The world shall know that I will keep my faith to friends and enemies, come what will.
It is not the qualified voters, but the qualified voters who choose to vote, that constitute political power.
When you make it to the top, turn and reach down for the person behind you.
I would rather be assassinated than see a single star removed from the American flag.
It is a sin to be silent when it is your duty to protest.
I could not sleep when I got on the hunt for an idea, until I had caught it. This was a kind of passion with me, and it has stuck with me.
It must now atone in blood for its complicity in wickedness.
Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, while I must not touch a hair of the wily agitator who induces him to desert? I think that in such a cse to silence the agitator and save the boy is not only constitutional but withal a great mercy.
What is to be, will be, and no prayers of ours can arrest the decree.
I think I stand where that man stands.
The person who is incapable of making a mistake, is incapable of anything.
The war, the American Civil War of 1861-1865, would never have been possible without the sinister influence of the Jesuits.
A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man.
I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country.
Such will be a great lesson of peace: teaching men that what they cannot take by an election, neither can they take it by war.
I desire to see the time when education, and by its means, morality, sobriety, enterprise and industry shall become much more general than at present.
We better know there is a fire whence we see much smoke rising than we could know it by one or two witnesses swearing to it. The witnesses may commit perjury, but the smoke cannot.
We must settle this question now – whether in a free government the minority have the right to break it up whenever they choose. If we fail, it will go far to prove the incapability of the people to govern themselves.
When the hour comes for dealing with slavery, I trust I will be willing to do my duty though it cost my life.
Never change horses in midstream.