Lincoln

Lincoln;

 Words of the Man, not the Politician

Politicians use words much as do Generals and Admirals directing field artillery or naval barrages. The words are uttered to destroy and rout the opposing side. However, the real meanings can be more elusive to determine. Are the words expressive of the office seeker’s conscience or are they artfully contrived to garner the largest number of votes to ensure election? Is Nancy Pelosi just gullible or merely contemptuous of the public when she states ‘we have to pass the bill to find out what is in it’? Is Hillary Clinton to be taken seriously when she says, of the death of four Americans in Benghazi ‘what difference does it make’? Is Donald Trump…? Well, mere words fail me.

Abraham Lincoln was one of the shrewdest and effective politicians ever to hold the office of the Presidency. He and the two Roosevelts were perhaps the most successful of the Presidents, at least in the terms of providing effective leadership and concrete accomplishments. Lincoln’s speeches have been analyzed and parsed over and over, but these were for public consumption.  Do they expose the heart of the man or are they reflective of the immediate issues of that moment in time?

There are two instances of Lincoln’s thoughts that were not crafted speeches, and were not much more than his private feelings expressed without intention to inspire or to promote his causes or to achieve election. These considerations are probably the closest we will get to the real man. During this, the month of his birthday, I believe they deserve our reflection.

This is the speech Abraham Lincoln gave to his neighbors as he left Springfield to go to Washington to assume the Presidency. This was no prepared speech, just the thoughts of a man who, no one knew then for the last time, was speaking farewell to his neighbors after many years of mutual work, friendship, and association. 

  

Lincoln's Home in Springfield, Illinois

"My friends, no one, not in my situation, can appreciate my feeling of sadness at this parting. To this place, and the kindness of these people, I owe everything. Here I have lived a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young to an old man. Here my children have been born, and one is buried. I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return, with a task before me greater than that which rested upon Washington. Without the assistance of the Divine Being who ever attended him, I cannot succeed. With that assistance I cannot fail. Trusting in Him who can go with me, and remain with you, and be everywhere for good, let us confidently hope that all will yet be well. To His care commending you, as I hope in your prayers you will commend me, I bid you an affectionate farewell."

Lincoln's Private Secretary
 John Milton Hay

This second fragment was found and preserved by John Hay, one of President Lincoln's White House secretaries, who said it was "not written to be seen of men." Some of the thoughts expressed here, written after discouraging days of personal sorrow and military defeats, also appear in Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address of 1865.

Hay said that in this writing "Mr. Lincoln admits us into the most secret recesses of his soul .... Perplexed and afflicted beyond the power of human help, by the disasters of war, the wrangling of parties, and the inexorable and constraining logic of his own mind, he shut out the world one day, and tried to put into form his double sense of responsibility to human duty and Divine Power; and this was the result. It shows ---- the awful sincerity of a perfectly honest soul, trying to bring itself into closer communion with its Maker."

Washington, D.C.
September, 1862

Lincoln in Thought

“The will of God prevails. In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be, wrong. God cannot be for and against the same thing at the same time. In the present civil war it is quite possible that God's purpose is something different from the purpose of either party -- and yet the human instrumentalities, working just as they do, are of the best adaptation to effect His purpose. I am almost ready to say that this is probably true -- that God wills this contest, and wills that it shall not end yet. By his mere great power, on the minds of the now contestants, He could have either saved or destroyed the Union without a human contest. Yet the contest began. And, having begun He could give the final victory to either side any day. Yet the contest proceeds.”

When Lincoln wrote these words he was coming to grips with the loss of his son, the failures of the Union offensives and the contempt the losing generals had for him, the impending loss of his party’s Congressional majority, the decision to free (and arm) the slaves, and trying to fight a war without end with an empty treasury. Small wonder at the solemn tone of these words in the face of such responsibilities.

Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.

‘Four score and seven years ago’, ‘Shall not perish from this earth’, ‘The better angels of our nature’, and ‘Let us strive to bind up the nation’s wounds’, are better known Lincoln phrases, but the above lines reflect the man rather than the politician speaking.

Presented February 13, 2016

Brother Gerard Devine MD, Patriotic Instructor
Major General Thomas H. Ruger Camp #1