Abraham Lincoln

A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see 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.

The ballot is stronger than the bullet.

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.

You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt.

The best way to destroy an enemy is to make him a friend.

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts, and beer.

Don't interfere with anything in the Constitution. That must be maintained, for it is the only safeguard of our liberties.

The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.

I walk slowly, but I never walk backward.

No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent.

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My own wisdom and that of all about me seemed insufficient for that day.

The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves—in their separate, and individual capacities.

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

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.