LINCOLN

A jury too often has at least one member who is more ready to hang the panel than the traitor.

Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?

And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new after all.

Character is like a tree and reputation is like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

God must love the common man, he made so many of them.

He can compress the worst words into the smallest idea of any man I ever met.

He reminds me of the man who murdered both his parents,and then, when the sentence was about to be pronounced, pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan.

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

I do the very best I know how, the very best I can.

I don't know who my grandfather was; I am much more concerned to know what his grandson will be.

I fear explanations explanatory of things explained.

I have come to the conclusion never again to think of marrying, and for this reason, I can never be satisfied with anyone who would be blockhead enough to have me. [In a letter to Mrs. O. H. Browning, April 1, 1838]

If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one?

If there is anything that a man can do well, I say let him do it. Give him a chance.

My father taught me to work, but not to love it. I never did like to work, and I don't deny it. I'd rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh--anything but work.

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.

No matter how much cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens.

Nothing valuable can be lost by taking time.

People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Property is the fruit of labor: property is desirable; it is a positive good.

Public opinion in this country is everything.

Sir, my concern is not whether God is on our side; my great concern is to be on God's side, for God is always right.

Surely God would not have created such a being as man... to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for immortality.