In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free—honourable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last, best hope of earth.

My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union … If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.

I think the necessity of being ready increases. Look to 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.

The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and heartstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

What is conservatism? Is it not adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried?

To give victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots only, are necessary.