to a second term of office, and that the paleness of one of the faces was an omen that I should not see life through the last term."

Lincoln at different times in his life had received other impressions that he would, some day, be the victim of a tragedy. Mrs. Lincoln had undoubtedly become familiar with the mystic phase of her husband's nature, and worried over the portent. The vision was quite as definite as many that came to the prophets of Holy Writ, giving warning of coming events; but as the Hebrew prophets persisted in the work to which they had been dedicated, whether the omens boded good or ill to themselves, so this seer of the crucial years of the nineteenth century, as God-illuminated as they were, ignored all personal danger and entered fearlessly upon his perilous task.

Lincoln's prophetic insight, so frequently manifested, accounts in large measure for the subtle, intangible, pervasive, ever enlarging influence of his personality upon the minds of men. He has grown more during the years that have followed his martyrdom than any other man in history. Others, prophets and martyrs, have often had to wait for centuries for full recognition; but, even now, while men still live who felt the grasp of his hand, his fame is world-wide.

The thought that appeals specially to the hearts of men is that he was here as a prophet of the Most High on a divine mission, creating an epoch in which he towers as the most conspicuous figure. He belonged to the class of men who have won in consecrated service the crown of enduring fame. It was not his statesmanship alone that keeps his memory great, nor his oratory, nor his gift of boundless common sense, nor even his devotion to the cause of freedom; it was not merely because he was the Chief Executive of the Republic during the stormiest period of its history, and directed it skilfully and successfully through the most terrific civil war ever waged. We must look deeper than his words, deeper than his deeds, to find the real source of his power. In any age, the man who discerns and appropriates the divine purpose projected through history is lifted into immortality through the power, the sweep, the grandeur of that purpose. The purpose which Lincoln grasped and embodied was interwoven with the spiritual texture of his nature and lifted him above the levels of the ordinary.

The career of Abraham Lincoln was the incarnated expression of the divine idea of human liberty and equal opportunity for all, rooted in the ground of common humanity. Throughout his

whole career, in the White House no less than in his father's cabin, on the farm, in the humble lawyer's cottage at Springfield, in the courts of law, on the political rostrum, in the halls of legislation, he was ever the plain and unassuming citizen, kindly neighbour, advocate of the poor, counsellor of the widow-always the devout servitor of his fellow man, a Heaven-inspired guide in times of perplexity and peril.

In the order of Providence he came, uncouth and unceremonious-a strange, mysterious man from the tangled forests and interminable prairies of the frontier. He appeared upon the stage of affairs with the simplicity which is the expression of true majesty. In his presence, the most conspicuous men of his time dwindled into comparative insignificance, while he demonstrated the glory of American democracy, and, by his devotion to the Constitution and the flag, preserved the Union and emancipated the slaves, thus making his name the synonym-the enshrined reality, as religious as it is practical-of all the concealed and revealed meaning of Americanism.

CHAPTER XVIII

GUARDING THE CITADEL

MR. LINCOLN was not ignorant of the critical condition into which the country had drifted, nor was he panic-stricken. During the months after his election, and before his inauguration, he studied the situation from every standpoint and took such measures as he could to meet the emergencies he would have to face when clothed with the authority to act. He conducted a voluminous correspondence with trusted men of prominence throughout the country, whose sympathy and co-operation he sought in the solution of the problems which awaited him. His temper, firmness, and determination are sufficiently revealed in his correspondence with Hon. E. B. Washburne, a warm friend of Lincoln's, and Congressman from Illinois. In a letter of December 13, 1860, he wrote:

Your long letter received. Prevent, so far as possible, any of our friends from demoralizing themselves and our cause by entertaining propositions for compromise of any sort on the slavery question.

There is no possible compromise upon it but which puts us under again, and leaves us to do all our work over again. Whether it be a Missouri line or Eli Thayer's Popular Sovereignty, it is all the same. Let either be done, and immediately filibustering and extending slavery, recommence. On that point hold firm as with a chain of steel.

Eight days later, he wrote again to Washburne:

Last night I received your letter, giving an account of your interview with Gen. Scott, and for which I thank you. Please present my respects to the General, and tell him, confidentially, I shall be obliged to him to be as well prepared as he can either to hold or retake the forts as the case may require, at and after the inauguration.

Thus was Lincoln manifesting the “firmness and determination, without the temper of Jackson," as an intimate friend aptly said. He knew he was succeeding to the office of President, rendered as nearly impotent as plotters in places of power could make it. He was aware that the erstwhile strong arm of the Federal Government was now as weak and helpless as plotting custodians in charge of the public interest had been able to make it. If the Ship of State had not been scuttled and sunk it was through no lack of mean contriving of the plotters.

Lincoln further knew that his life would prob