"By what principle of original right is it that one-fiftieth or one-ninetieth of a great nation, by calling themselves a State, have the right to break up and ruin that nation as a matter of original principle?"

"Never stir up litigation. A worse man can scarcely be found than one who does this."

"To give victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots only, are necessary."

"In this sad world of ours, sorrow comes to all; and to the young, it comes with bitterest agony because it takes them unawares. I have had experience enough to know what I say."

"If once you forfeit the confidence of your fellow-citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem."

"Avoid popularity if you would have peace."

"Stand with anybody that stands right, stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong."

"I am humble Abraham Lincoln. I have been solicited by my friends to become a candidate for the Legislature. My politics are short and sweet, like the old woman's dance."

"If I like a thing, it just sticks after once reading it or hearing it."

"Gold is good in its place; but loving, brave, patriotic men are better than gold."

"The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next."

"Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves."

"A woman is the only thing I am afraid of that I know will not hurt me."

"The point - the power to hurt - of all figures lies in the truthfulness of their application."

"I pass my life in preventing the storm from blowing down the tent, and I drive in the pegs as fast as they are pulled up."

"Some single mind must be master, else there will be no agreement in anything."

"Hold on with a bulldog grip, and chew and choke as much as possible."

"It was that which gave promise that in due time the weights should be lifted from the shoulders of all men, and that all should have an equal chance. This is the sentiment embodied in that Declaration of Independence."

"The people know their rights, and they are never slow to assert and maintain them when they are invaded."

"I hope to stand firm enough to not go backward, and yet not go forward fast enough to wreck the country's cause."

"True patriotism is better than the wrong kind of piety."

"If a man had more than one life, I think a little hanging would not hurt this one; but after he is once dead, we cannot bring him back, no matter how sorry we may be; so the boy shall be pardoned."

"He who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves and, under a just God, cannot long retain it."

"If you think you can slander a woman into loving you, or a man into voting for you, try it till you are satisfied."

"I learned a great many years ago that in a fight between husband and wife, a third party should never get between the woman's skillet and the man's ax-helve."

"There is no grievance that is a fit object of redress by mob law."

"We think the Dred Scott decision is erroneous. We know the court that made it has often overruled its own decisions, and we shall do what we can to have it overrule this."

"I believe this government cannot endure permanently, half slave and half free."

"I have talked with great men, and I do not see how they differ from others."

"In so far as the government lands can be disposed of, I am in favor of cutting up the wild lands into parcels so that every poor man may have a home."

"Don't swap horses in crossing a stream."

"Never regret what you don't write."

"I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him."

"With the fearful strain that is on me night and day, if I did not laugh I should die."

"Some day I shall be President."

"These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people; and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel."

"Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail. Without it, nothing can succeed."

"If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business."

"The time comes upon every public man when it is best for him to keep his lips closed."

"Let not him who is houseless pull down the house of another, but let him work diligently and build one for himself, thus by example assuring that his own shall be safe from violence when built."

"Marriage is neither heaven nor hell, it is simply purgatory."

"Surely God would not have created such a being as man, with an ability to grasp the infinite, to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for immortality."

"Every one desires to live long, but no one would be old."

"I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end... I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me."

"I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right; but it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation may be on the Lord's side."

"Biographies, as generally written, are not only misleading but false... In most instances, they commemorate a lie and cheat posterity out of the truth."

"The leading rule for the lawyer, as for the man of every calling, is diligence."

"A friend is one who has the same enemies as you have."

"I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow."

"As our case is new, we must think and act anew."