435) Abraham Lincoln on God and Doing What is Right

In regard to this great book (the Bible), I have but to say it is the best gift God has given to men.  All the good the Savior gave to the world is communicated through this book.  But for it could we not know right from wrong.  All things most desirable for man’s welfare, here and hereafter, are to be found portrayed in it.

Let us have faith that Right makes Might, and in that faith, let us to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it.

I am not at all concerned about that, that the Lord is on our side in this great struggle, for 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.

God selects his own instruments, and sometimes they are queer ones; for instance, he chose me to steer the ship through a great crisis.

‘A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.’  So with men.  If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend.  Therein is a drop of honey which catches his heart which, say what he will, is the high road to his reason.

The true rule, in determining to embrace or reject anything, is not whether it have any evil in it, but whether it have more of evil than of good.  There are few things wholly evil or wholly good.

The power of hope upon human exertion and happiness is wonderful.

Men are not flattered by being shown that there is a difference of purpose between the Almighty God and them.

Bless all the churches, and blessed be God who, in this our great trial, giveth us the churches.

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.

How true it is that ‘God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb,’ or in other words, that he renders the worst of human conditions tolerable, while he permits the best to be nothing better than tolerable.

It is no pleasure to me to triumph over anyone.

I am very little inclined on any occasion to say anything unless I hope to produce some good by it.

I should be the most presumptuous blockhead upon this footstool if I for one day thought that I could discharge the duties which have come upon me since I came to this place without the aid and enlightenment of One who is stronger and wiser than all others.

***********************************************

Psalm 40:1-2  —  I waited patiently for the Lord; he turned to me and heard my cry.  He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand.

Galatians 1:3-5  —  Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever.  Amen.

Philippians 1:21  —  For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

**********************************************
A PRAYER THAT WE MAY PROPERLY RESPOND TO GOD’S WORD:
Let not thy Word, O Lord, become a judgment upon us, that we hear it and do it not, that we know it and love it not, that we believe it and obey it not.  Amen.  — Thomas a Kempis

————————————————————————————————–

P. S.  

“Not all internet quotes are accurate.”   –Abraham Lincoln