Society and the World

Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bond-man’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, ‘The judgements of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.’

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ’em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.

The best fame is a writer’s fame: it’s enough to get a table at a good restaurant, but not enough that you get interrupted when you eat.

Is it progress if a cannibal uses knife and fork?

And that will be England gone,

The greatest pleasure I know, is to do a good action by stealth, and to have it found out by accident.

Not many sounds in life … exceed in interest a knock at the door.

Not many sounds in life … exceed in interest a knock at the door.

Books think for me.

The human species, according to the best theory I can form of it, is composed of two distinct races, the men who borrow, and the men who lend.

Ah! que la vie est quotidienne.

Mankind’s true moral test, its fundamental test (which lies deeply buried from view) consists of its attitudes towards those who are at its mercy: animals.

The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.

The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.

The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.