than any of which the history of former times tells us. We find ourselves the legal inheritors of these fundamental blessings. We toiled not in the acquirement or establishment of them, they are a legacy bequeathed to us by a once hardy, brave and patriotic, but now lamented and departed, race of ancestors. Theirs was the task (and nobly they performed it) to possess themselves, and through themselves us, of this goodly land, and to uprear upon its hills and in its valleys a political edifice of liberty and equal rights. It is ours, only, to transmit these the former unprofaned by the foot of an invader, the latter undecayed by the lapse of time and untorn by usurpation-to the latest generation that fate shall permit the world to know. This task, gratitude to our fathers, justice to ourselves, duty to posterity and love for our species, in general, all imperatively require us faithfully to perform.

25

(January 27, 1837, Speech at Springfield, Ill.-Complete Works, Vol. I, p. 13.)

Many great and good men, sufficiently qualified for any task they should undertake, may ever be found whose ambition would aspire to nothing beyond a seat in Congress, a gubernatorial or a presidential chair; but such belong not to the family of the lion, or the tribe of the eagle. What! Think

you these places would satisfy an Alexander, a Caesar, or a Napoleon? Never!

Towering genius disdains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored. It sees no distinction in adding story to story upon the monuments of fame erected to the memory of others. It denies that it is glory enough to serve under any chief. It scorns to tread in the footsteps of any predecessor however illustrious. It thirsts and burns for distinction; and, if possible, it will have it, whether at the expense of emancipating slaves or enslaving free men. Is it unreasonable then to expect that some man possessed of the loftiest genius, coupled with ambition sufficient to push it to its utmost stretch, will at some time spring up among us? And when such an one does, it will require the people to be united with each other, attached to the government and laws and generally intelligent to successfully frustrate his designs.

26

(July 1, 1854, Fragment-Complete Works, Vol. I, p. 179.)

If A can prove, however conclusively, that he may, of right, enslave B, why may not B snatch the same argument and prove equally that he may enslave A? You say A is white and B is black. It is color, then the lighter having the right to enslave the darker? Take care! By this rule you are

to be slave to the first man you meet with a fairer skin than your own. You do not mean color exactly? You mean the whites are intellectually the superiors of the blacks, and, therefore, have the right to enslave them? Take care, again! By this rule you are to be slave to the first man you meet with an intellect superior to your own. But, say you, it is a question of interest; and, if you make it your interest, you have the right to enslave another. Very well! And, if he can make it his interest, he has the right to enslave you!

27

(February 11, 1861, Speech at Indianapolis, Ind.-Van Buren, p. 19.)

I will only say that to the salvation of the Union there needs but one single thing, the hearts of a people like yours. When the people rise in mass in behalf of the Union and the liberties of this country, truly may it be said, "The gates of hell cannot prevail against them." In all trying positions in which I shall be placed, and doubtless I shall be placed in many such, my reliance will be upon you and the people of the United States; and I wish you to remember, now and forever, that it is your business, and not mine; that if the Union of these States and the liberties of this people shall be lost, it is but little to any one man of fifty-two years of age, but a great deal to the thirty millions of people who inhabit

these United States, and to their posterity in all coming time. It is your business to rise up and preserve the Union and liberty for yourselves, and not for me. I appeal to you again to constantly bear in mind that not with politicians, not with presidents, not with office-seekers, but with you, is the question: Shall the Union and shall the liberties. of this country be preserved to the latest generations?

28

(November 19, 1858, Letter to H. Asbury-Herndon, p. 414.)

The fight must go on. The cause of civil liberty must not be surrendered at the end of one or even one hundred defeats.

29

(April 4, 1864, Letter to A. G. Hodges-Life by Barrett, p. 480.)

I am naturally anti-slavery. If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong. I cannot remember when I did not so think and feel.

30

(October 16, 1854, Speech at Peoria, Ill.-Howells, p. 286.)

Slavery is founded in the selfishness of man's nature-opposition to it in his love of justice. These principles are an eternal antagonism. * * * Repeal the Missouri Compromise-repeal all compromises-repeal the Declaration of Independence

-repeal all past history-you still cannot repeal human nature. It still will be the abundance of man's heart that slavery extension is wrong, and out of the abundance of his heart his mouth will continue to speak.

31

(August 21, 1858, Speech at Ottawa, Ill.-Debates, p. 74.) This declared indifference, but, as I must think, covert zeal, for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our Republican example of its just influence in the world, enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites, causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many good men among ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty, criticising the Declaration of Independence and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.

32

(October 16, 1854, Speech at Peoria, Ill.-Howells, p. 293.) Is there no danger to liberty itself in discarding the earliest practice and first precept of our ancient faith? In our greedy chase to make profit of the negro, let us beware lest we "cancel and tear in pieces" even the white man's charter of freedom.

-་ ང མ ཪ་ས "