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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Abraham Lincoln's Religion + +Author: Madison Clinton Peters + +Release Date: September 1, 2011 [EBook #37287] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S RELIGION *** + + + + +Produced by Roberta Staehlin, Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive/American +Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/tp.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h1>ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S RELIGION</h1> + +<h2>MADISON C. PETERS</h2> + +<h3><i>Author of "Justice to the Jew," etc., etc.</i></h3> + + +<p class="center">BOSTON<br /> +RICHARD G. BADGER<br /> +The Gorham Press<br /> +1909</p> + +<p class="center"><i>Copyright, 1909, by Richard G. Badger</i></p> + +<p class="center"><i>All rights reserved</i></p> + +<p class="center"><i>The Gorham Press Boston, U S A</i></p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table width="50%"> + +<tr><td align="right">I. </td><td><a href="#LINCOLN_THE_MAN">Lincoln the Man </a></td><td align="right">1</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">II. </td><td><a href="#WAS_ABRAHAM_LINCOLN_A_CHRISTIAN">Was Abraham Lincoln a Christian </a></td><td align="right">15</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">III. </td><td><a href="#WHY_DID_LINCOLN_NEVER_JOIN_A_CHURCH">Why did Lincoln Never Join the Church </a></td><td align="right">39</td></tr> +</table> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LINCOLN_THE_MAN" id="LINCOLN_THE_MAN"></a>LINCOLN THE MAN</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Thou, too, sail on O Ship of State!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Sail on, O Union, strong and great!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Humanity with all its fears,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>With all its hopes of future years,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Is hanging breathless on thy fate!</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>We know what Master laid thy keel,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>What Workman wrought thy ribs of steel,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Who made each mast and sail and rope,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>What anvils rang, what hammers beat,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>In what a forge and what a heat</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Were shaped the anchors of thy hope!</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Fear not each sudden sound and shock:</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>'Tis the wave, and not the rock,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>'Tis but the flapping of the sail,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>And not a rent made by the gale!</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>In spite of rock and tempest's roar,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>In spite of false lights on the shore,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Our faith triumphant o'er our fears,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Are all with thee</i>—are all with thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8"><i>Henry Wadsworth Longfellow</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>LINCOLN THE MAN</h3> + + +<p>The name of Abraham Lincoln is imperishable, immortal; can never fade +from the pages of history or grow dim with the lapse of time.</p> + +<p>Had this lowly born Kentucky boy been ushered into the world centuries +ago in England, doubtless he would have become the father of a royal +family, the founder of a kingly dynasty, the pioneer of a courtly line +whose proudest boast would be to acclaim him their progenitor.</p> + +<p>Fortunately he belongs to modern time and sprang from the loins of a +democratic race in a young and democratic country, around whose virgin +brow he twined the garlands of a never-fading luster.</p> + +<p>His fame is America's, but his glory belongs to the world, and humanity +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span>is proud to honor him as one of the noblest among the sons of men.</p> + +<p>He founded no royal house to perpetuate his name on its escutcheon, yet +no Caliph or Conqueror, no Emperor or Excellency, no Master or Monarch, +no Prince or Potentate, no Prelate or Pontiff, no Saladin or Sultan has +left behind a name so dear to the hearts of posterity as that of this +plain man of the people, this champion of human rights, this friend of +the down-trodden and oppressed, whose heart went out in sympathy and +love to all mankind, irrespective of race or religion.</p> + +<p>No character in American history or, perhaps, in the world's history +stands out so clearly silhouetted against the background of time as +Lincoln; none so free from defect or flaw, with no irregularities to mar +its outlines, no inequalities to detract from its perfect formation; its +every curve and section a symmetry of proportion.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p> + +<p>Born, February 12, 1809, as lowly as Jesus of Nazareth, in a one-room, +shackling Kentucky cabin, the child of a poverty-stricken man, whom +misfortune had seemingly chosen for her own, and whose ambitions were +blighted and hopes almost dead, he conquered every environment of an +untoward fate, burst every link that bound him to the misery of his +surroundings, and came forth in invincible majesty to write his name in +letters of adamant on the walls of Fame.</p> + +<p>Reared in gripping, grinding, pinching penury and pallid poverty, amid +the most squalid destitution possible to conceive, successively a +choreboy, common laborer, rail-splitter, river pilot, and country +storekeeper, he made his way through trials and difficulties that would +have overwhelmed the bravest spirit; broke down every barrier, turned +all obstacles into stepping-stones to progress, until he entered the +arena of public life as a lawyer, commanding the confidence and respect<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> +of all who knew him and the terrible odds he had to fight against to win +out in the battle of life.</p> + +<p>Practically an unknown man when nominated for the Presidency, his +election due to factional strife among his opponents, the people of +America when approaching the greatest crisis in their history, turned as +if by chance, and Providence that chance did guide, to this +comparatively obscure man of the prairies, and with one bound he took +his place with the world's greatest statesmen, the leader of his party, +the real ruler of a mighty nation.</p> + +<p>Led as it were by an Unseen Hand to the front, he solved problems that +staggered the wisest minds of the nation, directed military campaigns, +and conducted diplomatic relations with such skill as to astonish the +most astute statesmen, cabinet ministers, and army generals. The +rail-splitter of the Sangamon had become at the supreme moment the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> man +of destiny to whom the nation looked in the most crucial period it had +yet encountered.</p> + +<p>Such a man is not an accident,—he is more than a circumstance. He is +sent upon a mission and bears his credentials from a Higher Power than +that of earth,—there is a purpose and a plan in his existence, the +latter is mapped out, the former must be fulfilled.</p> + +<p>In view of the fact that Lincoln had barely a year's schooling, where +and how did he acquire his profound wisdom and his depth of knowledge?</p> + +<p>That he was a God-ordained man, raised up to accomplish a divine design, +few, who have closely studied the character and work of the man, will +gainsay.</p> + +<p>As the early prophets were inspired by God to utter golden words of +divine wisdom, so Lincoln was inspired from the same source to speak, +and act in conformity to divine intention. The keynote of this idea is +forcibly struck by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> Henry Watterson, when he writes: "And a thousand +years hence, no tragedy, no drama, no epic poem will be filled with +greater wonder, or be followed by mankind with deeper feelings, than +that which tells the story of his life and death."</p> + +<p>Lincoln was a Providential man,—of that there can be little question, +but every man has it in his power to be Providential also, though not in +the same way, by being the deliverer of a race and the saviour of a +nation, but by living up to the promptings of his better nature and +seizing the opportunities God sends his way. Any man can thus be +Providential in the full length and breadth and sweep of his life.</p> + +<p>Next to Washington, Lincoln stands out the most colossal figure in +American history, and is pre-eminent to Washington in the affection with +which his memory is enshrined in the hearts of his countrymen; though +Washington, as the Father<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> of his Country, must always be given the more +exalted place.</p> + +<p>Washington gave us a country; Lincoln preserved it; Washington wrote the +first page of our history; Lincoln was called upon to write another, and +at a period which covers the most momentous crisis the country had +witnessed since Liberty Bell proclaimed the birth of a separate and +independent nation. He wrote the page and he kept it clean, though to do +so he had to wash it in rivers of human blood, the warm heart's blood +too of the countrymen he loved, but he would have willingly washed it in +his own also, had the sacrifice been necessary. Alas! Lincoln's blood +was shed in the end, not on the altar of his country, but by the hand of +an assassin; not for the glory of the flag, but for the sorrow of the +nation.</p> + +<p>More, perhaps, has been written concerning the illustrious martyr +President than of any other national character, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> nearly all of this +writing has been eulogy approaching almost to deification. We have +enshrined Lincoln in a Pantheon of Glory, all by himself, for the praise +and emulation of future ages, just as we have placed Benedict Arnold and +Aaron Burr in a Pillory of Shame to be held up for the scorn, +execration, and anathema of all time.</p> + +<p>The beatification of Lincoln, especially by Northerners, is due, in a +great measure, to his devotion and loyalty to the cause of the Union. +The issue of the war was to amalgamate the contending parties into a +unified whole under one flag, but Lincoln was not to see the full +fruition of his mighty work, the final triumph of his policy. The hand +of the assassin fell upon him just at the very zenith of his fame, the +meridian of his greatness, a time when public sentiment was at the +boiling-point. He had struck the shackles from the limbs of four +millions of people, brought order out of chaos, planted the banners of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +victory on the broken ramparts of defeat, and had done it in such a way +that the vanquished almost fancied themselves the conquerors, and +willingly, proudly, saluted the flag of a cemented Fatherland.</p> + +<p>He had brought together the warring elements into a splendid and +invincible Union; he had become the idol of his people as Washington had +once been; he had been hailed as the Messiah of the slave and the +Saviour of the oppressed, and then, in a moment, his great light was +extinguished in the gloom and darkness of universal sorrow. With all +that he had accomplished, nevertheless, he went down to the grave, like +another Columbus, unconscious of the great work he had consummated.</p> + +<p>His Emancipation Proclamation not only melted the manacles of the slaves +by its electric touch, but it freed the whole nation from the bondage of +years. Free speech had been suppressed, men dared not utter their +convictions, the pulpit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> had been overawed, the press had been shackled, +we were being reproached by the nations of the earth for violating the +first principles of freedom by holding men in bondage. Europe was in +transports of laughter at a country proclaiming human liberty, while +clinging to all the traditions of slavery, and her risible faculties +were really excusable in face of such a paradox. Lincoln keenly felt the +sneers and taunts, and in the indignation of his mighty manhood he arose +and freed the nation from its incubus of shame. He made its soil too hot +for the feet of slaves; he unshackled the pulpit; he unmuzzled the +press; he removed the dark blots from the national honor, and united and +free he placed his country greatest among the nations of the earth.</p> + +<p>The immortal Proclamation linked his name with the rights of man, the +cause of personal liberty, and the progress of humanity. This is why +Lincoln is enthroned on so high a pedestal; this is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> why the great War +President is enshrined in the heart of hearts of his countrymen.</p> + +<p>Some are of the opinion, that had the illustrious Tribune been spared, +his plans of Reconstruction would have antagonized the best men of his +party, and instead of coming down to posterity as the most revered and +popular President, after Washington, he would have left his name in our +annals as probably that of the most unpopular Executive we have had. But +such surmise is a piece of far-fetched anticipation very remotely +removed from the boundary of probability. Lincoln would not have +antagonized, he would have converted and brought men to the same +viewpoint as himself.</p> + +<p>As it is, he towers so majestically above our horizon, that in his great +and commanding national role, we are apt to quite forget his character +as an individual, his personality as a man and what it represented in +the domain of private life.</p> + +<p>That Lincoln was a man of strong<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> character and tenacious purpose, +rather than brilliant and intellectual, is a point conceded by all who +have studied him in the calm of impartiality and in no sense indulged in +hero worship. Despite the claim of his divine mission, his greatness was +service in loyalty to an ideal and it was subordination of the personal +self to his ideals rather than any extraordinary gifts with which nature +had endowed him, which gives glory to him and the men who stood with +him.</p> + +<p>He has been contrasted with Napoleon, whose star was just sinking below +the horizon as his was ascending above it, but it is rather invidious to +contrast two so widely divergent actors on the stage of fame. The +difference between them is the difference between the iron heel and the +helping hand, between tyranny and freedom, between a man living for self +and glory, and a man living for the broadest kind of cosmopolitanism and +the widest type of humanitarianism.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> + +<p>Lincoln's whole career is a manifestation of his absolute integrity of +purpose, of his fearless honesty in all things, of his considerate +feeling for others, of his profound respect for conscience, and his +reverential fear of God.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="WAS_ABRAHAM_LINCOLN_A_CHRISTIAN" id="WAS_ABRAHAM_LINCOLN_A_CHRISTIAN"></a>WAS ABRAHAM LINCOLN A CHRISTIAN?</h2> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>God give us men! A time like this demands</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Clean minds, pure hearts, true faith, and ready hands.</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who possess opinions and a will;</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men whom desire for office does not kill;</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy;</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who have honor; men who will not lie;</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Tall men; sun-crowned men; men who will live above the fog</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>In public duty and in private thinking;</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who can stand before a demagogue</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>And denounce his treacherous flatteries, and without winking.</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>For a while base tricksters with their wornout creeds,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Their large professions, and their little deeds,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Wrangle in selfish strife, lo! Freedom weeps,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Wrong rules the land and waiting Justice sleeps.</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">—<i>J. G. Holland</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>WAS ABRAHAM LINCOLN A CHRISTIAN?</h3> + + +<p>In regard to his religious views, Lincoln was always exceedingly +reticent, but this reserve gives but greater force to the striking proof +of the deep faith professed in his proclamations and public addresses, +and that his life was actuated by high religious principles. He was too +broad, too big brained, to care for doctrinal beliefs or sectarian +differences.</p> + +<p>His mother and father were Free-Will Baptists in Kentucky. In Indiana +they became members of what was then known as the Predestinarian church, +not from any change in belief, but because it was the only denomination +in the neighborhood. When Thomas Lincoln removed to Illinois he united +with the Christian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> church, commonly known as "Campbellites," and in +that faith he died.</p> + +<p>In his early days Lincoln had little opportunity for the practice of +religion, and his parents, though religious enough in themselves, as has +just been pointed out, took little trouble to inculcate its precepts on +his youthful mind. The charge has been brought against him that he was +an agnostic, but this arose from the fact that when a young man at +Salem, in 1834, he prepared a review of Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason" +and Volney's "Ruins of Empires," with a view to reading it before a +literary society that had been organized in the neighborhood. A friend +of his—Sam Hill—burned the manuscript, which made the young man very +indignant, as he had spent much time in its preparation. He had, to an +extent, indorsed the views of these deistic writers, and their works had +made a deep impression on him, but he came to realize their specious +sophistries at their true<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> value and turned away from them with feelings +of strong aversion, so that he thanked Sam Hill for the service he had +done him in destroying the manuscripts of approval and thus turning his +thoughts in the right direction which led him to see the evils of +infidel teachings.</p> + +<p>He never was an unbeliever, and as he advanced in years his religious +conceptions deepened and his faith and reliance on the Divine Power +strengthened with time.</p> + +<p>In common with those reared under similar circumstances in rural +localities he was highly superstitious, and this superstition he was +never able to shake off in after life, though to offset it and +counteract the morbid influence it exerted over him he had recourse to +humor and tried to look on the bright side of everything, often on the +ludicrous side, and gave such free rein to his inclination in this +direction that he gained for himself something of the reputation of a +humorist<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> and wag, but in reality his love for jesting and telling +humorous stories came to him as a second nature, an inheritance from his +father, who was renowned in his section for droll sayings, funny +anecdotes, and striking illustrations.</p> + +<p>He was also somewhat interested in spiritualism, but as the occult art +of communicating with the denizens of the unseen world had not attained +such a degree of perfection in his day as in ours, his opportunity for +investigation was limited to a few seances given by peripatetic mediums, +which, however, instead of increasing his faith in intercommunication +with the <i>manes</i> of the departed, only excited his disgust for the +fakirs who laid claim to the power of summoning spirits to mortal +presence.</p> + +<p>All his life Lincoln was a man who thought for himself; he would not +allow the opinions of others to obtrude themselves on him, he +investigated for himself, and his intellectual honesty would not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> permit +him to make pretense to faith or simulate what he did not feel.</p> + +<p>Some writers would have us believe that he was not a Christian at all, +in fact, was an out and out infidel of the stripe of Voltaire and Paine; +but we have seen what gave rise to this misconception of his character +and caused it to gain circulation. The works of Paine and Volney were +the only books of an infidel tendency that he ever read, and when he saw +his error he tried to disabuse his mind of their teachings as quickly as +possible.</p> + +<p>To get at a right consideration of his religious beliefs, we must go +back to those early days in the life of the future statesman after the +family had removed from Kentucky to Indiana. It was a wild place in +which his boyhood was spent; the primeval American wood which was only +beginning to hear the voice of a crude civilization, and had not, as +yet, heard the sound of a church bell. There were no places of worship; +there were no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> schools or even stores or shops; in truth, so isolated +and primitive was the location of the Lincoln camp that the necessities +of life were many miles removed from it.</p> + +<p>His father, Thomas Lincoln, though a good man in a general way, was but +an indifferent parent, and consequently a poor guide or mentor for the +youth. The poor man had received many hard knocks from the iron hand of +misfortune and had become almost wholly disheartened, which led to +carelessness and thriftlessness, and besides, he was illiterate and +unpolished. It could not be expected that a man thus handicapped himself +could give his boy good training, either morally or intellectually. The +mother, too, had been ground down by poverty to such a degree as to lose +almost all interest in life; her burden soon became too heavy to bear, +and she had to lay it down before coming to the middle milestone of +life. It is not to be wondered that, under such circumstances and amid +such surroundings, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> boy Abraham grew up after the manner of a wild, +strong weed, following the bent of his own rugged nature.</p> + +<p>It was a dark time and the Lincolns were in dark struggles. Their abode +at first was a rude hut, a mere shed of rough poles, open to the suns of +summer and the snows of winter. Even when a cabin was at length erected, +there were neither doors nor windows in it. The beds were composed of +dried leaves and their coverings of the skins of wild animals. Food was +scarce and of the coarsest kind and had to be brought from a long +distance. In after years Lincoln never cared to refer to this period in +his career.</p> + +<p>In 1818, when Abraham was nine years old, his mother died and was buried +in a cleared space a little beyond the cabin, without any religious +ceremonies or observances whatever. However, there was a service held +over the grave some months afterwards by an itinerant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> preacher who came +at the request of young Abraham. The prayers that Parson Elkin said +above the mound of Nancy Hanks were the first public prayers to which +Abraham Lincoln listened.</p> + +<p>After a time Thomas Lincoln went back to Kentucky, and shortly returned +with a new wife, Sally Bush Johnson, widow of the jailer of Hardin +County. She had three children, and these, with the Lincoln household, +which included two Hanks boys, kin of the late Mrs. Lincoln, formed a +somewhat heterogeneous family.</p> + +<p>They were, however, extremely domestic and tenderly attached to one +another, which is very seldom the case in mixed households, but they +were all of the same class, born and reared under similar circumstances.</p> + +<p>The two branches even united in religion and joined the little church a +few miles distant, which had as the seat of worship a small frame +building lately<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> erected in that region. Young Abraham, however, did not +affiliate and follow the example of his kin. He had to work hard, and +religion at this time seemed to give him little concern, for, as before +observed, he had little opportunity to cultivate it had he desired to do +so. At an early age he was cast upon the bitterness of the world, and in +the sweat of his brow had he to earn his daily bread. With him the stern +battle of life began early; he had to gird on his sword for the combat +at an age when the cares and shadows of the world are in the far +perspective of the future and the sunshine of happiness illumines the +morning of life with its brightest rays.</p> + +<p>The specter of poverty was at his side; he could not get away from it; +his only hope to exorcise it from his presence lay in unremitting toil, +constant endeavor to overcome its influence on his career, and with this +end in view he sternly resolved to do all that hard work, patience, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> +perseverance demanded to free himself from its sinister companionship.</p> + +<p>The story of his thirst for knowledge and the limited means at his +disposal for assuaging it need scarcely be repeated, for it is a +pathetic story familiar to almost all, and becomes hackneyed with +repetition.</p> + +<p>In August, 1831, at the age of twenty-two, being satisfied that he had +fully discharged any debt which he owed his father for such rearing and +opportunities as he had received, he left the parent cabin, and, as it +turned out, forever. Deep down in his soul he had resolved to make +himself something better and higher than his father was or ever could +hope to be. From this stage onwards his career is a matter of national +history; the man is almost lost sight of in the statesman, and his +private life is submerged in the public eminence to which he attained.</p> + +<p>We must, however, deal with those<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> phases of his boyhood and young +manhood which bear a relation and lead up to the illustrious heights he +was destined to gain as the ruler of a nation and the emancipator of a +race.</p> + +<p>We have said that most people believe that Lincoln was a Providential +man, was called of God to be the preserver of a nation and the deliverer +of the slave, and this really seems to be the explanation which accounts +for the singular success of his unparalleled career; otherwise, how +could this backwoods youth, rough, uncouth, little educated, reach the +greatest eminence possible for an American; how could he have climbed +the heights of fame until he arrived at the culminating pinnacle; how +could he have become the recipient of the greatest and grandest honors +his countrymen had in their power to confer upon him?</p> + +<p>His accomplishments surely prove beyond question that this obscure, +lowly born man was the chosen instrument of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> a Divine Wisdom, raised up +to fulfill the designs of an all-wise Providence in freeing a race from +bondage, just as Moses was raised up to lead 'the chosen people' from +the land of their captivity.</p> + +<p>Despite his early training, or rather lack of training, regardless of +his seeming early indifference to religion, and all for which it stood, +Abraham Lincoln was on all occasions and at all times not only a good +Christian and sincere believer, but a man of the deepest religious +sentiments, imbued with a strong faith and earnest allegiance to moral +principles; a man who all through life had the utmost dependence upon +and reliance in divine guidance, and who undertook nothing without +invoking God's assistance to enable him to determine what was right from +what was wrong. Unwavering trust in the Almighty was the keynote to his +success and the foundation stone of his greatness.</p> + +<p>Let us pause to consider what really<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> were the religious convictions of +this wonderful man.</p> + +<p>That he was a true and sincere Christian, in fact, if not in form, is +fully proved by many extracts from his letters and numerous addresses; +his public utterances more than verify his belief in the intervention of +a Supreme Power in the affairs of men.</p> + +<p>Apart from this, however, we have explicit testimony of the sincerity of +his convictions of the truth of religion by the fact that he was a +faithful attendant on divine service. For four years in Washington he +attended Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church, and such attendance is +certainly conclusive that he was in form, as well as in fact, a +believing Christian.</p> + +<p>That he attended church merely for the sake of appearance is not +tenable, for his nature was too open and honest to do that which was not +based upon sincere conviction.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> + +<p>His reply to the negroes of Baltimore who, in 1864, presented him with a +beautiful Bible, confirms his belief in the divine inspiration of God's +word as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. On the occasion of this Bible +presentation he said: "This great Book is the best gift God has given to +man; all the good from the Saviour of the world is communicated through +this Book."</p> + +<p>He was an habitual reader of the Bible, more familiar with its contents +than most ministers. His familiarity with its pages is shown in his +literary style and in the frequent quotations from it with which his +writings are interspersed. He once wrote his early friend, Joshua +Speed,—"I am profitably engaged reading the Bible. Take all of this +Book upon reason that you can and the balance upon faith and you will +live and die a better man."</p> + +<p>To deny that he was a believer is to accuse him of hypocrisy and double +dealing, an accusation which is made<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> more emphatic in view of his +regular church attendance and the fervent religious sentiments which +characterized his public acceptance of the teachings of Christianity.</p> + +<p>When he left his home at Springfield, with a full appreciation of the +grave responsibility devolving upon him, in bidding farewell to the +Christian community in which he had lived for more than a quarter of a +century, he gave expression to his sentiments in this pathetic +valedictory: "I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may +return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon +Washington. With the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended +him I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me and remain with +you and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will +yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you +will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p> + +<p>Such language does not sound much like that of an unbeliever, but on the +contrary is pregnant with faith and hope in the guidance and +watchfulness of a Supreme Being.</p> + +<p>When requested to preside at a meeting of the Christian Commission in +Washington, held February 22, 1863, he replied, "The birthday of +Washington and the Christian Sabbath coinciding this year, and +suggesting together the highest interests of this life, and of that to +come, is most propitious for the meeting proposed."</p> + +<p>In the February of the preceding year Lincoln was visited by a severe +affliction in the death of his beloved son, Willie, to whom he was much +attached, and by the extreme illness of another son, Thomas, familiarly +called "Tad." This was a new burden and a heavy one, but through his +firm faith in Providence he regarded the double visitation as direct +from God, accepting the otherwise inexplicable affliction as a +manifestation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> of the divine design in regard to himself. A devout +Christian lady from Massachusetts, who was officiating in one of the +hospitals at the time, came to attend the sick children. She reports +that the President watched with her about the bedside of the sick ones, +and that he often walked the room, saying sadly, "This is the hardest +trial of my life,—why is it, why is it?" In the course of conversation +with this nurse, he closely questioned her concerning her situation; she +told him that she was a widow, and that her husband and two children +were in heaven, and added, that she saw the hand of God in it all, and +that she never loved Him so much before as she had since her affliction.</p> + +<p>"How is that brought about?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>"Simply by trusting in God and feeling that He does all things well," +she replied.</p> + +<p>"Did you submit fully under the first loss?" Lincoln again inquired.</p> + +<p>"No!" she answered, "not wholly,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> but as blow came upon blow, and all +were taken, I could and did submit and was very happy."</p> + +<p>"I am glad to hear you say that," said the President, pathetically, +"your experience will help me to bear my affliction."</p> + +<p>On the morning of his boy's funeral, when assured that many Christians +were praying for him, the tears welled in his eyes as he faltered out to +his comforter, "I am glad to hear that, I want them to pray for me, I +need their prayers." When the nurse came forward to express her +sympathy, the President thanked her and said, "I will try to go to God +with my sorrows." A few days afterwards she asked him if he could trust +God, and he answered, "I think I can and I will try." Continuing, he +expressed himself more fully, "I wish I had that childlike faith you +speak of and I trust He will give it to me." Then he went on to speak of +his mother who, so many years<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> before, had been laid to rest in the +lonely Indiana clearing; the memory of her who had pillowed his head on +her bosom came back to him with the tenderest recollections. Though, as +has been stated, she had little time or opportunity to teach him the +principles of her own simple faith and reverence, she did not wholly +neglect him. She taught him a few short prayers and pious precepts, and +these he never forgot in the after time. "I remember her prayers," said +he, "and they have followed me; they have clung to me all my life."</p> + +<p>Some think that it was Sally Bush Johnson to whom he here refers, who +was a good and religious woman, but there can be little doubt that the +allusion is to his own mother, for whose early death he sorrowed deeply +and whom he recalled to memory many a time, though he was but a lad when +she passed away.</p> + +<p>Many a time Lincoln sought the prayers of others, which proves that he +believed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> in the efficacy of appealing to heaven when in doubt and +difficulties. Bishop Simpson often called upon him, and on these +occasions they would talk as brothers. On parting the President would +say, "Bishop, don't leave without prayer." The doors would then be +locked and the two great men, as little children, would unite their +petitions.</p> + +<p>General Daniel E. Sickles puts on record a remarkable interview with +Lincoln, in which the latter expressed himself as follows: "When Lee +crossed the Potomac and entered Pennsylvania, followed by our army, I +felt that the crisis had come. I knew that defeat in a great battle on +Northern soil involved the loss of Washington, to be followed, perhaps, +by the intervention of England or France in favor of the Southern +Confederacy. I went to my room and got down on my knees in prayer. I +felt that I must put all my trust in Almighty God. He gave to our people +the best country ever given<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> to man. He alone could save it from +destruction. I had tried my best to do my duty and found myself unequal +to the task. The burden was more than I could bear. God had been often +our Protector in other days. I prayed Him to help us and give us victory +now. I felt that my prayer was answered. I knew that God was on our +side. I had no misgivings about the result of Gettysburg."</p> + +<p>"How do you feel about Vicksburg, Mr. President?" asked General Sickles.</p> + +<p>"Grant will pull through all right," returned Lincoln, "I am sure of it; +I have been despondent, but am so no longer. God is with us."</p> + +<p>Rising from his seat, the President took Sickles by the hand, and +continued, "Sickles, I am told, as you have been told, perhaps, that +your condition is serious. I am in a prophetic mood to-day. You will get +well."</p> + +<p>Do not such sentiments as these show<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> conclusively his faith in divine +power and his utter dependence upon God?</p> + +<p>To express such deep feelings of religious principles did not +necessitate his being a sectarian or even an attendant at church.</p> + +<p>Yet we know Lincoln did attend church. We have already mentioned that he +went regularly to Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church in Washington, but he +was a regular worshiper long before he came to Washington. When in +Springfield he was an attendant of the First Presbyterian Church, of +which the Rev. Dr. James Smith was pastor. This clergyman aided Lincoln, +who had then begun the practice of law, in an investigation into the +claims of the Bible. The future President at that time made a frank +acknowledgment of his belief that the Bible is an authoritative +revelation of God.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="WHY_DID_LINCOLN_NEVER_JOIN_A_CHURCH" id="WHY_DID_LINCOLN_NEVER_JOIN_A_CHURCH"></a>WHY DID LINCOLN NEVER JOIN A CHURCH?</h2> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 40-41]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4"><i>Give us men!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who, when the tempest gathers,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Grasp the standard of their fathers</i><br /></span> +<span class="i4"><i>In the thickest fight.</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who strike for homes and altar,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>(Let the coward cringe and falter—</i><br /></span> +<span class="i4"><i>God defend the Right).</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>True as truth, though lorn and lonely,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Tender as the brave are only—</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men who tread where saints have trod,</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Men for Country, Right, and God—</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Give us men!—I say again, again</i><br /></span> +<span class="i4"><i>Give us men!</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">—<i>Bishop of Exeter</i><br /></span> +<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span></div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> +<h2>III</h2> + +<h3>WHY DID LINCOLN NEVER JOIN A CHURCH?</h3> + + +<p>That Lincoln did not join a church is no reason for inferring that he +was not a believer in Christianity. It was just the opposite in his +case,—as the years passed his convictions and faith became stronger.</p> + +<p>The warring creeds of Christianity looked to him like so many soldiers +of the same army disagreeing among themselves as to the best way to win +a battle. Lincoln would win in any way he could, and would look on that +way as the best. In his day, even more than in ours, ministers fell out +with one another touching the meaning of the Bible, and then, as always, +weakened its influence and their own upon the public mind. Preachers and +teachers even now devote their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> time to useless discussions which will +never benefit any one, and to the investigation of controverted points +in theology, deciding principles of interpretation and attacking +chronological difficulties that have no more connection with winning men +to right living than the battle of Lexington has with the reformation of +drunkards.</p> + +<p>The precious time that Lincoln saw wasted, the energies misspent, and +the intellectual antagonisms begotten, which then, as now, divided the +hearts of men, caused him to reject dogmas which were considered +essential to salvation by the denominations of his day. They moved, as +alas! too many of them still do, in the old rut of orthodox tradition, +steeped in human creeds and almost incapable of an original idea.</p> + +<p>Lincoln preferred new truths to old falsehoods, and, like Christ, was +out of sympathy with men who swallowed dogmas whole and produced only +pious<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> platitudes. This very thing to-day accounts for the fact that so +many brilliant men and interesting women are unconnected with the +churches and therefore unreached by the pulpits. Everywhere, in +increasingly large numbers, we find men, energetic, learned, and +refined, humane, generous, reverent, open to argument and spiritual +persuasion, moral men with religious sensibilities, who often set a +worthy example to professors themselves, the very choicest spirits in +the community, not identified with any church, but whose lives, we all +must admit, are as much and often more Christian than those of professed +church-goers.</p> + +<p>Mere water, whether a person is "buried in it," or whether it is applied +at the tips of a bishop's fingers, makes no change whatever in +character. Faith in religion as an institution is faith in a +machine,—its application is what tells.</p> + +<p>When a member of Congress, knowing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> Lincoln's religious character, asked +him why he did not join some church, he replied: "Because I find +difficulty without mental reservation in giving my assent to their long +and complicated creeds. When any church inscribes on its altar, as a +qualification for membership, the Saviour's statement of the substance +of the law and the Gospel,—'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all +thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind ... and thy +neighbor as thyself'—that church will I join with all my heart and +soul."</p> + +<p>John G. Nicolay, who probably was better acquainted with Lincoln and +more closely attached to him than any one outside his own family and +near relatives, writes: "I do not remember ever having discussed +religion with Mr. Lincoln, nor do I know of any authorized statement of +his views in existence. He sometimes talked freely, and never made any +concealment of his belief or unbelief in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> any dogma or doctrine, but +never provoked religious controversies. I speak more from his +disposition and habits than from any positive declaration on his part. +He frequently made remarks about sermons he had heard, books he had +read, or doctrines that had been advanced, and my opinion as to his +religious belief is based upon such casual evidence. There is not the +slightest doubt that he believed in a Supreme Being of omnipotent power +and omniscient watchfulness over the children of men, and that this +great Being could be reached by prayer. Mr. Lincoln, was a praying man; +I know that to be a fact. And I have heard him request people to pray +for him, which he would not have done had he not believed that prayer is +answered. Many a time have I heard Mr. Lincoln ask ministers and +Christian women to pray for him, and he did not do this for effect. He +was no hypocrite, and had such reverence for sacred things that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> he +would not trifle with them. I have heard him say that he prayed for this +or that, and remember one occasion on which he remarked that if a +certain thing did not occur he would lose his faith in prayer.</p> + +<p>"It is a matter of history that he told the Cabinet he had promised his +Maker to issue an Emancipation Proclamation, and it was not an idle +remark. At the same time he did not believe in some of the dogmas of the +orthodox churches. I have heard him argue against the doctrine of +atonement, for instance. He considered it illogical and unjust and a +premium upon evil-doing if a man who had been wicked all his life could +make up for it by a few words or prayers at the hour of death; and he +had no faith in death-bed repentances. He did not believe in several +other articles of the creeds of the orthodox churches. He believed in +the Bible, however.... He used to consider it the greatest of all +text-books of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> morals and ethics and that there was nothing to compare +with it in literature....</p> + +<p>"It would be difficult for any one to define Mr. Lincoln's position or +to classify him among the sects. I should say that he believed in a good +many articles in the creeds of the orthodox churches and rejected a good +many that did not appeal to his reason.</p> + +<p>"He praised the simplicity of the Gospels. He often declared that the +Sermon on the Mount contained the essence of all law and justice, and +that the Lord's Prayer was the sublimest composition in human language. +He was a constant reader of the Bible, but had no sympathy with +theology, and often said that in matters affecting a man's relations +with his Maker he couldn't give a power of attorney.</p> + +<p>"Yes, there is a story, and it is probably true, that when he was very +young and very ignorant he wrote an essay that might be called +atheistical. It was after<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> he had been reading a couple of atheistic +books which made a great impression on his mind, and the essay is +supposed to have expressed his views on those books,—a sort of review +of them, containing both approval and disapproval,—and one of his +friends burned it. He was very indignant at the time, but was afterwards +glad of it.</p> + +<p>"The opposition of the Springfield clergy to his election was chiefly +due to remarks he made about them. One careless remark, I remember, was +widely quoted. An eminent clergyman was delivering a series of doctrinal +discourses that attracted considerable local attention. Although Lincoln +was frequently invited, he would not be induced to attend them. He +remarked that he wouldn't trust Brother —— to construe the statutes of +Illinois and much less the laws of God; that people who knew him +wouldn't trust his advice on an ordinary business transaction because +they didn't consider him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> competent; hence he didn't see why they did so +in the most important of all human affairs, the salvation of their +souls.</p> + +<p>"These remarks were quoted widely and misrepresented, to Lincoln's +injury. In those days people were not so liberal as now, and any one who +criticized a parson was considered a sceptic."</p> + +<p>An orthodox believer Lincoln may not have been, in fact was not, but he +was better,—he had the spirit of Christ which manifests itself more +peculiarly in actions than in words. Love to God and man was his creed, +the world was his church, kindly words and merciful deeds his sermons.</p> + +<p>In a certain formal sense the baptized man or woman is a Christian, just +as all foreigners who have been naturalized are Americans before the +law, but the simple act of naturalization will not make any man a good +American. There is a vast difference between naturalizing a man and +nationalizing him. He is an American who is an American at heart, who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> +owes but one allegiance, is loyal to but one country, and is true to but +one flag, whose sympathies and choices, whose heroic labors and +sacrifices in behalf of his country make him deserve the peerless name +of American.</p> + +<p>So the mere act of baptism or church membership gives a man but a poor +title to the Christian name. Paul said, the man was not a Jew who was +only one outwardly, that the mere rite of circumcision was nothing, that +the true Jew was one inwardly and at heart. If Paul could thus express +himself as to the qualifications which characterized a member of the +Jewish church, which was avowedly a ritualistic organization, it must be +safe to say the same thing about those who profess a belief in the +Christian church, which differed from the Jewish, mainly in caring less +for rites and more for rightness.</p> + +<p>Faith has its fundamental place in the plan of salvation, but faith, +according to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> some people's understanding of it, is a vivid perception +of, or rather a subscription to truth as the church fathers, or, more +likely the church grandmothers, defined it. Faith, in this sense of the +word, makes nobody a Christian. The devils believe and tremble.</p> + +<p>It is of great importance to rightly believe the truth which relates to +Christ and His kingdom, but the most unhesitating assent of the +intellect to the most orthodox creeds, catechisms, commentaries, and +systems ever framed will make no man a Christian. An upright and down +square life is worth more than a whole ton of tall talk.</p> + +<p>The grandest profession of religion is a life all devoted to glorifying +Christ, by living in obedience to His commands, and thus making the +world a little less accursed and more worthy of God.</p> + +<p>A man may be a member of the most orthodox church in Christendom, he may +sit at all the communions for a lifetime,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> but if he be mean and selfish +and careless of the world's condition, he is no Christian. While, on the +other hand, a man may, like Abraham Lincoln, have peculiarities of +religious beliefs, and yet if he spend his whole life for others, as +Lincoln did, then he is so much like Christ, emulating His example so +well that he has good claim to be called a Christian.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Blest is the man whose softening heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Feels all another's pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To whom the supplicating eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was never raised in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose breast expands with generous warmth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A stranger's woes to feel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bleeds in pity o'er the wound<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He wants the power to heal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gentle offices of love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His feet are never slow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He views through Mercy's melting eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A brother in a foe."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Abraham Lincoln never joined a church, because the creeds of his day +and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> of his community were too inclusive of detail in doctrine and +exacting in their ritual and terminology. He had no sympathy with +theologians. He frequently declared that it was blasphemy for a preacher +to "twist the words of Christ around, so as to sustain his own doctrine +and confirm his own private views," and he often remarked that "the more +a man knew of theology, the further he got away from the spirit of +Christ."</p> + +<p>Many preachers in the past have been strong factors in the march of +civilization, but courageous preachers have always been scarce. As a +rule, they have been more conservators of the past than moulders of the +future, clinging with grim tenacity to the traditions and teachings of +the early fathers.</p> + +<p>Among the Church of England preachers in Virginia, while nearly all +opposed separation from the mother country, there were few so militant +as the famous John Peter Muhlenberg, who, from his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> pulpit at Woodstock, +Virginia, declared: "There is a time for all things, a time to preach +and a time to pray, but there is also a time to fight, and that time has +now come," and suiting the action to the word, threw off his gown, +disclosing a uniform beneath, and followed by three hundred men of his +congregation, marched to join Washington's forces.</p> + +<p>In Colonial times in New England, the pulpit occupied a more general +sphere and exerted more general influence than to-day. Ministers +preached that the Hebrew Commonwealth was the model for the new +Republic, and so strenuously that as an effect our government assumed +that form which prevailed among the Hebrews under the judges and had the +divine sanction.</p> + +<p>In the agitation of the slave question, as a class, the preachers were +mostly silent. Had they roused themselves to the defence of right, they +could have created a public sentiment towards the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> inhuman and shameless +traffic which would have destroyed slavery without the necessity of a +civil war in which tens of thousands of lives were sacrificed and +millions of money were lost.</p> + +<p>Theodore Parker, Bishop Simpson, Albert Barnes, E. H. Chapin, Rabbis +Sabato Morais and David Einhorn, and above all, Henry Ward Beecher, +constituted the few conspicuous examples of the preachers who came out +strongly for abolition, but the stand these great men took was +effective, and once the die was cast, practically all the preachers +became leaders in the movement for emancipation.</p> + +<p>The attitude of Lincoln on slavery was not determined by churchmen. +Lincoln made a wide distinction between churchmen and Christians. +Christianity is unselfish service born of love; churchianity is often a +form without a God, a wearing of religion as a cloak and not as an +armor,—it never obeys a command unless it is too feeble to resist, and +in many cases,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> is a perfidy and treason against the law of Christ.</p> + +<p>In Springfield, when Lincoln found that twenty of the twenty-three +ministers of the different denominations and the majority of the members +of the principal churches were arrayed against him in his Presidential +campaign, he drew forth from his pocket a New Testament, saying to some +friends present: "I have carefully read the Bible and I do not so +understand this book. These men well know that I am for freedom in the +territories, freedom everywhere, as free as the Constitution and laws +will permit, and that my opponents are for slavery. They know this and +yet, with this book in their hands, in the light of which human bondage +cannot live a moment, they are going to vote against me. I know that +Liberty is right, for Christ teaches it and Christ is God. I shall be +vindicated and these men will find that they have not read their Bible +aright."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p> + +<p>Despite the great abolition preachers and those who followed their +example, some of the churches in Lincoln's time made a choice of public +favor and sided with slavery, though, as has been stated, the majority +of the ministers were strongly moved to follow in the lead of their +distinguished brethren who had unfurled the flag of freedom, yet withal +the church did not exert sufficient force to make herself a power in +determining the issue. At this time the opportunity was afforded her of +moulding public sentiment, and it may be readily inferred that had she +possessed the solid Christianity of Abraham Lincoln the terrible war +could have been averted and the country kept from being plunged in blood +and gloom, but in this, the greatest of all crises, the church failed to +do her duty as she should have done, and as a result, the bloodiest war +of history devastated and almost desolated the land. Of course, once the +war was declared the church stood solidly behind the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> President, but she +had no other alternative compatible with reason and common sense, not to +speak of patriotism. At length the preachers recognized the manner of +man the country had in its great leader, and so they looked to him for +counsel and for guidance. Lincoln was practically demonstrating that his +religion was as good as theirs, and they, in turn, were now trying to +make their religion as good as Lincoln's.</p> + +<p>All along the Christianity of Lincoln had the true ring in it. It was of +that type beautifully described in these lines:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Creeds and confessions, high church or the low<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I cannot say; but you would vastly please us<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If some pointed scripture you would show<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To which of these belonged the Saviour, Jesus.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think to all or none. Not curious creeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or ordered forms of church rule He taught,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But love of soul that blossomed into deeds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With human good and human blessings fraught.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">On me nor priest nor presbyter nor pope,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bishop nor dean may stamp a party name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Jesus with His largely human scope<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The service of my human life may claim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let prideful priests do battle about creeds—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The church is mine that does most charitable deeds."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There was not a day, nay, not an hour of Lincoln's life but was devoted +to some good work, some act of charity, some message of consolation or +comfort or mercy to the miserable and the suffering; in short, Abraham +Lincoln carried his religion into daily life; it accompanied him +everywhere and on all occasions.</p> + +<p>Every phase of his character was a demonstration of the Golden Rule. +From boyhood to manhood, from manhood to fame, honesty was his +distinguishing trait. As a lawyer all his transactions were above +suspicion. He would not take a case to which there could possibly be +attached any stain of falsehood or foul-dealing. To a man who once +offered him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> a case of which he could not approve, he gave this +explanation, quoted by his partner, Herndon, who vouches for it: "There +is no reasonable doubt that I can gain your case for you. I can set a +whole neighborhood at loggerheads, I can distress a widowed mother and +her six fatherless children, and thereby get you $600, which rightly +belongs, as it appears to me, as much to them as it does to you. I shall +not take your case, but I will give you a little advice for +nothing,—you seem to be a splendid, energetic man,—I would advise you +to try your hand at making $600 in some other way."</p> + +<p>Here is an example of how he brought his religion into politics. When he +was in the legislature and the caucus sought to get him into schemes +that were not creditable, in a discussion which lasted until midnight, +contending that the end would justify the means, Lincoln closed the +debate and defined his own position<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> by saying, "You may burn my body to +ashes and scatter them to the four winds of heaven; you may drag my soul +down to the regions of darkness and despair, to be tormented forever, +but you will not get me to support a measure which I believe to be +wrong."</p> + +<p>Judged alone by his actions Lincoln was a Christian of the very highest +type; his principles were founded upon the teachings of the Master. He +was gentle, kind, loving, thoughtful, tender, his big heart overflowed +at the sight of suffering and he alleviated it when he could. His +sympathies went out to the poor in their afflictions. He tempered the +harshness and severity of the great war by words of comfort and acts of +mercy. He denied himself at the White House to no one, the poorest woman +being as courteously received as the most distinguished statesman. On +one occasion a heartbroken mother came to plead for the life of an only +son who had forfeited it by some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> breach of discipline in the ranks. She +was sent away rejoicing. Turning to her male companion on leaving the +White House she indignantly exclaimed: "You said the President was an +ugly man,—why, he's the handsomest man I have ever seen."</p> + +<p>Both by act and word did Lincoln try to emulate the Man of Galilee. +Indeed few, if any, of the world's leaders followed so closely the +precepts and example of the Saviour. He adopted the Golden Rule as his +standard of conduct and lived up to it in every particular. He acted on +"the square" to every man, so that he gained for himself the soubriquet +of "Honest Abe," which was fondly applied to him all through his public +career. He was just in his dealings with his fellow-men and never once +was guilty of deception.</p> + +<p>If the character of this man is to be estimated by the words of Jesus +Himself, "By their fruits ye shall know them," then Abraham Lincoln was +one of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> highest types of Christian gentleman that ever trod the +earth.</p> + +<p>During the four terrible years of the war he carried the sorrows of the +people on his own shoulders and displayed the true qualities of a noble +man and a Christian. He placed himself at this time absolutely in the +hands of a higher power. Hear him make this confession: "I should be the +most presumptuous blockhead upon this footstool, if I for one day +thought that I could discharge the duties which have come upon me since +I came into this place without the aid and enlightenment of One who is +stronger and wiser than all others."</p> + +<p>The light of Holy Writ was the beacon star that guided him through the +darkness of trying days; not alone were the Holy Scriptures a guide for +his actions, but they served as a model for his literary style. His +education was defective, yet at times few of the great masters of +literature could equal him in purity of language. High<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> critics declare +his second inaugural address to be one of the greatest masterpieces of +English prose. Here are a few of the closing sentences: "Fondly do we +hope, fervently do we pray that the mighty scourge of war may pass away, +yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the +bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, +and until every drop of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another +drawn by the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it +must be said, 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous +altogether.' With malice towards none, with charity for all, with +firmness in the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to +bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the +battle, and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve +and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all +nations."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> + +<p>Apart from the beauty and diction of the language there is a deep spirit +of faith and dependence on God breathed throughout the whole of the +address.</p> + +<p>Surely the most sceptical must be convinced of the sincerity of +Lincoln's religious belief from his words, from his actions, from his +principles, from his prayers, from his confessions, in a word, from the +rectitude of his life, and admit that he was, not only a fervent +believer, but a practical Christian of the best kind, though he knelt at +no denominational altar.</p> + +<p>Such was our Lincoln. With wonder and admiration we stand in his +presence and feel the magnetism that attracts us to the man. His +goodness constituted his greatness.</p> + +<p>As the world brings its frankincense of praise to offer as an incense at +his shrine, in him men can see such an embodiment of true and glorious +manhood that to him can fittingly be applied the word picture of +Shakespeare's ideal:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The qualities are so blended in him that all the world can stand up and +say, Here is a <i>man</i>."</p> + +<p>A little doctor of divinity in a large Baptist convention stood on a +step and thanked God he was a Baptist. The audience could hear him but +not see him, so some one shouted, "Get up higher." "I can't," replied +the minister, "to be a Baptist is as high as I can get." He was +mistaken,—there is something higher than being a Baptist or any other +kind of an enthusiastic sectarian, and that is being a man. It is quite +possible to be a churchman higher than the highest steeple and yet not +have the affections which cluster around the throne of glory and find +their nutriment in the bosom of God.</p> + +<p>Lincoln's religion was that of character, the greatest force in the +universe. He gave us a life by which to know him, a life overflowing +with good works, full of that seriousness which comes from seeing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> and +dealing with eternal realities, a continuous exhibit of unselfishness.</p> + +<p>The pure and unblemished character of this man, his integrity of deed, +his honesty of purpose, his faith in God have given him an everlasting +place in the affections of the people, and the example which he has left +behind nerves the heart and strengthens the arm and inspires the courage +of others to emulate him and follow in his footsteps. No higher or +better type can be placed before American youth as an exemplar and spur +for ambition.</p> + +<p>He is not a Christian who, however orthodox in his beliefs, has not love +and devotion, self-sacrifice and honesty, truthfulness and manliness.</p> + +<p>No power is like character,—this was the power which Abraham Lincoln +possessed and which carried with it the blessing of God, gaining for him +the attachment of a continent and the personal love and loyalty of the +Anglo-Saxon race.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span></p> + +<p>We may truthfully describe this man, whose greatness was his goodness, +as Tennyson describes one of his heroes: he was</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Rich in saving commonsense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as the greatest only are—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his simplicity sublime;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who never sold the truth to serve the hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor paltered with eternal God for power;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose life was work, whose language rife<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With rugged maxims hewn from life;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who never spake against a foe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let his great example stand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Colossal, seen in every land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till in all lands and through all human story,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The path of duty be the way to glory."<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Abraham Lincoln's Religion, by +Madison Clinton Peters + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S RELIGION *** + +***** This file should be named 37287-h.htm or 37287-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/2/8/37287/ + +Produced by Roberta Staehlin, Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive/American +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Abraham Lincoln's Religion + +Author: Madison Clinton Peters + +Release Date: September 1, 2011 [EBook #37287] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S RELIGION *** + + + + +Produced by Roberta Staehlin, Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive/American +Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Abraham Lincoln's Religion + + MADISON C. PETERS + + _Author of "Justice to the Jew," etc., etc._ + + + BOSTON + RICHARD G. BADGER + The Gorham Press + 1909 + + _Copyright, 1909, by Richard G. Badger_ + + _All rights reserved_ + + _The Gorham Press Boston, U S A_ + + + + +CONTENTS + + + I. Lincoln the Man 1 + + II. Was Abraham Lincoln a Christian 15 + + III. Why did Lincoln Never Join the Church 39 + + + + +LINCOLN THE MAN + + + _Thou, too, sail on O Ship of State! + Sail on, O Union, strong and great! + Humanity with all its fears, + With all its hopes of future years, + Is hanging breathless on thy fate!_ + + _We know what Master laid thy keel, + What Workman wrought thy ribs of steel, + Who made each mast and sail and rope, + What anvils rang, what hammers beat, + In what a forge and what a heat + Were shaped the anchors of thy hope!_ + + _Fear not each sudden sound and shock: + 'Tis the wave, and not the rock, + 'Tis but the flapping of the sail, + And not a rent made by the gale!_ + + _In spite of rock and tempest's roar, + In spite of false lights on the shore, + Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea! + Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, + Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, + Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, + Are all with thee_--are all with thee! + + + _Henry Wadsworth Longfellow_ + + + + +I + +LINCOLN THE MAN + + +The name of Abraham Lincoln is imperishable, immortal; can never fade +from the pages of history or grow dim with the lapse of time. + +Had this lowly born Kentucky boy been ushered into the world centuries +ago in England, doubtless he would have become the father of a royal +family, the founder of a kingly dynasty, the pioneer of a courtly line +whose proudest boast would be to acclaim him their progenitor. + +Fortunately he belongs to modern time and sprang from the loins of a +democratic race in a young and democratic country, around whose virgin +brow he twined the garlands of a never-fading luster. + +His fame is America's, but his glory belongs to the world, and humanity +is proud to honor him as one of the noblest among the sons of men. + +He founded no royal house to perpetuate his name on its escutcheon, yet +no Caliph or Conqueror, no Emperor or Excellency, no Master or Monarch, +no Prince or Potentate, no Prelate or Pontiff, no Saladin or Sultan has +left behind a name so dear to the hearts of posterity as that of this +plain man of the people, this champion of human rights, this friend of +the down-trodden and oppressed, whose heart went out in sympathy and +love to all mankind, irrespective of race or religion. + +No character in American history or, perhaps, in the world's history +stands out so clearly silhouetted against the background of time as +Lincoln; none so free from defect or flaw, with no irregularities to mar +its outlines, no inequalities to detract from its perfect formation; its +every curve and section a symmetry of proportion. + +Born, February 12, 1809, as lowly as Jesus of Nazareth, in a one-room, +shackling Kentucky cabin, the child of a poverty-stricken man, whom +misfortune had seemingly chosen for her own, and whose ambitions were +blighted and hopes almost dead, he conquered every environment of an +untoward fate, burst every link that bound him to the misery of his +surroundings, and came forth in invincible majesty to write his name in +letters of adamant on the walls of Fame. + +Reared in gripping, grinding, pinching penury and pallid poverty, amid +the most squalid destitution possible to conceive, successively a +choreboy, common laborer, rail-splitter, river pilot, and country +storekeeper, he made his way through trials and difficulties that would +have overwhelmed the bravest spirit; broke down every barrier, turned +all obstacles into stepping-stones to progress, until he entered the +arena of public life as a lawyer, commanding the confidence and respect +of all who knew him and the terrible odds he had to fight against to win +out in the battle of life. + +Practically an unknown man when nominated for the Presidency, his +election due to factional strife among his opponents, the people of +America when approaching the greatest crisis in their history, turned as +if by chance, and Providence that chance did guide, to this +comparatively obscure man of the prairies, and with one bound he took +his place with the world's greatest statesmen, the leader of his party, +the real ruler of a mighty nation. + +Led as it were by an Unseen Hand to the front, he solved problems that +staggered the wisest minds of the nation, directed military campaigns, +and conducted diplomatic relations with such skill as to astonish the +most astute statesmen, cabinet ministers, and army generals. The +rail-splitter of the Sangamon had become at the supreme moment the man +of destiny to whom the nation looked in the most crucial period it had +yet encountered. + +Such a man is not an accident,--he is more than a circumstance. He is +sent upon a mission and bears his credentials from a Higher Power than +that of earth,--there is a purpose and a plan in his existence, the +latter is mapped out, the former must be fulfilled. + +In view of the fact that Lincoln had barely a year's schooling, where +and how did he acquire his profound wisdom and his depth of knowledge? + +That he was a God-ordained man, raised up to accomplish a divine design, +few, who have closely studied the character and work of the man, will +gainsay. + +As the early prophets were inspired by God to utter golden words of +divine wisdom, so Lincoln was inspired from the same source to speak, +and act in conformity to divine intention. The keynote of this idea is +forcibly struck by Henry Watterson, when he writes: "And a thousand +years hence, no tragedy, no drama, no epic poem will be filled with +greater wonder, or be followed by mankind with deeper feelings, than +that which tells the story of his life and death." + +Lincoln was a Providential man,--of that there can be little question, +but every man has it in his power to be Providential also, though not in +the same way, by being the deliverer of a race and the saviour of a +nation, but by living up to the promptings of his better nature and +seizing the opportunities God sends his way. Any man can thus be +Providential in the full length and breadth and sweep of his life. + +Next to Washington, Lincoln stands out the most colossal figure in +American history, and is pre-eminent to Washington in the affection with +which his memory is enshrined in the hearts of his countrymen; though +Washington, as the Father of his Country, must always be given the more +exalted place. + +Washington gave us a country; Lincoln preserved it; Washington wrote the +first page of our history; Lincoln was called upon to write another, and +at a period which covers the most momentous crisis the country had +witnessed since Liberty Bell proclaimed the birth of a separate and +independent nation. He wrote the page and he kept it clean, though to do +so he had to wash it in rivers of human blood, the warm heart's blood +too of the countrymen he loved, but he would have willingly washed it in +his own also, had the sacrifice been necessary. Alas! Lincoln's blood +was shed in the end, not on the altar of his country, but by the hand of +an assassin; not for the glory of the flag, but for the sorrow of the +nation. + +More, perhaps, has been written concerning the illustrious martyr +President than of any other national character, and nearly all of this +writing has been eulogy approaching almost to deification. We have +enshrined Lincoln in a Pantheon of Glory, all by himself, for the praise +and emulation of future ages, just as we have placed Benedict Arnold and +Aaron Burr in a Pillory of Shame to be held up for the scorn, +execration, and anathema of all time. + +The beatification of Lincoln, especially by Northerners, is due, in a +great measure, to his devotion and loyalty to the cause of the Union. +The issue of the war was to amalgamate the contending parties into a +unified whole under one flag, but Lincoln was not to see the full +fruition of his mighty work, the final triumph of his policy. The hand +of the assassin fell upon him just at the very zenith of his fame, the +meridian of his greatness, a time when public sentiment was at the +boiling-point. He had struck the shackles from the limbs of four +millions of people, brought order out of chaos, planted the banners of +victory on the broken ramparts of defeat, and had done it in such a way +that the vanquished almost fancied themselves the conquerors, and +willingly, proudly, saluted the flag of a cemented Fatherland. + +He had brought together the warring elements into a splendid and +invincible Union; he had become the idol of his people as Washington had +once been; he had been hailed as the Messiah of the slave and the +Saviour of the oppressed, and then, in a moment, his great light was +extinguished in the gloom and darkness of universal sorrow. With all +that he had accomplished, nevertheless, he went down to the grave, like +another Columbus, unconscious of the great work he had consummated. + +His Emancipation Proclamation not only melted the manacles of the slaves +by its electric touch, but it freed the whole nation from the bondage of +years. Free speech had been suppressed, men dared not utter their +convictions, the pulpit had been overawed, the press had been shackled, +we were being reproached by the nations of the earth for violating the +first principles of freedom by holding men in bondage. Europe was in +transports of laughter at a country proclaiming human liberty, while +clinging to all the traditions of slavery, and her risible faculties +were really excusable in face of such a paradox. Lincoln keenly felt the +sneers and taunts, and in the indignation of his mighty manhood he arose +and freed the nation from its incubus of shame. He made its soil too hot +for the feet of slaves; he unshackled the pulpit; he unmuzzled the +press; he removed the dark blots from the national honor, and united and +free he placed his country greatest among the nations of the earth. + +The immortal Proclamation linked his name with the rights of man, the +cause of personal liberty, and the progress of humanity. This is why +Lincoln is enthroned on so high a pedestal; this is why the great War +President is enshrined in the heart of hearts of his countrymen. + +Some are of the opinion, that had the illustrious Tribune been spared, +his plans of Reconstruction would have antagonized the best men of his +party, and instead of coming down to posterity as the most revered and +popular President, after Washington, he would have left his name in our +annals as probably that of the most unpopular Executive we have had. But +such surmise is a piece of far-fetched anticipation very remotely +removed from the boundary of probability. Lincoln would not have +antagonized, he would have converted and brought men to the same +viewpoint as himself. + +As it is, he towers so majestically above our horizon, that in his great +and commanding national role, we are apt to quite forget his character +as an individual, his personality as a man and what it represented in +the domain of private life. + +That Lincoln was a man of strong character and tenacious purpose, +rather than brilliant and intellectual, is a point conceded by all who +have studied him in the calm of impartiality and in no sense indulged in +hero worship. Despite the claim of his divine mission, his greatness was +service in loyalty to an ideal and it was subordination of the personal +self to his ideals rather than any extraordinary gifts with which nature +had endowed him, which gives glory to him and the men who stood with +him. + +He has been contrasted with Napoleon, whose star was just sinking below +the horizon as his was ascending above it, but it is rather invidious to +contrast two so widely divergent actors on the stage of fame. The +difference between them is the difference between the iron heel and the +helping hand, between tyranny and freedom, between a man living for self +and glory, and a man living for the broadest kind of cosmopolitanism and +the widest type of humanitarianism. + +Lincoln's whole career is a manifestation of his absolute integrity of +purpose, of his fearless honesty in all things, of his considerate +feeling for others, of his profound respect for conscience, and his +reverential fear of God. + + + + +WAS ABRAHAM LINCOLN A CHRISTIAN? + + + _God give us men! A time like this demands + Clean minds, pure hearts, true faith, and ready hands. + Men who possess opinions and a will; + Men whom desire for office does not kill; + Men whom the spoils of office cannot buy; + Men who have honor; men who will not lie; + Tall men; sun-crowned men; men who will live above the fog + In public duty and in private thinking; + Men who can stand before a demagogue + And denounce his treacherous flatteries, and without winking. + For a while base tricksters with their wornout creeds, + Their large professions, and their little deeds, + Wrangle in selfish strife, lo! Freedom weeps, + Wrong rules the land and waiting Justice sleeps._ + + --_J. G. Holland_ + + + + +II + +WAS ABRAHAM LINCOLN A CHRISTIAN? + + +In regard to his religious views, Lincoln was always exceedingly +reticent, but this reserve gives but greater force to the striking proof +of the deep faith professed in his proclamations and public addresses, +and that his life was actuated by high religious principles. He was too +broad, too big brained, to care for doctrinal beliefs or sectarian +differences. + +His mother and father were Free-Will Baptists in Kentucky. In Indiana +they became members of what was then known as the Predestinarian church, +not from any change in belief, but because it was the only denomination +in the neighborhood. When Thomas Lincoln removed to Illinois he united +with the Christian church, commonly known as "Campbellites," and in +that faith he died. + +In his early days Lincoln had little opportunity for the practice of +religion, and his parents, though religious enough in themselves, as has +just been pointed out, took little trouble to inculcate its precepts on +his youthful mind. The charge has been brought against him that he was +an agnostic, but this arose from the fact that when a young man at +Salem, in 1834, he prepared a review of Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason" +and Volney's "Ruins of Empires," with a view to reading it before a +literary society that had been organized in the neighborhood. A friend +of his--Sam Hill--burned the manuscript, which made the young man very +indignant, as he had spent much time in its preparation. He had, to an +extent, indorsed the views of these deistic writers, and their works had +made a deep impression on him, but he came to realize their specious +sophistries at their true value and turned away from them with feelings +of strong aversion, so that he thanked Sam Hill for the service he had +done him in destroying the manuscripts of approval and thus turning his +thoughts in the right direction which led him to see the evils of +infidel teachings. + +He never was an unbeliever, and as he advanced in years his religious +conceptions deepened and his faith and reliance on the Divine Power +strengthened with time. + +In common with those reared under similar circumstances in rural +localities he was highly superstitious, and this superstition he was +never able to shake off in after life, though to offset it and +counteract the morbid influence it exerted over him he had recourse to +humor and tried to look on the bright side of everything, often on the +ludicrous side, and gave such free rein to his inclination in this +direction that he gained for himself something of the reputation of a +humorist and wag, but in reality his love for jesting and telling +humorous stories came to him as a second nature, an inheritance from his +father, who was renowned in his section for droll sayings, funny +anecdotes, and striking illustrations. + +He was also somewhat interested in spiritualism, but as the occult art +of communicating with the denizens of the unseen world had not attained +such a degree of perfection in his day as in ours, his opportunity for +investigation was limited to a few seances given by peripatetic mediums, +which, however, instead of increasing his faith in intercommunication +with the _manes_ of the departed, only excited his disgust for the +fakirs who laid claim to the power of summoning spirits to mortal +presence. + +All his life Lincoln was a man who thought for himself; he would not +allow the opinions of others to obtrude themselves on him, he +investigated for himself, and his intellectual honesty would not permit +him to make pretense to faith or simulate what he did not feel. + +Some writers would have us believe that he was not a Christian at all, +in fact, was an out and out infidel of the stripe of Voltaire and Paine; +but we have seen what gave rise to this misconception of his character +and caused it to gain circulation. The works of Paine and Volney were +the only books of an infidel tendency that he ever read, and when he saw +his error he tried to disabuse his mind of their teachings as quickly as +possible. + +To get at a right consideration of his religious beliefs, we must go +back to those early days in the life of the future statesman after the +family had removed from Kentucky to Indiana. It was a wild place in +which his boyhood was spent; the primeval American wood which was only +beginning to hear the voice of a crude civilization, and had not, as +yet, heard the sound of a church bell. There were no places of worship; +there were no schools or even stores or shops; in truth, so isolated +and primitive was the location of the Lincoln camp that the necessities +of life were many miles removed from it. + +His father, Thomas Lincoln, though a good man in a general way, was but +an indifferent parent, and consequently a poor guide or mentor for the +youth. The poor man had received many hard knocks from the iron hand of +misfortune and had become almost wholly disheartened, which led to +carelessness and thriftlessness, and besides, he was illiterate and +unpolished. It could not be expected that a man thus handicapped himself +could give his boy good training, either morally or intellectually. The +mother, too, had been ground down by poverty to such a degree as to lose +almost all interest in life; her burden soon became too heavy to bear, +and she had to lay it down before coming to the middle milestone of +life. It is not to be wondered that, under such circumstances and amid +such surroundings, the boy Abraham grew up after the manner of a wild, +strong weed, following the bent of his own rugged nature. + +It was a dark time and the Lincolns were in dark struggles. Their abode +at first was a rude hut, a mere shed of rough poles, open to the suns of +summer and the snows of winter. Even when a cabin was at length erected, +there were neither doors nor windows in it. The beds were composed of +dried leaves and their coverings of the skins of wild animals. Food was +scarce and of the coarsest kind and had to be brought from a long +distance. In after years Lincoln never cared to refer to this period in +his career. + +In 1818, when Abraham was nine years old, his mother died and was buried +in a cleared space a little beyond the cabin, without any religious +ceremonies or observances whatever. However, there was a service held +over the grave some months afterwards by an itinerant preacher who came +at the request of young Abraham. The prayers that Parson Elkin said +above the mound of Nancy Hanks were the first public prayers to which +Abraham Lincoln listened. + +After a time Thomas Lincoln went back to Kentucky, and shortly returned +with a new wife, Sally Bush Johnson, widow of the jailer of Hardin +County. She had three children, and these, with the Lincoln household, +which included two Hanks boys, kin of the late Mrs. Lincoln, formed a +somewhat heterogeneous family. + +They were, however, extremely domestic and tenderly attached to one +another, which is very seldom the case in mixed households, but they +were all of the same class, born and reared under similar circumstances. + +The two branches even united in religion and joined the little church a +few miles distant, which had as the seat of worship a small frame +building lately erected in that region. Young Abraham, however, did not +affiliate and follow the example of his kin. He had to work hard, and +religion at this time seemed to give him little concern, for, as before +observed, he had little opportunity to cultivate it had he desired to do +so. At an early age he was cast upon the bitterness of the world, and in +the sweat of his brow had he to earn his daily bread. With him the stern +battle of life began early; he had to gird on his sword for the combat +at an age when the cares and shadows of the world are in the far +perspective of the future and the sunshine of happiness illumines the +morning of life with its brightest rays. + +The specter of poverty was at his side; he could not get away from it; +his only hope to exorcise it from his presence lay in unremitting toil, +constant endeavor to overcome its influence on his career, and with this +end in view he sternly resolved to do all that hard work, patience, and +perseverance demanded to free himself from its sinister companionship. + +The story of his thirst for knowledge and the limited means at his +disposal for assuaging it need scarcely be repeated, for it is a +pathetic story familiar to almost all, and becomes hackneyed with +repetition. + +In August, 1831, at the age of twenty-two, being satisfied that he had +fully discharged any debt which he owed his father for such rearing and +opportunities as he had received, he left the parent cabin, and, as it +turned out, forever. Deep down in his soul he had resolved to make +himself something better and higher than his father was or ever could +hope to be. From this stage onwards his career is a matter of national +history; the man is almost lost sight of in the statesman, and his +private life is submerged in the public eminence to which he attained. + +We must, however, deal with those phases of his boyhood and young +manhood which bear a relation and lead up to the illustrious heights he +was destined to gain as the ruler of a nation and the emancipator of a +race. + +We have said that most people believe that Lincoln was a Providential +man, was called of God to be the preserver of a nation and the deliverer +of the slave, and this really seems to be the explanation which accounts +for the singular success of his unparalleled career; otherwise, how +could this backwoods youth, rough, uncouth, little educated, reach the +greatest eminence possible for an American; how could he have climbed +the heights of fame until he arrived at the culminating pinnacle; how +could he have become the recipient of the greatest and grandest honors +his countrymen had in their power to confer upon him? + +His accomplishments surely prove beyond question that this obscure, +lowly born man was the chosen instrument of a Divine Wisdom, raised up +to fulfill the designs of an all-wise Providence in freeing a race from +bondage, just as Moses was raised up to lead 'the chosen people' from +the land of their captivity. + +Despite his early training, or rather lack of training, regardless of +his seeming early indifference to religion, and all for which it stood, +Abraham Lincoln was on all occasions and at all times not only a good +Christian and sincere believer, but a man of the deepest religious +sentiments, imbued with a strong faith and earnest allegiance to moral +principles; a man who all through life had the utmost dependence upon +and reliance in divine guidance, and who undertook nothing without +invoking God's assistance to enable him to determine what was right from +what was wrong. Unwavering trust in the Almighty was the keynote to his +success and the foundation stone of his greatness. + +Let us pause to consider what really were the religious convictions of +this wonderful man. + +That he was a true and sincere Christian, in fact, if not in form, is +fully proved by many extracts from his letters and numerous addresses; +his public utterances more than verify his belief in the intervention of +a Supreme Power in the affairs of men. + +Apart from this, however, we have explicit testimony of the sincerity of +his convictions of the truth of religion by the fact that he was a +faithful attendant on divine service. For four years in Washington he +attended Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church, and such attendance is +certainly conclusive that he was in form, as well as in fact, a +believing Christian. + +That he attended church merely for the sake of appearance is not +tenable, for his nature was too open and honest to do that which was not +based upon sincere conviction. + +His reply to the negroes of Baltimore who, in 1864, presented him with a +beautiful Bible, confirms his belief in the divine inspiration of God's +word as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. On the occasion of this Bible +presentation he said: "This great Book is the best gift God has given to +man; all the good from the Saviour of the world is communicated through +this Book." + +He was an habitual reader of the Bible, more familiar with its contents +than most ministers. His familiarity with its pages is shown in his +literary style and in the frequent quotations from it with which his +writings are interspersed. He once wrote his early friend, Joshua +Speed,--"I am profitably engaged reading the Bible. Take all of this +Book upon reason that you can and the balance upon faith and you will +live and die a better man." + +To deny that he was a believer is to accuse him of hypocrisy and double +dealing, an accusation which is made more emphatic in view of his +regular church attendance and the fervent religious sentiments which +characterized his public acceptance of the teachings of Christianity. + +When he left his home at Springfield, with a full appreciation of the +grave responsibility devolving upon him, in bidding farewell to the +Christian community in which he had lived for more than a quarter of a +century, he gave expression to his sentiments in this pathetic +valedictory: "I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may +return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon +Washington. With the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended +him I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me and remain with +you and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will +yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you +will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell." + +Such language does not sound much like that of an unbeliever, but on the +contrary is pregnant with faith and hope in the guidance and +watchfulness of a Supreme Being. + +When requested to preside at a meeting of the Christian Commission in +Washington, held February 22, 1863, he replied, "The birthday of +Washington and the Christian Sabbath coinciding this year, and +suggesting together the highest interests of this life, and of that to +come, is most propitious for the meeting proposed." + +In the February of the preceding year Lincoln was visited by a severe +affliction in the death of his beloved son, Willie, to whom he was much +attached, and by the extreme illness of another son, Thomas, familiarly +called "Tad." This was a new burden and a heavy one, but through his +firm faith in Providence he regarded the double visitation as direct +from God, accepting the otherwise inexplicable affliction as a +manifestation of the divine design in regard to himself. A devout +Christian lady from Massachusetts, who was officiating in one of the +hospitals at the time, came to attend the sick children. She reports +that the President watched with her about the bedside of the sick ones, +and that he often walked the room, saying sadly, "This is the hardest +trial of my life,--why is it, why is it?" In the course of conversation +with this nurse, he closely questioned her concerning her situation; she +told him that she was a widow, and that her husband and two children +were in heaven, and added, that she saw the hand of God in it all, and +that she never loved Him so much before as she had since her affliction. + +"How is that brought about?" he inquired. + +"Simply by trusting in God and feeling that He does all things well," +she replied. + +"Did you submit fully under the first loss?" Lincoln again inquired. + +"No!" she answered, "not wholly, but as blow came upon blow, and all +were taken, I could and did submit and was very happy." + +"I am glad to hear you say that," said the President, pathetically, +"your experience will help me to bear my affliction." + +On the morning of his boy's funeral, when assured that many Christians +were praying for him, the tears welled in his eyes as he faltered out to +his comforter, "I am glad to hear that, I want them to pray for me, I +need their prayers." When the nurse came forward to express her +sympathy, the President thanked her and said, "I will try to go to God +with my sorrows." A few days afterwards she asked him if he could trust +God, and he answered, "I think I can and I will try." Continuing, he +expressed himself more fully, "I wish I had that childlike faith you +speak of and I trust He will give it to me." Then he went on to speak of +his mother who, so many years before, had been laid to rest in the +lonely Indiana clearing; the memory of her who had pillowed his head on +her bosom came back to him with the tenderest recollections. Though, as +has been stated, she had little time or opportunity to teach him the +principles of her own simple faith and reverence, she did not wholly +neglect him. She taught him a few short prayers and pious precepts, and +these he never forgot in the after time. "I remember her prayers," said +he, "and they have followed me; they have clung to me all my life." + +Some think that it was Sally Bush Johnson to whom he here refers, who +was a good and religious woman, but there can be little doubt that the +allusion is to his own mother, for whose early death he sorrowed deeply +and whom he recalled to memory many a time, though he was but a lad when +she passed away. + +Many a time Lincoln sought the prayers of others, which proves that he +believed in the efficacy of appealing to heaven when in doubt and +difficulties. Bishop Simpson often called upon him, and on these +occasions they would talk as brothers. On parting the President would +say, "Bishop, don't leave without prayer." The doors would then be +locked and the two great men, as little children, would unite their +petitions. + +General Daniel E. Sickles puts on record a remarkable interview with +Lincoln, in which the latter expressed himself as follows: "When Lee +crossed the Potomac and entered Pennsylvania, followed by our army, I +felt that the crisis had come. I knew that defeat in a great battle on +Northern soil involved the loss of Washington, to be followed, perhaps, +by the intervention of England or France in favor of the Southern +Confederacy. I went to my room and got down on my knees in prayer. I +felt that I must put all my trust in Almighty God. He gave to our people +the best country ever given to man. He alone could save it from +destruction. I had tried my best to do my duty and found myself unequal +to the task. The burden was more than I could bear. God had been often +our Protector in other days. I prayed Him to help us and give us victory +now. I felt that my prayer was answered. I knew that God was on our +side. I had no misgivings about the result of Gettysburg." + +"How do you feel about Vicksburg, Mr. President?" asked General Sickles. + +"Grant will pull through all right," returned Lincoln, "I am sure of it; +I have been despondent, but am so no longer. God is with us." + +Rising from his seat, the President took Sickles by the hand, and +continued, "Sickles, I am told, as you have been told, perhaps, that +your condition is serious. I am in a prophetic mood to-day. You will get +well." + +Do not such sentiments as these show conclusively his faith in divine +power and his utter dependence upon God? + +To express such deep feelings of religious principles did not +necessitate his being a sectarian or even an attendant at church. + +Yet we know Lincoln did attend church. We have already mentioned that he +went regularly to Dr. Gurley's Presbyterian church in Washington, but he +was a regular worshiper long before he came to Washington. When in +Springfield he was an attendant of the First Presbyterian Church, of +which the Rev. Dr. James Smith was pastor. This clergyman aided Lincoln, +who had then begun the practice of law, in an investigation into the +claims of the Bible. The future President at that time made a frank +acknowledgment of his belief that the Bible is an authoritative +revelation of God. + + + + +WHY DID LINCOLN NEVER JOIN A CHURCH? + + + _Give us men! + Men who, when the tempest gathers, + Grasp the standard of their fathers + In the thickest fight. + Men who strike for homes and altar, + (Let the coward cringe and falter-- + God defend the Right). + True as truth, though lorn and lonely, + Tender as the brave are only-- + Men who tread where saints have trod, + Men for Country, Right, and God-- + Give us men!--I say again, again + Give us men!_ + + --_Bishop of Exeter_ + + + + +III + +WHY DID LINCOLN NEVER JOIN A CHURCH? + + +That Lincoln did not join a church is no reason for inferring that he +was not a believer in Christianity. It was just the opposite in his +case,--as the years passed his convictions and faith became stronger. + +The warring creeds of Christianity looked to him like so many soldiers +of the same army disagreeing among themselves as to the best way to win +a battle. Lincoln would win in any way he could, and would look on that +way as the best. In his day, even more than in ours, ministers fell out +with one another touching the meaning of the Bible, and then, as always, +weakened its influence and their own upon the public mind. Preachers and +teachers even now devote their time to useless discussions which will +never benefit any one, and to the investigation of controverted points +in theology, deciding principles of interpretation and attacking +chronological difficulties that have no more connection with winning men +to right living than the battle of Lexington has with the reformation of +drunkards. + +The precious time that Lincoln saw wasted, the energies misspent, and +the intellectual antagonisms begotten, which then, as now, divided the +hearts of men, caused him to reject dogmas which were considered +essential to salvation by the denominations of his day. They moved, as +alas! too many of them still do, in the old rut of orthodox tradition, +steeped in human creeds and almost incapable of an original idea. + +Lincoln preferred new truths to old falsehoods, and, like Christ, was +out of sympathy with men who swallowed dogmas whole and produced only +pious platitudes. This very thing to-day accounts for the fact that so +many brilliant men and interesting women are unconnected with the +churches and therefore unreached by the pulpits. Everywhere, in +increasingly large numbers, we find men, energetic, learned, and +refined, humane, generous, reverent, open to argument and spiritual +persuasion, moral men with religious sensibilities, who often set a +worthy example to professors themselves, the very choicest spirits in +the community, not identified with any church, but whose lives, we all +must admit, are as much and often more Christian than those of professed +church-goers. + +Mere water, whether a person is "buried in it," or whether it is applied +at the tips of a bishop's fingers, makes no change whatever in +character. Faith in religion as an institution is faith in a +machine,--its application is what tells. + +When a member of Congress, knowing Lincoln's religious character, asked +him why he did not join some church, he replied: "Because I find +difficulty without mental reservation in giving my assent to their long +and complicated creeds. When any church inscribes on its altar, as a +qualification for membership, the Saviour's statement of the substance +of the law and the Gospel,--'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all +thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind ... and thy +neighbor as thyself'--that church will I join with all my heart and +soul." + +John G. Nicolay, who probably was better acquainted with Lincoln and +more closely attached to him than any one outside his own family and +near relatives, writes: "I do not remember ever having discussed +religion with Mr. Lincoln, nor do I know of any authorized statement of +his views in existence. He sometimes talked freely, and never made any +concealment of his belief or unbelief in any dogma or doctrine, but +never provoked religious controversies. I speak more from his +disposition and habits than from any positive declaration on his part. +He frequently made remarks about sermons he had heard, books he had +read, or doctrines that had been advanced, and my opinion as to his +religious belief is based upon such casual evidence. There is not the +slightest doubt that he believed in a Supreme Being of omnipotent power +and omniscient watchfulness over the children of men, and that this +great Being could be reached by prayer. Mr. Lincoln, was a praying man; +I know that to be a fact. And I have heard him request people to pray +for him, which he would not have done had he not believed that prayer is +answered. Many a time have I heard Mr. Lincoln ask ministers and +Christian women to pray for him, and he did not do this for effect. He +was no hypocrite, and had such reverence for sacred things that he +would not trifle with them. I have heard him say that he prayed for this +or that, and remember one occasion on which he remarked that if a +certain thing did not occur he would lose his faith in prayer. + +"It is a matter of history that he told the Cabinet he had promised his +Maker to issue an Emancipation Proclamation, and it was not an idle +remark. At the same time he did not believe in some of the dogmas of the +orthodox churches. I have heard him argue against the doctrine of +atonement, for instance. He considered it illogical and unjust and a +premium upon evil-doing if a man who had been wicked all his life could +make up for it by a few words or prayers at the hour of death; and he +had no faith in death-bed repentances. He did not believe in several +other articles of the creeds of the orthodox churches. He believed in +the Bible, however.... He used to consider it the greatest of all +text-books of morals and ethics and that there was nothing to compare +with it in literature.... + +"It would be difficult for any one to define Mr. Lincoln's position or +to classify him among the sects. I should say that he believed in a good +many articles in the creeds of the orthodox churches and rejected a good +many that did not appeal to his reason. + +"He praised the simplicity of the Gospels. He often declared that the +Sermon on the Mount contained the essence of all law and justice, and +that the Lord's Prayer was the sublimest composition in human language. +He was a constant reader of the Bible, but had no sympathy with +theology, and often said that in matters affecting a man's relations +with his Maker he couldn't give a power of attorney. + +"Yes, there is a story, and it is probably true, that when he was very +young and very ignorant he wrote an essay that might be called +atheistical. It was after he had been reading a couple of atheistic +books which made a great impression on his mind, and the essay is +supposed to have expressed his views on those books,--a sort of review +of them, containing both approval and disapproval,--and one of his +friends burned it. He was very indignant at the time, but was afterwards +glad of it. + +"The opposition of the Springfield clergy to his election was chiefly +due to remarks he made about them. One careless remark, I remember, was +widely quoted. An eminent clergyman was delivering a series of doctrinal +discourses that attracted considerable local attention. Although Lincoln +was frequently invited, he would not be induced to attend them. He +remarked that he wouldn't trust Brother ---- to construe the statutes of +Illinois and much less the laws of God; that people who knew him +wouldn't trust his advice on an ordinary business transaction because +they didn't consider him competent; hence he didn't see why they did so +in the most important of all human affairs, the salvation of their +souls. + +"These remarks were quoted widely and misrepresented, to Lincoln's +injury. In those days people were not so liberal as now, and any one who +criticized a parson was considered a sceptic." + +An orthodox believer Lincoln may not have been, in fact was not, but he +was better,--he had the spirit of Christ which manifests itself more +peculiarly in actions than in words. Love to God and man was his creed, +the world was his church, kindly words and merciful deeds his sermons. + +In a certain formal sense the baptized man or woman is a Christian, just +as all foreigners who have been naturalized are Americans before the +law, but the simple act of naturalization will not make any man a good +American. There is a vast difference between naturalizing a man and +nationalizing him. He is an American who is an American at heart, who +owes but one allegiance, is loyal to but one country, and is true to but +one flag, whose sympathies and choices, whose heroic labors and +sacrifices in behalf of his country make him deserve the peerless name +of American. + +So the mere act of baptism or church membership gives a man but a poor +title to the Christian name. Paul said, the man was not a Jew who was +only one outwardly, that the mere rite of circumcision was nothing, that +the true Jew was one inwardly and at heart. If Paul could thus express +himself as to the qualifications which characterized a member of the +Jewish church, which was avowedly a ritualistic organization, it must be +safe to say the same thing about those who profess a belief in the +Christian church, which differed from the Jewish, mainly in caring less +for rites and more for rightness. + +Faith has its fundamental place in the plan of salvation, but faith, +according to some people's understanding of it, is a vivid perception +of, or rather a subscription to truth as the church fathers, or, more +likely the church grandmothers, defined it. Faith, in this sense of the +word, makes nobody a Christian. The devils believe and tremble. + +It is of great importance to rightly believe the truth which relates to +Christ and His kingdom, but the most unhesitating assent of the +intellect to the most orthodox creeds, catechisms, commentaries, and +systems ever framed will make no man a Christian. An upright and down +square life is worth more than a whole ton of tall talk. + +The grandest profession of religion is a life all devoted to glorifying +Christ, by living in obedience to His commands, and thus making the +world a little less accursed and more worthy of God. + +A man may be a member of the most orthodox church in Christendom, he may +sit at all the communions for a lifetime, but if he be mean and selfish +and careless of the world's condition, he is no Christian. While, on the +other hand, a man may, like Abraham Lincoln, have peculiarities of +religious beliefs, and yet if he spend his whole life for others, as +Lincoln did, then he is so much like Christ, emulating His example so +well that he has good claim to be called a Christian. + + "Blest is the man whose softening heart + Feels all another's pain, + To whom the supplicating eye + Was never raised in vain; + Whose breast expands with generous warmth, + A stranger's woes to feel, + And bleeds in pity o'er the wound + He wants the power to heal; + To gentle offices of love + His feet are never slow-- + He views through Mercy's melting eye + A brother in a foe." + +Abraham Lincoln never joined a church, because the creeds of his day +and of his community were too inclusive of detail in doctrine and +exacting in their ritual and terminology. He had no sympathy with +theologians. He frequently declared that it was blasphemy for a preacher +to "twist the words of Christ around, so as to sustain his own doctrine +and confirm his own private views," and he often remarked that "the more +a man knew of theology, the further he got away from the spirit of +Christ." + +Many preachers in the past have been strong factors in the march of +civilization, but courageous preachers have always been scarce. As a +rule, they have been more conservators of the past than moulders of the +future, clinging with grim tenacity to the traditions and teachings of +the early fathers. + +Among the Church of England preachers in Virginia, while nearly all +opposed separation from the mother country, there were few so militant +as the famous John Peter Muhlenberg, who, from his pulpit at Woodstock, +Virginia, declared: "There is a time for all things, a time to preach +and a time to pray, but there is also a time to fight, and that time has +now come," and suiting the action to the word, threw off his gown, +disclosing a uniform beneath, and followed by three hundred men of his +congregation, marched to join Washington's forces. + +In Colonial times in New England, the pulpit occupied a more general +sphere and exerted more general influence than to-day. Ministers +preached that the Hebrew Commonwealth was the model for the new +Republic, and so strenuously that as an effect our government assumed +that form which prevailed among the Hebrews under the judges and had the +divine sanction. + +In the agitation of the slave question, as a class, the preachers were +mostly silent. Had they roused themselves to the defence of right, they +could have created a public sentiment towards the inhuman and shameless +traffic which would have destroyed slavery without the necessity of a +civil war in which tens of thousands of lives were sacrificed and +millions of money were lost. + +Theodore Parker, Bishop Simpson, Albert Barnes, E. H. Chapin, Rabbis +Sabato Morais and David Einhorn, and above all, Henry Ward Beecher, +constituted the few conspicuous examples of the preachers who came out +strongly for abolition, but the stand these great men took was +effective, and once the die was cast, practically all the preachers +became leaders in the movement for emancipation. + +The attitude of Lincoln on slavery was not determined by churchmen. +Lincoln made a wide distinction between churchmen and Christians. +Christianity is unselfish service born of love; churchianity is often a +form without a God, a wearing of religion as a cloak and not as an +armor,--it never obeys a command unless it is too feeble to resist, and +in many cases, is a perfidy and treason against the law of Christ. + +In Springfield, when Lincoln found that twenty of the twenty-three +ministers of the different denominations and the majority of the members +of the principal churches were arrayed against him in his Presidential +campaign, he drew forth from his pocket a New Testament, saying to some +friends present: "I have carefully read the Bible and I do not so +understand this book. These men well know that I am for freedom in the +territories, freedom everywhere, as free as the Constitution and laws +will permit, and that my opponents are for slavery. They know this and +yet, with this book in their hands, in the light of which human bondage +cannot live a moment, they are going to vote against me. I know that +Liberty is right, for Christ teaches it and Christ is God. I shall be +vindicated and these men will find that they have not read their Bible +aright." + +Despite the great abolition preachers and those who followed their +example, some of the churches in Lincoln's time made a choice of public +favor and sided with slavery, though, as has been stated, the majority +of the ministers were strongly moved to follow in the lead of their +distinguished brethren who had unfurled the flag of freedom, yet withal +the church did not exert sufficient force to make herself a power in +determining the issue. At this time the opportunity was afforded her of +moulding public sentiment, and it may be readily inferred that had she +possessed the solid Christianity of Abraham Lincoln the terrible war +could have been averted and the country kept from being plunged in blood +and gloom, but in this, the greatest of all crises, the church failed to +do her duty as she should have done, and as a result, the bloodiest war +of history devastated and almost desolated the land. Of course, once the +war was declared the church stood solidly behind the President, but she +had no other alternative compatible with reason and common sense, not to +speak of patriotism. At length the preachers recognized the manner of +man the country had in its great leader, and so they looked to him for +counsel and for guidance. Lincoln was practically demonstrating that his +religion was as good as theirs, and they, in turn, were now trying to +make their religion as good as Lincoln's. + +All along the Christianity of Lincoln had the true ring in it. It was of +that type beautifully described in these lines: + + "Creeds and confessions, high church or the low + I cannot say; but you would vastly please us + If some pointed scripture you would show + To which of these belonged the Saviour, Jesus. + I think to all or none. Not curious creeds, + Or ordered forms of church rule He taught, + But love of soul that blossomed into deeds + With human good and human blessings fraught. + On me nor priest nor presbyter nor pope, + Bishop nor dean may stamp a party name, + But Jesus with His largely human scope + The service of my human life may claim; + Let prideful priests do battle about creeds-- + The church is mine that does most charitable deeds." + +There was not a day, nay, not an hour of Lincoln's life but was devoted +to some good work, some act of charity, some message of consolation or +comfort or mercy to the miserable and the suffering; in short, Abraham +Lincoln carried his religion into daily life; it accompanied him +everywhere and on all occasions. + +Every phase of his character was a demonstration of the Golden Rule. +From boyhood to manhood, from manhood to fame, honesty was his +distinguishing trait. As a lawyer all his transactions were above +suspicion. He would not take a case to which there could possibly be +attached any stain of falsehood or foul-dealing. To a man who once +offered him a case of which he could not approve, he gave this +explanation, quoted by his partner, Herndon, who vouches for it: "There +is no reasonable doubt that I can gain your case for you. I can set a +whole neighborhood at loggerheads, I can distress a widowed mother and +her six fatherless children, and thereby get you $600, which rightly +belongs, as it appears to me, as much to them as it does to you. I shall +not take your case, but I will give you a little advice for +nothing,--you seem to be a splendid, energetic man,--I would advise you +to try your hand at making $600 in some other way." + +Here is an example of how he brought his religion into politics. When he +was in the legislature and the caucus sought to get him into schemes +that were not creditable, in a discussion which lasted until midnight, +contending that the end would justify the means, Lincoln closed the +debate and defined his own position by saying, "You may burn my body to +ashes and scatter them to the four winds of heaven; you may drag my soul +down to the regions of darkness and despair, to be tormented forever, +but you will not get me to support a measure which I believe to be +wrong." + +Judged alone by his actions Lincoln was a Christian of the very highest +type; his principles were founded upon the teachings of the Master. He +was gentle, kind, loving, thoughtful, tender, his big heart overflowed +at the sight of suffering and he alleviated it when he could. His +sympathies went out to the poor in their afflictions. He tempered the +harshness and severity of the great war by words of comfort and acts of +mercy. He denied himself at the White House to no one, the poorest woman +being as courteously received as the most distinguished statesman. On +one occasion a heartbroken mother came to plead for the life of an only +son who had forfeited it by some breach of discipline in the ranks. She +was sent away rejoicing. Turning to her male companion on leaving the +White House she indignantly exclaimed: "You said the President was an +ugly man,--why, he's the handsomest man I have ever seen." + +Both by act and word did Lincoln try to emulate the Man of Galilee. +Indeed few, if any, of the world's leaders followed so closely the +precepts and example of the Saviour. He adopted the Golden Rule as his +standard of conduct and lived up to it in every particular. He acted on +"the square" to every man, so that he gained for himself the soubriquet +of "Honest Abe," which was fondly applied to him all through his public +career. He was just in his dealings with his fellow-men and never once +was guilty of deception. + +If the character of this man is to be estimated by the words of Jesus +Himself, "By their fruits ye shall know them," then Abraham Lincoln was +one of the highest types of Christian gentleman that ever trod the +earth. + +During the four terrible years of the war he carried the sorrows of the +people on his own shoulders and displayed the true qualities of a noble +man and a Christian. He placed himself at this time absolutely in the +hands of a higher power. Hear him make this confession: "I should be the +most presumptuous blockhead upon this footstool, if I for one day +thought that I could discharge the duties which have come upon me since +I came into this place without the aid and enlightenment of One who is +stronger and wiser than all others." + +The light of Holy Writ was the beacon star that guided him through the +darkness of trying days; not alone were the Holy Scriptures a guide for +his actions, but they served as a model for his literary style. His +education was defective, yet at times few of the great masters of +literature could equal him in purity of language. High critics declare +his second inaugural address to be one of the greatest masterpieces of +English prose. Here are a few of the closing sentences: "Fondly do we +hope, fervently do we pray that the mighty scourge of war may pass away, +yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the +bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, +and until every drop of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another +drawn by the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it +must be said, 'the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous +altogether.' With malice towards none, with charity for all, with +firmness in the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to +bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the +battle, and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve +and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all +nations." + +Apart from the beauty and diction of the language there is a deep spirit +of faith and dependence on God breathed throughout the whole of the +address. + +Surely the most sceptical must be convinced of the sincerity of +Lincoln's religious belief from his words, from his actions, from his +principles, from his prayers, from his confessions, in a word, from the +rectitude of his life, and admit that he was, not only a fervent +believer, but a practical Christian of the best kind, though he knelt at +no denominational altar. + +Such was our Lincoln. With wonder and admiration we stand in his +presence and feel the magnetism that attracts us to the man. His +goodness constituted his greatness. + +As the world brings its frankincense of praise to offer as an incense at +his shrine, in him men can see such an embodiment of true and glorious +manhood that to him can fittingly be applied the word picture of +Shakespeare's ideal: + +"The qualities are so blended in him that all the world can stand up and +say, Here is a _man_." + +A little doctor of divinity in a large Baptist convention stood on a +step and thanked God he was a Baptist. The audience could hear him but +not see him, so some one shouted, "Get up higher." "I can't," replied +the minister, "to be a Baptist is as high as I can get." He was +mistaken,--there is something higher than being a Baptist or any other +kind of an enthusiastic sectarian, and that is being a man. It is quite +possible to be a churchman higher than the highest steeple and yet not +have the affections which cluster around the throne of glory and find +their nutriment in the bosom of God. + +Lincoln's religion was that of character, the greatest force in the +universe. He gave us a life by which to know him, a life overflowing +with good works, full of that seriousness which comes from seeing and +dealing with eternal realities, a continuous exhibit of unselfishness. + +The pure and unblemished character of this man, his integrity of deed, +his honesty of purpose, his faith in God have given him an everlasting +place in the affections of the people, and the example which he has left +behind nerves the heart and strengthens the arm and inspires the courage +of others to emulate him and follow in his footsteps. No higher or +better type can be placed before American youth as an exemplar and spur +for ambition. + +He is not a Christian who, however orthodox in his beliefs, has not love +and devotion, self-sacrifice and honesty, truthfulness and manliness. + +No power is like character,--this was the power which Abraham Lincoln +possessed and which carried with it the blessing of God, gaining for him +the attachment of a continent and the personal love and loyalty of the +Anglo-Saxon race. + +We may truthfully describe this man, whose greatness was his goodness, +as Tennyson describes one of his heroes: he was + + "Rich in saving commonsense, + And as the greatest only are-- + In his simplicity sublime; + Who never sold the truth to serve the hour, + Nor paltered with eternal God for power; + Whose life was work, whose language rife + With rugged maxims hewn from life; + Who never spake against a foe. + Let his great example stand + Colossal, seen in every land, + Till in all lands and through all human story, + The path of duty be the way to glory." + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Abraham Lincoln's Religion, by +Madison Clinton Peters + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S RELIGION *** + +***** This file should be named 37287.txt or 37287.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/2/8/37287/ + +Produced by Roberta Staehlin, Suzanne Shell, Mary Meehan +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive/American +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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