling and surviving this mighty drama of his life1 mightily resembling ,god4 ,a speech and scene like this bear witness to an author and actor outdating and outranking both scene and speech4 ,an author looms within this speech1 self-moved1 creative1 free4 ,an actor moves within this scene1 self-made1 poetic1 unconstrained4 ,speech and scene1 voice and form are not the man4 ,these are but his fading vesture4 ,deep within those solemn trilogies1 as within a kingly robe1 conveying to his vestment all its dignity1 though all unseen among its shapely folds1 stands ,lincoln's living1 ,godlike self4 ,it was to this the people paid their deference4 ,through those clear syllables that came to utterance upon those mortal lips it was ,lincoln's immortal soul that became articulate4 ,in those ringing accents ,lincoln's self became identified4 ,if ever a human personality crossed a human stage1 not as actor echoing the words and attitudes of other men1 but as an author and creator1 fulfilling within himself1 in ,god's fear1 on other men's behalf1 and with an eye to deathless destinies1 his own responsible trust1 that man was ,lincoln in this second inaugural address4 ,there he asserted and declared himself4 ,here then1 in the tone and impress of this address is the sovereign place to find the tone and impress of ,lincoln's soul4 ,if that living soul ever gave a conscious hint of its living lineaments and hidden dwelling place1 here is that hint's finest published utterance4 ,here1 then1 is the total measure of our task4 ,upon this transparent speech1 and not upon vacant air1 is the student of psychology to direct his eye4 ,here is the final challenge4 ,deep within the deeps of this supreme address1 clear within the rhythms of these resounding trilogies1 what does one see and hear8 ,to the question thus defined an answer something such as this must be returned3 ,here in this inaugural address is designation and signature of a man astute to comprehend a ,nation's history1 reverent towards responsibility1 a champion and exponent of liberty1 commending with radiant earnestness that all his fellow men so walk with ,god1 so cherish equity1 and so walk in charity as to secure in all the earth an amity that time can never disrupt4 ,something such is the personality which this address attests4 ,while this speech exists1 this testimony will endure4 ,its word stands firm4 ,and its signature is plain4 ,he who wrote the speech has left upon its manuscript his clear and sacred seal4 ,he who gave its body shape was a freeman none could bend1 heedful of the arbiter none might disobey1 humble towards ,god1 loyal to himself1 a friend to every man1 an aspirant for life4 ,surely these are intimations of personality4 ,here is ,lincoln1 a vivid plenitude in living unison of timeless quietness and harmony1 ordaining freely his own law of even heed for self and brother man1 for ,god and spirit life4 ,here is the full manhood of a living soul1 ,godlike and earthly-born4 ,none of its features are solidified in flesh1 to be again and soon resolved4 ,all its face is spiritual2 all its action free1 self-ordered1 and self-judged2 all preserving jealously its own kingly honor2 all beaming graciously on other men2 all bearing homage up to ,god2 all vivid with immortality2 abhorring mightily all pride and hate1 all falsehood and decay2 all sharing sacrificially with other men the cost and shame entailed in righting human wrong4 ,this is ,lincoln's personality4 ,in ,godlike1 friendly1 undying self-respect2 in heavenly1 upright1 immortal kindliness2 in humane1 divine1 self-honoring heed for spirit-life--in each and any one of these four identical affirmations is ,lincoln's personality exhaustively engrossed1 each and any one declaring that he contains within himself a free and deathless soul1 akin alike to ,god and man1 and bound therein by the self-wrought law of love and truth4 ,these terms define a life at once of human and of heavenly range1 at once inhabiting and transcending realms of change1 at once self-ruled and environed with responsibility4 ,here is elemental personality1 in inwrought and indivisible unity1 with measureless capacity for versatility1 easily blending fulness of vigor with complete repose1 vestured and transfused with native symmetry and grace4 ,in some such living1 breathing words1 themselves transfigured and illumined by the quickening verities they strive to body forth1 may the pure1 immortal soul of ,lincoln1 and of every child of man1 be defined1 unburdened1 and declared4 ,something thus must written words describe the soul that surged beneath this speech1 and freely gave this speech its being4 ,surely such an undertaking must not be despised4 ,that aspiring1 creative spirit1 so earnest and so resolute1 far more than any speech its vision or its passion may body forth1 demands to be portrayed4 ,grand as are these paragraphs1 their author has a far surpassing majesty4 ,fitted as are these accents to reach and stir the auditors of a continent1 the soul from which these accents rise has an access to all those auditors far more intimate4 ,if readers of this essay spurn the effort which it undertakes1 let them not be scorners merely4 ,from among their number1 let some one arise1 artist enough in insight and handicraft to make some truer delineation of that living ,lincoln1 the abiding origin and author of this and his every other noble speech and deed4 ,such an artist is sure to find1 if ever the conscious soul of ,lincoln shines through his hand1 that when the inner face of ,lincoln is portrayed1 that portrait will carry speaking evidence of a joyful and abiding consciousness of liberty and law1 of self and brother man1 of things eternal1 and of ,god2 that in his countenance1 so sorrow-shadowed and yet so serene1 will shine a close resemblance to every other man2 that through his quiet eye will gleam that image of ,god in which he and all his fellow men have been made2 and that deep within it all will beam a radiant assurance that by the way of sacrifice the awful mystery of sin has been resolved4 ,hitherward must men who seek the soul of ,lincoln turn their eye4 ,humble1 gentle1 and loyal1 eager after the life that is its own reward1 at once dutiful and free1 lavishing out his life to take the sting from sin--this is the soul of ,lincoln4 ,in this image every man will see himself reflected1 either in affinity1 or by rebuke1 herein revealing how all men resemble ,god4 ,something such is man4 ,something such is our common manhood4 ,something such is our inherent testimony as to our origin and source4 ,and something such is the task of him who would frame a valid definition of personality4 ,no undertaking is more profound1 none more supreme4 ,and once it is accomplished1 forms of statement will have been found availing to embody all man can ever know of self or ,god4 ,,part ,v4 ,,conclusion ,,lincoln',s ,,character ,in all the chapters that have gone before1 the essential constructive factors have been very few4 ,this is evident from their continual reiteration--a reiteration that is too conspicuous to be overlooked4 ,in this is intimation that the last inclusive affirmation of this study will be remarkable for its brevity and also for its open clarity4 ,the simple elements of such a closing synthesis may be here set down4 ,as encouraging this attempt1 it may be first remarked that ,lincoln's life attests and demonstrates the primacy of character4 ,this is the foundation of his fame2 and hereby his fame is felt to be secure4 ,to this all men agree4 ,this world-wide consent may be said to be unhesitant1 spontaneous1 unforced1 arising as though by common instinct1 or by a moral intuition1 all men everywhere viewing him alike1 even as all eyes everywhere act alike in receiving and reflecting light4 ,here is something of a significance nothing less than imperial for a student of ethics4 ,for it seems to say that by universal suffrage an international tribute is rendered to a common pattern of human life2 that there is a world ideal in the moral realm2 that this ideal is visibly near2 and that this realized ideal is so altogether friendly1 admirable and excellent as to win from every land an overflowing flood of thankfulness and joy4 ,so genuine1 so genial1 and so grand is ,lincoln's moral life4 ,in the face of such a life1 and of such a tribute1 a student of ethics may be emboldened to assume that his science has indeed foundations2 that those sure grounds are after all not far to seek2 and that when those cornerstones are once uncovered1 they will be within the easy comprehension of common men4 ,here1 then1 in ,lincoln's open and exalted life is at once a challenge and a test for all who would like to attempt a careful survey of the moral realm4 ,one sterling1 standing coefficient of ,lincoln's character was its thoughtfulness4 ,piercing1 pondering thought was with him a habitude4 ,his mind had insight1 and he used its eye unsparingly4 ,this was no mere mental cunning1 though he was surely passing shrewd and keen4 ,in ,lincoln insight was so inseparably allied with an active sense of responsibility that it may be best defined as searching honesty4 ,into the massive1 solid1 stubborn problems of his perplexing day he drilled and pierced by plodding1 patient1 penetrating thought4 ,kepler never fixed his mind more steadily upon any study of geometric curves than ,lincoln his upon the intricate questions of government4 ,and not in vain4 ,it may be truly said that ,lincoln's moral judgments and resolves were without exception the long-sought winnings of exactest and most exacting mental toil4 ,one fruit of this sharp scrutiny was a quite unusual foresight4 ,in this keen certitude touching things to come he was almost without a peer4 ,but its design and its utility for him were ethical4 ,the coming issues towards which he explored were moral4 ,the future he foresaw was thick with evolving sanctions involved in moral deeds4 ,for such events1 whether near or far1 he had a seeing eye4 ,and with a steady view to those oncoming certainties he shaped his resolutions1 and plotted out his life4 ,that those high purposes involved his soul in untold sorrow he well and unerringly foresaw4 ,it was not by mental blunders that he became enmeshed in the anguish and anxiety that made his life so shadowed and solitary4 ,and it was not by shrewder wits that other men escaped his all but constant fellowship with reproach and grief4 ,lincoln saw beforehand whither his studied view of duty and his clear-eyed obedience led4 ,where other men stood blind he achieved to see that his selected1 sorrow-burdened path was the only way to the happiness that could wear and satisfy4 ,his insight was betrothed right loyally to the faithful league of moral verities4 ,thus ,lincoln's character was stamped and sealed with prudence4 ,here gleams his wisdom4 ,his thought was balanced1 looking many ways and comprehending many parts4 ,hence his sane judiciousness4 ,but this well-pondered carefulness was no mere mental sapience4 ,the world of ,lincoln's painstaking thought was a world of character2 a world of liberty2 a world of binding obligation2 a world of right and wrong2 a world of ,god-like opportunities2 a world of awful sanctions2 a world where dignity and shame are infinite2 a world of manhood and of brother men2 a world where human souls outrank all other things1 like ,god4 ,these were the themes that ,lincoln's mind inspected and adjudged4 ,it is by virtue of his life-long search to find in such mighty interests as these their rational consistency1 that mental values of the highest grade pervade and signalize his character4 ,no mortal course in all our history was ever reasoned out more carefully than the course that ,lincoln chose and held with moral heroism to his death4 ,to overlook or underrate this thoughtfulness in any reasoned estimate or exposition of ,lincoln's character would be infinitely unfair4 ,as with light and vision1 his thoughtfulness is the medium in which his character stands manifest4 ,quite as elemental in ,lincoln's character as his thoughtfulness is his courtly deference to duty4 ,lincoln's conscience controlled and held him in his course1 as gravitation holds and guides this globe4 ,this all men discern2 and discerning1 they admire4 ,deep in the center of this unanimous admiration is a respect for ,lincoln that amounts almost to reverence4 ,lincoln's estimate of law was most profound4 ,when1 after humble and all-engrossing search1 he found and traced those sovereign obligations to which he bowed his life1 his estimate and attitude were as though he stood face to face with ,god4 ,but in that deference was a courtliness that was beautifully ,lincoln's own4 ,he too admired1 where he obeyed4 ,his thoughtfulness was a stately1 sovereign court that sanctioned and made supreme every law that he revered4 ,this transcendent1 all-commanding sense of duty1 springing from within1 and also descending from above1 seated centrally within his character1 is centrally and inseparably inwrought within his fame4 ,while his name abides this princely heed for duty will persist to challenge and to test each studied statement of his character4 ,another factor of ,lincoln's character1 likewise radical1 impossible to omit1 is his free and self-formed choice4 ,that ,lincoln's choice was truly free1 self-moved1 and truly unconstrained comes clear impressively when one for long inspects and understands his thoughtfulness4 ,lincoln's mental action in its riper stages was a pure deliberation4 ,in that careful pondering we can feel and see his ripening moral preference grow clear and free from trammels of every sort1 and gain towards decisions that know no other influence but reason wholly purified4 ,so inseparable in him were choice and seasoned wisdom4 ,from this it follows that ,lincoln's ripe decisions can be understood only when one comprehends his mental equilibrium4 ,and here it comes to view that ,lincoln's moral resolutions led him far asunder from the multitudes4 ,it is here that ,lincoln's isolation takes departure4 ,this parting of the ways needs noting narrowly4 ,from his selection of his path for life the world at large draws back4 ,yet even so he still retains the world's applause4 ,here opens the true secret of his distinction1 as of his excellence and power4 ,this secret lies deeply hidden1 and yet openly revealed in the comely balanced law his thoughtful wisdom led his noble will loyally to admire1 adopt1 and struggle unto death to keep4 ,what now in true precision was this comely1 balanced programme of a moral life that ,lincoln's wisdom led his will to adopt8 ,here is the apex of this study4 ,that it is not beyond man's reach1 the world's applause and ,lincoln's lowly plainness and full accessibility may well encourage any man to hope4 ,that this inquiry should stand unanswered1 or be answered heedlessly1 or with any vagueness1 is unworthy of our day or of our land4 ,but in the answer should be verbally embodied adequate and intelligible explanation of ,lincoln's moral majesty1 of his unexampled intimateness with every sort of men1 and of an undivided world's applause4 ,these tests are heeded by the answer which this study ventures to suggest1 when it says that ,lincoln's thoughtful ponderings on the ways of ,god1 on the souls and lives of men1 on the microcosm in every man1 and on the principles of all society1 revealed to him the obligation1 in deference to himself1 to his neighbor1 and to his ,god1 and with full heed to immortality1 to choose and follow to its full perfection the law of even truth and love4 ,to be fair1 and kind1 and pure1 as a lowly1 kingly child of ,god--this was the wisdom1 the obligation1 the aspiration of ,lincoln's life4 ,this was the moral sum and substance of his thoughtful1 free1 obedient life4 ,here in brief and in full is ,lincoln's character4 ,in such a character is ,godlike potency1 and fluency1 and dignity4 ,within its easy interplay is true simplicity1 and unison4 ,within its harmony shines the eye of beauty4 ,amid all turbulence it holds serene4 ,its movements convey a majesty that awakens deference4 ,it is free1 like ,god1 to devise1 adjust1 and originate1 ever having inner power creatively to overcome or reconcile outright antagonism4 ,its thoughtfulness has a master's power to divide1 combine1 and comprehend4 ,it can gaze unblenched and unamazed into the awful face of evil4 ,it can plant and wield a leverage that can overturn every evil argument4 ,in its finished ministry it can present a portrait of the human soul true to its very life4 ,in such a character1 though compassed in a single life1 and marked with signal modesty1 there dwells a fulness adequate to delineate and comprehend all the mighty magnitudes within the moral universe4 ,such is the character that ,lincoln's life leads all the world to admire4 ,its beauty lies enshrined within the blended light of wisdom1 freedom and obedience along the way where loyalty1 charity1 humility and hope of immortality shine ever brighter unto perfect day4 ,here is wisdom4 ,and here is worth4 ,and here these two are one4 ,,lincoln',s ,,preference ,in the chapter just concluded1 the field of ethics is termed a universe4 ,in the chapter upon ,theodicy1 it was noted that in ,lincoln's most thoughtful ponderings1 the great world of reality that passes under the name of physics1 or the physical world1 seemed to lie outside the field of his concern4 ,here is a matter demanding something more than a bare allusion4 ,the ponderable universe of material things has impressive majesty4 ,it is too solid and real and present in our life to be ignored4 ,among the stars and beneath the hills and within the seas are solid and substantial verities4 ,we are environed by their influences on every side4 ,it is deep within their strong embrace that our predetermined fate is being continuously unrolled4 ,what can be the scope and what must be the value of any view of ethics or any plan of life in which this solid1 ever-present1 all-embracing material world is so indifferently esteemed8 ,it is with just this query in mind that this research into the mind of ,lincoln was first conceived4 ,and the query which has been throughout in immediate review1 but unpropounded openly as yet1 now demands to be defined and scrutinized4 ,did the mind of ,lincoln1 engrossed as it was upon interests supremely ethical1 and ignoring1 as it seemed to do1 all those vast and deep complexities of the purely physical world1 find for our unquiet human thought the true and perfect equilibrium8 ,or was the thought of ,lincoln unbalanced and incomplete1 misguided and inadequate essentially8 ,in brief1 how must ethics and physics1 these two and only two supreme realities1 when each is most fairly understood1 be conceived to correlate and harmonize8 ,as between these two realities1 each so imperial and so irreducible1 which holds primacy8 ,here is for any thoughtful mind well nigh the last interrogation4 ,to attain a competent reply the essential qualities of each and either realm must be uncovered and compared4 ,in physics here1 and in ethics there1 what attributes pervade1 abide1 and are essential8 ,and1 these true qualities being seen in each1 as between the two1 which proves itself superior2 in which does the soul of man find rest8 ,in the universe of physics1 in all the world of things men see and touch and weigh one pervading and abiding quality is change4 ,we speak indeed of the eternal hills2 and before their age-long steadfastness that phrase seems accurate4 ,but it is only soaring rhetoric1 surely sinking from its flight1 when sober science sets about to cipher from the distinct confessions of their very rocks the date of their birth1 the story of their growth1 and the sure predictions of their complete decay4 ,in all the stability of the solid hills there is nothing permanent4 ,so with the ageless stars4 ,so with the ever-flowing sea4 ,and so with the very elements of which hills and stars and sea are mixed4 ,all the story of all their genesis and journeying and vanishing is a never-ending tale of change4 ,nothing physical abides the same4 ,beneath the daring rays of present-day research all things are being proved impermanent1 all found verging over the infinite abyss4 ,transmutations are in progress everywhere4 ,in the soul of ,lincoln there was craving for a sort of satisfaction which nothing mutable could ever meet4 ,amid this pageantry of change1 among these ceaseless transformations1 with all their passing beauty1 and all their final disappointment1 there was in him a hungering after something that should hold eternally4 ,and within this very eagerness was genuine kinship with the changeless foothold in things eternal which it aspired to find4 ,his very longing was innerly undying4 ,his thirst for immortality was in itself averse and opposite to death essentially4 ,deep within his desire1 deep within himself were living verities1 within themselves immutable4 ,his admiration before ,god's majesty1 his free covenant with perfect loyalty1 his friendly kindliness towards all others like himself1 and his ,god-like sacrificial grief for all wrongdoing1 held within their pure vitality visions and passions and aspirations that no mortal darts could touch4 ,and when with clear discernment he freely chose to fill his soul with hopes and deeds that eternally evade decay1 he selected1 as between things that change and things that abide1 that reality to whose eternal primacy every passing day yields perfect demonstration4 ,nowhere in physics1 in ethics alone could be found the perfect solace of conscious perpetuity4 ,another quality of all things physical1 a quality likewise all-pervading and persistent1 is their want of spontaneity4 ,within the nature of this mighty physical bulk1 that is forever altering its garb and form1 and within all its flowing change there is no liberty4 ,through all the ever-varying orbit of the moon2 in all the marvelous wedlock of the elements within the rocks and soils and plants2 in all convulsions and explosions of air and sea and fluent gas2 in lightning1 fire1 and plague2 in all the age-long monotony of instinct1 habit1 and proclivity1 there is no conscious choice1 no character-worth1 no ennobling and terrifying responsibility4 ,through all this change of mortal things all things are fixed4 ,naught is nobly free4 ,in the soul of ,lincoln there was a passion to be free4 ,in this desire there was a clear intelligence1 and a purpose like to ,god's4 ,he coveted a dignity that was self-achieved4 ,he deemed that worth1 and that alone1 supreme that was his own creation4 ,only in deeds that he himself determined could he discern true excellence4 ,herein he stood apart from brutes1 ranked above the hills1 and pierced beyond the stars4 ,and when1 with such an insight1 and such a soaring wish1 and in such high dignity1 he freely chose to hold supreme the life and thought and joy that are truly free1 rating all things fixed and physical as forever far beneath1 he allotted certain primacy to that which he discreetly judged undoubtedly pre-eminent4 ,in closest consonance with what has last been said1 comes now to be affirmed1 a central quality of all things purely physical--persistent and pervading everywhere--their absolute inertia morally4 ,they move as they are moved1 and never otherwise4 ,the law by which their being is controlled is not their own4 ,at the last and evermore physics1 though the measureless arena of unmeasured active energy1 is powerless4 ,it cannot even obey4 ,but most demonstrably it can never command1 not even itself4 ,it is vastly1 deeply1 and forever only passive2 although within its ponderous frame are playing with baffling constancy forces that weary all too easily our most stalwart thought4 ,in such a realm as this1 forever unawakened and evermore unjudged1 ,lincoln's awakened and judicial soul could never find contentment4 ,within that manly heart was enthroned a conscience1 alert alike to receive and to originate1 as also to approve and fulfill all noble and ennobling obligations4 ,he knew the meaning and the sense of duty1 the weight of duty claimed1 and the worth of duty done4 ,in his true heart was a living spring of moral law4 ,and in cherishing with exalted satisfaction this imperial quality of all true moral life1 therein deciding that physics held nothing worthy of any comparison1 he gave kingly utterance to a judgment and decision and desire that could estimate infallibly the ultimate competitors within his conscious life for primacy4 ,for ever in ethics1 as never in physics1 right judgment finds its source4 ,yet another quality of physics1 likewise all-pervasive and permanent1 is the mocking1 paralyzing mystery in which all its certainties are veiled4 ,the mighty acquisitions to our certain knowledge in the realm of nature are superbly manifold and as superbly sure4 ,the swelling catalogue of things well certified in the material world seems to advance the modern scientific mind almost to genuine apotheosis4 ,but of all these stately certitudes there is not one but walks in darkness no human eye nor thought can penetrate4 ,before heroic and unexampled diligence and daring the scientific frontiers are receding everywhere2 but only to make still more amazing and unbearable their inscrutability4 ,on every horizon of the physical realm yawn infinitudes1 whether of space or time1 of geometry or arithmetic1 of electron or of cell1 so defiant1 so bewildering1 and so overwhelming in their complete defeat and mockery of our bravest and best intelligence that our proudest powers are palsied utterly4 ,whichever ways we turn1 whatever gains we win1 we face at last1 in the very eye of our research1 and in the very heart of our desire1 a changeless silence that mocks all hope1 and leaves us standing in an utter void4 ,in the realm of simple physics the human intellect1 despite the fact that in the physical realm the mind of man has triumphed gloriously1 is faced forever with the taunting consciousness that its primal task is still undone4 ,in an undertaking such as this1 and in such a hapless outcome1 the mind and life of ,lincoln could never be engrossed4 ,he was ever facing mystery indeed in the perplexities that throng the moral realm4 ,in fact1 in the darkness and confusion that enshroud and mystify the world of duty and award were all his sorrows born4 ,but in those mysteries moral honesty is not mocked4 ,where iniquities prevail1 the soul that bows towards ,god sees light4 ,where sin abounds1 the heart that yields the sacrifice of penitence finds peace4 ,in the face of hate and strife and bloodshed1 to banish malice and to cherish charity is to enter and to introduce complete tranquillity4 ,where lives grow coarse and souls are base and purity is all denied1 the soul that seeks refinement grows refined and consciously approaches ,god4 ,when ,god is mocked and scorners multiply and hearts grow hard in pride1 the heart that meekly1 humbly holds its confidence in the transcendent1 all-controlling ,deity opens in that lowly faith deep springs of never-failing hope4 ,in these mysteries1 however baffling and persistent1 these efforts towards relief find sure and great reward4 ,in such a field and in such endeavors it was ,lincoln's sovereign preference to measure out all the forces of his conscious life4 ,attent towards ,god1 benign towards men1 upright within1 and prizing life1 he found1 not defiance and despair1 but perennial quickening and encouragement1 whatever problems darkened round his life4 ,for him such soul-filling verities1 and such a corresponding faith held far-transcending primacy4 ,and so in conscious1 sovereign and everlasting preference for the truth that shows all its light in character1 and for the faith that such clear truth forever illuminates1 ,lincoln testified his confidence that in the face of physics ethics holds supreme pre-eminence4 ,of all this searching estimate and supreme comparison of these two divergent realms one's mind may gravely doubt whether ,lincoln's mind had perfect consciousness4 ,concerning this no one may speak1 except with hesitance4 ,but any one whose mind has entered into intimate partnership with all the wealth of ,lincoln's words is well aware that it was a habit of his mind to pursue its themes to their farthest bourne4 ,in penetration and in pondering not many minds were ever more evenly taxed4 ,his mental persistence and deliberation were almost preternatural4 ,discovering this1 a student of his mental ways will grow to feel that1 in a likelihood almost equivalent to full certainty1 ,lincoln was wittingly aware of all the meaning in his proclivity to rate ethical interests uppermost4 ,at any rate1 in his life and writings1 so the matter stands4 ,and standing thus in the deeply conscious soul of ,lincoln1 the matter has a high significance4 ,it seems to testify with a prophet's steady voice that in all the total realm of being1 the realm of freedom1 of consciousness1 and of character is the first and sovereign verity2 that the real is fundamentally ethical2 that he who seeks for perfect satisfaction must bring to his inquiry the glad allegiance of a moral freeman and a moral judge2 that in every undertaking becoming him as man each cardinal moral excellence must grow and shine increasingly2 that every mental acquisition must conduce to a lowliness that adores1 to a gentleness that loves1 to a purity that pledges immortality1 to a self-respect that is the mirror and original of all reality2 that only thus1 in all this universe1 and to all eternity1 can the soul of man gain triumphs that can satisfy4 ,only so will truth grow fully radiant1 and mystery become benign4 ,only so can finite man find peace before his ,maker1 and face serenely all that wisest unbelief finds terrible4 ,this is truth4 ,here is freedom4 ,such is faith4 ,thus1 in a freeman's faith truth stands complete4 ,such is ,lincoln's preference4 ,like another ,abraham1 and with a kindred insight and determination1 he won all his triumphs and renown by faith--a free and conscious faith in ,god1 and soul1 and character4 ,here are designations1 at once so plastic and so precise1 at once so simple and so profound1 as to signify and demonstrate how souls of men may conquer death2 how one may be a perfect devotee to another person's weal1 and still preserve his own integrity2 how perfect sanctity may assume a full companionship with sin1 whether by redemption or rebuke1 and still remain unflecked2 and how in man's humility may be enshrined a dignity wherein supernal majesty may be unveiled4 ,in some such vivid1 moral terms1 mobile to grasp and manifest the boundless range and priceless worth within the sovereign moral law2 as also to declare unerringly the fateful and unbounded issues of a moral choice1 may students hope to trace with true intelligence the real foundations of ,lincoln's all but unexampled power and fame4 ,,an ,,epilogue ,,addressed ,,to ,,theologians ,in designing and constructing the chapters that precede1 three motives have been actively at work4 ,there has been a desire to set within the realm of ,civics a clear and balanced exposition of ,lincoln's moral grandeur4 ,there has been a desire to introduce within the realm of ,ethics a fertile method of discussion and research4 ,there has been a desire to intimate how in the realm of pure ,religion the finished outline of a transparent character may provide a pattern for a true description of the problems of ,theology4 ,of these three motives the one last named has been preponderant4 ,lincoln's public life was keyed alike to moral honor and to faith in ,god4 ,in his most quickening aspirations and in his most sacrificial sorrows his sense of personal obligation and his belief in an over-ruling ,providence held fast together in a most notable unison4 ,guileless1 luminous1 and single-hearted in his rectitude and in his reverence1 he affords a signal illustration of the way in which faith and conscience may vitally co-operate and even coalesce4 ,he presents in consequence a signal opportunity for exploring the inner kinship of ethics and religion4 ,his personality challenges us to inquire and see how honesty and godliness consort2 how in a complete and balanced character the categories that define the basis of one's moral excellence may prove themselves to be the very categories that inform and underlie the religious life4 ,here opens an engaging investigation4 ,may the ultimate principles of a true ethical theory and the ultimate rationale of a true theology be found in living deed to coincide8 ,to bring this question into open view is the ulterior aim of this book1 and more particularly of this appended ,epilogue4 ,in the open petals of the plainest flower soil and sunlight1 earth and heaven meet in almost mystic union4 ,be this our parable4 ,in the ample compass of a normal character1 such as ,lincoln shows1 there is in very deed a mystic union--a vital partnership of man with fellowman1 and of men with ,god4 ,be this deep fellowship described2 for here commingle indivisibly the essential elements in any pure and full display in human life of morals and religion4 ,in ,lincoln's public life there was undeniably a close companionship with ,god4 ,earth-born and earth-environed though he was1 he had supreme affinity with heavenly realms4 ,his face was seamed with suffering2 he wore a humble mien2 his habitual posture was a pattern of unstudied modesty4 ,but through those sorrow-shadowed features shone a radiant exalted hope1 as he walked and toiled in reverend covenant with the sovereign ,god of ,nations4 ,besieged by day and night with difficulties and distresses such as rarely burden mortal men1 in his nightly vigils and in his daily labors he clung to ,deity1 true civilian and true man of ,god at once4 ,the terms of this high covenant were specific and distinct4 ,they were the very terms that defined the conscious qualities of his upright1 ,god-revering character4 ,be those qualities described4 ,in the first place1 here in ,lincoln's open character it becomes heavenly clear how profoundly intimate and at one are majesty and true humility4 ,when the guise of each is fully genuine1 they minutely correspond4 ,in ,lincoln's lowliness lay the very image of the majesty of ,god4 ,to that high majesty his lowliness conformed4 ,as in a mountain lake may be enshrined a perfect pattern of the heavenly firmament1 so was ,lincoln's reverence a conscious1 free reflection of the excellence of ,god4 ,his obedience was an intelligent recognition and re-enthronement of the sovereign law of ,god4 ,his lowly posture1 when in supplicating or interceding prayer1 was induced by the bending pity of a compassionate ,god4 ,that trusting appeal was the very echo of ,god's benign concern2 and within the wrestlings of those intense entreaties the divine designs gained place in human history4 ,lincoln in his lowliness was ,godlike4 ,his humility was supremely dignified1 supremely beautiful4 ,in its open face1 as in the face of a flower opening towards the sun1 was resident a heavenly glory4 ,in the second place1 this vital unison of man with ,god stands superbly evident in the stately wedlock of ,lincoln's honesty with ,god's righteousness4 ,in ,lincoln's soul there lived a faith in ,god's integrity which no dark storm of human faithlessness1 and no delay of heaven's righteous judgments could eclipse or wear away4 ,this belief was in him an active energy4 ,it grew to be a partnership with ,god's uprightness--a covenant in which his own soul's eagerest ambitions and resolves became upright4 ,in his inmost soul it was his inmost aspiration to be an agent for enthroning here on earth the equity of ,god4 ,and so1 in fact1 as a mighty nation's chief executive1 he did become the executive of the will of ,god4 ,in his transparent honesty there was a reflection of the sincerity of ,god4 ,in his firm constancy there was upheld before this people's eye an index finger pointing to the steadfast constancy of ,god4 ,in his pure jealousy for the utter sanctity of his plighted word there burned a fire that was kindled in the eye of ,god4 ,in all his even1 glowing zeal for righteousness he has been adjudged by all his fellowmen pre-eminently a man of ,god4 ,and as signal devotee to honesty he demonstrates most signally that ,god and man may set their lives in unison4 ,in the third place there was in ,lincoln's patient gentleness a profound resemblance to the all-enduring gentleness of ,god4 ,his mastery of malice and his universal charity in the face of multitudes of bitter and malignant men attest eternally an intimate companionship with divine forbearing grace4 ,his sacrificial intervention on behalf of all ,god's little ones whom human heartlessness had oppressed is world-arresting evidence and demonstration that in his kindly heart was throned the ,heavenly ,father's sympathy4 ,unto costly fellowship with this divine forbearance and compassion ,lincoln opened unreservedly all the compass of his life4 ,for afflicted and afflicting men he felt a sorrow1 mixed with pity and rebuke1 both born of the affection fathers feel1 both proved sincere by years of sacrificial anguish unto death4 ,and this he did with a discerning and deliberate mind4 ,it was thus he understood the heart and ways of ,god2 and thus by clear design he undertook in his own life to recommend the ways of ,god to men4 ,in verity he was partaker and dispenser of the manifold grace of ,god4 ,in him the mighty love of ,god found living medium4 ,like a gentle flower drinking gratefully the warmth and beauty flowing towards it from the sun1 his soul absorbed the gentle ways of ,god and itself grew kind and beautiful4 ,here again it may be seen how intimate may be the life of man in ,god1 the life of ,god in man4 ,in the fourth place there was in ,lincoln's soul an all-prevailing confidence touching future destiny4 ,this living confidence was the outcome of his close partnership with ,god4 ,his faith believed that ,god's designs held fast eternally1 and that conviction clouds and night and death were impotent to overshadow or obscure4 ,the rather1 as his faith and hope confided in that unfailing verity1 that faith and hope became themselves unfailing4 ,his sure belief became participant in ,god's dependability4 ,here is the deepest secret of his abiding steadiness4 ,hence his calm indifference to death4 ,and this illumines all his great appeals to his fellowmen with the light of a prophetic vision4 ,for his fellow-citizens1 as for himself1 his sovereign aspiration was after permanence4 ,this abiding life1 whether in the ,nation or in himself1 he had the mind to comprehend1 must be the very life of ,god within the soul4 ,in civic ,godliness alone could there be civic permanence4 ,in the ,nation's life the life of ,god must be incorporate4 ,then and then alone would any ,nation long endure4 ,for this bright civic hope1 for this alone he lived4 ,and this ever-springing hopefulness and confidence is the shining efflorescence of his ,godliness4 ,he clung to things eternal in a conscious league with ,god4 ,here is something wonderful--something replete alike with mystery and with certitude--a vital unison of ,god and man in undeniable verity--a unison in righteousness and kindliness1 in lowly and majestic dignity1 in immortal spirit purity--a unison in which all that is most sacredly elemental in ,god and man most intimately coalesce1 while yet remaining most unmistakably distinct--a unison in which is freely and consciously engaged all that personality1 however self-discerning and free1 can ever contribute or contain--a unison as historically real as it is immeasurably profound--a unison in which space and time provide the theater1 while yet a unison in which time and space dissolve4 ,here is surely ample range for ample exposition of many a major problem in theology1 and all within the open and familiar bounds of a normal moral life4 ,in close alliance and affinity with ,lincoln's vital partnership with ,god1 and of almost equal pregnancy for the problems of religious thought1 is the marvelous intimacy of his inner and essential fellowship with men4 ,this feature of his public life is becoming more commanding and impressive every year4 ,to a degree altogether notable it is becoming widely understood how he and all his fellowmen were wonderfully allied4 ,it is becoming seen by all of us that the qualities essential to his commanding excellence are qualities deeply typical of us all4 ,his attitudes of deference and modesty1 his promptings towards things permanent and durable1 his equities1 his kindnesses are universal4 ,they are enthroned within us all4 ,everywhere1 in everyone they ultimately predominate4 ,wonderful as it may seem1 this holds as true of enemies as it does of friends4 ,hosts of people1 while ,lincoln lived1 held him their deadliest foe4 ,through all those bitter years1 while they defamed1 he meekly1 mightily held his own1 subduing malice1 disdaining subtlety1 despising scorn and arrogance1 abhorring sordid greed2 pleading humbly1 but as a prince instead1 for righteousness and charity and man's immortal destiny4 ,and now all men detect that however deep and overmastering those aversions and animosities may have been1 there was in his enemies and himself a moral kinship and agreement far more powerful and profound4 ,his humble1 hopeful plea that every man be fair and pitiful is winning everywhere today glad witness to its eternal and imperial validity4 ,and the wonder of this deep partnership with men but deepens1 when we consider that the form of this all-appealing1 all-prevailing partnership was sacrificial4 ,this leads straight into the innermost interior of the problem of vicarious suffering--one mortal1 suffering in another's place and for another's sake4 ,never in all that era of civic anguish in the civil war did any human mortal suffer keener or more continual sorrow than did he who of all the ,nation's multitudes stood most untainted and innocent of the iniquity which that stern civic judgment was to purge away4 ,guiltless utterly of any part in slavery for his own profit or by his own consent1 he partook with all the guilty ones of all the sorrows of its expurgation4 ,and yet more wonderful is the sequent fact that in precisely this voluntary and conscious unison of innocence and suffering in his outstanding life stood and moved the pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud that led this ,nation through those sorrows by night and day4 ,here again is something wonderful--something again replete with mystery and with certitude4 ,and here again do mystery and certitude stand truly unified and harmonized4 ,truly they are unified4 ,but in that unison their identity stands clarified4 ,there where ,lincoln's manhood shows most humane and universal1 a ,nation's common symbol1 outlining nothing less than a puissant ,nation's boundless majesty1 there stands defined1 as with engraver's finished art1 his separate1 ever sacred1 individual nobility4 ,even there where his moral being merges most completely into deepest sympathy with the afflictions that descend on sin1 there his own integrity and personal jealousy for righteousness are most outstanding and distinct4 ,but be it said again1 in ,lincoln do that broad humaneness and that erect nobility1 that sympathy and that jealousy subsist in unison4 ,in strict verity he is our ,nation's surrogate4 ,surely here again is ample range for ample exposition of many a major problem of theology1 and all still held within the open and familiar bounds of a normal moral life4 ,so ,lincoln stood in unison with ,god and fellowman4 ,ideally complete in his own identity1 he was ideally allied with other lives through all the personal realm4 ,and be it well and truly seen that the elements of this affiance with his ,god1 and the elements of his firm league with brothermen were identically the same4 ,in each and either realm the binding bonds were fealty to charity1 to equity1 to humility1 to purity4 ,these four qualities explain and guarantee completely his allegiance4 ,these and these alone were the constituent elements of all his brotherhood and of all his reverence4 ,and it is within the nature of these four vital qualities1 at once so ,godlike and so human1 and within their ever-living interplay that one must look to find whatever ,lincoln's character can contribute to the problems of theology4 ,what averments tremble here6 ,our mighty human race does truly live in unison4 ,within that peopled unison the life of one may have far-ranging partnership4 ,that partnership is closely definable in terms of character4 ,in ,lincoln's life as private soul1 and as vicar of us all alike1 his constancy and kindliness1 his purity and lowliness embrace and body forth his total being1 with all he bore and wrought4 ,herein unfolded all his beauty and all his worth1 whether as a single citizen or as a ,nation's representative4 ,and our humble human life does also truly share the life in ,god4 ,within that heavenly unison the lowliest soul may have exalted fellowship4 ,and so in ,lincoln's loyalty and tenderness1 his lowliness and thirst for immortality1 as man of ,god1 unfolds the heavenly beauty of ,god's eternal purity and majesty1 ,god's benignity and faithfulness4 ,so do lives of free and conscious beings most truly flourish and so do they most truly blend4 ,our fellowship with ,lincoln1 and ,lincoln's fellowship with us2 ,god's fellowship with ,lincoln and ,lincoln's fellowship with ,god2 this mystic unrestricted partnership of noble souls2 unfolding and unrolling sovereign harmonies1 even when they antagonize2 in vengeance or compassion fulfilling all their mission and dominion through the earth--these are indeed our sovereign realities4 ,in scanning these we may indeed discern deep ways of ,god and men4 ,mighty highways open here--highways that enter every major province of theology4 ,be these avenues observed4 ,whence came the blight of slavery8 ,how in human soil could such inhumanity germinate8 ,what is the virus of its contagion8 ,what makes its guilt so terrible8 ,must inhumanity be avenged8 ,may avengers still be merciful8 ,may hardened men become regenerate8 ,may guilt and innocence be reconciled8 ,why such anguish on the innocent8 ,why should little ones be crushed8 ,why such hosts of patient ones meekly bearing wrong and shame8 ,why do offenses need to come8 ,how does patience work on sin8 ,how does sorrow work on guilt8 ,what is human brotherhood8 ,may fellowmen be surrogates8 ,may men's honor interchange8 ,wherein stands human character8 ,what makes a man responsible8 ,how sovereign is man's liberty8 ,how supreme is man's intelligence8 ,are moral beings subject to decay8 ,may finite man come near to ,god8 ,does ,god come near to finite man8 ,may plans of men and ,god's designs combine8 ,may ,god be seen in human life8 ,may human hearts partake of ,god8 ,are love and truth and liberty1 the crown of human dignity1 enthroned in ,god ideally8 ,is ,christ indeed the ,lord of men8 ,is he our life8 ,are his teachings true8 ,is his love divine8 ,can he indeed redeem8 ,upon such queryings as these1 all running deeply into mystery1 each one fast rooted in reality1 and each one voicing in each human soul an urgent quest1 those sterling elements of ,lincoln's character1 his lowliness1 his living hope1 his pity1 and his faithfulness shed grateful light4 ,be these four qualities unveiled before the face of sin1 that sin may be defined4 ,when in the presence of some noble majesty or of some courtly modesty a free and conscious soul is arrogant or insolent2 when a being born for endless life in freedom1 light and purity1 exchanges ,god and immortality for idol forms and baseness and decay2 when recipients of ,god's unnumbered benefits1 and participants in the joys and sorrows of a teeming world of brothermen remain ungrateful and unpitiful2 when beings destined to be sons of light prefer hypocrisy and unbelief2 then1 irreverent1 corrupt1 ungracious1 and untrue1 sin shows all its horridness and iniquity4 ,and when in the presence of pure grace and truth all such perverseness stands revealed2 then the beauty of a quiet modesty1 as it respects all worthy majesty1 will make supremely plain the ugliness of every form of insolence2 then the life that opens towards perpetual dawn will most mightily and forevermore reproach the life that feasts upon corroding food1 fattening and hardening towards decay2 then outpouring1 patient love will visit on ingratitude and hate their most unbearable rebuke2 and then the radiant light of simple truth and pure sincerity will set all falsity and unbelief in uttermost disgrace4 ,in such an awful penalty1 supreme and unavoidable1 will sin incur its doom4 ,but in the very penalty it stands proclaimed how sinful souls may be transformed1 and hostile hearts be reconciled4 ,when pride1 subdued by majesty1 rejoices in humility2 when grossness1 shamed by purity1 welcomes purging fires2 when malice1 melted by forbearance1 partakes the sacrifice and becomes itself compassionate2 when falsity1 unveiled by verity1 submits to its rebuke and welcomes truth with deep docility and faith2 then within the sinner's penitence is every penalty absolved1 and between embittered souls comes perfect reconciliation4 ,be these four qualities addressed to that supreme transaction named atonement4 ,when1 in perfect loyalty and in perfect lowliness1 with a perfect charity and with an utter trust in immortality1 one like a ,son of ,man consents to bear the dark affront of insolence and perfidy from base and deadly men1 enduring meekly what his soul abhors1 then to all the sons of men is published equally1 and with supreme assurance1 that sins of men must be indeed avenged1 and that sinful men may be indeed redeemed4 ,in that transaction malice faces patience1 and patience faces malice for a final strife4 ,there candor bears the lying taunt of acting in disguise4 ,humility endures the shameful charge of shameless arrogance4 ,compassion bows as though a thief to all the brutal rudeness of a mob4 ,the soul of immortal purity is bartered for by traders greedy after silver coins1 and driving through their trade with lamps and clubs4 ,but in the measure and in the manner of that transcendent patience malice is preparing for itself the manner and the measure of its own just doom4 ,and in the measure and the manner of that same transcendent patience contrition may discern the manner and the measure of its release4 ,in that mighty mingling of aversion and endurance sin must behold alike its omnipotent redemption and its omnipotent rebuke4 ,thus love1 in perfect sympathy1 and truth1 in perfect equity set forth in heavenly purity the sovereign majesty of an atonement for the world4 ,be these four radiant qualities applied to him we call alike the son of ,mary and the ,son of ,god4 ,in him1 the ,son of ,god1 shines such a plenitude of grace and truth as becomes the glory of the very ,god1 revealed in such immortal purity as proves him heir and very ,lord of all eternity1 and wearing such a dignity as belongs at once to heaven's majesty and our most genuine humility2 while deep within his open life as son of ,mary there shines such a full and genial truth and grace as proves his true humanity1 so free from mortal taint through all our transient scenes as proves his spirit's immortality1 and manifesting everywhere to all the sons of man their own ideal lowliness4 ,these are all his beauty4 ,in him they fully blend4 ,they blend in him indeed4 ,but they do not dissolve4 ,and so may we with souls akin to him whom ,mary bore behold in him the proper image of our complete humanity2 and still with eyes and vision all unchanged1 behold within those same fair traits the very image and the unbounded fulness of the glory of the infinite ,god4 ,be these same radiant qualities our proper medium for beholding ,deity4 ,conceive of ,one in whose being the only light and glory reside in the pure majesty of a perfect grace and truth4 ,conceive how these free living qualities permit a unison in fellowship1 a fellowship in unison4 ,conceive how such a unison permits to each participant complete equality and a full infinity4 ,conceive thus how perfect constancy and perfect kindliness1 revealed in perfect purity1 and clad in perfect majesty may manifest eternally in mystic unison the blessedness of a perfect personality4 ,conceive how such a partnership in unison1 and unison in partnership will be evermore containing and enjoying within itself an evermore unsullied ,spirit life1 engendering and completing all the finite forms of being of the created universe2 an evermore unfolding ,love that is the one original of every fatherhood in heaven and earth2 and an evermore ,responding ,love that is the primal inspiration of the admiring and adoring thankfulness of every child of ,god2 while evermore displaying in a loyal self-respect the eternal archetype and origin of every verity and every equity enthroned in any earnest upright mind4 ,and so conceive in terms as vivid as our own intelligence and liberty how true transcendent ,deity may wield no other energy and know no other blessedness than unfolds forever in a free and conscious unison and partnership in pure transcendent love and truth4 ,transcendent thoughts and ventures these4 ,but abounding other thoughts and ventures no less transcendent wait and urge for utterance4 ,they all assume no less1 and nothing more1 than that in the living vision of a living personality hides and shines the harmony that may unite the mysteries and the certainties of this universe4 ,let ,truth1 as personal self-respect2 and ,love1 as self-devoting life2 and ,purity1 that fears no death2 and ,dignity1 that crowns all worth--let these be clearly seen1 each one apart2 and clearly seen again when fully unified--and human thought holds categories in hand whereby the problems of our mental and ethical and religious life may be resolved4 ,of all of this what goes before is but a brief and bare suggestive hint4 ,its development and vindication call for the completed exposition of such a balanced round of thought as may be found in a prophet like ,isaiah1 an apostle like ,paul1 or an evangelist like ,john4 ,,lincoln',s ,,second ,,inaugural ,fellow-,countrymen3 ,at this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office1 there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first4 ,then a statement1 somewhat in detail1 of a course to be pursued1 seemed fitting and proper4 ,now1 at the expiration of four years1 during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the ,nation1 little that is new could be presented4 ,the progress of our arms1 upon which all else chiefly depends1 is as well known to the public as to myself2 and it is1 ,i trust1 reasonably satisfactory4 ,with high hope for the future1 no prediction in regard to it is ventured4 ,on the occasion corresponding to this four years ago1 all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war4 ,all dreaded it--all sought to avert it4 ,while the inaugural address was being delivered from this place1 devoted altogether to saving the ,union without war1 insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war--seeking to dissolve the ,union1 and divide effects1 by negotiation4 ,both parties deprecated war2 but one of them would make war rather than let the ,nation survive2 and the other would accept war rather than let it perish4 ,and the war came4 ,one-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves1 not distributed generally over the ,union1 but localized in the southern part of it4 ,these slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest4 ,all knew that this interest was1 somehow1 the cause of the war4 ,to strengthen1 perpetuate1 and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the ,union1 even by war2 while the ,government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it4 ,neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained4 ,neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with1 or even before1 the conflict itself should cease4 ,each looked for an easier triumph1 and a result less fundamental and astounding4 ,both read the same ,bible1 and pray to the same ,god2 and each invokes ,his aid against the other4 ,it may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just ,god's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces2 but let us judge not1 that we be not judged4 ,the prayers of both could not be answered--that of neither has been answered fully4 ,the ,almighty has ,his own purposes4 ,woe unto the world because of offenses6 for it must needs be that offenses come2 but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh4 ,if we shall suppose that ,american slavery is one of those offenses which1 in the ,providence of ,god1 must needs come1 but which1 having continued through ,his appointed time1 ,he now wills to remove1 and that ,he gives to both ,north and ,south this terrible war1 as the woe due to those by whom the offense came1 shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living ,god always ascribe to ,him8 ,fondly do we hope--fervently do we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away4 ,yet1 if ,god wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk1 and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword1 as was said three thousand years ago1 so still it must be said1 ,the judgments of the ,lord are true and righteous altogether4 ,with malice toward none2 with charity for all2 with firmness in the right1 as ,god gives us to see the right1 let us strive on to finish the work we are in2 to bind up the ,nation's wounds2 to care for him who shall have borne the battle1 and for his widow1 and his orphan--to do all which may achieve a just and lasting peace among ourselves1 and with all ,nations4 ,transcriber's ,notes3 ,inconsistent_/archaic spelling and punctuation retained from original4